Common Paradox Tech Blog

An email sent to Consumerist by a Best Buy employee lays out the changes Best Buy has made in pushing their optimization service. Basically, you can’t be forced to pay for optimization—but the salesman won’t tell you that.

What starts out promising soon turns shitty. Before, Best Buy would often advertise computers at a certain price, but only offer them “optimized,” which adds $40 for a totally unnecessary process that nobody wants. Now, Best Buy changed their policy, saying that forcing someone to pay for optimization is now an offense warranting termination. Great!

But wait, don’t get too excited—the idea is that the salesman will argue, forcefully pushing optimization on you even if you say you don’t want it, because Best Buy judges the performance of its sales staff by how many of these ridiculous unnecessary add-ons they sell. So the salesman is going to do everything he can to get you to buy that optimization software. You have to know enough to keep arguing until the salesman gives up, at which point they’ll erase the $40 charge and uninstall the software. Of course, that means your brand-new laptop isn’t exactly brand-new anymore, since Best Buy has dicked around with the settings and software before you get your hands on it. The letter:

I work for Best Buy and thought you might want to know the Best Buy internal response to the recent article criticizing optimization. The items stated here were discussed on the employee Best Buy news.

To start of with, the policy [of] how many computers should undergo optimization was restated: 40% is the guideline. This should be altered as per demand. So stores offering customers only optimized models are not being properly managed. The article continued to say if demand for optimization is only 15%, then only 15% should be optimized. This is not in the store’s interest, I should note. Best Buy does not make a significant profit on computer sales (less than $50 per unit, typically), instead relying on ’services’ such as the optimization for a major source of profits. The more optimized computers sold, the more profits.

The article stated plainly, in large, bold letters, that a customer cannot be forced to pay for optimization if they do not want it and that is all that is available. Anyone who forces a customer to pay for it is subject to, and I quote, termination. I should say they did not state to make it easy to get out of paying for optimization, the article encourages salespersons to explain why it is worth the money before not charging it. Management can waive the fee if the customer declines. Optimization software, if any was installed, should then be removed before giving the computer to the customer. Anyone forced to pay should contact the store’s management or someone higher up the ladder.

Best Buy considers optimization an important service, and believes it has great value to many customers. I, personally, believe most people can take care of such things on their own with minimal time and would never pay for it. Judging by comments posted below the article, many other employees believe so too, but just as many fervently believe that optimization is the best thing to ever happen since the wheel.

I feel I should stress that it is not a salespersons fault to push optimization and other services strongly on customers. Hours (and this pay, we are not commission) are often determined by the amount of sales made. Someone who isn’t selling any optimization will see reduced hours as compared to someone who is. Especially given this economy, many just need a job and this is all they could find, myself included. So just be polite and remember you’re giving people a job.

Optimization does just consist of booting up the computer and and putting in a disc that does some random stuff. Some GeekSquad agents may do more manually, some may not. I personally would suggest downloading free software to cleans up registry errors, broken and unused shortcuts, and defrags.

As one final note, the article initially refused to link to the Consumerists for fear of giving more hits. It was later added after complaints in the comments section stated they couldn’t respond to customers citing the Consumerist without having read the article.

Way to keep on fighting the lousy fight, Best Buy. [Consumerist]

Website performance is a hugely important topic, so much so that the big companies of the Web are obsessed with it. For the Googles, Yahoos, Amazons and eBays, slow websites mean fewer users and less happy users and thus lost revenue and reputation. In your case, annoying a few users wouldn’t be much of a problem, but if millions of people are using your product, you’d better be snappy in delivering it. For years, Hollywood movies showed us how fast the Internet was: time to make that a reality.

Even if you don’t have millions of users (yet), consider one very important thing: people are consuming the Web nowadays less with fat connections and massive computers and more with mobile phones over slow wireless and 3G connections, but they still expect the same performance. Waiting for a slow website to load on a mobile phone is doubly annoying because the user is usually already in a hurry and is paying by the byte or second. It’s 1997 all over again.

Performance is an expert’s game… to an extent. You can do innumerable things to make a website perform well, and much of it requires in-depth knowledge and boring testing and research. I am sure a potential market exists for website performance optimization, much like there is one now for search engine optimization. Interestingly, Google recently announced that it will factor performance into its search rankings, so this is already happening. That said, you can do a lot of things without having to pay someone to point out the obvious.

Here it is, the brand new Smashing Book. Announced several months ago in a couple of posts, it has finally arrived. You can buy the Smashing Book right now. And in case you didn’t know, it’s available here exclusively. The book is available and can be shipped right away.

The Smashing Book is a printed book about best practices in modern Web design. The book shares technical tips and best practices on coding, usability and optimization and explores how to create successful user interfaces and apply marketing principles to increase conversion rates. It also shows how to get the most out of typography, color and branding so that you end up with intuitive and effective Web designs. And lastly, you will also get a peek behind the curtains of Smashing Magazine.

IBM this week announced it has acquired Guardium, a real-time enterprise database monitoring and security startup. Guardium, a privately held company based in Waltham, Massachusetts, focuses both on real-time monitoring and automating and streamlining regulatory compliance tasks.

"Organizations are grappling with government mandates, industry standards, and business demands to ensure that their critical data is protected against internal and external threats," said Arvind Krishna, general manager, IBM Information Management. "This acquisition is another significant step in our abilities to help clients govern and monitor their data, and ultimately make their information more secure throughout its lifecycle."

IBM said it will integrate Guardium within IBM’s Information Management Software portfolio and sell its products through the newly created Business Analytics and Optimization Consulting organization, which is staffed by 4,000 consultants.

Neither side disclosed financial terms of the deal.

Image Credit: IBM

Last year’s holiday season wasn’t so cheery for online retailers. The devastating economic recession hit people’s wallets, forcing them to cut back and save whatever they could. Now with the markets recovering, are consumers shopping again?

Data released today by marketing optimization firm Coremetrics reveals that Black Friday, the traditional start to the holiday shopping season, turned out to be a good day (and a welcomed relief) for online retailers. Consumers spent more, ordered more, and did it all more efficiently than compared to Black Friday last year.

Stats Point to a Recovery

According to the Coremetrics data, the average online order on Black Friday jumped to $170.19, an increase of 35 percent. Last year, consumers only spent $126.04 per order on the websites Coremetrics tracks. In addition, there was an 18% increase in the average number of items purchased per order. Last year, it was 4.56 items per order, but this year it rose to 5.40 items.

Coremetrics had some interesting data on how users behaved on retail websites as well. The average bounce rate rose by nearly 40% and browsing sessions decreased by 5%, suggesting that consumers were focused less on “window shopping” and more focused on specific items and deals. If they couldn’t find them on a specific website, they left.

The biggest winners seem to be apparel and jewelry retailers. The data says that the amount spent per order for these websites increased by about 25%. Part of it is department store websites, which had a flood of new customers visiting their websites this Black Friday.

Black Friday has always been an important barometer for the health of the holiday shopping season and the economy. These numbers are reassuring and encouraging, although it’s still just data from a single day. We’ll have to see what the final numbers are for this holiday season to really know if we’re through the worst of the global economic downturn.

Tags: black friday, online retailers, shopping, stats, trending

Last week Zynga CEO Mark Pincus said that they would take steps to remove scammy advertising offers from their social games. There have been a couple of missteps since then, and Facebook responded by taking Zynga’s newest game, FishVille, offline.

Zynga insists they are serious about cleaning up the industry. And today Pincus has announced that the company will remove all offer advertising from their games.

This isn’t a meaningless action. Offers account for 1/3 or so of Zynga’s rumored $250 million in revenue.

All offers will be removed by the end of today, says Pincus, “until we can control their inclusion and presentation ourselves.”

The blog post also discloses that Zynga is an investor in DoubleDing, an offer provider that competes with OfferPal and SuperRewards. DoubleDing was serving the mobile offers that popped back onto Zynga on Friday.

Pincus’ blog post:

bth nods an AppleInsider story on a patent troll who has gotten hold of fundamental Ethernet patents and is wielding them broadly. Three guesses which US Appeals Court the lawsuit was filed in. “A Texas company has targeted a number of technology companies, including Apple, in a new lawsuit regarding a handful of computer networking patents issued in the 1990s. … 3Com Corporation was granted four patents from 1994 to 1998 pertaining to network adapters. Two deal with the automatic initiation of data transmission, and one addresses ‘host indication optimization.’ … The company’s Web site states that U.S. Ethernet Innovations was founded ‘to continue 3Com Corporation’s successful licensing program related to a portfolio of foundational patents in Ethernet technology.’ A press release from the company states that it is the ‘owner of the fundamental Ethernet technology developed and sold by 3Com Corporation in the 1990s,’ suggesting it purchased the patents. … In addition to Apple, the lawsuit names Acer, ASUS, Dell, Fujitsu, Gateway, Hewlett Packard, Sony, and Toshiba as defendants.”

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

After today’s bad news, Adobe Senior Product Manager for Developer Relations Mike Chambers has announced a way to put Flash into the iPhone: Compile Flash into full standalone applications for the App Store. This solves part of the iPhone-Flash conundrum.

Using the next version of Flash Authoring—which is now in private beta—developers will be able to turn any Flash app or widget into an iPhone/iPod touch application. Some apps will require optimization, taking into account the iPhone’s hardware limitations and its multi-touch user interface conventions:

The iPhone has a significantly slower processor and less memory than what can be found in a typical desktop computer. As such, existing content may need to be optimized for performance, and / or user interactions (given the smaller screen and different UI metaphors).

However, publishers will be able to easily adjust their existing code at a small cost, developing a full app that would be available at the App Store. While this doesn’t fix the lack of Flash in Safari—which Chambers says they are still working on—it’s a huge advance. Just imagine Web publishers creating iPhone-capable versions of their sites—or part of them—which would feed on the same online data as their browser-based counterparts.

Now, if Adobe introduced a Flash video player, and Apple enabled Safari to recognize Flash video like they do now with YouTube H.234 material, everything would be fine. [Flash apps for iPhone and Mike Chambers]

Poor battery life and iPhone are a few words that get mixed together all too often it seems. While some will say it’s fine, others will say it’s pitiful. As many of you know, battery life will fluctuate greatly between users and their individual usage patterns but TiPb wants to provide you with some simple [...]

Tonight, Google’s Android platform is getting another application that gives it functionality iPhone users can only gaze at longingly. This time, it’s Ustream, a mobile streaming application that lets you broadcast video directly from your phone. The application will be available on the Android Market by 9 AM PST tomorrow morning.

Ustream isn’t the only option available for streaming video on Android — Qik launched its own version in June. But it’s a very solid debut that comes with some features that Qik doesn’t. CEO John Ham says that one key differentiator for the new Ustream app is the way it handles latency. While competitors can build up a ‘lag time’ over the course of an extended broadcast, Ham says that Ustream uses a low latency connection and optimization both client and server side to keep this to a minimum — in other words, the lag doesn’t build up. In my testing I got a lag time of around three seconds over a 3G connection (nothing to scoff at), and perhaps more importantly the delay didn’t grow over time, which is especially important if you’re going to interact with your viewers through the app’s various community features.