Poisoned Apple

Apple tried to kill me. No, seriously they did. If you own an iPhone, iPad, or iPod Touch, look out! Apple may try to kill you too. Before I tell you how, allow me to provide some background.

On September 12, Apple announced the iPhone 5 and showed it off to the world. At this event, they also demoed a spanking new app called Apple Maps. Apple Maps was great to look at, and received many accolades from journalists who tried it out at the iPhone 5 launch event. Plus, Apple was arguably justified to create their own mapping app, since the iOS version of the Google App was missing key features such as turn by turn navigation. Said features being available on Google's own Android OS.

With the release of iOS 6 on September 19, Apple replaced Google Maps with this home grown app, fresh off the orchard. But this app quickly spoiled and turned sour as users began to find gaping holes in the apps accuracy. Some users in the UK can't get home, because their entire town is missing from Apple Maps. Our poor friends in the US have had their Lady Liberty kidnapped. Meanwhile out in the East, Apple has single handedly solved the Senkaku Island debacle by duplicating it. These are but a few of the many bugs in this new app.

Like many users who upgraded to iOS on their iDevices, I am disappointed with the new Apple Maps application. But my disappointment is made more personal by the attempt at my life mentioned earlier. After downloading the new iOS upgrade, and launching the spiffy new maps app, I decided to ask it for directions from home to work. Lo and behold, the app gave me directions which would have sent me the wrong way up a one way street!

At first I dismissed this as a glitch, thinking that Jamaica wasn't big enough for cartographers to pay much attention to. But after reading of what has been dubbed the 'mapocalypse', I decided to try the same directions on Google Maps. And guess what! Google gave me safe, correct directions to work. Good job Google! And to Apple I say, 'Don't Be Evil'.

Apple's move to completely do away with Google Maps may have been premature. Let's hope it doesn't take them as long to fix this issue, as it did for them to implement copy and paste on the iPhone.

RIM Needs a Hat Trick

Research In Motion (RIM) dominated the smartphone market at the turn of the century. Their BlackBerry smartphones gained a foothold in the business world, with corporations and individual business users. Pretty soon consumers also discovered the usefulness of their devices. And then Apple happened. Apple's iPhone showed the world that every other phone was broken.

Having been czar of the smartphone realm, it is arguable that RIM lost the most when Apple invaded. The company attempted to stem the tide of losses with overhauls to its devices, it's operating system, and by introducing a tablet. While decidedly losing relevance in markets such as the US, UK and even their home country Canada, they maintain a foothold in developing regions where they are still considerably more affordable than other smartphones. The BlackBerry Messenger platform also keeps some people loyal, many owning the device solely because of the ubiquity of the messaging service.

RIM is not dead yet, but I'm hardpressed to name a technology company, besides Apple, who staged a successful comeback after losing relevance. Palm, Yahoo, Nokia, Netscape, Gateway, and America Online all failed and never returned. And that was certainly not an exhaustive list. If RIM is to avoid relegation, they will have to accomplish something that the records say is impossible. In this arena they can perhaps take a play from the books of Spain's national football team. They will have to change how the game is played, take bold risks, and stick to their guns. The question is, do they have the gusto to pull it off?

Changing the game isn't easy, and it may not pay off right away. When Spain decided to do away with the forward position, many called it suicide. When Apple decided to eliminate buttons from the phone, leaving just one, people thought it extreme. Spain and Apple suceeded by doing things which went against conventional wisdom. For RIM to stage a comeback, they too will need to make things remarkably better, in ways that are obvious only after it's done.

It is also important for RIM to build on the experience and expertise they have accumulated. Heralding from the days of their two way pagers, the BlackBerry keyboard has captured the fingers of many a user. However, their first foray into the touchscreen arena failed to take the market by storm. The BlackBerry Storm was clunky and unresponsive. It's 'click screen' was more annoying than innovative. Even diehard BlackBerry fans won't defend that black sheep of a device.

RIM also failed to make the jump into the tablet segment. The Playbook didn't play to their strengths. It was initially missing a native email client, and did not appeal to business users. Lacking BlackBerry Messeger, it also failed to capture the consumer market. They were caught on the backfoot, being forced to respond to their competitors, instead of playing forward in a game they were in control of.

RIM seems to have learned from the Storm debacle, having since released hybrid phones with both keyboards and touchscreens. While not the first to experiment with such a combination, RIM has done a commendable job in making the combination work. If a Playbook 2 ever sees the light of day, they will need to show the world something that Samsung, Asus, Amazon and others haven't discovered as yet. RIM will need to think way outside of the box, if they are to have a future in the new mobile marketplace.

When the pager market died, RIM transitioned to smartphones. Smartphones have evolved, and are less phones, and more mobile computing devices that happen to make calls. If RIM is to pull off a hat trick and succeed with a third generation of mobile devices, they will need to avoid further false starts. Had consumers been as unforgiving as the IAAF, they would have long been disqualified. With their stocks taking a beating, and their market share on the decline, they better act quickly. Their loyal fan base won't be enough to save them when the numbers stop adding up.

Learn, To Teach

"If you really want to learn something, teach it to someone". That old saying is indeed a key to learning to master something - a new skill, a dance, a math equation. Teaching is a skill and also an art, so it's a good idea to start by leaning to teach. Being a very good teacher requires three things.

The first is an understanding of what you're teaching. This almost goes without saying: if you want to teach someone you have to know the subject matter first. Let's use dancing as an example. If you want to learn to dance, you may watch someone and imitate them. Perhaps it comes naturally to you. But if you want to teach someone the steps to a dance, you first have to learn the steps yourself. You have to break them down in your mind, so that you can feed them to someone else, as a parent would feed pieces of a meal to a child. When you can identify the pieces that constitute the whole, and explain how the pieces fit together, then you have truly mastered what you have studied. This is what makes learning with a view to teaching, such a powerful practice for developing the mind.

The second thing required to excel at teaching, is an understanding of how the person you are teaching thinks. This is where the art begins. You will be challenged to connect the dots in a way that your student's mind will grasp. More often than not, teaching someone involves figuring out what they do not undertand. You need to thoroughly understand what you're teaching, so that you can see the small pieces that  your student is missing. To draw on the example of dancing, the difference between taking a step, and taking a wide enough step to provide support for the next move, may be the detail that throws your student off balance. You may never have thought about how you maintain balance when you execute the move. Presented with a student who is unable to maintain balance forces you to think about your balance, and thereby deepens your understanding of how you dance. No matter how well you understand something, you will understand it even more, when you are forced to teach it to another unique mind.

The third and final requirement is patience. It takes patience to mentally scour something that you think you already know. It takes patience to try things a different way, so as to test theories and gain new insight. And of course it takes patience to teach someone whose skull may appear as thick as the floor on which you're dancing. But if you're patient with yourself, and with your student, you will both benefit greatly from the learning experience.

Learning with a view to teaching, is a surefire way to truly comprehend the breath and depth, of any concept or skill. If you approach every learning experience with the goal of teaching it to someone, then you will greatly enhance your learning, and ultimately find it easier to teach someone else.

Is The Customer Always Right?

When doing business in a competitive environment, a customer always has choices. If they don't like your price, service, payment plan, or you, they can always do business elsewhere. Often overlooked is the fact that businesses also have choices, they don't have to want you as a customer. To some business owners, this is heresy. They attempt to cater to every customer, thinking that they have to try to eke out every possible dollar. Let's examine some scenarios which prove that you can build a business by not catering first and foremost to your customer.

First, let's look at premium brands and boutique businesses. In economics, the concept of price discrimination basically says you can charge more for a product or service, if you can identify, or create, a demand for it. The most obvious example is a business which sells expensive things to people who can afford them. It obviously works, or brands such as Versace, and store such as Saks Fifth Avenue would not exist. Premium appeal, and a premium price tag. Such businesses realize that not all customers are interested in a bargain. Bargain hunters are not their customers.

Sometimes a peculiar business decision has obvious benefits. Other times they are not readily apparent. Express Fitness Jamaica fits the later description. They are a self described "fitness club" bringing a new kind of gym to Jamaica. Membership gives you access to all five locations across the island. They have an automated billing system through which your membership is deducted from your bank account monthly. They also have fully automated twenty-four hour facilities, which aren't staffed beyond specified hours. The lights come on when there is activity, and turn off when you leave.

Express Fitness' model won't cater to everyone. First, some will be reluctant to provide their banking information for automated deductions. Such customers don't like the idea of relinquishing control of their money, or just don't trust a company with their banking information. The gym also doesn't cater to those who may be at the extreme of body building - they don't offer free weight bench presses or weights above a certain amount. Additionally, the facilities are monitored by surveillance cameras to make sure you're not sneaking others in, or loaning out your membership card. The weight restrictions are due to the fact that the facilities aren't staffed around the clock, and they would rather you not decapitate yourself on one of their benches. The surveillance has the two fold purpose of protecting you and safeguarding their business model.

The fact that there is only one payment option, and the lack of equipment for certain classes of gym users means that they will not attract everyone. But do they need to? Conventional business wisdom says you should cater to all kinds of customers so that you can have a larger customer base. But as we already established, there are business that cater to a subset of potential customers, and that works for them. They are in effect saying 'no' to customers who want to be members, but want to pay using a credit card, debit card, or cash. They are also saying no to customers who want heavier weights, certain free weight exercise options, and constant supervision.

A business doesn't need to win every potential customer to be successful and profitable. And sometimes streamlined and efficient operations beat the complexities involved in catering to everyone. If you could earn money with very minimal effort and low overhead, wouldn't you choose to?

Then there is Apple. This most valuable company and brand has a reputation of disdain for customers, at least that's how it appears to the uninitiated. Apple seems to snub it's nose at customers by making their devices non modifiable and closed physically and in software. Apple believes in making great products by controlling the entire user experience. The success of the first Macintosh, the iPod, iPhone, and iPad all seem to lend credence to that philosophy. So as people continue to call for openness, more features, and lower prices, Apple continues to ignore them. Yet they continue to be successful.

Depending on your viewpoint, Apple may be successful either because of, or in spite of their disregard for customer input. But again, what you think doesn't matter to them. Steve Jobs believed that "people don't know what they want until you show it to them". His goal was to "figure out what they want before they do". This philosophy is the touchstone of Apple, directing their every decision. The $100 billion dollars they have in the bank says they're on to something.

Customers make your business successful, but you aren't beholden to them. And you certainly don't have to cater to everyone. You can and should discriminate by price, choice, or philosophy. It will keep you focused, on the ball, and in the money.

Will You Be My Friend?

When we were children, making friends was a big deal. For some of us it was easy to do so. We were likable, outgoing, and friendly. For those of us who looked different, were reserved, or were unsure of ourselves, forming bonds of friendship was a challenging task. But for all of us rejection was hard to deal with. All it took were the words "I don't want to be your friend" to bring forth a stream of tears, and send us dashing to the comforting arms of a grownup. The parent or teacher would tell us that the other child didn't mean it, or that there were lots of other kids to make friends with. That latter truth may have done little to comfort us as we doted on this lost friend, but we proved it true as we inevitably made more friends and lost others.

As adults, we like to call our friendships 'relationships' and best friends are dubbed the 'significant other'. However, in our quest for a soul mate, we are no different than we were as children. In fact we are worse. We fear rejection, and that often cripples our desire to approach others. When we do find someone, we treat the object of our affections as the only person in the world for us. The truth is that there are many people in the world that we are compatible with. Granted we may never meet half of them, and we may even mess up our relationships with some that we do meet. But like that child who was rejected by a playmate, we take it to heart and feel like it's the end of the world.

Children have short memories, but adults harbour grudges. As a child we quickly forgot the pain of being spurned by a play mate. But as adults we vacillate between depression and anger, pensiveness and frustration. Instead of returning to the playground and finding a new companion, we sulk, mourne and singlehandedly double the profits on alcohol, chocolate, and ice cream at the corner shop.

Maybe losing a soul mate rips us off balance, and triggers a regression to a childlike state. Or perhaps we grow up, but our affections don't.