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| Friday, March 31, 2006 |
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Meeting 
Bigger Blue
Bet on intention
| | The car rental example is of a marketing economy, not a market economy. A marketing economy is one in which marketing "manages", "owns" and otherwise controls the "behavior" of customers whose choices are so limited that they are known only as "consumers". A market economy is one in which buyers and sellers are both autonomous and independent, and are free to make all kinds of choices. The two are very different. |
| | Problem is, we've been in a marketing economy for so long we think it's natural, and not just normal. That's why so many of us -- even certified economists -- continue to believe a free market is "your choice of silo", each of which is designed more to trap customers than to serve them. |
| | To borrow the language of geology, marketing economies flourished in the Mass Marketing period of the Industrial Era, both of which are now coming to an end. Comparably, tyrannosaurs flourished in the Cretaceous period of the Mesozoic era, both of which came to an end when a meteor smacked into the Yucután and changed everything. |
| | The meteor that ended the Mass Marketing Period and the Industrial Era was the Internet. But instead of setting the old world on fire and killing off species, the Net gave every living thing a better world in which to do business and make culture. In pure business terms, the networked world far better suited for markets than for marketing. |
| | And most of the post below is about the latter, not the former. |
Later
| | Heading out early to F2C in DC, which starts Monday. That's so I get a weekend with Colette and Allen, who both live around there. Expect light blogging. |
| | AARG. Just got a call from United. (It's 9:30am.) My 11am flight to San Francisco is delayed by an hour, killing the connection to Baltimore. Since it's Spring Break weekend, everything cross-country through San Francisco, Los Angeles and Denver is sold out. The only route they could put together is one that starts in Santa Barbara at 6pm and goes to San Francisco and Las Vegas before putting me on a USAir flight to Baltimore that arrives at 6:10am tomorrow. I'll have six red eyes when I arrive. Provided there aren't any more screw-ups. |
| | I'm on the phone with the "automated customer response line" with USAir. I'm in the "seat selection process", hoping to avoid getting sandwiched in a middle seat on the Las Vegas-Baltimore leg. What robotic mess. "Your seat request is pending" with America West (the other half of the new USAirways). Now I'm on hold waiting to speak to a human representative. No music (which is fine). Just a "please wait" every ten seconds or so. Then... just a hiss. |
| | "We're sorry. Your call could not be completed. Please hang up and call the toll-free number again." |
| | Ever hear what "USAIR" stands for? Unfortunately Still Allegheny In Reality. |
| | Calling back... Again... Each time I'm navigating the customer deflection maze, hunting for a human. No luck. Okay, I've decided to fake not having a touch-tone phone. |
| | Oy vay. The service person, who barely spoke English, couldn't understand that I don't need her to help me with the first two legs of the flight. I need to do seat selection on the third, cross-country flight, I explained. At great length, she failed. "I am sorry. That is an America West flight You'll need to call them instead". |
| | "Thank you for calling USAirways," the recording says. It's exactly the same as the other recording. Okay, I'm faking a dial phone again. Good: got a human... Well, at least I avoided a middle seat, by getting an aisle. I wanted a window seat, but alas. There won't be much to see between 10:46pm and 6:10am anyway. |
| | Now I've gotta call and change the car rental. "To speak to a member services representative, press 2." Three automated choices follow. None are for changing a reservation. Two of the three lead to more recordings. I hang up and try again. Got a human, made the change. Saved a day on the reservation, anyway. |
| | This all took more time than it does to fly from here to San Francisco. |
| | [Later...] It's 8:10pm PST, and I'm still in Santa Barbara getting on the Net over my bluetooth phone (nothing modern like wi-fi here). There were "flow control" issues in San Francisco, and my plane wouldn't have made the connection to Las Vegas. So the United guy at the counter got me on a direct America West flight to Vegas. Leaves at 9:05, and gives me about half an hour to change planes and make the 10:56 from Las Vegas to Baltimore. At least this way I'll have four red eyes rather than six. |
| | [Still later...] In las vegas. Another saga I detailed then lost. Anyway, I made the plane. See ya on the East Side. |
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Blog/Counterblog
| | Eric Norlin offers to referee a rematch. Scoble. Werner. In a death-cage match about blogging. What could be better? |
| | Dave: ...asking why you should use blogs is like asking why you should answer the phone. |
Who new?
Nora knows
| | ...what Ephron lacks in technical chops, she makes up for in observational skills. She pegs a few things about conference life: The special uber-class of professional panelists, like Friedman. The endless self-congratulating, hyping atmosphere. And the tendency for the pundits to get everything wrong. Their last mistake: There's no money in internet advertising. Their current mistake: We'll all get rich on internet advertising. |
| | She does drop in a nice definition of "content," too: that which appears alongside the ads. |
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