"The anti-Khadafi rebels and the Arab League are begging for a no-fly zone over Libya. The powers that would do it are balking, afraid of offending Muslims. Logic never was a strong suit at the United
Nations." ~ Yasha Harari
Fresh Baked Goods
Laughzilla the Third (2012)
The Third Volume in the Funny Stuff Cartoon Book Collection Available Now.
Google has quietly released an iOS version of its mobile app for managing its Google Apps enterprise product.
The app allows super admins of Google Apps domains to manage individual users, adjust group settings and review audit logs. It’s designed to work with business, education, government, Google Coordinate and Chromebook accounts.
Google launched the Android version of its Google Admin app last May.
Hulu has inked a new deal with CBS to bring more of the U.S. broadcaster’s programming to Hulu Plus, its subscription-based TV and movie streaming service.
The deal adds 2,600 new episodes to Hulu’s library, covering classic TV shows such as The Brady Brunch, Melrose Place, and Taxi, as well as more recent programming such as Everybody Loves Raymond, Undercover Boss, United States of Tara and Ghost Whisperer.
The fresh content nearly doubles the 2,700 CBS episodes that were added to Hulu’s catalog in November 2012, giving new and existing Hulu Plus subscribers access to over 5,300 instalments in total. The previous deal brought across arguably more high-profile titles including Star Trek, The Good Wife, CSI: Miami, Numb3rs and Sabrina the Teenage Witch.
Today’s announcement is a non-exclusive, multi-year agreement and follows a separate deal last week that gives Hulu exclusive subscription video-on-demand rights for the Sherlock Holmes-based drama ‘Elementary’.
Groupon has today released its first self-service Deal Builder, which allows businesses to put together Groupon package deals for themselves.
Since launching back in 2008, local businesses that wanted to run a Groupon offer have needed to coordinate these campaigns with Groupon itself. However, according to today’s announcement, this will be a thing of the past – at least, if the business involved is happy to do it all themselves.
The new Deal Builder (found at GrouponWorks.com) guides merchants through the step-by-step process of building their own deals and allows them to choose from a selection of different deal templates.
From today, the Deal Builder is available to “almost all” local businesses in the US following a successful trial period with 10,000 businesses, the company said.
Mikael Cho is the co-founder of ooomf, a network that connects short-term software projects with handpicked developers and designers. Mikael writes about psychology, startups, and product marketing over on the ooomf blog.
Damn. I forgot my headphones.
Nothing has a more negative impact on my day than showing up to our office without them.
Like most people, music is a huge part of my life and my tastes are constantly changing based on how I feel or what I’m doing.
I listen to the most music while I work, sifting through playlists, from jazz, to indie pop, to electronica, on what seems to be a never-ending search for the perfect tunes to keep me in the zone.
When I looked back at all my favorite playlists, I wondered what effect music has had on my work and more specifically, which types of music have had the most impact.
I thought it’d be interesting to take a dive into the science behind the deep power of music to find out if it actually helps you work better.
Why you love music
Whether you’re listening to the driving beat of a Daft Punk song or the opening chords of a mellow Jack Johnson track, both have an effect on your brain that is not seen in any other animal.
When you listen to music, a part of your brain called the nucleus accumbens activates. This triggers the release of the ‘pleasure chemical’ dopamine, that lives in a group of neurons in your brain called the Ventral Tegmental Area (VTA):
This pathway in the brain is called the Reward System and Dopamine is strongly associated with it.
Dopamine is the same chemical that gets released when you eat your favorite food or when you get a new follower on Twitter, causing you to want more, more, more.
This is why Dopamine is also responsible for the saying:
The amount of dopamine that gets released and the feelings of pleasure we get from it are also largely dependent on the element of surprise.
For instance, when you stumble upon a new song that you love, more dopamine is released and you get even more excited than if you were to listen to one of your favorite songs that you’ve heard multiple times.
Music was meant to keep you alive
From the perspective of evolution, there’s something deeper about why you feel pleasure when you listen to music.
Neuroscientist and musician Jamshed Bharucha noted that creative domains, like music, allow humans to connect in a synchronized way, helping us develop a group identity and makes us more likely to work together – which was an immensely important advantage for keeping the human species alive.
This development of group identity through music was seen in a recent study of preschool children.
The study paired children together in sets of two and showed them toy frogs. The researchers said these toy frogs needed to be woken up by either a song or exercise.
Psychologists then split the children up into two groups of 24 sets of children.
One group sang a song as they walked around a collection of toy frogs while the other group walked (or crawled) around a separate set of frogs without any music:
Afterwards, the children were presented with tubes filled with marbles. When the children were given their tubes, the bottoms would fall out, causing the marbles to fall on the floor.
The researchers noted if the two children paired together would help each other to pick up the marbles.
The results of the study showed that children who sang the song together, were more cooperative in helping to clean up the marbles.
The researchers concluded that music may have evolved as a way of fostering a sense of community and developing immediate empathetic concern.
Music’s power is deeply rooted in our brains and developed out of a need to empathize, create harmony, and more importantly, survive.
Does listening to music actually make you better at your job?
Music has a powerful relationship to our primal need of connecting with others, so how does this translate over to listening to music while you work?
Music helps you finish boring tasks faster
If you’re not looking forward to cleaning out your email after getting back from a vacation or filling out that nasty excel spreadsheet at the end of the month with your finances, music can help.
Because listening to music you like is pleasurable, it will not only make the task seem more fun but as research shows, it can actually help you complete the task faster.
In a study published in the journal of Neuroscience of Behavior and Physiology, it was found that a person’s ability to recognize images, letters, and numbers was faster when rock or classical music was playing in the background compared to when there was no music.
A similar effect was noted when workers on an assembly line listened to music. The workers who listened to music were more happy and efficient and made fewer errors.
So whatever type of music you like, as long as you’re listening to something, you’ll enjoy repetitive or boring tasks more and get them done faster.
Press pause when learning something new
When you’re presented with new information that’s complicated, it takes more focus and mental energy for you to grasp and apply that knowledge.
For instance, if you’re learning how to drive a stick shift car or writing your first lines of programming code, it’s best to shut the music off.
In 2010, researchers at the University of Wales Institute showed that when adults were asked to complete a relatively complex task of recalling a series of sounds presented in a specific order, their performance decreased while listening to music.
The study concluded that your ability to learn something new that is cognitively demanding decreases when you listen to music.
So when you’re tackling something new and complex, put your headphones down and learn without distraction.
If you’re good at what you do, music works
The magic of music comes into play the most when you’re an expert at what you do, even if it’s something as challenging as surgery.
A study in the Journal of the American Medical Associationreported that surgeons worked more accurately when music they liked was playing in the background (music that they didn’t like was second best, and no music was least helpful of all).
If you’re working on something that you have done many times before, even if it’s complicated, your performance can increase and errors become less likely when you listen to music you like.
The perfect mix tape: How to use music to create flow
While musical tastes vary greatly, listening to your favorite type of music, whatever it is, lowers feelings of tension.
Author Stephen King said that he preferred to work while listening to hard rock music (which for some of us, would be too noisy to concentrate on anything).
Whether it’s hard rock or acoustic jams, as long as the music makes you feel like doing things that’s what you should choose to listen to.
Choose music you’ve heard before
If you’re listening to new music (especially with lyrics) while working, your brain may release too much dopamine especially if you find a song you love.
You’ll start to focus more on the music rather than the work you’re actually trying to do.
When you learn something new, dopamine levels increase and can cause you to lose focus and interest in your work because it’s not as interesting (and therefore not as pleasurable) as the new song you just discovered.
Stick to your favorites list when you work but, if you must have something new, play songs that have little or no lyrics.
Instrumental music works best
There are a few types of music that have proven to be effective in establishing flow for most people.
Classical or instrumental music has been shown to enhance mental performance more than music with lyrics.
For strong focus, music that has little variety and little to no lyrics are best.
Tip: For creative tasks, the noise from a coffee shop can be enough to do the trick says a study published in the Journal of Consumer Research. Moderate background noise (about the volume of a vacuum cleaner) can create enough distraction to allow you to think more imaginatively. To re-create the sounds of a coffee shop, try Coffitivity:
While music helps you breeze through simple tasks and things you are well-trained to do, when it comes to taking on something new that’s challenging, it’s best to ditch the tunes until you know your stuff.
Everyone’s experience of music is different but now that you understand the why and how of its effects, hopefully your quest for creating the perfect playlist will be much easier.
Online shopping has been a boon for retailers and shoppers alike. While the absence of bricks-and-mortar stores help companies keep their overheads down, it also means consumers often pay much less for a product than they otherwise would from a city-center outlet. Coupled with the fact that e-commerce equates to 24-hour opening hours, well, there shouldn’t be a lot to complain about.
A knock-on effect, of course, has seen many once-mighty brands close their doors, including Blockbuster, Borders, and HMV. So does this mean that main shopping streets are on a permanent downwards spiral, and we’ll soon only be able to procure our goods on the Web? Well, not so fast. There are many things that can’t quite be replicated by e-tail. For now, at least.
Same-day deliveries & try-before-you-buy
Same-day deliveries may be on the rise in the digital realm, with the UK’s Currys and PC World getting involved, not to mention eBay and Snapdeal too. But same-day deliveries aren’t yet standard, they often come with a premium, and ‘same-day’ isn’t the same as ‘right now’. There’s a lot to be said for walking to your local shop(s) to procure a new book or micro USB cable, and have the item in-hand in less than an hour.
Moreover, some services are simply better suited to physical stores. Companies such as Fits.me may be trying to bridge the virtual/physical divide by replicating the try-before-you-buy ethos on the Web, but it’s not quite the same as perusing your local fashion outlets to see and feel clothes first-hand.
There are many other scenarios too where physical outlets really begin to demonstrate their worth. And this, perhaps, is why we’re seeing more traditionally digital-focused companies breaking from their roots to forge a presence in towns and cities.
Bridging the divide
Last week, news emerged courtesy of PCR that UK-based electrical retailer Ebuyer.com was considering a move into the physical world. Since launching back in 1999, Ebuyer has emerged as one of the largest independent British e-tailers, with around four million registered customers.
Though it seems like it’s still some way off from actually happening, Managing Director Stuart Carlisle hinted at what’s to come:
“Yes we have considered it [opening physical stores] and once we have found the most effective model for our customer base, we will act upon it. Retail has changed significantly over the last five years and so we are always investigating ways to best meet our customers’ needs. Whether this is through online, High Street or multi-channel retail, the options are there for us to progress.”
While there is a temptation here to view this as one example of how e-commerce isn’t killing off traditional retail outlets, it’s more of an admission that there’s scope for something out in the real world. More…a complementary service rather than a replacement service.
“Online retail will continue to grow,” continues Carlisle. “Simple economics dictate online retailers can usually offer products at better prices – so this is where most of the consumers will go. The High Street will by no means die out, it will just have to adapt. People still want to buy products in store, it’s just clear the current model is not sustainable.”
Though it’s only a temporary endeavor, it’s still interesting to see some of the ideas they have for bringing their digital store into the real world.
Indeed, there’s a screen and headphones with a reel-to-reel setup so visitors can listen to customer testimonies from businesses that use Moo.com’s cards. Then there’s the display on the wall featuring pull-cords and panels, replicating drop-down menus and left-to-right scrolling.
Taking a website and working it out in a physical sense is a playful idea and it works well in a small shop, but this probably won’t work on scale. However, that’s not to say the giants from the online world don’t have one eye on the physical retail pie too.
Amazon Avenue
Launching way back in the early days of the WWW, Amazon is pretty much synonymous with online shopping. It all started with books, but now you can buy just about anything through the company’s myriad of localized e-portals around the world, with giant warehouses serving as product holding-pens.
But could Amazon ever go down the bricks-and-mortar route? And by that we don’t mean selling materials to build yourself a new home.
Rumors have abounded before, and Amazon’s head honcho Jeff Bezos has stated he’d open offline stores if they could find a formula for making it work. The company has been bridging the virtual and physical divide for a while already, however, with Amazon Lockers permeating third-party retailers and public locations in the US and UK.
The premise is simple enough. You’re not at home to take receipt of an Amazon delivery? Have it delivered to a Locker located nearby, and pick it up in person.
For Amazon, it solves some problems and gives them that physical presence out on the street. And for customers, it offers an extra incentive to buy from Amazon. But what about partner retailers? Well, the idea is it will get folk into their shops and buying other things when they collect their goods. Except that’s maybe not how things are panning out.
Back in September, news emerged that US retailers Staples and RadioShack were ditching Amazon Lockers from their stores. The exact reasons weren’t divulged, but it did hint at the inherent disparity between the online world inhabited by Amazon, and the physical sphere occupied by Staples and RadioShack.
The route Amazon is currently trying to venture down makes sense in many ways though, even though Lockers are currently limited in their availability. The online behemoth may have the capital and brand-awareness to launch a bricks-and-mortar offensive if it so desired, but it is very much at odds with its core raison d’être – undercutting the competition with an uber-streamlined, military-like operation. A value-added proposition – through partnering with existing local stores – makes much more sense as opposed to rolling out fully-fledged outlets, as it needs to keep its costs down.
That, however, is not to say Amazon couldn’t launch a handful of flagship stores in key locations around the world. Imagine a giant multi-category emporium in London’s Oxford Circus or New York’s Times Square? It’s certainly feasible, though it’s not necessarily a priority for the company at present.
eBay: High-Street ‘auctions’
Launching around the same time as Amazon in the mid-nineties, eBay is deeply ingrained in the very fabric of e-commerce. But given its historical focus on third-party auctions and fixed-price items, rather than selling eBay-owned goods, bricks-and-mortar stores are perhaps less of an option here. That said, eBay has dabbled with such initiatives in the past.
Timed to coincide with the Christmas rush in 2011, the main caveat with eBay’s temporary pop-up store was there would be no tills, a very limited selection of products and shoppers weren’t allowed to take any of the items away with them. Not your typical shop.
The eBay boutique opened from 1-5 December, and saw 2,500 customers arrive through its doors. Richard Brewer-Hay, a Senior Manager at eBay, called the store “the UK’s first-ever QR code shopping emporium”, with consumers able to browse more than 350 items provided by a selection of the top-rated eBay sellers, with sales completed using mobile devices. So it was more of a concept store – an experiment, perhaps, in what a physical eBay store could look like.
The following Christmas, eBay took to London’s streets again, this time with eBay Social Shopping, an initiative powered entirely by social media. As with their previous exploits, this was timed to coincide with the busiest online shopping weekend, but instead it tapped Facebook, Twitter and Instagram to garner information on product recommendations, and morph it with eBay’s own search data. The upshot of all this, was a live, real-time pulse of what the nation wanted for Christmas.
“By pairing views of social communities with eBay’s own vast selection of top Christmas gifts and mobile expertise, we gave shoppers lots of inspiration and put a little bit of fun into Christmas shopping,” explained Carrie Bienkowski, Head of Buyer Experience at eBay.
“Mobile technology is a catalyst for retail growth and is changing the way we shop,” she added. “Consumers now carry a global showroom in their pocket and are increasingly as inclined to seek recommendations online and shop mobile as visit the high street.”
You can view the official promo skit for yourself here to get an idea of what it entailed, but it gives some ideas on how data can be used to inform in-store sales during busy shopping periods.
Google: Chrome Zone and beyond
Google’s sidling steadily into the hardware realm, with laptops (Chromebooks), smartphones and tablets now part of its arsenal of offerings. And there has been growing speculation in recent times around a possible move into branded retail stores.
Indeed, Google has made at least one small stride into its own bricks-and-mortar store with the Chrome Zone, a dedicated Chromebook retail space at PC World’s Tottenham Court Road branch in London. The store has dedicated staff who have been specifically trained in using and demoing Chromebooks.
And just before Christmas, Google launched temporary pop-up shops to showcase the Chromecast, Chromebooks and Nexus 7, though these were restricted to New York, Chicago, Sacramento, Los Angeles, Washington, DC, and Paramus, New Jersey.
Though Google has yet to launch a full-on retail store, it doesn’t seem beyond the realms of possibility that it could go down that route at some point. Its Android operating system is on more than half of all smartphones, while more and more quality affordable tablets now sport the OS too. Throw into the mix its own Nexus range of phones and tablets, Chromebooks and the associated accessories, then Google retail stores actually seem likely at some juncture.
Microsoft: 63 stores and counting
As with Google, Microsoft was always traditionally a software company. But with its push into hardware and the omnipresence of its desktop operating system on third-party manufacturer’s machines, it’s not difficult to understand why a Microsoft Store makes sense.
Opening in October 2009, Microsoft’s first foray into bricks-and-mortar kicked off in Phoenix, Arizona, eight years after Apple’s own shift into physical outlets. This led to more than sixty additional stores opening across the US and Canada in the four years that followed, though rumors of a move into Europe has yet to materialize.
But with the Xbox One, its own-branded Surface tablets and Nokia’s mobile phone business under its wings, we’ll likely see more Microsoft Stores crop up across North America and beyond.
Samsung Stores: On the rise
Okay, Samsung has never really been an e-commerce company as such, but it did recently announce it was ramping up its sales and marketing efforts by opening more than sixty new dedicated stores across Europe in conjunction with the Carphone Warehouse.
This deal follows the three initial outlets that opened in Spain back in 2013, and now it’s effectively pushing Samsung front-and-center in main shopping thoroughfares across the UK, Ireland, Germany, Spain, Portugal, Sweden and the Netherlands. Though full details have yet to emerge of what form these new outlets will take, we were told that they’ll have a “premium look and feel”, with Samsung-branded tablets used by personnel on the shop floor to complete sales. Very much like an Apple Store, in other words.
This move follows almost two years after Samsung launched a series of temporary pop-up stores for the London Olympics.
Samsung is almost synonymous with Android already, so by pushing its brand out into the wild with dedicated retail outlets, this can only serve to increase its mindshare among the mobile masses.
Getting physical
It has been interesting observing the evolution of commerce over the past two decades. The initial skepticism back in 1995 about whether people would really shop online was slowly replaced with a worried “Oh, can shops survive the e-commerce revolution?” debate a decade or so later. And now we’re seeing interest from some of the major players in the digital space, who are looking to transcend their online heritage and dip their toes in a shopping mall near you.
However, the examples outlined here are certainly not indicative of a reversal in fortunes for bricks-and-mortar stores. It’s more a realization that humans are social creatures – people like to talk to and mingle with other people. Sure, buying a ream of paper or book from a website offers much convenience. But people still want to venture into physical spaces to touch and test things, and ask questions.
To what degree we start seeing the tech titans of the world embrace dedicated retail stores remains to be seen. But there’s clearly an interest there – from corporations and customers. And if a microchip manufacturer such as Intel is toying with its own outlets, then it’s clear that big tech brands understand the need for a real-world presence.