Comments for Paul Wallbank

Comment on The battle between the old and the new by Paul Wallbank

Paul Wallbank — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 06:14:41 +0000

The status quo certainly are well connected, Chris. We should have no doubt that change will be long and bloody, particularly if we see the incumbent refusing to acknowledge reality as we see with the TV Now case.

What bugged me with the PM’s speech was how there were all these references to the “new economy” and the high dollar but no real answers on how governments are going to deal with these.

Comment on The battle between the old and the new by Chris

Chris — Thu, 02 Feb 2012 04:18:26 +0000

Embrace change or perish. That seems about right. Early adopters can make inroads before the laggards catch on. Darwinism applied to our modern existence.

This particular transition could be long and bloody. The status quo forces are large, loud, well-funded and well-connected.

Against this backdrop was the PM’s speech yesterday with seemingly countless “new economy” references. Was it a call for change or a smokescreen while the forces rally?

Comment on The dying Yelp of Sensis by Paul Wallbank

Paul Wallbank — Tue, 31 Jan 2012 11:40:27 +0000

It is a worry how poor Telstra’s information systems are. While it’s understandable that a business the size and complexity of Telstra will have some legacy systems and communications problems between divisions, I sometimes wonder whether the business is run on a spreadsheet.

As the NBN starts taking a lot of the wholesale and engineering functions off Telstra, we may see management being able to focus better and get their systems and customer service right.

Unfortunately I think it’s all too late for Sensis. I think they’ve passed the point of no return.

Comment on The dying Yelp of Sensis by shamaroo

shamaroo — Tue, 31 Jan 2012 10:17:12 +0000

Sensis and Telstra are completely out of control – mismanaged, misinformed and incompetent. Telstra – make an appointment 2 weeks into the future to get a feature turned off on your service that you specifically requested not be put on in the first place. Sensis – complete fail with expensive, paid for ads being printed with incorrect information and online ads just as bad. Online system top heavy and with badly managed filtering of results make this service a complete waste of time.

To top it all off, they buy Yelp – a company with no kudos in the market. Another completely stupid and irrelevant decision by Telstra management.

Comment on I don’t think I’ll write that by Paul Wallbank

Paul Wallbank — Tue, 31 Jan 2012 00:02:00 +0000

One place I did some work at had the ‘Peter Principle’ squared – most of the managers had been promoted at least two levels above the limits of their competency.

Comment on Creepy business by Paul Wallbank

Paul Wallbank — Tue, 31 Jan 2012 00:00:41 +0000

Absolutely right, Chris. When I was operating a PC repair business from home, one of the big lead generators was my kids’ school.

I think one of the things that gets lost when we talk about “social business” is that all businesses are social. We shouldn’t forget that.

Comment on I don’t think I’ll write that by Chris

Chris — Mon, 30 Jan 2012 23:55:50 +0000

The “Peter Principle” is still alive and well.

Comment on Creepy business by Chris

Chris — Mon, 30 Jan 2012 23:52:23 +0000

The gym may be off limits for some as a networking venue, but the concept is valid. We encounter people in a wide range of situations every day. We just need to recognise the opportunities – P & C meetings, if you have kids, perhaps Tradies working on at your home or office.

Comment on The Internet’s cold war by @kewal

@kewal — Sun, 29 Jan 2012 04:03:29 +0000

I don’t disagree. But – I do recall watching a “Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous” back in the late 80′s or early 90′s that had a very interesting interview with Larry Ellison. If you were to see that interview now, you might think, “My God – he planned all this!” And by “all this” I mean everything right down to the “cloud”. The “Cloud” – which he hates now, as a buzz word, but ranted then about how silly it was that I was getting into my car to drive down to a store, to buy a box with bits in it, to drive it back to my computer, to put the bits in my computer. He claimed, even back then, that the network was the computer. It should be noted that the key acquisition in the Sun Microsystems deal for Oracle probably wasn’t MySQL, but rather Java. If they had no intention on competing in this arena, they wouldn’t be in court with Google now over the use of Java.

Mr. Ellison’s “Rich and Famous Lifestyle” included an amazing house that was inspired by a samurai’s palace. The best ninja, in my experience, tend to look a lot like the best samurai. All I’m saying is keep on eye on Oracle – I think they may be the sleeping ninja in the room.

Comment on The Internet’s cold war by Paul Wallbank

Paul Wallbank — Sun, 29 Jan 2012 01:06:24 +0000

It’s interesting how we forget about previous lock in attempts – Microsoft’s NetBEUI is a good case in point.

This is one of the lessons from the web, that lock in eventually fails. Hopefully that’s going to happen again as the market rejects being locked into the various services.