Amazon begins offering refunds for unauthorized in-app purchases

 Were you one of the many parents surprised to find hundreds of dollars’ worth of Smurfberries charged to your card a few years back? Amazon’s lax in-app purchasing requirements let kids all over the country buy coins and crystals to their hearts’ content, something the FTC frowned on. News that refunds would be available soon broke in April, and the time has come at last. Read More

from Amazon – TechCrunch https://techcrunch.com/2017/05/31/amazon-begins-offering-refunds-for-unauthorized-in-app-purchases/?ncid=rss

Microsoft launches Draft to help developers build container-based applications

Microsoft today announced the launch of Draft, a new open-source tool that helps developers streamline the processes of developing container-based applications that are meant to run on Kubernetes clusters. Read More

from Microsoft – TechCrunch https://techcrunch.com/2017/05/31/microsoft-launches-draft-to-help-developers-build-container-based-applications/?ncid=rss

Amazon rejects AI2’s Alexa skill voice-search engine. Will it build one?

 Surprisingly, Amazon Alexa doesn’t have a good way to search for Alexa skills by voice. You can’t say that you want to play word games, need a skill to check airport security wait times, or feel like meditating. Alexa doesn’t know what to tell you. Amazon released its own “Skill Finder” skill last year, but it’s a bare-bones experience that can only read off… Read More

from Amazon – TechCrunch https://techcrunch.com/2017/05/31/amazon-skill-search-engine/?ncid=rss

Do we have a choice?

"Do what I say" vs.
    "Use your best judgment."

"I'm in charge because I have authority" vs.
    "Take responsibility if you care."

"It's simple and easy but ineffective" vs.
    "It's difficult and a bit complex, but you can handle it and it's more likely to work."

"It's the same as last time" vs.
    "This might not work."

"Because I said so" vs.
    "Show your work."

"Here's the kid's menu" vs.
    "Learn to cook."

"Comply" vs.
    "Question."

"Consume" vs.
    "Produce."

"You haven't been picked" vs.
    "It's always your turn."

"You have no choice" vs.
    "It's always up to you, if you care enough."

       

from Seth Godin's Blog on marketing, tribes and respect http://feeds.feedblitz.com/~/340499034/0/sethsblog~Do-we-have-a-choice.html

Ballmer explains why he invested in Twitter

 Former Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer took the stage at Code Conference on Tuesday and talked about why he took a large position in Twitter. “There’s a real opportunity to make that a valuable economic asset,” said Ballmer, defending his decision to invest in what has been a volatile ride for the social media company. He believes in its potential because it “gives people… Read More

from Microsoft – TechCrunch https://techcrunch.com/2017/05/30/ballmer-explains-why-he-invested-in-twitter/?ncid=rss

Amazon cancels its QVC-like shopping show “Style Code Live”

 Amazon’s own take on a QVC-like home shopping experience, “Style Code Live,” has gone off the air. The live program, first launched in March 2016, was streamed online and via mobile to Amazon shoppers, who could learn about fashion and beauty tips from style experts, then instantly shop the products being featured on the show. Just ahead of the Memorial Day weekend here in… Read More

from Amazon – TechCrunch https://techcrunch.com/2017/05/30/amazon-cancels-its-qvc-like-shopping-show-style-code-live/?ncid=rss

Choosing your spot

It's difficult to find the leverage to make a difference. At your job, there are probably people with more experience than you, more domain knowledge than you, even more skills than you. The same is true about your competition.

But there's one place where you can make your mark: Your attitude.

You can bring more generosity of spirit, more enthusiasm, more kindness, more resilience, more positive energy, more bravery and more magic to the room than anyone else, at least right now. Because you choose to.

That can be what you stand for.

These aren't soft skills. They're real.

       

from Seth Godin's Blog on marketing, tribes and respect http://feeds.feedblitz.com/~/339259600/0/sethsblog~Choosing-your-spot.html

An overlooked secret to effectiveness (and happiness)

Knowing where 'enough' is.

More might be better for awhile, but sooner or later, it can't always be better. Diminishing returns are the law.

If we look to advertisers, marketers, bosses, doctors, partners and suppliers to tell us when we've reached 'enough', we're almost certainly going to get it wrong.

It's okay to stop when you're happy. 

Is more always better? Sometimes, only better is better

       

from Seth Godin's Blog on marketing, tribes and respect http://feeds.feedblitz.com/~/338023404/0/sethsblog~An-overlooked-secret-to-effectiveness-and-happiness.html

In search of familiarity

Ask someone what they do, and they'll probably talk about where they work. "I work in insurance," or even, "I work for Aetna."

Of course, most of the 47,000 people who work for Aetna don't do anything that's specifically insurance-y. They do security for Building 7, or they answer the phone for someone, or they work in the graphic design department.

Most people have been trained to come to work in search of familiarity and competence. To work with familiar people, doing familiar tasks, getting familiar feedback from a familiar boss. Competence is rewarded, coloring inside the lines is something we were taught in kindergarten.

People will do a bad (a truly noxious) job for a long time because it feels familiar. Legions of people will stick with a dying industry because it feels familiar.

The reason Kodak failed, it turns out, has nothing to do with grand corporate strategy (the people at the top saw it coming), and nothing to do with technology (the scientists and engineers got the early patents in digital cameras). Kodak failed because it was a chemical company and a bureaucracy, filled with people eager to do what they did yesterday.

Change is the unfamiliar.

Change creates incompetence.

In the face of change, the critical questions that leaders must start with are, "Why did people come to work here today? What did they sign up for?"

That's why it's so difficult to change the school system. Not because teachers and administrators don't care (they do!). It's because changing the school system isn't what they signed up for.

The solution is as simple as it is difficult: If you want to build an organization that thrives in change (and on change), hire and train people to do the paradoxical: To discover that the unfamiliar is the comfortable familiar they seek. Skiers like going downhill when it's cold, scuba divers like getting wet. That's their comfortable familiar. Perhaps you and your team can view change the same way.

       

from Seth Godin's Blog on marketing, tribes and respect http://feeds.feedblitz.com/~/337005008/0/sethsblog~In-search-of-familiarity.html

Predicting or inventing...

The most common way to deal with the future is to try to predict it. To be in the right place at the right time with the right skills or investments.

A far more successful and reliable approach is to invent the future. Not all of it, just a little part. But enough to make a difference.

       

from Seth Godin's Blog on marketing, tribes and respect http://feeds.feedblitz.com/~/335905904/0/sethsblog~Predicting-or-inventing.html

Microcopy in the age of the glance

People rarely read to the end. And they almost never spend as much time reading your words as you spend writing them.

Which makes it ironic that the little phrases we use (in designing a simple form, or when we answer the phone) matter so much.

Being gentle, kind or human goes a long way.

Coming across as confident, clear and correct matters as well.

Microcopy is word choice. It's a glimpse of a smile or a slip of impatience.

When you start putting™ trademark symbols in random spots, using extra exclamation points or (this is the biggest one) adopting a false commanding tone and being a jerk in your writing, then you lose us.

We know that you feel like using words like ONLY, NEVER, PERMANENT and NOTICE, but we'd rather hear from someone we like instead.

       

from Seth Godin's Blog on marketing, tribes and respect http://feeds.feedblitz.com/~/334528454/0/sethsblog~Microcopy-in-the-age-of-the-glance.html

Crunch Report | Mark Zuckerberg’s Harvard Commencement Speech

Mark Zuckerberg gives this year’s Harvard commencement speech, Uber and Lyft are returning to Austin, Ford has some leadership shake-ups and TC Battlefield company Beam (acquired by Microsoft) is now called Mixer. All this on Crunch Report. Read More

from Microsoft – TechCrunch https://techcrunch.com/2017/05/25/crunch-report-mark-zuckerbergs-harvard-commencement-speech/?ncid=rss

AmazonFresh opens its grocery Pickup locations in Seattle

 Amazon has officially begun operating its AmazonFresh Pickup locations in Seattle, letting customers order groceries ahead of time and then quickly grab them on their way home. The service requires as little as 15 minutes advance notice, without any minimum purchase requirements, and it’s a free service for any Amazon Prime members. Amazon first revealed Pickup back in March, but… Read More

from Amazon – TechCrunch https://techcrunch.com/2017/05/25/amazonfresh-opens-its-grocery-pickup-locations-in-seattle/?ncid=rss

Microsoft’s game streaming service Beam rebrands as Mixer, adds co-streaming, a guide & mobile broadcasting

 Microsoft’s live-streaming service Beam, which the company acquired last year shortly after it emerged as the winner of the TechCrunch Disrupt Startup Battlefield, is today getting a new name: Mixer. The name is meant to express the way the service brings people together, the team explains, but it’s not the only change rolling out today, as it turns out. Mixer is also launching… Read More

from Microsoft – TechCrunch https://techcrunch.com/2017/05/25/microsofts-game-streaming-service-beam-rebrands-as-mixer-adds-co-streaming-a-guide-mobile-broadcasting/?ncid=rss

“What about endogeneity?”

Ask this question often.

Several times a day, at least.

Endogeneity is a fancy term for confusing cause and effect. For not being clear about causation and correlation.

It's one reason why smart people make so many mistakes. We think A leads to B, so more A gets more B. While A and B may have been related in the past, though, it's not at all clear that improving A is going to do anything about B.

There is, for example, an extraordinarily high correlation between per capita cheese consumption and the risk of being strangled by your bedsheets while you sleep:

That doesn't mean that eating less cheese is going to help you not die in bed.

       

from Seth Godin's Blog on marketing, tribes and respect http://feeds.feedblitz.com/~/333209082/0/sethsblog~%e2%80%9cWhat-about-endogeneity%e2%80%9d.html