Actually Rails 2.0.1 was released. Just a sidenote to David and his team. Our company wouldn’t exist if it were not for his efforts –> Thanks David…

Over the last four months ServiceGuy went from and simple idea to a nationwide service with more than 1000 contractors in ten cities. The 1,000th contractor to sign up for the ServiceGuy referral system was Mike Fox from Norristown, PA who offers landscaping services.I arbitrarily set our Phase One goal at 1,000 ServiceGuys. Now that we have met our Phase One goals we are ready for Phase Two. Phase Two is where we start getting business for our ServcieGuys. Imaginuity is developing interactive advertising for placement on Comcast’s ad network that is slated to start just before Christmas. We are also testing physical placement of ‘tear sheets‘ in grocery stores (400 stores per market) delivered on a weekly basis. Finally, we are testing Google Adwords in several markets. Our goal for Phase Two is to generate 2 calls per day per call queue.

Since early August Mike has made 27 major upgrades (some might be better termed bug fixes) to the system. The final items include some goofy things like allowing users to reset/retrieve their password, providing a method for news/announcements to users and finally an upgrade to the user profile pages. Once these last seven to-dos are finished Mike will be turning over day-to-day management/tweaking to Francis. Mike will be starting another pretty cool project that involves ACH, USB signature pads and data warehousing.

The FX team called us (Big in Japan) late Friday afternoon with an idea.  Wouldn’t it be cool if we could have a phone at the new McNamara / Troy location in Hollywood?  The Nip/Tuck team is moving to LA this year and to promote the move they created a ‘simulated’ office in the Hollywood and Highland outdoor mall.  The office has some very cool holographic videos of the doctors (so you can see them at work) as well as real live models waiting for the doctors.  The only problem?  You can’t get in.

The phone would allow people passing by to interact with the promotion.  When FX told us about the idea I said, “sound great, when do you need it up and running?”  The answer was, “within a week!”  I thought to myseld, “OMG, we will never get it done within a week!”  Of course we agreed to do it.  Within a week we shipped a pre-configured Cisco ATA to the team building the storefront.  We then connected it to our FanPodCast system.  When you pick up the phone it auto-dials our switch in Dallas and you get the ‘doctors’ IVR.  You can leave a message for the doctors if you like: 310.747.3447

If you are in Hollywood, stop by the store and check out those holograms:

Atlanta, Boston, Chicago, Dallas, Detroit, Houston, Los Angeles, Washington DC, New York City or Philadelphia?  ServiceGuy might be just what you need.  (most of these don’t have many providers so if you are not connected to someone try again in a couple of weeks) Give it a try:

• Computer Guy in Atlanta call 404.478.2724
• Computer Guy in Chicago call 773.654.2145
• Computer Guy in Dallas call 214.635.4701
• Computer Guy in Detroit call 313.557.3570
• Computer Guy in Houston 281.657.4522
• Computer Guy in Los Angeles 213.405.5304
• Computer Guy in Philadelphia 267.350.8103

ServiceGuy is a new service the Big in Japan team has been rolling out over the past couple of months.  What is ServiceGuy?  I wrote about it back in May in a post titled, “Quick Project: ServiceGuy Referral Network” when I was having trouble finding a pool guy.  The idea is simple: You need help now.  You don’t want to wait to receive a call back.  You don’t want to wait for an email response.  You don’t want to create an account or provide demographic data.  You want to talk to a service provider in your area right NOW!  Just call the ServiceGuy number for your area and the service you need.  Your call is then connected to a service provider.  No voicemail.  No email.  No accounts.  Just a direct connect to someone who can help you right NOW!

Phase one of our launch is focused on seeding each service with providers.  We need to find a minimum of 25 providers in each category before phase two can begin.  Phase two of our launch is focused on getting consumers to call our providers.

The Big in Japan team develops intellectual property to allow brands to create unique interactions with their customers.  Our clients include FOX Television, LEGO, TechData, The United States Postal Service and The Federal Reserve to name a few.

Our latest development, ServiceGuy, utilizes patent pending technology to allow for ‘live connections’ between homeowners and service providers.  ServiceGuy is a real world example (visit http://serviceguy.org) of the type of interaction that is possible utilizing our technology.  Our team is prepared to implement our technology within your brand’s internet presence, allowing for a private label experience for your customers.

Typical referral systems focus on demographic matching, while ServiceGuy allows for ‘availability matching.’  Combined with your existing referral system (or a new system we implement), the underlying ServiceGuy technology will allow you to provide immediate ‘live connections’ between homeowners (users) and contractors (service providers).  In many cases an immediate connection is more valuable than a perfect connection.  What if you could offer users the ability immediately talk to a service provider 24/7?  The ServiceGuy call engine can call 25-250 service providers at the same time, ensuring at least one provider is available to take the user’s call.  For example:

Each service provider who accepts the call from the ServiceGuy call engine is prompted to press a key to indicate their availability.  The first provider to do so is given answering instructions and is connected to the user.  The call is recorded for the service provider’s records.

The system can call the user at a later date (1 day, 1 week or 1 month) and request feedback about the service provider.  Feedback can then be used to increase or decrease a providers position in the call queue.

For more information please contact:

Alexander Muse
amuse@biggu.com
1+214.558.1079

Last week I wrote a post titled, “Timothy Ferriss: ruining lives four hours at a time” where I was critical of Timothy’s book.  I have never received more legit comments on a single post that I wasn’t willing to moderate.  OMG, evidently there are lots of fans of Timothy’s idea that a four hour work week is a good idea.  They get VERY pissed if you say anything negative about the book, so pissed that they cannot help but use vulgarity to express their views.  My question: Should I redact the vulgarity and post the comments or simply delete them?  I have been deleted them so far, but started to wonder if I was making a mistake.  Thoughts?

The eSport Partners situation is a great case study for any company who is interested in what NOT to do when you find yourself the target of former employees who make random comments on blog posts. Sometimes the best response to negative feedback is no response. Other times it makes sense to respond. Let me know what you think about this situation:

Almost eight months ago we wrote a post titled, “The eSports Partners Comment Debacle.” The post detailed how I had written a short post indicating that eSports had raised money (actually debt). The post was short and positive. Several disgruntled employees (former I assume) commented on the post indicating linking to lawsuits filed by various governmental organizations. According to the suits, the company didn’t seem to treat their workers fairly. Truth be told, the comments seemed a little like sour grapes and I didn’t really give them a second thought.

Almost a year later lawyers from eSports Partners contacted me and demanded that I remove the post and comments as well as provide the identities of the employees who made the comments. After a few conversations I decided to comply with their request and remove the post and comments, but I replaced it with a scanned copy of the demand letter. The lawyers contacted me once again and threatened to sue me if I didn’t remove their letter. I refused.

So what is new? If you Google eSport Partners the third result is my post containing the letter from their lawyers. So what? Almost monthly I get emails from potential employees asking for more information about the company. Here is an example message (some details changed to protect the identity of the person):

> —– Original Message —–
> From: /redacted /
> To: /redacted/
> Sent: August 3, 2007 4:49:44 PM GMT-0600
> Subject: ESports Partners
>
> Hey Alex,
> I saw your retracted post on Esports and I’m going in
> there on Thursday for an interview. Can’t find any
> web history on the posting you had on them and was
> hoping you would fill me in on any information that would
> be helpful to me.
>
> I have a kid and a husband, so I take my career
> considerations seriously. Any way you could fill me
> in on what the context was on the post?
>
> Thanks in advance.
>
> /redacted/

Of course I can’t say much, other than explain the situation because I don’t know much. I do know that the company really mishandled the response. In this case I believe eSports Partners should have left well enough alone and ignored the comments.

I started playing with YouTube back in 2005 and didn’t really get it.  I posted a couple of videos, but I wasn’t a consumer (i.e. I didn’t watch other people’s videos unless someone blogged about one).  Fast forward to this year and add the Apple TV to the mix.  I bought Apple TVs for the office and the house and found myself showing off the Apple TV by playing videos from YouTube.

Soon we started turning on YouTube (via Apple TV) any time we had a few people over.  We would each pick a couple of ‘funny’ videos to play and let the system rip.  It wasn’t like watching traditional TV, something we would never consider doing with guests, instead it was a different experience.  The clips are short.  The content is kitsch. The experience in a word is casual.  It didn’t hamper our conversation, it enriched the content.  YouTube + AppleTV = Great for Small Parties.

Now with my iPhone I find myself doing the same thing.  People want to see how it works and after I show them the visual voice mail I show off YouTube.  People are amazed.  YouTube finally makes sense for me.  Will I watch hours of YouTube?  Never.  Will I watch 2-3 three minute clips per week?  Definitely.

Turns out Google Maps are even better when they include Microformats.  This is great news from Google.  Specifically, they are using the hCard microformat.  Very nice!!!

You can get the benefits of microformats for your own maps applications if you change your HTML to contain the necessary hcard classes. In this simple example, we’ve changed the infowindow to contain an hCard formatted address. The code for that is below:

  var html = '<div class="vcard"> <span class="adr">'
             + '<span class="fn n">Googleplex<br />'
             + '<span class="street-address">1300 Amphitheatre Parkway</span><br />'
             + '<span class="locality">Mountain View</span>, '
             + '<abbr class="region" title="California">CA</abbr>'
             + '<span class="postal-code">94043</span>'
             + '</span> </div>';
  map.openInfoWindowHtml(map.getCenter(), html);

FX premiered their newest series, Damages, last night.  Tom Shales of the Washington Post suggests,

“Damages,” making a sensational premiere tonight on the FX network, thoroughly justifies adding yet another high-powered law firm to the prime-time population. The firm is not only high-powered but it’s also “high-stakes,” we keep being told — and so is the show. “Damages” is also emphatically, and almost tortuously, high-tension, and the pilot script is one of the most artfully crafted since the debut back in the 20th century of “The Sopranos.”

FX decided to include our social podcasting application, FanPodCast (via API, design by Big Interactive), for the launch.  Check it out here.