E-Commerce

This week provided me with an opportunity to talk about a business that I helped create. Several years ago while snowmobiling with my father, he began tracking all the trails we had ridden on around the state using a handheld GPS. I told him it could be a great business opportunity to collect GPS maps of the whole state and sell them to other snowmobile riders in New England. He continued to collect data for a couple years and in 2010 created a website, www.gpstrailmasters.com. The website targets a niche market of riders who use Garmin GPS units while snowmobiling, and is restricted to the states of Maine, New Hampshire and Vermont for the time being. The site takes advantage of both B2C and B2B strategies. The B2C end comes from selling digital copies of the trail maps to consumers. There is also incentive for customers to submit unmapped trails in exchange for an extended "upgrade period" in which the customer will receive free copies of updated maps. The B2B aspect comes from the opportunity for local clubs to submit data for their trails in exchange for localized maps for use exclusively by the club. Trail services such as gas, food, and lodging are also encouraged to have a GPS waypoint added for their locations. I believe this business model is viable because the current system of paper trail maps for recreational vehicles is outdated and inconvenient. Digital maps that incorporate a uniform legend and an all-in-one package are increasing in demand along with the use of GPS units on recreational vehicles. Since the business also harnesses collective intelligence through tail submissions, the maps will continue to get more accurate and include more local trails and services.

Green IT

A lot of PC users see the act of using computers as a "greener" alternative to using paper, but how can computers be utilized in such a way to minimize their impact on the environment? There are a lot of options an organization can choose to help improve their green status. One idea that many banks and credit card companies take advantage of is issuing digital statements via e-mail or online. This obviously reduces the amount of paper consumed by the organization. Another approach a business can take for Green IT is to use energy-saving technology. Most companies that manufacture computer components are continuously trying to improve their energy consumption. Furthermore, enforcing policies on power saving and when to shut down computers and network components can help a business reduce their power consumption. Possibly one of the biggest issues related to going green related to computing is what to do with old computers. A business can minimize the waste by working to keep the technology up and running for as long as possible. This can be achieved by maintaining the computers and updating components only when they are no longer capable of running business applications. Much can be done to implement green IT in almost every company.

The Online Dating Game

More and more relationships are started online these days. Industry frontrunners such as eHarmony and Match.com offer personality tests that will match you with a compatible mate, but many online dating sites take advantage of a long tail business model. For example, WealthyMen.com has found a niche market that only allows men with salaries over $85k a year to join. One very unique attribute of the service is that they verify your profession and income to prevent men from lying about just how wealthy they are. The home page for the website displays several pictures of "people currently searching" that include mostly beautiful women. However, once you create an account and start browsing you find that most of the women are not that attractive. This website leverages collective intelligence by having women compete for men based on their salaries and pictures. At $20-$35 a month, this service doesn't come cheap. However, since most users  are wealthy anyways, it is probably worth the expense for them. Another dating service utilizing a niche market is GreenSingles.com. This website attracts users who are passionate about the environment, vegetarian, animal lovers and people with other similar interests. One unique feature is that you can register, search and contact other members for free or choose to upgrade your account and pay. This website leverages collective intelligence because users upload information about themselves that other users can search by criteria for. GreenSingles provides great value because of the fact that you can search and contact for free. This allows users to explore the website a little bit before deciding if they would like to pay for upgraded services.

Web 2.0

In recent years, the Internet has been changing in significant ways. Social networking sites, blogs, YouTube, and Google started to become the most popular things on the web. The term Web 2.0 came about due to these changes and the affect they had on the internet as a whole. Many e-businesses have changed their business models to take advantage of Web 2.0 and found great success. One way that businesses have taken advantage of Web 2.0 is by utilizing Google AdSense. AdSense will place advertisements on your website based on factors such as content and location. In this way, Google can generate revenue for every click on the advertisement. Businesses can use this to their advantage by targeting the customers most likely to buy their products and not waste money on advertisements geared toward somebody not interested. Other ways Web 2.0 can be utilized would be following in Amazon's footsteps and allowing users to rate and review products, and group similar items together to give customers recommendations on other products. A lot of businesses could take advantage of Facebook and blogs to connect with their customers and learn about their consumption habits. The possibilities for Web 2.0 are endless, especially with the capability to create iPhone and Android apps that provide cross-platform functionality.

Pervasive Networking

From my understanding, pervasive networking is the ability for many computers or digital devices to work together to improve the usefulness and abilities of the device. Essentially, it is the fact that instead of there being one device per user there are now a network of "invisible" devices networked together in order to deliver information to one user. Good examples of pervasive networking would be BitTorrent. This technology works by having many different users sharing small parts of a whole file. Many simultaneous connections allows the file to be downloaded bit by bit until the downloader has the entire file. Pervasive networking also includes the means by which all of these devices communicate together, such as routers, WiFi, or Bluetooth. Connecting a mobile phone to a computer or two computers together via Bluetooth to share information between the two would be a small scale example of pervasive networking. The further development of pervasive networking will allow more and more devices to connect and share information and make everyday life more seamlessly integrated together digitally. It is hard for me to imagine how much more can be done since it seems like everything can already be networked together from cell phones to video game consoles and televisions, but like all technology it will continue to improve and become faster.

The effects of networks

As I sit here thinking about how networks have affected my life it is hard to imagine life without networks. My cell phone is constantly connected to a mobile network, syncing e-mails and delivering the days weather to the palm of my hand. When I want to relax and play a video game what do I do? That's right I connect to Xbox Live, another network connecting millions of people around the world so they can play Call of Duty against each other. If I want to check in on how my friends from home are doing I often log on to Facebook a.k.a. "the Social Network" to see whats new. The more I think about it the more I realize how much I depend on networks for nearly every part of my life. I use to networks to talk to friends and family, to stay up to date with my schoolwork, to play games, to look up information, to watch movies and download music. Just about every use I have for modern technology only exists because of networks. I have often pondered how people got through school or had a social life back before computers and cell phones because I rely so heavily on technology. However, I do sometimes think that the wealth of information readily available to us all nowadays has somewhat eliminated the need to actually learn. Maybe that's a good thing, maybe not, but I am certainly grateful I don't have to search through a book for information anymore.