by alec on January 9, 2009
One of the monitors on my desk at the office has been logged in, via remote desktop, to my home PC all day long. Why? Well, at home we have a nice fat internet pipe, and I’ve been waiting for my chance to download the Windows 7 beta. Unfortunately, Microsoft appears to have been caught flat footed by the interest. Earlier in the day, for example, I tried to go to the Technet site and discovered that the servers there had been flattened by the load. And at this point in time, the official public download has still to make it’s appearance… over 3 hours after it was supposed to.
I’m a little disappointed, but not surprised. Clearly PC enthusiasts, having snubbed Windows Vista, are dying to give Windows 7 a test drive. The last time I recall Microsoft servers being flattened due to demand created by interest in an operating system was… Windows 95. Yup. It has been a long time since I’ve seen this level of interest in a new OS.
Good luck to the folks in Redmond. It looks like That Ol’ Black Magic might be back.
by alec on January 9, 2009
As Facebook has grown, Internet Marketers have come to call it home. There are countless events at any one time being promoted that are focused on getting people to join self improvement seminars or buy products. The Facebook for Business group has over 33,000 members at this point, and is still growing. When we launched Calliflower on Facebook, it was with the intent of reaching these business people with a quality conferencing service.
Recently I’ve been hearing increasing reports from this community of people being arbitrarily and inexplicably banned. There is even a rumoured class action suit in the works, as Internet Marketers find their efforts at building community suddenly cut off. In some cases, that might be more than a year’s work and many thousands of dollars invested.
Sometimes these folks come to me asking for my help believing that as a prominent blogger who has written about Facebook, and the CEO of a development company with a Facebook product, I might have some sway. Unfortunately not.
Facebook has always focused on ensuring that users have a good experience. That has meant aggressively weeding out certain kinds of members and solicitations. Perhaps it’s time, however, to find an accommodation with the Internet Marketing community. At minimum that should include instituting an efficient appeals process. After all, these folks signed up for Facebook in good faith, and they’re only using Facebook for its intended purpose – building community amongst their own following of users.
