NGage is live. I'm going fishing.

Yeaps. That's right. Surf over to www.ngage.com to download. The official blog posting is here.

As for me? I'm going fishing. Oh, and if you fancy testing your fishing skills against mine, add me as a friend on NGage. My handle is darthpoke (don't ask why.)



Happy gaming.

Silly eyes (Testing Ovi)

This is really just to test out Share on Ovi.

Lydia and I came across some silly, silly eye-glasses near Christmas last year. I posted them up on Ovi. Best. Have a laugh, at my expense. :)

Intel Atom! My EeePC put on hold

I'm officially putting my project to get hold of an ASUS Eee PC on hold after Intel's introduction of the Atom today in China's IDF. A journalist was MSNing me live from Shanghai, and giving me the details:

[censored] said: eh you should see the new intel atom platform devices
[censored] said: they run vista, etc. and can fit into n800 profile
davidlian said:
BEST!
davidlian said:
Got pics? I want...
[censored] said: 3W power consumption
[censored] said: you can run quake iii on it
[censored] said: lol
[censored] said: quite powerful processor
[censored] said:
Got heaps!
davidlian said:
email me
[censored] said: soon la

Then the bloke goes running out for another briefing. I was piqued, but curious to see what devices actually looked like.

Surfing Engadget later in the afternoon and, Bingo! Lenovo Ideapad U8 (my client, but this post isn't fixed). Looks like this:Picture via Engadget

Lovely right? I'm just wondering if there'll be a version that looks closer to a mini-laptop (like the Eee PC). I'm told there are many various devices with many different form factors. I'm also told that they'll come pretty cheap (Eee PC range?). Guess I'll wait and see now.

Creative: Fixed drivers, broken PR

A post on Wired yesterday brought to public attention a story on Creative Labs (Creative) that had been simmering for about a month on PC Audio enthusiasts forums. Interestingly, it also highlighted for a PR person like me the dynamics of technology PR in the connected age.

First, a summary of the issue:

• The launch of Windows Vista saw many Creative soundcards (and some high-end recent models) having capabilities "reduced" due to driver issues. Creative didn't fix all the issues leaving its customers with essentially worse sound quality from its products than if they had just stuck to on-board audio.
  
• Enter Daniel Kawakami (known as Daniel_K on modder forums), who in his own free time, takes the Creative drivers and modifies them to enable most of the features (like Dolby Surround) for Windows Vista. Many people download his drivers. Daniel_K starts asking for donations.
  
• Creative decides to crack down on this via a post on its own public forum and deleting Daniel_K's post. The main points for the "cease-and-desist" post are that Daniel_K shouldn't be soliciting donations to "profit" from Creative's IP and that he shouldn't be re-packaging the software for use with products it was not originally intended to. The original post was subsequently deleted thanks to public outcry, but can still be found here. Granted, the language seemed carefully thought-out and I think the reaction was a bit harsh on what was essentially a measured response.
  
• This led to Daniel_K's response. He also raises some valid points about the Creative approach which he calls "threatening me on a public forum", "removed everything I posted on the forum" etc. etc.
• Creative apologises and removes Phil O' Shaughnessy's post, with a much friendlier tone from moderator Dale (whom board members have come to love and respect.)
  

Okay, you can probably add up a lot more detail to my summary, but what I'm really interested in pointing out is the way the PR game has changed especially with digitally-connected audiences.

When I first read O' Shaughnessy's response, I found it really acceptable (and forgive me for examining the dude's grammar), I thought it was measured and concise. However, putting it up on a public forum is akin to the old media tactic of faxing statements like this out to every news media there is. And it smacked of arrogance to Daniel_K, and not just Daniel_K, but the rest of the loyal Creative modding community.

Observation#1: Don't talk to customers the same way you'd talk to the media.

I wonder if Creative could have used friendly moderator Dale as the official mouthpiece for this right from the start - perhaps having Dale private message Daniel_K about Creative's concerns. Why Dale? Simple. Dale's built traction, trust and credibility with forum-goers throughout his tenure over at the Creative boards. If you compare his message to Phil's you can see how the difference in tone of voice (from corporate swinger to friendly neighbourhood mod) makes all the difference in how the community talks to you.

Customers like to be addressed personally, by a friend if possible. A mass statement makes you sound like a distant corporation out to make money. A personal contact point through personal communication means gets you closer to the customer's real issues.

Observation #2: Customers talk back - in a BIG way!

Uh, yeah, obviously. Customers have always been talking back to companies - whether it's the silent protest of boycotting products or giving earfuls to customer service reps. But they have perhaps never been as easily mobilised or united as the customers on the internet today.

What this means is companies need to be prepared to have a conversation. And there is no "I win, you lose" outcome. If that's the goal, then the company has already lost. There has to be genuine consideration for the points and issues raised by the customers and not blissful ignorance that they exist.

As a Creative customer (yes I am! Dave's laughing.), I would have loved to get all the nice extras I plonked RM 400 for with my soundcard. Otherwise, I would have saved that RM 400 and stuck to my on-board sound. If that's my issue, how can Creative solve that? Maybe...uh... just leave Daniel_K's mods alone? Wouldn't people actually buy more Creative soundcards now that it would actually work better in Vista?

Observation#3: What's posted on the internet, stays on the internet.

I was having a discussion with Dave on this and we both agreed its practically useless trying to control information on the internet when you've published it (posted on a forum, blog etc.). Why? At the very least, search engines would have indexed your page and kept a cached copy of it. And that's if no one else has copied your content and posted it on his site lock stock and barrel (like how I retrieved Mr. O' Shaughnessy's statement).

Yes, there might be a small window of opportunity to delete offending posts before they get indexed, but we're talking about the 2 - 3 hour window before the feedback starts pouring in.

Lesson? Think very,very carefully before you put what you want to say online. You can't take it back.

That's it, just three short points. Personally, I'm hoping Creative gets back on its feet and that this will spark a series of initiatives to win back the modding community. Full functionality of old products on Vista is surely a good thing for the customers, and in the long run, the company.

Human-powered search?

Nearly a decade ago, Google brought innovation to the words "internet search" by using pigeons to sort out good search results from the bad ones.

Fast-forward to this decade, and pigeons have evolved to human beings. Enter human-powered search by Mahalo. Though I've known about Mahalo for a while now (thanks to Buzz Out Loud and Jason Calacanis appearing on TWIT every so often!), I've only recently begun to actually start using it, and I'm quite, quite loving it.




Let me start by saying, Mahalo isn't Google. Yes, they are both search services, but Google's a bit more "engine" and Mahalo is a bit more "service."

You see, Mahalo actually pays human beings to write up search entries, and still relies on aggregating search engine results from Google, Yahoo!, del.icio.us and more to give you results for any searches they don't have entries for.

So, say, if you were searching for "Barack Obama" you'd end up with a great looking page full of links, video and information on Mr. Obama like this:



But let's say you were looking for a lesser known somebody, oh say... davidlian... you'd just get a bunch of google links like this:



Of course, if i was a bit hardsell, I could put in a request for Mahalo to write an article about my search topic. This is a bit of interesting interaction that I really found to be unique about Mahalo. Teams of real people would be putting together pages for specific topics and so it ends up becoming a little bit of a cross between Wikipedia and Google. And, if you wanted to be one of those people, its pretty easy to sign up here and get paid.

If you just wanted to get casually involved with the search community at Mahalo, you could alternatively sign up as a member and volunteer links. Each search page entry gives you the option to volunteer links that are relevant to the topic and will be vetted through by Mahalo's team to ensure a better search result for everyone.

I still use Google an awful lot (though I'm more and more going back to Yahoo! now), but Mahalo is also one of the great sites I check out on a daily basis to see the pulse of the internet. The front page changes everyday and though it's a far cry from the minimalistic design of Google, Mahalo manages to deliver important topics on its front page without the clutter of sites like Yahoo!.

More interestingly, I love how Mahalo tries to be more than just a search engine. Stuff like the Mahalo Daily Show by Veronica Belmont means there'll always be meaningful content to discover on Mahalo.

The only drawback is, I can't get over how everytime I punch in David Lian, this dude called David Binn keeps popping up.