Is it a good idea to encourage ALL employees to trade in these markets? Should insiders and/or highly uninformed people be allowed to trade? Do they help or hurt the market?
More the number of employees better the prediction markets outcome because of collective intelligence. Google's experiment of prediction market is seems good and may deliver accurate results in tightly controlled environment. But there can be biases and pitfalls associated with these kind of markets. For example by encouraging all employees to use prediction markets might result in sensitive information available to all. For example there might be lot of bets on a future event outcome of which might be sensitive in nature. Moreover the new employees might skew the results as they might not be able to trade effectively as their experienced counterparts and they are going to hurt the market. Also as the case states small group was driving almost 48% of the traffic this might be because of small group sitting together and betting collectively and thus skewing the outcome.
Thursday, April 23, 2009
Thursday, April 16, 2009
Threadless
In what other industries or areas would Threadless’ community-driven product development model work well? And not so well?
The model would work well in the industries which incorporate creative ideas into their products for example designer mugs, pens or novelty items etc. It would work best on creating designer greeting cards like hallmark etc.
The model would work well in the industries which incorporate creative ideas into their products for example designer mugs, pens or novelty items etc. It would work best on creating designer greeting cards like hallmark etc.
Thursday, April 9, 2009
LinkedIn Vs. Others
Online social networks have become ubiquitous in the past few years. What forms of value do users get from these services and who is most likely to sign up on LinkedIn versus other sites?
I feel LinkedIn is more of a professional networking website where majority of the users sign up to network with people from similar profession and also if they are in the market looking for a job. Given the state of economy LinkedIn business is going to get bigger with more users signing up in order to find job opportunities. A true example is my wife who works for a Management Consulting firm which was sold off to a competitor recently. Being uncertain about the job prospects she created LinkedIn profile few days back and connected with her previous and current professional colleague’s within two days of creating the profile she has job leads from three of her colleagues she networked through LinkedIn. All this happened with no cost, just little work to set up the profile and send invitations. On the other hand other social sites like Facebook, Orkut and MySpace etc. are more focused towards people who want to socialize with friends and families and moreover these sites offer more services compared to what is offered by LinkedIn.
I feel LinkedIn is more of a professional networking website where majority of the users sign up to network with people from similar profession and also if they are in the market looking for a job. Given the state of economy LinkedIn business is going to get bigger with more users signing up in order to find job opportunities. A true example is my wife who works for a Management Consulting firm which was sold off to a competitor recently. Being uncertain about the job prospects she created LinkedIn profile few days back and connected with her previous and current professional colleague’s within two days of creating the profile she has job leads from three of her colleagues she networked through LinkedIn. All this happened with no cost, just little work to set up the profile and send invitations. On the other hand other social sites like Facebook, Orkut and MySpace etc. are more focused towards people who want to socialize with friends and families and moreover these sites offer more services compared to what is offered by LinkedIn.
Thursday, April 2, 2009
Wiki's
How do Wikipedia’s processes for creating and modifying articles ever lead to high-quality results?
I don't think creating and modifying articles ever lead to high-quality results as anybody can edit and revert back the changes. Posting high quality content is beneficial to the author based on the fact that poorly written comment might be overwritten by some other user. If only subject matter experts author and edit the document then we might see high quality results. It’s up to the readers of the Wikis to decide what they consider high quality or average quality. For some readers same wiki might seem to be high quality to other it might seems like an average. I think Wikis with high visibilities are going to get high-quality results with many eyes looking at them for example wiki's on popular movie stars on the other hand wikis with less visibility might not have high quality content. If Wiki's are moderated then probably we can see high quality content coming from reputed authors.
I don't think creating and modifying articles ever lead to high-quality results as anybody can edit and revert back the changes. Posting high quality content is beneficial to the author based on the fact that poorly written comment might be overwritten by some other user. If only subject matter experts author and edit the document then we might see high quality results. It’s up to the readers of the Wikis to decide what they consider high quality or average quality. For some readers same wiki might seem to be high quality to other it might seems like an average. I think Wikis with high visibilities are going to get high-quality results with many eyes looking at them for example wiki's on popular movie stars on the other hand wikis with less visibility might not have high quality content. If Wiki's are moderated then probably we can see high quality content coming from reputed authors.
Thursday, March 26, 2009
External Vs. Internal Blogging
What are the advantages and disadvantages of implementing internal versus external employee blogs in a corporate setting?
The advantages of setting internal blogs are organizations can have more control on what is posted on the blogs. Moreover they are easy to setup and maintain. Also, organizations like financial institutions which have tough regulations can easily encourage collaboration through internal blogs instead of worrying about content posted on the external blog. On the flipside, internal blogs suffer from the closed audience and lack of outside perspective.
There are several advantages of the external blogs for example external blogs could be an effective marketing channel for a company launching a new product. Bedsides expert comments from internal audience there is advantage of comments from external expert audience. External blogs have positive network effects. Moreover search engines index the contents, so the blog posting show up together with other related articles.
Are there certain industries where one of these strategies makes more sense?
For media, technology related companies and manufacturing companies’ external blogging make more sense where as for financial institutions like banks and government entities internal blogging makes sense.
The advantages of setting internal blogs are organizations can have more control on what is posted on the blogs. Moreover they are easy to setup and maintain. Also, organizations like financial institutions which have tough regulations can easily encourage collaboration through internal blogs instead of worrying about content posted on the external blog. On the flipside, internal blogs suffer from the closed audience and lack of outside perspective.
There are several advantages of the external blogs for example external blogs could be an effective marketing channel for a company launching a new product. Bedsides expert comments from internal audience there is advantage of comments from external expert audience. External blogs have positive network effects. Moreover search engines index the contents, so the blog posting show up together with other related articles.
Are there certain industries where one of these strategies makes more sense?
For media, technology related companies and manufacturing companies’ external blogging make more sense where as for financial institutions like banks and government entities internal blogging makes sense.
Thursday, March 19, 2009
Ipod Vs. Cell Phone
Has the digital music market irreversibly tipped in Apple’s favor?
Looking at the success of Apple IPod and the market share it has captured it would be difficult for the new entrants to dethrone Apple from its dominant position. Many key players tried offering mobile music through cell phone services in order to compete with Apple's IPod but were not that successful. This tough competition gave Apple to come up with its own mobile music offering through the launch of Apple IPhone which has led to wave of mobile applications compatible with IPhone. Until the launch of IPhone there was chance of the new player emerging and threatening Apple's dominant position but with the launch of IPhone it seems like for the time being digital music market is irreversibly tipped in Apple's favor.
Looking at the success of Apple IPod and the market share it has captured it would be difficult for the new entrants to dethrone Apple from its dominant position. Many key players tried offering mobile music through cell phone services in order to compete with Apple's IPod but were not that successful. This tough competition gave Apple to come up with its own mobile music offering through the launch of Apple IPhone which has led to wave of mobile applications compatible with IPhone. Until the launch of IPhone there was chance of the new player emerging and threatening Apple's dominant position but with the launch of IPhone it seems like for the time being digital music market is irreversibly tipped in Apple's favor.
Thursday, March 5, 2009
BrightCove
Strength’s of Brightcove's business model includes its ability to distribute professional video content and generating revenue model against advertising sales. Also with its publishing platform Brightcove was able to attract premium customers like Discovery Communications and Newsweek.
One of the weaknesses of Brightcove was that it devoted too much time customizing the platform for premium publishers that it ignored the consumers and the competitor like YouTube took significant first mover advantage in attracting these consumers. Also Brightcove was trying to reach content owners, advertisers, distributors and consumers all at once without focusing which side would be more profitable in the long run.
One of the weaknesses of Brightcove was that it devoted too much time customizing the platform for premium publishers that it ignored the consumers and the competitor like YouTube took significant first mover advantage in attracting these consumers. Also Brightcove was trying to reach content owners, advertisers, distributors and consumers all at once without focusing which side would be more profitable in the long run.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
