Day at the Data Center

Wanted to post yesterday evening, but instead found myself in a cold Data Center helping my colleague replace a Dell Quad Proc Server with an Intel-provided Xeon (Woodcrest class --- whatever this is) server.

All I can say about the Data Center is, apart from being a cold place, that it is a boring / lonely place to be.

Imagine watching over someone else's server day in, day out... making sure you strictly comply with and follow the rules... fill up a lot of forms every time there's a machine coming in or going out... endure the sound of the machines' hum all day... (almost forgo) endure the cold, impersonal place... WHILE all the action happens outside.

I have no idea what the engineers do in a typical day. I guess it's more than just staring at the monitor... making sure everything's A-Ok. If it is not more than just the staring part... oh, men... you wouldn't find myself working in such a place if ever I happen to know anything about their craft.

The ironic thing is... this Data Center may well be the power behind one of the most exciting things to happen in Philippine Commerce... soon.

The Platform vs. "The Walled Garden"

I am grateful to be in this day and age where everyone can read everyone, can talk to anyone, and be seen by anyone.

I have always been an avid follower of great men and have always wondered what is going on in their minds. Just a few years back, you can relish their thoughts and opinion by getting a book or by reading it through some newspaper or magazine articles. If it isn't an autobiography, then you get someone spilling the guts out of the person in question for you.

With today's technology, you can get these luminaries' thoughts straight from their mouth... or pen... or keyboard... whatever...

I first read about Marc Andreessen, the founder of Netscape, in a book called "Architects of the Web" (a dull and rather uninspiring account of the history of the World Wide Web). I caught a "glimpse" of what he did with Netscape in that book. But I never heard him "talk".

Through the help of BlogRovr, a Firefox Plug-in that lets you subscribe to your favorite blog and surf the net in the process, I managed to stumble upon Marc Andreessen's newly created blog. Finally, the words of a Pioneer delivered right to my laptop's monitor.

I was hoping to blog about the title of this post. But, hey! Let us hear it from the expert.

In a recently posted entry, Marc Andreessen writes about his take on the Facebook Platform. While reading, I felt relief to find out, in not so many words, the gist of what I was going to write about. Here is the salient nut-shell (lifted from his blog, of course):

The web, after all, vanquished proprietary online services like America Online, Prodigy, and Compuserve -- the so-called "walled gardens" -- in large part because the web is a platform and the walled gardens were not. No single closed service, no matter how good, and no matter how big, could compete with the diversity of thousands and then millions of web sites that were customized to every conceivable user interest and need. (Marc Andreessen, "Analyzing the Facebook Platform, three weeks in")

On the money.

This is a portent. A hint of things to come in commerce.

Time to tear the walls down.

Get Everyone Connected!

Now , the Telcos have a very good reason to tell those who have yet to subscribe to a broadband connection... PRONTO!

The reason? The Advent of Relevant Commerce Content.

Low Internet Penetration and the Social-Entertainment Basis of Connection
Based on recent statistics (hopefully, accurate data), there are about 9 million internet users in the Philippines. Majority of these users are hooked up via corporate LANs (quite a number of netizens are call center agents who are voracious consumers of online time and content) and internet cafes.

The important thing, now, is to get people to get their own internet connection... small businesses, most especially, to spur demand for subscription.

The Telcos must look beyond offering promotional discounts to lure new subscribers or to entice dial-up subscribers to upgrade to a broadband service. This tack does not create customer lock-in. Loyalty will be only as good as the next cheaper offering. The only lock-in created by this tactic is the 1 year or 2 year non-cancellation clause which telcos normally demand from new subscribers. Telcos will see increased sales, at the least, but will not create that needed stickiness to have long-time, satisfied customers.

The creation of commerce-driven value-add services that sit on top of broadband offerings will supply the adhesive needed to root customers firmly with the telcos. Broadband connection providers must find ways to go beyond the usual fare of "social" and "entertainment" reasons driving the need to go online (your usual emailing, chatting - through Yahoo and MSN, Friendster, file sharing, bitttorrent downloads, Youtube viewing, etc.).

Let us slightly shift the paradigm, and turn the messaging around to something like... "Start a business for only P775 a month...." Will we get attention?

Allow People to Earn while Online
Let's take a look at my favorite example --- eBay.

I have encountered a considerable number of eBay.ph members --- enterprising Mothers, Students, Employees (some of whom quit their day job to be eBayers full-time!), and, yes, the Unemployed ---- who have devoted a great number of hours online managing their budding and growing online business or "sidelines" through eBay. From mere pre-paid dial-up internet cards, they, without the prodding from the telco giants, saw the need to upgrade their connection speed in order to more efficiently and effectively go about buying and selling their wares online.

The upgrade will come naturally since with an eBay business, one would need to: upload pictures, create new item listings (and relisting), constantly monitor email inquiries, leave feedback, participate in the forum, sending out invoices. This multi-tasking environment demands faster connection if you need to get things done quickly (so that you'll have time for your other chores like washing the dishes, going out to have coffee with friends...).

There are also those individuals or small groups of people with similar interests who put up their own online presence via Wordpress or Multiply. A site called Kikay Exchange, started as a hobby to a band of merry women, mesmerized by the calling of anything "kikay" (Filipino-term denoting the whims and caprices of the female gender). Now, it has grown to be a veritable community with very avid following. I am sure most of those who have visited the site come back for more as different contributors post articles about the latest Mall Sale, Make-up Tips, newest Spa in town, where to get bargain shoes, etc. I believe the next step for these entrepreneuring ladies would be to offer online shopping for their community of users. All these from just the price of an internet connection and a PC.

Possibly, the Last Mile...
The not-yet-so-ubiquitous PC.

Even if prices of broadband connectivity go down to levels that are quite affordable to more people, the cost of acquiring and owning a PC in the Philippines is still a barrier to entry to the online world. If we can find ways to make these PC's more affordable, at least, to the small business owner or to someone who has saved up P15,000, then we will have something to look forward to.

I can only cite the following, which will hopefully help in increasing internet users in the country:

• Intel or AMD, together with Microsoft, come up with a program offering affordable entry level PC's (around the P15,000 to P18,000 range) and laptops (around P25,000 to P30,000 range)
  
• Banks, Credit Card companies, and other financial institutions offer affordable financing schemes to PC / Hardware vendors and the end-consumers
• Private companies offer, as part of employee benefits, a PC or Laptop loan

I am sure that there are other creative and innovative ways to do these. What are your thoughts?

The Useless Doc

To me, one of the useless documents existing on the face of this earth would be that legal piece of sheet called Non-disclosure Agreement. Or NDA, for short. Most especially in the Philippines.

It takes up a lot of time, but isn't going to be any good at all when it comes to it.

This, supposedly, public document essentially aims to prevent parties privy to confidential information (once disclosed to one another, of course, and assuming the information is not yet public knowledge) from divulging or sharing with any body such secret data.

Far too many activities have been stalled by this document. Far too many timelines have been adjusted to accommodate this requirement. How many (and how much, in actual costs) opportunity losses has this created?

What prevents an employee, an officer, a director of an entity, supposedly, covered by the legal spirit of its words from sharing and giving away these confidential sets of info to other interested individuals who may see great value to what was disclosed? A "mole" could easily claim that he picked up the information somewhere... He can claim that the brilliant idea came from a spur of the moment inspiration or that he conjured such great things in a state of genius revelation.

Proving the last two statements may be a difficult task in itself.

I may be naive. I may be too ignorant for that matter. But is a Non-disclosure Agreement truly enforcible under Philippine Laws? How many cases have been successfully prosecuted to levy the requisite punishments to offenders? Or if there have been successful prosecutions, were the punishments levied enough to deter any one or any entity from breaking the law?

No secrets are safe in this part of the world.

The Market is Learning

Finally, the banks have seen the value of cooperating and the wisdom in opening up....

GCash and the Bank of the Philippine Islands (BPI) announced a tie up that will make it possible for GCash users to transfer their GCash funds to their BPI accounts. And vice versa.

It will be now more convenient for those who get paid via GCash as they are now able to transfer the funds from the GCash wallet to their BPI account, and withdraw same through the ATM. And for those who would like to pay someone via GCash, they can now fund their GCash wallets by transferring the funds from, say, their BPI Payroll account to GCash.

This is very good news, indeed, for those who are using GCash as a mode of sending and receiving money for online transactions. I know for a fact that in eBay.ph, this innovative product from GXchange, Inc. (GXi - a subsidiary of Globe Telecom), is the preferred mode of payment.

Most definitely a win-win scenario for both GXchange, Inc. and BPI. GXi can immediately tap BPI funds, thereby effectively extending their reach. Previous to this tie-up, GCash users had to go to a Globe Business Center, or other accredited GCash Merchants, to load their GCash wallets or wait to get paid by someone via P2P payment transactons. On the other hand, BPI will now also be able to entice new account openings from GCash users without a BPI account.

GCash and BPI has finally broken the barrier. Hopefully, this development will spur e-Commerce transactions and lead to more opportunities for would-be and existing enterpreneurs.

UPDATE (06.29.07, 2:12 PM Manila Time):

Fund transfer rates

• GCash to BPI - P70.00 or 1% of transferred amount whichever is higher
• BPI to GCash - P20.00 or 1% of tranferred amount whichever is higher.

The World and I

I am here in a coffee shop, sipping my coffee, and banging away on my keyboard. Who would have thought that just less than a decade ago throngs of people were disconnected from the world, unable to share their thoughts and feelings online?

It used to be that I just pull out a pen, get hold of a table napkin or some piece of scrap paper, and jot down my thoughts. I only carry a pen nowadays. No need for a little notebook in my pocket. Instead, I open my Notebook, connect to the net, and pour out glimpses of inspiration in my head.

This is, actually, a much belated conveyance of what is happening to our connected world right now. Much has been said about the "uploading community" and the "participative" nature of the wired and wireless sphere (or should I say "plane"). Telcos used to worry about how much bandwidth to allocate to subscribers because of the downloading phenomenon just a few years back. With the advent of sites and technology such as Youtube, Bittorrent, Friendster, MySpace, WordPress, Blogger.com, Picasa, Flickr, and the like, the issue was suddenly how to properly allocate bandwidth to accommodate the thirst to upload content.

Yup, everything's suddenly about YOU. Or, more rightly, the "I".

I can now control whatever I like to do. I can now share pictures, prognostications, videos, my outrage at an injustice, observations about the funny and the stupid, my political views on the state of affairs of my country. I can now, most definitely, sell my junk and other valuable little items in a site called eBay. A dear Friend, who is not that technologically savvy, can now establish her own online presence through a website that she made herself. I can now drive traffic to that site by linking it to this blog... or by inserting a hyperlink to her URL.

Online commerce is getting there as well. But presently, only bits and pieces of solutions lay scattered and have yet to be strung together to form one end-to-end, integrated whole.

The next question waiting to be answered is.... How to connect all the connected individuals to the businesses they transact with and consummate that same transaction with a universally accepted payment method.

A quest has been set in motion a few years back. Though still in progress, much has already been achieved. No one's at liberty as of the moment to proclaim the merits of this Grand Project online. Skeptics abound. The fear of the new and the revolutionary still rears its ugly head.

There are a number of visionaries who have and had conjured fantastic innovations. Bill Gates easily comes to mind circa early 80's. Marc Andreesen and Scott McNealy must be mentioned in the same breadth. Pierre Omidyar of eBay fame. Niklas Zennstrom and Janus Friis with Kazaa and Skype. Sergey Brin and Larry Page of Google are the most recent of this lot.

It is quite noticeable that none of these illustrious band of men came from our part of the world. An oriental claim to fame maybe that of the installation of Asia as the business process outsourcing haven (with India and the Philippines leading the pack... soon enough, maybe, China) of the global economy. But this has been more of an afterthought (and the pressing need to scrimp on costs), brought about by the advent of technological progress in the field of communication and software.

Now... What if... Revolutionaries and Visionaries will finally come out from the ranks of Asian thinking men and women? Is that a far-fetched enough reality? Asia, particularly the Philippines, are fermenting grounds of practical innovation. Collectively, the size of our markets dwarf that of the American or the EU economies. India and China alone can take up the cudgels for the rest of its Asian brethren.

What of the Philippines? Can a small nation, with markets dispersed by virtue of its archipelagic geography, a relatively meager population of 80 million, hounded by issues of corruption, bureacracy, lack of legal and intellectual property rights enforcement, and relative poverty, burst out of the pack to lead the world in the field of technology and e-Commerce?

The answers, again, may come soon enough. If only myopic and fear-ridden captains of industry will see the light.

I say this.... "In darkness, you grope hard enough and you'll find Hope."

A cigarette you may find, but a flicker tips its end.

General Ideas on Building Filipino Entrepreneurship

Of late, I have been encountering quite a number of noble efforts and initiatives to build a consciousness on entrepreneurship among Filipinos. It is very encouraging that a great many individuals and groups have been focusing their energies in trying to open varied avenues to support such a drive.

Recent events such as the Go Negosyo Entrepeurship Summit and Expo (organized by the Philippine Center for Entrepreneurship) held last February 2006, Microsoft Philippines' Technopreneur Series (an event where successful IT guys who have put up their businesses get to share their two cents worth with aspiring, young entrepreneurs), and the 15th Philippine Retailers Association Expo (where a small Filipino-owned IT company showcased a POS software that can accept payments from the mobile phone and an internet connected PC) have helped provide a groundswell of awareness to the merits of having one's own business.

Resource materials on basic and advanced How To's in doing business line up the shelves of any bookstore and magazine stands (even convenience stores like 7-11 and Mini-Stop carry these reading materials). I recently heard about a new magazine that will focus on the businesses of small and medium sized companies will soon publish its maiden issue.

eBay Philippines

On a personal level, I have observed this rise in consciousness and the overt effort into entrepreneurship in my active participation in eBay Philippines. I have seen the growth of the online auction giant's member base since its entry into the local scene two years ago. There are a great number of Filipinos who "sidelines" selling in eBay.ph (happily disposing of stuff they don't use at home anymore or selling "duplicate" gifts they've received from friends and relatives or quietly indulging their appetite for entrepreneurship which they can't do since they are being tied down by their 9 to 5 job) and a respectable number who have built reputable "online stores" full time (mostly housewives, work-at-home Moms). I have talked to a few who are considering of quitting their day job to concentrate on selling through eBay.

This is a strong indication that Filipinos are, once again, finding ways to address the pinch.

Let the flower of entrepreneurship bloom

From what I have seen so far, the ingredients are all in place. It is now a matter of putting these ingredients together to come up with a very palatable dish to satisfy the palates of the Filipino entrepreneur. It is, also, now a matter of getting the government, both national and local, to enact laws that will make it easy for Filipinos to put up businesses (this, of course, should be done with strict attention to enforcing the proper balance between the substance of the law and the "ease" on doing business) and to obtain financing to fund the business. *Note: More on these in subsequent posts.

The private sector, on the other hand, should come up with services that will benefit the multitude of would-be and existing entrepreneurs through the provision of reasonably cheap packages that will aid in the creation and sustenance of businesses. The telcos can be at the forefront of this initiative by offering competitive and cost-effective product / service bundles for connectivity (i.e. internet, SMS, GPRS, 3G, etc.) as well as business content for both the SMS and the internet medium.

Presently, an estimated 85% of all SMS message are used for personal communication. The same could be said about content for individual Filipino internet users who, mostly, use the internet for chatting (Yahoo! Messenger and Groups), social networking (Friendster, MySpace), email, and just plain surfing (News, Sports, Entertainment). By providing a good reason for using the SMS and internet medium for business and offering lower rates for access to such, the telcos can benefit as well through increased traffic. Hence, more revenues.

The private sector, through the above-cited symposiums, events, and seminars, is headed in the right direction in generating interest in entrepreneurship. Let's all hope the individuals and the groups behind this effort are able to sustain such in the long run. These can then be followed up by more specific seminars that will focus on shoring up the technical and business expertise to run a business. Awareness is not enough. The eagerness, I believe is there. What these new entrepreneurs and those that are already in business will need are tools to equip them to manage the business effectively and profitably.

No News Until Now

We've been waiting for that time when the herald of glad tidings come a-knocking on our red door. Still no news about the Gate's opening.

I am starting to wonder why it is so. Why the delay?

Is it simply a case of an innovative solution arriving way ahead of its time? Is it simply because of entrenched beliefs and habits finding no incentive to pull itself out of the comforts of stability? Probably, it is a matter of one protecting its turf while trying ways to cough up a solution nowhere near what is being offered on the table.

Questions are still left unanswered. More question marks line up the face of an almost empty plate.

When such a brilliant, yet simple solution to a pressing problem of commerce is already available, and no one is, at all, seemingly interested, then we have a problem. This is a problem that will most likely send shivers to the inner confidences that we have. When this happens, you begin to question the very idea of your crusade, which you have fueled with so much passion and resolve.

The very portrait you have pictured in your mind starts to dissipate in a cloud of haze... becoming nothing more than an illusion as the ticks and the tocks go by.

Nonetheless, you hold on. There's nothing left to do, but hold on.

I hate to say this... but... yes... Let's just hope for the best.