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Where leaping to conclusions is my primary form of forward motion.
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Rethinking Skype Conference Call Scenario
Meetup.com Cuts Freebies, Charges $230/year
Monday, April 18, 2005
No Free Lunch - Even In Norway
NYT: Interesting story on the "world's richest country," the Scandinavian welfare state, real economic growth across the EU, and how it all compares to the US. Good background reading for those wailing about the evils of a market economy and longing for the loving embrace of a government-funded social system. Four key paragraphs:[...]
All this was illuminated last year in a study by a Swedish research organization, Timbro, which compared the gross domestic products of the 15 European Union members (before the 2004 expansion) with those of the 50 American states and the District of Columbia. (Norway, not being a member of the union, was not included.)
After adjusting the figures for the different purchasing powers of the dollar and euro, the only European country whose economic output per person was greater than the United States average was the tiny tax haven of Luxembourg, which ranked third, just behind Delaware and slightly ahead of Connecticut.
The next European country on the list was Ireland, down at 41st place out of 66; Sweden was 14th from the bottom (after Alabama), followed by Oklahoma, and then Britain, France, Finland, Germany and Italy. The bottom three spots on the list went to Spain, Portugal and Greece.
Alternatively, the study found, if the E.U. was treated as a single American state, it would rank fifth from the bottom, topping only Arkansas, Montana, West Virginia and Mississippi. In short, while Scandinavians are constantly told how much better they have it than Americans, Timbro's statistics suggest otherwise. So did a paper by a Swedish economics writer, Johan Norberg. [...]
Terry Frazier at 10:14 AM
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Saturday, April 16, 2005
Rethinking Skype Conference Call Scenario
Skype Journal has me rethinking my opinion on Skype conference calls. As usual, I was thinking inside-the-box and viewing conference calls as requiring individual endpoint origination (participants should call into the conference.) Of course, with SkypeOut I can originate the conference and connect all parties. I had some initial resistance to the idea of having to pay for calls here in the states, having gotten used to calling anywhere in the US from my cell phone without additional fees. But SkypeOut's $.02/minute rate is less than half the lowest conference calling service I've seen, and the hassle factor is lower. Not requiring participants to remember a special number and passcode is a good thing.I'm still having lots of trouble with the 1.2.0.41 client, and Skype have not bothered to answer my support request. But once I get that cleared up I'll be adding some SkypeOut minutes and trying the conference calling feature. I'll still be adding the VoIP line for my main business number, but the Skype scenario is promising.
Terry Frazier at 12:25 AM
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Thursday, April 14, 2005
Meetup.com Cuts Freebies, Charges $230/year
Meetup.com has put away the teat. It will be interesting to see if this starts a spiral down into nothingness.We have some news to share that we don't think you're going to like. There's no point in dancing around it so here it is. Starting May 1st, every Meetup Group will have to pay a monthly fee. Read on for the details.
How much? If your group starts paying in April, the charge is $9/month for the rest of the year. (If you wait until May 1st it goes up to $19/month). The substantial discount (more than 50%) is a "thank you" for being one of the first Meetup Groups.
Nine dollars?! To some, $9 every month may sound like a lot for an Organizer to pay, but remember, it's a group fee, not per person. If the Organizer splits the cost among the members who show up each month, it's probably $1 - $2 per person.
With a Thank You like that, I'm not sure Meetup users need any enemies. "Only $1 or $2 per user" is a tired, overused ploy that just doesn't work. Hundreds of internet services have died on the premise they could get a few pennies a day per user. I'm sure Meetup has lots of user stats and something makes them believe, however vaguely, they can pull this off. I don't know. I sure don't have the smarts of someone like Esther Dyson or the other backers, but this is such a drastic change that, to my cynical mind, it smells like VCs at DFJ have tightened the screws to get some profits rolling at any cost - maybe to pretty it up financially to try and unload it or something.
Meetup has never really taken off here in the south and maybe that colors my view. This will be interesting to watch.
Terry Frazier at 8:35 PM
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