Chris Sacca's 'What is left?'

Will Ads & Instant Gratification Save Us?

The TED Conference officially kicks off today in Monterey and already this small town is abuzz with the good intentions and lofty goals of the actively curious and benevolent who find their way here each year.  There is a palpable energy, with ambitious and inspired social entrepreneurs preaching their messages and appealing for support and collaboration.

Last night, at a pre-party thrown by Google (thanks for the invite!) I was treated to a host of intriguing conversations aimed at addressing social problems including personal health, disease, fossil-fuel addiction, drug discovery and the like. One after another, TEDsters shared staggering insights from their work and research and were now hoping to start projects to get this information more widely disseminated to the masses so we can all start taking care of ourselves and our planet and living better.

Despite the laudable aims of these efforts, I have a major concern and it has taken me a while to admit it: I don't think we, as humans and citizens, have been trained to be good decision-makers. In fact, any instincts we did have to make good choices have been systematically neutered. In an advertising-driven realm, we have consistently been programmed to allocate our thoughts, resources, and energy to satisfy perversely short-term cravings, invariably at the expense of longer term benefit and this behavior has been rewarded by the delights of instant gratification and pleasure-associative feedback.

If it's easy, and it works, high usage shouldn't be a surprise

With interest, I read recent accounts of Google's new mobile leader, former MSFT exec Vic Gundotra, exclaiming his shock that iPhone users sent fifty times the number of queries to Google than other mobile device users. "We thought it was a mistake and made our engineers check the logs again,” he relayed to the Financial Times.

Yet, when I discussed this theme with former colleagues at Google and others, no one else seemed as moved or surprised as Gundotra, nor did they think it was the result of anything new the Google mobile team had done. Instead, I hypothesize, there are two reasons for the high query numbers:

a) iPhone hardcoded Google queries right into the navigational chrome of their mobile browser. When using iPhone's browser, you have two navigational options. You can either enter a URL or directly search Google. Because the iPhone spellchecker does not autocorrect entries when entering 'Net addresses, it is often easier just to enter a query and navigate by the results. The traditional process of using Google on a mobile device used to be

1) launch mobile browser and wait for carrier homepage to load
2) direct browser to google.com (or m.google.com or the like) and wait for page to load
3) enter query

iPhone's configuration reduces this to one step

1) enter query (browser is already on and queries will be directed automatically to Google)

Mitigating all of that user effort and creating a concrete funnel for queries would very predictably increase total search volume, and hats off to whomever on the Google partner team secured this placement. However, I think the more important aspect is the second half of this equation, the browser itself.

b) iPhone users have access to a full Internet browser allowing users to surf anywhere, even if slowly. Having higher confidence that search results pages will be accessible and readable has dramatically inclined users toward querying in the first place. In the same way that Flash finally made users feel comfortable clicking on video links, iPhone users feel increasingly sure that the page resulting from their search will be worthwhile, despite the relatively slow network connectivity.

I am no Apple fanboy and I will not heap unqualified praise on the otherwise closed device Jobs and AT&T launched. Forbidding the download and installation of third party applications is something against which I have rallied consumers and lawmakers. However, I will give credit where credit is due.

Until this year, American consumers have known their mobile devices almost exclusively as a means for 1) making calls 2) sending texts and MMS 3) buying ringtones and, 4) in the case of Blackberry devices, sending and receiving email. Thanks to the iPhone, Americans are now realizing they have the Internet in their pocket. 

Channeling Decision-makers

For reasons I won't get into here, before the Microsoft bid to buy Yahoo, I had been spending a lot of time learning about Yahoo and considering its prospects.  In parallel, during the days preceding their latest earnings release, a number of journalists had been interviewing me for perspectives on Yahoo and, specifically, Jerry Yang and his management style as perceived by competitors. Most of the pending stories were likely shelved to make room for extended takeover coverage. Yet, there was one insight that the occurred to me that I thought was worth sharing nevertheless:

At Google, Eric, Larry, and Sergey are ultimately responsible for the decision-making. There is no doubt about that. Nothing significant can get done without their buy-in, and they come to unanimity with remarkable frequency. Yet, in a company of 16,000+ people, it just isn't possible to have ELS (their much more efficient moniker within Google) weigh in at every stage of the product conception, creation, distribution, and refinement process.

Instead, those guys have done a remarkable job (with the help of many around them) of building a core set of principles and ideas that embody what Google believes and how individual products can serve Google's mission. This codification and notes from discussions as to how it was applied in each case are then shared liberally throughout the company. In most cases while big decisions are being made, in addition to 6-12 senior executives at the table engaging the presenting team, there are usually 10 or so junior people in the periphery of the room watching and learning from the exchange as well. If that isn't enough, the triumvirate is available on stage at the weekly TGIF all-hands meeting to close any gaps in understanding.

The result is that product managers and engineers working on new efforts can almost channel Eric, Larry, or Sergey and role play how the discussion might unfold with them in the room. (One Googler executive I spoke to about this observation wanted to know how soon before there was a Larry Page Ouija board to actually channel him. Hmm, good idea.) By the time product and related decisions bubble up to the big guys there tend to be fewer surprises and the level of debate and discussion is more informed. Sure, there are anomalous outcomes, but generally Googlers walking into executive meetings understand what Google is aiming to accomplish and if ELS are likely to support the proposed path to that end.

From what I hear from friends at Yahoo, there is no consistent and universal sense of Yahoo's mission, let alone a consistent sense of how the brass will think about things. From a variety of folks, I heard that the company used to be logjammed at the top and the decision-making process was opaque, with only conclusions being communicated. It was thus extremely difficult to build an institutional sense for how outcomes were reached and how to presage such events in the future.

In an attempt to create a more nimble organization, decision-making was distributed deeper into the ranks among what Kara Swisher has reported to be in excess of 300 vice presidents at Yahoo. Yet, without any common feel for what the company's goals and values were, and as a result of alarming inconsistencies in how each of the newly minted decision-makers perceived Yahoo's future, Yahoos have had no reliable compass by which to guide their efforts. The impact on Yahoo morale has been palpable.

I won't begin to speculate as to how the new bosses at Microhoo might deal with this issue, but I am curious to hear your thoughts.

 

Big Company, Small Company

Google has done a better job of any outfit I know at retaining a small company feeling despite massive growth in its employee ranks. The shared information, distributed decision-making, and entrepreneurial encouragement all give Googlers a stronger start-up sense than has ever been possible while juggling 16,000+ employees. Just how many people is that? Click here to get a staggering sense thanks to Google Blogoscoped.

Yet, despite Google's efforts, it is nearly futile to replicate the nimbleness and commitment to execution that one finds in a startup where the three coders all live and work in the same apartment. Case in point, this email exchange lifted from the blog of my portfolio company, Auctomatic.com:

On Feb 7, 2008, at 2:12 AM, Vincent wrote:

Hi,

I just found your site. It looks nice but I have a question: do you support ebay NL (Netherlands) ?
Regards,

Vincent

Yes, that is 2:12 AM Pacific Time. Most of us are asleep, but the Auctomatic boys have just fired up another bowl of ramen and are on top of things:

On Feb 7, 2008, at 2:23 AM, Harjeet Taggar wrote:

Hi Vincent,

Thanks for your email. We did not support eBay Netherlands ten minutes ago, but we’ve worked on it since your email, and support is now available—please test it out, and let us know how you’re finding Auctomatic.

We’re adding new features all the time, so please do feel free to drop me an email with any feedback you have.

Thanks,

Harjeet

Come on! At 2:23 AM, within eleven minutes of the original request these guys added international site support and got back to the user!

I love startups and I love Auctomatic.

Snowkiting with CRV

Every venture capital firm here in the Valley has its own approach to staying connected to entrepreneurs, early stage investors, and likely acquirers. Some teams throw lavish parties, some hold retreats with motivational speakers, others just woo folks with the old faithful dinner and wine routine. Thanks to Bill Tai and Saar Gur, Charles River Ventures has taken a very different approach: kite junkets.

Bill started the tradition a few years ago when he invited a couple dozen folks from Silicon Valley to join him and a smattering of professional kitesurfers in Maui for a few days of riding perfect winds in warm water and geeking out about technology whenever the winds were light. The trip was an instant hit with folks of varying kitesurfing abilities making the trek to Maui and learning one of the more thrilling sports I have experienced. I was lucky enough to be invited last year and had an unqualified blast.

This weekend, the CRV guys outdid themselves, however, as they invited a group of us to join them in Utah for a weekend of snowkiting. Yeah. Kitesurfing on snow!

We were buried in fascinating amounts of snow during the trip, making the entire venture difficult. Nevertheless, thanks to capable guides like the trio who kited Mavericks and the Farallons, Jeff Kafka, Chips Wasson, and Steve Gibson, we were soon being whipped around an 11,000 foot ridge outside of Mt. Pleasant, UT.

Kiting on show is surreal as it is possible to travel in all four directions, including heading uphill! That said, the stakes are raised when jumping and crashing as hard ground tends not to be as forgiving as water. Ouch.

I will skip over a detailed review of what transpires when two dozen adrenaline junkie nerds descend upon a quiet Mormon town's sole watering hole and encounter a one man band who we soon convert to a karaoke format. Let's just say that the power of rock was palpable.

On Sunday, the snow came down even harder making kiting at high elevation impossible due to lack of visibility. Discouraged, we pulled stakes to head for some resort skiing in Little Cottonwood Canyon. Along the way up Interstate 15, Chip scoped out a large field just off the road in Draper, UT and thought it might be worth throwing up some kites. Far from the wonderfully isolated park in which we had kited the day before, let me be clear. This was a 10 acre field just off the road with a Cabela's superstore on one side and the neighborhood embodiment of the subprime mortgage crisis on the other. In fact, our field was probably intended to be "Phase 2" of the development before the financing dried up.

Needless to say, kiting in suburbia was a hoot. Chip, Steve, P-Air Wolff, and I pumped up our kites and cheered as each of them took to the sky. Dozens of trucks (people in Utah don't drive cars, it seems) pulled over to make heads or tails of what these wahoos were doing. We ripped back and forth, popped airs, and laughed out loud for a couple of hours. Such a memorable day.  To make it even better, Steve let me know he has officially named the spot "Subprimes."

All told, I love new adventures and snowkiting was no exception. More than just the individual thrill, there is something so incredible about tackling fresh challenges with friends. On this trip, I made some great new pals and got closer to some old ones. Thanks again to Bill and Saar for putting this together and I look forward to seeing you all on the snow, or the water, soon.