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The Allens Posts

The demise of the checkout counter?

John Stewart wrote a piece called Payments Execs Already Foresee the Store Checkout Yielding to ‘Uberesque Approach’ where he identifies a number of situations where the traditional in store checkout process is disappearing.

Technology already exists that allows customers to order ahead and pay, to order while standing in the aisle in front of the merchandise, and to pay for services like car rides without an actual checkout. Now some see these processes ultimately rendering in-store checkouts obsolete.

This is an interesting take on the demise of the checkout counter. I can see this happening in situations where the customer knows what they want and there isn’t any value in standing in line to pay (Starbucks) or the transaction is essentially pre-approved via some other action (Uber).

The take and bake pizza chain Papa Murphy’s has introduced online ordering with a separate counter to pick up pre-paid internet orders. The convenience for me is fantastic, but I wonder if the overall store revenue will go down due to the lost opportunity to upsell at the time of checkout. Obviously you can do this in the mobile app – time will tell which is more effective.

I would really love to see this in my grocery store. Standing in line so the cashier can handle everything I’ve already put in my cart is something I wouldn’t miss.

I really don’t see this in markets where the final price is unknown or the customer is looking for advice/expertise. Automotive repair springs to mind as the technician needs to evaluate the vehicle and discuss with the customer what work they want done and how they will pay for it.

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Why Uber and Tesla are not “disruptive” companies

“Disruptive” is another one of those word that get thrown around and gets applied to everything.

Disruption theory as described originally by Clay Christensen has 3 parts:

  1. Customer dependence – low end, niche market, incumbents don’t care about or don’t see. The existing solutions are overkill and too expensive for the customer.
  2. Fundamentally different business model – allows you to serve the niche market profitably.
  3. There is a technological accelerator (enabling technology) – allows you to serve the mainstream with the new business model.

Disruption theory describes a pathway of how a small startup can succeed against dominant incumbents. It doesn’t describe the impact to the market. Building a better mousetrap is not disruptive.

Let’s take a look at Uber.

  1. Is Uber selling to a low end market that the taxi companies were unwilling to serve? Nope, the number of rides in New York has been constant before and after Uber showed up.
  2. Does Uber have a fundamentally different business model? Maybe, using privately owned vehicles, but still charging per mile.
  3. Is there an enabling technology? Doesn’t matter since they are not moving from an underserved niche to the mainstream.

How about Tesla?

  1. Is Tesla selling to a low end market that other car makers don’t care about? Nope, this is the primary market for Mercedes, Lexus and BMW.
  2. Does Tesla have a fundamentally different business model? Nope.
  3. Is there an enabling technology? Doesn’t matter since they are not moving from an underserved niche to the mainstream.

A lot of this content was spurred by an interview with Michael Raynor on the A16z podcast.

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What is the Sharing Economy?

You Keep Using That Word, I Do Not Think It Means What You Think It Means

The “sharing economy” it is a phrase being thrown around a lot and has a pleasant connotation – after all didn’t your mom tell your that sharing is nice?

But what is it really? Say I need to get downtown for a meeting. In the old days I might call you up and ask for a ride or you might loan me the car for a couple of hours. But only if it didn’t conflict with your need for the car.

Enter Uber. Uber is a car “sharing” service. You create an account with Uber, then when you need a ride somewhere you use the app to request a ride. Someone then shows up and drives you to your destination – for a price.

The last time I checked sharing didn’t require payment. Also how is this different than calling a taxi service?

Airbnb is a home “sharing” service. But it really isn’t any different than any of the other short term rental services than have been available for decades.

What is really going on is that it has become effective to set up two sided markets since both those who have something (suppliers) and those who need something (consumers) are now online. The company setting up the market provides an easy way for the 2 parties to connect. Given enough suppliers there will always be availability for the consumer. Since the job of the company is to ensure there are plenty of suppliers for the consumers rather than purchasing and maintaining the product there is little overhead other than marketing.

Even this isn’t a new concept. I once did some work for a company whose product was a catalog of other companies that had manufacturing waste such as scrap steel and construction debris. They spent all day on the phone calling other businesses looking for someone who wanted these things. What is different now is the cost of finding these people.

What is new is that since it is so cheap to connect suppliers and consumers now it becomes effective to rent items that are less expensive. I don’t have to have a fleet of cars, I can just rent the one I have and only when I want to. The market of suppliers provides coverage when I am unavailable.

All the suppliers are also listed in one place (not really since there are competitors to Uber) so it is easy to find one. Additionally there is typically a reputation system so that both the supplier and the consumer can rate each other. This keeps the system in balance and encourages both parties to be nice and do a good job. However, that reputation is only good for that market. I can’t take my Uber rider reputation and use it at DogVacay.com.

I get that the term “sharing economy” is here to stay, and that’s fine. But the next time I share my cookies with you expect a bill.

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What I look for in a Remote Employee

I hire technical people primarily. Each position has a number of key technologies that need to be accounted for. I use the “audition” approach wherein the candidate does what I actually want them to do as an employee (e.g. write code). I’m not all that interested in how well they interview (although it does helps me understand their soft skills).

Hiring in-person  for a position in our office is different than hiring a remote employee who will interview and work remotely.

Beyond the basic technical abilities which are teased out during the audition the key traits in a remote employee I’m looking for are:

  • Good communication – not too little and not too much, gets clarification when needed.
  • Follows direction – we do things a certain way for a reason, but we are open to change if it improves things.
  • Experience as a freelancer or a remote employee.
  • Proactive – doesn’t wait for permission to do what they know is necessary.
  • Willing to take and act on feedback – they will do something wrong at some point and we will tell them so, what they do next is key.
  • English skills – they don’t need to be Shakespeare, but we shouldn’t always be requesting clarification.
  • Workspace – good internet, good computer, dedicated quiet place to work.
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Electric Vehicles and Infinite Torque

I’ve seen/heard a couple of references to electric vehicles having “infinite torque” and something seems to be lost in translation. What they are referring to is that electric motors have “peak torque” available at 0 RPM. Essentially their torque curve is flat unlike internal combustion engines.

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Image courtesy of evdrive.com

Note that the torque curve doesn’t stay flat forever, eventually the limitations of physics prevent that.

Below is a comparison of a Tesla Roadster and Chevy Camero from automobilemag.com

0911_10_z+camaro_rs_vs_tesla_roadster+dyno_results

The following graph shows the torque each car’s rear wheels experience during an all-out run from a stop. The dips in the Camaro’s torque are the shifts between gears, which happen quite quickly and are among the smoothest you’ll see. Note that the Tesla has no interruptions. Between 0 and 55 mph, the Tesla is the clear winner, even though by 40 mph, the Tesla’s AC motor output begins diminishing.

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Windows Services Running as Local System and Environment Variables

As sometimes happens I installed an application on a Windows server and several days later another program stopped working.

I did my research and was able to determine that the installer for this new program had altered my PATH variable such that a specific DLL was now loading from the wrong place with an incompatible version causing the old program to stop working. Fix the path – everything works. All in a day’s work.

Except…

While I was able to successfully run the program from the command prompt the actual use was different. In fact this program was called from an Apache module that was shelling out to it. In this context the program was still failing. After checking to see if there was some Apache setting that was controlling the PATH variable and finding out that you can’t actually change environment variables in Apache on Windows I was able to confirm that the PATH value in the Apache context was different than the system PATH.

Now I knew that if you change the system PATH you need to close and reopen your command windows to reinitialize the environment variables so I assumed that restarting the Apache service would cause the same thing to happen. Not so much.

As it turns out my Apache service was running as Local System and evidently all the environment variables are set at startup time. That meant I needed to reboot the server. Unfortunately I can’t do that until our maintenance window several days from now and people need the function to work today.
Luckily there were several layers of code between Apache and the actual program that was failing. One layer was a C# application, so making use of the Environment.SetEnvironmentVariable("PATH", newPath, EnvironmentVariableTarget.Process) and then shelling out I was able to temporarily change the PATH to something that will work.

Now I just need to remember I did this 2 years from now when something else changes…

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Who, what, when, why, how

I’ve written in a number of places before, but as time marches on previous locations make less sense than they use to. This is my new spot.

  • Who: I’m Wayne.
  • What: I run software based businesses.
  • When: I started my professional journey in 1989 when I went full time in my own software contracting/consulting company.
  • Why: I like solving problems and helping people.
  • How: I am a pragmatist. I have an affinity towards agile/lean

There of course is more to a person than what they do professionally

  • I’m happily married with 2 great kids
  • I enjoy reading science fiction, riding motorcycles and brewing beer (not all at the same time).
  • I’ve traveled more than the average bear, but less than some. I plan on traveling more.
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