The Software Industry Conference gets underway in earnest.

After a good, and much needed, night of sleep, I awoke reasonably early, thanks primarily to a two hour time difference between Denver and home. Although I do not regularly eat breakfast, I made a point of going to the lobby to see what the conference had to offer. Alas, there were apparently no sponsors for breakfasts this year, so the spread was the standard “continental breakfast” provided free at almost every roadside motel (although I am sure that the SIAF got nicked good for it). Lacking the tasty omelets of years past, I decided not to eat.

Instead of breakfast, I decided to visit and check out the hospitality suite for the ASP (Association of Shareware Professionals), since I am on the Board of Directors. It was nice to have a place to sit down and relax, and this was the first time I saw the new ASP “20th Anniversary” T-shirts, as well as the cool USB rechargeable flashlight giveaways. A decision had been made to forgo the usual booth at exhibit night in favor of this room, and I was suitably impressed. (The food there was almost the same as upstairs, too.)

Unlike previous years, the SIC 2007 schedule did not include any “must see” sessions, and even among the ones that looked interesting, I did not have any conflicts (with two desirable sessions running at any given time). This is not to say that there was nothing worthwhile, however. I was looking forward to hearing from Bob Walsh, of 47 Hats, and David Intersimone (a.k.a., “DavidI”) of CodeGear (nee Borland), who were both attending/speaking for the first time, as well as several repeat speakers who are always entertaining and informative.

The first session I attended was Blogging for Your Business, presented by Bob Walsh. If his name sounds familiar (other than from the previous paragraph), it is probably due to his excellent book, Micro-ISV: From Vision to Reality. This session, though, he was speaking about good blogging practices, another topic on which he has “written the book” recently. The main takeaway points of this talk, for me, were that one should write on consistent topics and post regularly, two guidelines that I violate liberally here. A couple of tips given were to write news roundups and have a few “timeless” (i.e., not time critical) articles written in advance. One of the last comments, during Q&A, was that a blog author should not regularly put pictures of his cats on his blog (“for instance”); some of us had a good idea from whence that example was drawn.

As a bonus, Bob gave out copies of his new blogging book, Clear Blogging: How People Are Changing the World and How You Can Join Them, to a few worthy attendees. One of the recipients was Ben Weintraub, of Merit Software, with whom I was sitting and who was kind enough to pass the book on to me. I plan to review it in a future posting (even if the book tells me not to do so). Thanks, again, Ben.

I skipped all of the sessions in the middle of the day, spending most of my time hanging out in the ASP hospitality suite, where we had a leadership meeting during lunchtime. Later, I went to the session by David Intersimone, Native Code Application Development – Tools for ISV(s)/MicroISV(s). It was a knowledgeable presentation, but, alas, not terribly enlightening for me (being experienced with development tools). The primary point was that there is definitely a place for native code development and that CodeGear, at least, was not going to abandon us real programmers entirely for .NET anytime soon.

The evening reception, as usual, was hosted by Digital River, who seem to be renaming their e-commerce solutions to DR globalDirect, not that this changes any of their questionable practices or is even reflected on the web site yet (suggesting the relative importance of smaller ISVs in their long term plans). The more significant news, though, is they they do learn, albeit slowly; after two years of ridiculously loud music, this reception almost allowed people to actually talk to each other. The one mistake, however, was that the county fair-themed events included “ring the bell”, so every few seconds there was a loud crash of a hammer (almost never followed by a bell sound).

As the reception ended, some activity moved into the hotel bar…

The Software Industry Conference began today.

As previously mentioned, I chose to drive to Denver, Colorado from my home/office in East Lansing, Michigan, which is (according to MapQuest) a distance of 1220 miles. If the directions were to be believed, the drive should have taken just under 18 hours, though I took a few excursions and at least one decent nap. My total travelling time was about 29 hours (or 27 in local time, since I moved two time zones West). From Michigan, I passed through Indiana, Illinois, Iowa, and Nebraska on my way to Colorado.

For the sake of European comparison, this journey was slightly longer than driving from London, England to Stockholm, Sweden, passing through France, Belgium, The Netherlands, Germany, and Denmark en route.

After killing several hours at Colorado’s Jackson Lake State Park, I rolled into the conference hotel at about 4:00pm local time, which gave me time to check in and move my luggage to my room before conference registration closed for the day. Alas, it did not provide enough time for a good rest before the first event, at 6:00pm, so I got registered and just had a much needed shower.

SIC began with a reception, sponsored by Protexis, in the Centennial on the top (12th) floor of the Hyatt Regency Tech Center. Fortunately, the weather was somewhat overcast, which alleviated the problem of blinding sunlight experienced in years past. I wore my Zombie shirt, since the trip had me feeling like a zombie. I talked with people… networked… schmoozed…

The main rumor was that about half of the conference attendees were newbies and the other half were “old timers”, with the latter group including some who had only been to SIC in Denver (i.e., the past two years).

After the reception, I spent some time in a business meeting with Fred Clabuesch, the Treasurer for the ASP (Association of Shareware Professionals), learning the details of a new initiative to be launched for the benefit of the shareware industry. There will be more written on that once it is ready for public announcement.

Finally, I came to the most important part of the day. I slept (well).

This week I will be attending this conference in Denver, Colorado.

The Software Industry Conference, previously known as the Shareware Industry Conference (and the Summer Shareware Seminar before that), takes place this year from July 12th through the 14th, according to the web site. In truth, it begins with a reception on July 11th [tomorrow] and ends with a farewell breakfast on July 15th [Sunday].

With its renaming, this is either the First Ever or the 17th Annual Software Industry Conference, depending on how one chooses to count. Fortunately, the Shareware Industry Awards retains its previous name. Even more fortunately, our game, Pretty Good MahJongg, has been nominated for an SIA this year. The awards banquet is the last major event of the conference, on Saturday evening.

Aside from the new name, the other big story going into SIC is the number of regulars who have chosen to stay home this year. This list of non-attendees is led by Eric Isaacson (of ZIPKEY), who has never missed one prior to this year. Also, Thomas Warfield (of Goodsol Development) and my family opted out this year as well, leaving me in an otherwise empty vehicle on the road to Denver.

Honestly, I seriously considered not attending myself, but the nomination for Pretty Good MahJongg, as well as several industry friends who are going to be there, mean that I will be departing on the 1220 mile drive shortly.

Post your announcements to ‘comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.announce’.

Back in April, the Usenet powers that be (a.k.a., The Big-8 Management Board) began a discussion about removing the newsgroup, comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.announce. It made some sense, given that there had been a moderator vacancy and no legitimate messages posted in seven years (and only the Internet PC Games Charts for a couple years before that). It made me feel like a greybeard, given that I have been subscribed to that newsgroup since it was previously active.

Long story short: I volunteered to be the new moderator of that group, a unique game marketing resource, and “the people who decide these things” (in the words of Brian Epstein) appointed me to that position. Now, I am the sole and official moderator for that group. The next step is to increase content and readership.

The beauty of using Usenet for marketing is that it is essentially free, making it one of those easy steps that an independent game publisher can take to get additional exposure for its titles. Google Groups carries comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.announce, so your announcement is searchable there and quickly incorporated into the Google index as well.

This is an announcement group, rather than a discussion group, so messages will stand on their own, though the (unmoderated) ‘comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.misc’ discussion group provides an outlet for conversations. For shareware authors, there are other software announcement groups on Usenet, but none that cater specifically to games, so this is an opportunity to be noticed.

Here is the official charter for csipga (as it is known for short):

This newsgroup is for announcements that are useful to the entire PC computer gaming population, including but not limited to new release announcements, software publisher news, bug information, and PC game reviews. Followups will be directed to comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.misc, or another appropriate subgroup at the moderator’s discretion.

In practical terms, I will likely approve almost any message as long as it relates to PC gaming (not in a cheap spam way) under Windows, DOS, Linux, or even Mac OS X if I am feeling generous. Press releases are encouraged, as well as product announcements that may not warrant a full press release. Note also that game reviews are allowed, so it is perfectly acceptable to have a satisfied customer post a glowing game review (though it should come directly from the author, not via the publisher).

The first independent game publisher to take advantage of this opportunity was Ilya Olevsky of Valen Games, announcing the release of their new financial strategy game, Lunar Domination. I have had the pleasure of “speaking” with Ilya and my son did some beta testing on this title. If you enjoy strategy games, I urge you to check out this game, which follows in the beta traditions of the genre. It is available for Windows 2000/XP/Vista, Linux (all distributions), and Mac OS X (coming soon).

I look forward to more announcement approvals in short order.

My Usenet provider deserves a positive mention here.

In this world (and even in this blog), it is much more common to hear or read complaints about companies than praise for them. Therefore, I wanted to start a new series of ‘Kudos‘ reports to provide kind words about those who do a good job and, more importantly, run a business with respect for customers, as I try to run mine.

I have been using SuperNews to provide public newsgroup access for many (at least 5) years now. I switched when I was forced to change ISPs due to a service change from my then provider Comcast. (Do not look for a Kudos column on them any time soon.) My new SDSL provider did not advertise a newsgroup server, and for good reason: theirs was terrible. I needed to keep up to date on certain Usenet groups, so I found SuperNews and paid for a month or two of service.

After the initial monthly period, I was convinced that it was worthwhile to get an annual (text-only) account, which worked out to something like $5 per month. The servers were fast and always available, while the groups were fairly spam-free (compared to my previous experience). More importantly, the moderated shareware newsgroups, comp.software.shareware.*, were set up and working correctly. After the first year, I set up automatic annual billing to a company credit card and just used the service without incident.

Earlier this year, the aforementioned credit card expired, which precipitated a number of “your credit card has expired” warnings from various companies (some of whom should not, in my opinion, have saved the number in the first place). I did not, however, hear from SuperNews because, as I discovered later, I apparently opted out of receiving such email messages. Then, the inevitable happened…

A while ago, I tried to check the newsgroups and was unable to log in, and since I actually use this service to test whether or not the DSL line is working, I immediately thought that the squirrels had (once again) wreaked more havoc on my connectivity. However, on my second try (after verifying the DSL connection), I noticed that there was an error message that actually included an URL to explain the problem.

I went to the provided URL, logged in using the newsgroup password, and confirmed that the expired card was the only issue. Then I typed in the new card number and expiration date, pressed a button to confirm and approve the charge and then had instantaneous access to the news server as before. In fact, it happened so fast that I logged into our corporate account tied to the card and verified that the charge had already gone through. It was at that point I noticed that the annual charge had, without fanfare, gone down by $10.

The amazing thing about this event was that it occurred in the wee hours of the morning (around 3:00am) and the entire transaction took less than three minutes. It took me longer to look up my newsgroup password then it did to fix the problem, so I am now spending the time saved by not having to call anybody, or wait for the morning, or await an email in the quasi-standard “24-48 hours” support timeframe for other companies, to tell you how much I actually enjoyed spending that money with SuperNews. Kudos to them.

Additionally, I had a recent experience in which I was communicating with a group of people to work out how to moderate a Usenet newsgroup, from a technical standpoint. As it turns out, SuperNews requires a special moderator flag to be set on an account, lest one be evicted for spamming (due to posting messages under multiple names). One member of the group happened to be an employee of SuperNews and he noticed that I was a customer, so he went in and set the flag for me without being asked; in fact, I did not even know it was necessary until he had already (preemptively) resolved the issue. Now that is great customer service.

Obviously, for anybody looking for a reliable news server to access Usenet and other publicly propagated newsgroups (such as those from Microsoft and other small countries), I strongly recommend SuperNews. If you do not currently read Usenet or use appropriate groups for product marketing, then I suggest that you get an account and see how many of their 31558 groups (as of today) have something of professional or personal interest for you. (I subscribe to 65 public newsgroups myself, for various purposes.)

More on game marketing via Usenet in my next posting…

Windows Update crosses the line to the sleazy.

This morning, as part of my regular updates, I went to Microsoft Windows Update to get any operating system updates that had been released (usually on Tuesdays). After clicking on the ‘Custom’ button, indicating that the Microsoft Update ActiveX control had already loaded, I was greeted with the following:

To use this latest version of Windows Update, you will need to upgrade some of its components. This version provides you with the following enhancements to our service:

• Express and custom installation: Choose only the most recent critical updates or pick and choose from all available updates.
• Smarter downloads: If downloading is interrupted, the process will start up where it left off the next time you download that update.
• Smaller downloads: Only the files your computer needs are downloaded, saving download time and connection-speed costs.
• One version: Only the most recent updates are offered to you.
• Less clutter: You can now hide updates you don’t want to see.
• Update news: A News from Microsoft section on the Windows Update home page displays tips and the latest information.

That all sounded good, except that it looks like several of those features were already present in the previous version. Curious, I clicked on the ‘Details’ arrow to find out exactly what was being updated. To my surprise and dismay, I read the following:

Windows Genuine Advantage Validation Tool (KB892130)
1.1 MB , less than 1 minute
The Windows Genuine Advantage Validation Tool enables you to verify that your copy of Microsoft Windows is genuine. The tool validates your Windows installation by checking Windows Product Identification and Product Activation status.

Excuse me? This Windows Genuine Advantage Validation Tool is not what is being hyped above, and it is essentially the same piece of undesirable crap I ranted about in my post HNT: Respect Your Customers almost exactly one year ago. Apparently, Microsoft is desperate enough to get this piece of spyware on customers’ systems that they are willing to lie about it.

Signed, Disgusted.

My older son officially graduated high school today.

I just returned from the Commencement ceremony for the East Lansing High School Class of 2007. James, my son, graduated Summa Cum Laude (or merely Magna Cum Laude if you look in the wrong place) and took the special walk across the stage, along with about 275 of his classmates.

It was a special day for my wife, Sherry, and I because not only did we have our son graduating with honors, but we also had bonds with a couple dozen other graduates who I had coached in soccer, Sherry had led in both Cub Scouts and Boy Scouts, or we had cheered for as the other Senior members of the very successful Quiz Bowl team.

Speaking of the ELHS Quiz Bowl team and their success this year…

As already mentioned on this blog, the Quiz Bowl team won the Quiz Busters tournament in March of this year. In April, they followed that up with a win in the Michigan State Quiz Bowl Championship, making them the official State Champions for this year. Then, late last month, both the A and B varsity teams went to the NAQT High School National Championship Tournament in Chicago and qualified for the finals, where the A team (the one James played on) placed 13th in the nation.

The Quiz Bowl success was such that the class President, Kate Mulhern, mentioned in her commencement speech that it should be a recognized varsity sport. Ms. Mulhern also happens to be the daughter of Jennifer M. Granholm, the current Governor of the State of Michigan. (It was interesting to see the Governor in the same crush of people leaving after the proceedings were finished.)

The whole event (and an event it was) was held at the Great Hall of the Wharton Center at Michigan State University, and we were actually restricted to only seven tickets (yes, tickets) per graduate. It was definitely an impressive commencement, reminiscent of and rivaling my sister’s graduation from Texas A&M University. (It was far more impressive than my own commencement from the same high school.)

We are very proud of what James accomplished during the last four years, and next fall, our younger son, William, starts his own career at East Lansing High School, while James continues his education in the Honor College at Michigan State University.

This is the last day to vote for the Shareware Industry Awards.

Today [May 30] is the last day, actually just part of a day, that those who are registered can vote for the Shareware Industry Awards. Voting closes at Noon MDT [2:00pm EDT], so as I write this, there is less than 10 hours remaining. Hurry!

The SIA nominees this year are interesting, too. The Best Application category has two strong candidates, ClipMate and CSE HTML Validator (against Open Orifice); it is unfortunate that they cannot both win. I am glad to see WISCO Word Power in the Best Educational Program or Game category, as well as Auction Sentry Deluxe nominated for Best Hobby or Personal Interest Program.

Of course, my primary (selfish) interest is in the Best Game – Non Action/Arcade category, where our Pretty Good MahJongg is nominated. I am completely biased, but I will nevertheless say: Please vote for Pretty Good MahJongg!

For those not in the shareware industry, or who did not get registered to nominate and vote for the Shareware Industry Awards, you can still support your favorite software (including Pretty Good MahJongg, hopefully) in the SIAF People’s Choice Awards. Voting for these awards is open to anybody (with an email address) and all software is eligible. If you want to vote for your favorite programs this year, you can do so by registering at http://www.siavoting.com/pcregister.php and then submitting your selection of up to 7 (seven) programs before tomorrow [May 31].

“I Voted.”

Our game, Pretty Good MahJongg, received a 2007 SIA nomination.

Yesterday, the Shareware Industry Awards Foundation announced the nominees for the 2007 Shareware Industry Awards. These awards are presented annually at the Software (nee Shareware) Industry Conference in sixteen different categories (of which 2.5 are for games). What makes these special is the fact that the nominations and final voting are all done by other industry professionals, so the awards are determined by our peers.

This year, Pretty Good MahJongg was nominated in the Best Non-Action Game category. We are honored to have received this first nomination for this (deserving, in my opinion) game, and I want to thank everybody who nominated it. Pretty Good MahJongg has been my favorite game for a while now, and I am happy that it is receiving this recognition. I certainly hope that it will garner the award, but this is a much appreciated first step. If you are registered to vote, please vote for PGMJ when voting begins on May 24.

The competition is Pocket War, by Metal Shard, and Ant War 1, by Anarchy Enterprises. Ironically, both of the other two product titles include the word, “War”. If Pretty Good MahJongg can capture the pacifist vote, and the other two split the martial vote, we should be fine. Seriously, it definitely appears that all three products are quite different, so the results will be interesting.

In addition to the Shareware Industry Awards, there are also the SIAF People’s Choice Awards that are presented at the same ceremony. Voting for these awards is open to anybody (with an email address) and all software is eligible. If you want to vote for your favorite programs this year, you can do so by registering at http://www.siavoting.com/pcregister.php and then submitting your selection of up to 7 (seven) programs before May 31.

Please vote for Pretty Good MahJongg on May 24, if you are registered, and please consider voting for PGMJ (and/or our other games) for a SIAF People’s Choice Award.

Thanks.

This is How Not To get your email newsletters read.

Whenever sending a newsletter via email, remember that it is very likely that the recipients are overwhelmed with masses of spam. This means that most will have some sort of filtering in place to reduce the amount of junk they have to wade through to get the communications they want. It is also a pretty good bet that your potential customers have little or no incentive to trawl through the trash to find your message.

With that in mind, here are some wonderful tips on how not to have your newsletters read:

• Send your newsletter from a different email address each time and, as much as possible, be sure that address does not obviously correspond to your corporate identity. (Servers with multiple hosts and subhosts, all with cryptic two-character names, is best.)
• Change the format of the subject line for each issue.
• Never publish your newsletter on a regular schedule.
• Always remind recipients to whitelist your newsletter based on a name that includes a special character (such as the trademark symbol, â„¢) that is not included in all fonts or any standard keyboard.
• Make sure that your newsletter is only available in HTML format; do not offer an option for plain text.
• Further to the above, be sure that the layout formatting depends heavily on many small graphic files that have to be downloaded separately from your server. This assures that your content will be completely indecipherable in many circumstances (e.g., plain text, basic firewalls, or server issues).

Using techniques such as these, some companies (such as Intel), have managed to assure that their marketing messages successfully avoid my positive filtering and reliably end up in my junk folder. Of course, newsletters are only part of an email campaign, so after successfully fouling up the above, one could also (as Hewlett-Packard has done) employ the following advanced techniques for destroying good will:

• Add a corporate customer to a newsletter list targeted at (computer illiterate) home users, based on the need to get a replacement part for a different type of product.
• Implement ‘user profiles’ for newsletter configuration and email all subscribers (and the forcibly subscribed) separately to notify each one of this important development.
• Finally (and here is where the art really comes into it), track profile modifications and assume that the failure of one to make changes is an indication of ignorance, so email a reminder about user profiles. Greet a continued lack of response with increasingly frequent reminders.

One has to wonder how some of these companies managed to get as large as they did with such marketing ineptitude. Consistency and useful information would make these newsletters so much less challenging.