Latest Release (v0.6) of OneEyeDeer is Up

Wow - it's only been 3 weeks since we dropped the last version of OneEyeDeer and there's already been an amazing amount of activity on the site.

A big thanks to each and every one of you who has taken the time to jump on the site.

We're well aware that everyone is attention poor these days, so whether you've popped in to view an issue or done anything from posting an issue to ranking a solution to starting a community, we'd like to say a massive, "Thank you!"

Now, while you guys were working hard on the site, so were we! The latest version of the site has been released and is ready for you to play with.

Below are the main changes we've made. I've highlighted some of the big things so you know what to look for :)

As usual, thanks for playing a part in helping make OneEyeDeer better. We really appreciate it.

If you haven't already signed up as a beta-tester, jump on the site at www.oneeeydeer.com and register and we'll send you out details on how to participate straight away.

Kim + Pat

v 0.6 Release Notes


SOLUTIONS

• Top Solutions search now available from front page Sidebar (we really like this one)

TO DO ITEMS

• To-do items (our little project management tool) now listed in Solution sidebar (no more hiding for you, cheeky buggers)
• Reference to solution when creating to-do items

POSTING

• Post Issues now available from home page
• Post process changed - only title necessary (allowing for some nice new features in upcoming releases... make sure you keep adding descriptions though)

ISSUES

• "Communities Working on this issue" now visible from link under Issue with opportunity to add to your own communities in lightbox
• Social sharing widget under every issue (let us know if you'd like another service added)

INVITING

• Personalised messages now available for invitations

COMMUNITIES

• Private Communities functionality added (only people who are invited from inside community can join for now)
• Post Issue button inside Community only shows up when you're a member of that community

OTHER

• New to OneEyeDeer announce-bar added to top of homepage when not logged in
• Source (HTML) button added to description WYSIWYG editor
• FAQ and ABOUT updated
• Frame for community icons added to make it less cluttered

OneEyeDeer v0.5 Released!

OneEyeDeer is up and running for more beta-testing and boy have we made a bunch of changes!

We’ve included a list of all the changes below but, at a high level, the changes have focussed on making the site more engaging for you - the OneEyeDeer community member.

If you haven't already signed up as a beta-tester, jump on the site at www.oneeeydeer.com and register and we'll send you out details on how to participate straight away.

Exciting Times!

OneEyeDeer v0.5 - Release Notes
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LAYOUT AND BROWSER SUPPORT

• Support for 1024x768 added
• Support for ie6 and ie8 added
• Support for Opera 9.x added
• Support for iPhone browser added
  
• Support for zoomed text added

COMMENTS

• Cascading comments added
• Commenting and replies layout improved
• Anonymous commenting disabled

SIDEBAR FUNCTIONALITY

• Top Contributors table added
• Similar Issues functionality added
• Recommended "to-do's" added
• Tag cloud added

MYPAD

• Ability to view other members' MyPad added
  
• Add expertise slidebars as part of profile in MyPad
• Points and Awards system implemented
• Avatar scaling and pixelation issues fixed

SOLUTIONS

• Stage of solution slidebar added to solutions
• Potential of solution slidebar added to solution
• Stage and Potential of solution represented on Issues list
• Explanations for Stage (RIPPA) and Awards added (lightboxes)

INVITE FUNCTIONALITY

• Invite friends to OED functionality added to MyPad
  
• Invite friends to Community functionality added to every community

COMMUNITIES

• Community functionality completely revised - now act as self-contained, mini-sites with content feeding back into main site
• Community-specific navigation (including toolbar) added to communities
• Community logos/avatars added
• Community internal layout changed

PROJECT MANAGEMENT

• "To-Do's" added to bring simple Project Management functionality to solutions
• Call for help red button removed
• Take it the next level red button removed
• Call for help process automated through recommended to-do functionality

VOTING AND RANKING ALGORITHM

• Voting buttons redesigned changed. Now more prominent and AJAX-ified
• "Bury" removed. Functionality retained in new down-voting
• Issue Ranking algorithm overhauled including addition of time decay

OTHER

• Vanity URLs added across site
• Discussions removed - functionality retained in comments
• General overhaul of site - tightening up of design and functionality
• Addition of Company name with link to company site in Company Representative user name
• Added password confirmation to Registration
• Issues per page increased from 10 to 15
• Recent Activity pagination added with 100 items per page
• Company page content cleaned up

Sydney Uni Entrepreneurship Students Do Their OneEyeDeer Presentations

Earlier on in the year, Sydney Uni Lecturer Massimo Garbuio and I sat down and spoke about using OneEyeDeer as part of his Global Entrepreneurship and Enterprise course.

As a result, OED was the focus of a group assignment for three separate groups of students.

Those 3 groups selected OED as the subject of their assignment, after seeing presentations from a few different orgs.

I had the pleasure today of hearing the students do their presentations, which were framed as investor pitches. In the audience with me were Massimo and a local VC.

It was great to not only see how the students grasped the concepts behind OED, but also to hear their suggestions for making OED successful.

A big "thank you" to Massimo and all of the groups for spending time on OED. Hopefully you all learned something from the experience and will go on to be avid users of the site ;)

If you do, you may even see some of your suggestions on the site in the near future...

More Press For Lead User Innovation, This Time In The NYT

More press today for Lead User Innovation (LUI) - this time in The New York Times

Of course, LUI is the driving force behind our work here at OneEyeDeer.

It's a good article that goes over the motivation for LUI, dispels some of the "exploitation of users" myths and also highlights some of the companies starting to work with their users.

Not bad for a few hundred words. Well done to the author Steve Lohr.

You can check out the article here - http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/26/business/26unbox.html

Is Get Satisfaction Evil?

I've just finished reading Jason from 37Signals' post on why Get Satisfaction is getting it wrong.

Essentially, the article says that the way Get Satisfaction is treating companies is akin to extortion. There's more to it than that, but that's at the heart of Jason's argument. He feels that the Get Satisfaction 37 Signals company page represents 37 Signals as not caring about their customers and as a result 37 Signals (and other companies in the same situation) are compelled to participate at Get Satisfaction.

Before I go on I should say that my opinions come from the following perspective:

• Get Satisfaction is in some ways a competitor of OneEyeDeer, though probably not a direct competitor. (I'm guessing they've never heard of us, so this might be news to them...)
  
  
• We're thankful that Get Satisfaction has managed to do so well in building awareness of the benefits of leveraging the skills, knowledge and experience that exist outside of the organisation
  
  
• We're big fans of 37 signals and have even bought their seminal work on developing web apps - Getting Real.

With all of that in mind, here are my thoughts on the situation:

1. I completely understand why Get Satisfaction has pre-populated company sites. First of all it makes it easier for customers to start participating - i.e. for most well-known companies they don't have to actually start a site and for companies it's a simple way to get involved with little to no real cost.
   
   
2. I also understand that a massive benefit of Get Satisfaction is that by aggregating customer service forums you get cross-pollination of skills and ideas etc. as well as a standardised process that customers and companies are familiar with. This is something that has driven our work at OneEyeDeer.
   
   
3. I agree with Jason, however, there is a hint of "extortion" in the way that Get Satisfaction tries to force companies to be involved. The recent improvements made in response to Jason's post addresses this issue somewhat by making it clearer (as opposed to clear) that just because a company isn't actively involved on Get Satisfaction doesn't mean they don't care about their customers, but I still don't think it's enough. I agree most companies need a kick up the ass to start engaging more closely with their customers, but I'm not sure this is the perfect way to to do that.
   
   
4. I'm still unsure about whether or not being evil is in the Get Satisfaction DNA (to borrow a Haque-ism) or whether they just got it a little wrong and by fixing it have demonstrated that they're really a team of good people who are keen to revolutionise customer service. I suspect it may be the latter, but the idea of pay or we won't show competitors adds, as an example, is pretty lame (I know that their paid services offer additional benefits, but that's the one Jason picks up on). Essentially companies are paying for something that is totally uncorrelated to the value that Get Satisfaction provides and that is a losing strategy for any organisation.

Perhaps the lesson here is there isn't a one-size-fits-all process for customer service and that Get Satisfaction needs to work out how to please different customer company segments.

On the other hand, maybe they don't want or need customers like 37 Signals - i.e. their market is companies who don't have efficient customer service portals or good customer service in general (then again, Zappos use them and they are renowned for their customer service)

In reality however, I think the real point made here is that Get Satisfaction is a service with great potential, that has been doing really great things in the market, but they need to be sure that they keep their un-evil hat on when making decisions that will impact either the community or the companies.

Fixing problems quickly is an admirable quality. But if Get Satisfaction can't figure out what the problems are by themselves, people will soon move on.

There's probably a lesson in that for all of us.

Constructive Capitalism Talk By Umair Haque

We're big fans of Umair Haque here at OneEyeDeer. His work on edge competencies, networks, communities and markets helped drive the creation of OneEyeDeer.

His insights into what's wrong with business today and how it can be fixed has further inspired us to continue our work.

Umair recently presented at the Daytona Sessions. You can check out the video HERE.

It's a long talk - just over an hour - but it goes through several key points meaning that you can watch it in sections.

I have a feeling that sometime in the future someone will be looking at this post (is that you?) and will check out the video and think - that's so obvious! Well let me tell you, at the time I'm writing this, the ideas, despite their obviousness, are perceived as radical.

Then again, if you're reading this post from the future and saying Umair's thoughts are obvious, then the world will be a much better place than it is now - so happy days :)

Minister for Innovation Kim Carr Mentions User-Led Innovation

In case you don't know, I'm also the founder/editor of an Australian-focused tech startup news/reviews blog called TechNation Australia.

Last week I posted a story on that blog about a speech that Kim Carr, Federal Minister for Innovation, Industry, Science and Research, gave at the National Press Club. That post focused on a small portion of Mr. Carr's talk, but there were some other very interesting things he had to say.

For instance, during that speech it was great to hear Mr Carr speak of trying to borrow some of Europe's strategic innovation initiatives here in Australia including a special reference to user-led innovation policy in Denmark.

As we all know, words are one thing, actions another, particularly when it comes to politics. But it's still good to know that the head of innovation in Australia is at least aware of the potential of user-led innovation.

Kim