Minnov8 Gang 153 – SOPA is NOPA

Sun, Jan 22, 2012

 by Steve Borsch

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SOPA is not an Italian soap, as joked about on the Gang podcast. But we discuss the protests that caused the Stop Online Privacy Act (and its Senate sister act called PIPA or Protect IP Act) to be, as the Mafia always stated about someone who was killed and dumped in the river, “sleeping with the fishes” and we talk about what happened.

Besides all of the catching up we did our guest, Patrick E. Donohue from DealPen, is on to talk about their initiatives to work with startups on funding, knowledge and a host of other value propositions.

Hosts: Steve Borsch, Tim Elliott, Graeme Thickins and Phil Wilson
Music: Clear Blue 22 & the song “Through With You” from the podsafe Music Alley.

Discussed during the show:

Upcoming Events:

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Mobile Text Message “Cramming” Scam

Mon, Jan 16, 2012

 by Steve Borsch

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Sick with the flu all weekend I’d gone to bed early Sunday night (1/15/12) only to be awakened by two back-to-back text messages arriving on my iPhone. Having been in the internet/web industry since its beginning in the mid-1990s, I instantly recognized the potential for charges from this spammer so I sat up, grabbed my iPad, and started poking around to see if either the shortcode (the “318-50″) or the toll-free 866-861-1606 number was an active scam.

I was stunned to learn it is a scam. Not only that, based upon the sheer volume of complaints I found shows that this is rampant, apparently is seeing little-to-no preemptive action on the part of the wireless carriers, and many, many mobile users are being charged monthly fees. This fraud is commonly known as cramming.

I am writing this post for the express purpose of bringing this issue to your attention and that of Lori Swanson, our State Attorney General, in order to get some action and protect consumers. If *I* can get scammed (and I am VERY cautious, careful and savvy about online scams and still don’t know how my number was discovered). I can only guess how pervasive this is in Minnesota and that it appears the carriers are likely complicit in perpetuating these cramming scams due to conflicts of interest and their subsequent inaction.

THE SCAM
This is a mobile SMS (text message) scam which automatically subscribes the user to a monthly plan, in my case a $9.99 one as you can see from the screenshot to your right. What’s curious is that many people on several complaint forums I discovered recommended replying “STOP” to cancel since that would be an explicit opt-out. In my case I didn’t respond (never do to spam) and instead called AT&T Customer Service.

The charges were applied anyway which, I now know, is a common cramming practice. AT&T removed the charge and I explicitly requested they place a “subscription block” under my parental controls for all phones on my family plan. This part of the adventure burned up 45 minutes of my time.

During my short investigation last night for another 30 minutes, I came across these links to other people who have been victims of cramming from this same provider and have had similar charges:

…and so on and so on. But wait until you see how this cramming is potentially worth tens of millions of dollars per year for the scammers!

(more…)


Minnov8 Gang #152 – Mr. Happy *Loves* 2012

Sat, Jan 14, 2012

 by Steve Borsch

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2012 started off with a bang with the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) and the start of a new year also affords the Gang a chance to see just how far and fast a local emerging firm has come in the last year.

Joining the Gang on this podcast are two guests: First up is Justin Kaufenberg, CEO & Cofounder of TSTMedia, who provides us with a solid overview of his company and all of their properties (SportNGIN; EventNGIN; USPondHockey; and NGIN itself). Then we get a CES report from Mitchell Hislop (Site; LinkedIn; Twitter) who was on-the-ground for several days looking at CES developments from a hard core geek’s perspective.

Hosts: Steve Borsch, Tim Elliott, Graeme Thickins and Phil Wilson
Music: Ron Arnold & the song “Kiss Me” from the podsafe Music Alley.

Discussed during the show:

Upcoming Events:

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 Direct link to the show


Student Led Technology Conference

Fri, Jan 13, 2012

 by Steve Borsch

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Inver Grove Heights Community Schools has an upcoming event that seems so delightful that I had to bring it to you. It’s likely you know of someone who would really enjoy being enlightened about technology by a bunch of students, or perhaps you’d like to attend too and see how these kids have learned to use all the technology this district uses (you can get a sense in this highlights video).

A guy from the Inver Grove Heights Community Schools Office of Communications, Johnny Germscheid, reached out to us here at Minnov8 to tell us about the event. Its focus is about technology, education and breaking down the communication barrier between children and adults. I’m guessing there will be a lot of learning occurring on both sides (student-as-teacher and adult-as-student).

Students in grades K-12 will be teaching adults how to use iPads, iPods, and other devices and software programs. Conference highlights include:

  • Produce and publish an eBook using rich multimedia content.
  • Create a digital scrapbook to capture family memories.
  • Design a webpage or blog to share your story on the web.
  • Find out how to set up and manage your own social networking profile.
  • Collaborate electronically to edit documents in a more efficient manner.
  • Compose original songs to add flavor to your movies.
  • Learn how to get the most out of that new iPad.

This is the second year Inver Grove Heights Community Schools has offered this Student Led Technology Conference. Turns out the Inver Grove Heights school district (ISD 199) was nationally recognized in Washington DC by the Consortium of School Networking (CoSN) this winter for this innovative concept.

The conference is free and open to anyone in the metro, or our entire State for that matter. To check out details about the conference, which takes place on Saturday, February 25th from 8:30am until Noon, visit the event mini-site here.


UnitedHealth Group’s Booth at CES

Wed, Jan 11, 2012

 by Steve Borsch

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The Consumer Electronics Show (CES) is in full swing and UnitedHealth Group (UHG), along with its UnitedHealthcare health benefits and Optum health services businesses, is at CES this year because, as they say on their dedicated “CES Health” innovation showcase website, “…we’re increasingly invested in how the intersection of health and technology is empowering people to take greater control of their everyday health. By giving people the tools to better understand their health and health care, we’re helping them live healthier, happier lives. In short, our innovations are all part of a digital ecosystem we’ve created for health. See these innovations on display in booth #2833 in the North Hall at CES.”

Nick Martin, vice president of innovation and R&D at UnitedHealth Group, gave a quick tour of the booth and some of the innovations within (listed here, by the way):

One thing has surprised both our tech peers in Minnesota as well as we here at Minnov8: Who knew UHG was so active delivering tech innovations? Some of these include: UHC.tv; OptumizeMe (an iPhone/Android app); and Optum’s NowClinic, a virtual Doctor visit/prescribing platform with a corresponding smartphone app.

Might be that these “innovations” are targeted directly at corporate customers and to their respective employees who are under a UHG health plan. It’s interesting that each of their branding, user interfaces and integrations seem to be in separate silos, with no overall direction discernable from their presentation online. Still, it’s good to see a Minnesota employer innovating in the internet and web space.


Minnov8 Gang 151 – Opinions Are Like Donkeys

Sat, Jan 7, 2012

 by Steve Borsch

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There’s an old saying about people who rant that, “opinions are like a**es…everyone’s got one” and the Gang is no exception, though we like to think our opinions are a bit more informed than the average schmo and that we’re more like somewhat smarter donkeys.

Hosts: Steve Borsch, Tim Elliott, Graeme Thickins and Phil Wilson
Music: Jake Lear & their song “Kiss Me” from the podsafe Music Alley.

Discussed during the show:

Upcoming Events:

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Minnov8 Gang 150 – All Seeing, All Knowing?

Fri, Dec 30, 2011

 by Steve Borsch

6 Comments

It’s our annual predictions show where the Gang goes over our prediction hits-and-misses from last year’s show…and then we try again to predict what will happen in technology in 2012. Listen to discover how we did and what we think will happen in 2012.

Hosts: Steve Borsch, Tim Elliott, Graeme Thickins and Phil Wilson

Discussed during the show:

Upcoming Events:

  • Friday, January 13th: Club Entrepreneur, 11:30am-1:00pm, Minneapolis Club. (Speaker: Mary Meehan, Cofounder, Panoramix Global – “Global Trends Shifting Your Business”)
  • Thursday, January 16th: MinneDemo at 6:00 pm, location TBD.
  • Thursday, January 26th: WordPressMSP, at The Nerdery in Bloomington.
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3M Company supports SOPA

Fri, Dec 23, 2011

 by Steve Borsch

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More than 400 organizations have publicly expressed support of the contentious Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA), or the passage of other similar anti-piracy legislation, and we were stunned to see that Minnesota-based 3M Company made the list of those organizations IN FAVOR OF the Stop Online Privacy Act (SOPA) (click that link to get a quick overview of what SOPA is and why you should care).

3M’s support for SOPA came to light in this post at Digital Trends. Viewing the list was enlightening, especially considering the somewhat confusing array of those in favor of legislation that has virtually the entire tech industry — and specifically cybersecurity, internet inventors and internet engineers — lined up against it and the Senate’s version, Protect IP Act.

While it would have been somewhat less stunning to see a list comprised mostly of media companies, those around them like their law firms, and other clueless organizations supporting this act, it seems to make no sense that a company like 3M would even get in to the discussion.

We have reached out to 3M for a response and will publish it if and when we receive it.


Happy Holidays from the Minnov8 Gang!

Thu, Dec 22, 2011

 by Steve Borsch

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From all of us at Minnov8, we would like to wish you a safe, joyous and delightful holiday! We our grateful for our families, friends, you and, of course, for those who both invent and leverage great technology for incredible outcomes, profit and fun.

We will be back next week with another Minnov8 Gang podcast with our end of year recap and 2012 predictions.


Minnov8 Gang 149 – Holiday Zeitgeist

Fri, Dec 16, 2011

 by Tim Elliott

1 Comment

Minnov8 Gang Podcast 149 artwork

A smaller Gang discusses the past week’s news including the W3i Tech Holiday Party, Google Zeitgeist, Facebook Timeline and more.

Hosts: Tim Elliott, Graeme Thickins and Phil Wilson (Steve Borsch is on holiday)
Music: Uncle Seth sing “Little Pieces” from the podsafe Music Alley.

Discussed during the show:

Upcoming Events:

Note: We will be off next week but return the following week to discuss our 2011 predictions and gaze into the crystal ball again for 2012.


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