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:

• Best Buy gets slammed in Forbes
• Best Buy CEO Defends Himself Against Reports That His Company Is Slowly Dying
• Brian’s Whiteboard (Best Buy CEO’s blog) direct link
• Bloomberg story says Best Buy is a buyout candidate
• Best Buy reacts to price-checking smartphone app
• For Best Buy, holidays were good enough (Star Tribune)
• Apple to open new store-within-a-store outlets inside Target this year
• Why The Movie Industry Can’t Innovate and the Result is SOPA (by Steve Blank via Forbes)
• Consumer Electronics Show (CES) Preview of Minnesota companies
• Wired’s CES Preview 
• U.S. House’s Stop Online Privacy Act (SOPA) and the Senate’s Protect IP Act (PIPA) 

Upcoming Events:

• Friday, January 13th: Club Entrepreneur, 11:30am-1:00pm, Minneapolis Club. (Speaker: Mary Meehan, Cofounder, Panoramix Global)
• Thursday, January 16th: MinneDemo at 6:00 pm, Schulze Hall, University of St. Thomas (registration…but it’s sold out).
• Saturday, January 21st: Thomson Reuters Tech Event  
• Thursday, January 26th: WordPressMSP, at The Nerdery in Bloomington.
• Friday/Saturday, March 16th & 17th: Mobile March TC. Location TBD.

Minnov8 Gang 151 – Opinions Are Like Donkeys is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

Hosts: Steve Borsch, Tim Elliott, Graeme Thickins and Phil Wilson.
Music: Ruddin & their song “Cover the Distance” from the podsafe Music Alley.

Discussed during the show:

Carrier IQ scandal:

• Researcher’s Video Shows Secret Software on Millions of Phones Logging Everything
• Phone ‘Rootkit’ Maker Carrier IQ May Have Violated Wiretap Law In Millions Of Cases
• Carrier IQ references discovered in Apple’s iOS
• Apple: We Stopped Supporting Carrier IQ With iOS 5
• Senator Al Franken Demands Carrier IQ Explain Mobile Tracking

Black Friday/Cyber Monday sales strong:

• The Kindle Fire Is Beating The iPad At Best Buy
• Amazon, Best Buy, Walmart Lead Online Sales
• Target November sales miss analysts’ expectations
• Friday’s Deals May Not Be the Best

Guest: Don Ball:

• Google Chairman Praises Mpls Entrepreneurship at CoCo 
• Where Don Ball is speaking on Dec 8th
• Important New Research to be Unveiled at GigaOM Net:Work 
• Net:Work agenda (Don Ball’s panel at 2:50 pm)

Other: Julian Assange: iPhone, Blackberry and Gmail users are ‘screwed’ – video

Upcoming Events

• Friday, December 9th: Gadgets and Gifts from Geeks to Grandmas
• Wednesday, December 7th: MOJO Mixer 2 – Speed Mentoring for Startups
• Thursday, December 15th: 1st Annual Minnesota Tech Holiday Bash
• December 10th – 13th: TIES 2011 EduTech Conference

Direct link to the show

Minnov8 Gang 147 – Wanna Buy Some Wheat? is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

In a 10-minute video interview I did with Robert while we were having coffee and rolls before the general session started Thursday morning, we covered a range of topics — including the recent announcement that Best Buy is acquiring managed services provider MindShift for $167 million. I also got a sneak preview of other topics Robert was going to talk about in his opening keynote:

All the videos I shot at Defrag 2011, including three other interviews, are posted on my YouTube channel.  In addition, I have a photo set of the Defrag event on Flickr (213 pix) that documents my view of the proceedings over the three days. In some of the photos, you’ll be able to pick out several Minnesotans who attended this 5th edition of Defrag.  Startups represented included AsystMe, enStratus (a sponsor), FanChatter, KidBlog, Rifr, TST Media, and Zingstring.

Here are those screenshots showing a selection the tweets during Robert Stephens’ keynote:

Robert Stephens Rocks the #DefragCon Crowd is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

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

Discussed during the show:

• Defrag 2011; Graeme’s live blog of Defrag 2011; MN tech startups at Defrag: enStratus (a sponsor); TSTMedia; Asystme; FanChatter; ZingString; KidBlog; Rifr
• Best Buy Acquires IT Services Company mindSHIFT For $167 Million
• Best Buy UK stores to be shut down after a year of unprofitable operation
• Graeme’s interview with Robert Stephens 
• StarTribune: Best Buy’s tablet app…uh…needs some work
• Target Works to Fix Crashing Website Before Black Friday
• Google+ Brand Pages Launched; Scoble: “I wish I had never heard of Google+’s brand pages“; Google Direct Connect Hooks Search and Google+ Pages Together
• Intentionally Left Blank Page
• Verge
• Danah Boyd, Senior Researcher at Microsoft Research whose blog is “Apophenia“.

Upcoming Events:

• Saturday, Nov 12th: Code Slingers Challenge - 10:00am – 10:00pm
• Saturday, Nov 12th: ProductCamp Minnesota 3 - , University of St Thomas – Minneapolis, Schulze Hall
• Tuesday, Nov 15th: Mobile Twin Cities - 7:00pm
• Wednesday, Nov 16th: MIMA Event – Community Management with Olivier Blanchardat 7:30am
• December 10th to 13th: TIES 2011 EduTech Conference - 9:00am – 5:00pm, Hyatt Regency Minneapolis

Direct link to the show

Minnov8 Gang 145 – Nigel Tufnel Isn’t on Google+? is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

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

Discussed during the show:

• MN-Based Cloud Startup enStratus Secures Series A VC Investment
• MHTA Tekne Awards (MHTA site; BizJournal article)
• Returns aren’t in on Best Buy’s VC venture
• Google’s new GoMo – Google Creates “GoMo” Portal To Help You Mobilize
• New in Google Reader: a fresh design, and Google+ sharing  and Reader redesign: Terrible decision, or worst decision?
• Google Releases Gmail for iOS…then pulls it
• HTML5 and a great site with demos called,”HTML ROCKS”
• Square’s Card Case iOS App Adds Support For Hands-Free Payments, Twitter Integration For Merchants
• Groupon IPO 
• Mary Meeker’s State of the Internet
• Kidblog; Minnov8 Gang podcast with the co-founder; Graeme’s video with key folks about hitting 1M users

Upcoming Events:

• Friday, November 4th (weekly): Frontend Masters Workshop Series
• November 8-10: Defrag (Denver & MN startups going include: Zingstring, AsystMe, TST Media, KidBlog, FanChatter… enStratus is a sponsor)
• November 8-10: JAMF Software National User Conference 2011 @Guthrie Theater
• Wednesday, November 9th: Hacks/Hackers Twin Cities – “Newsrooms, Open Source, and the Maker Culture”
• Saturday, November 12th: ProductCamp Minnesota 3
• Saturday, November 12th: Code Slingers Challenge 
• Tuesday, November 15th: Mobile Twin Cities

Minnov8 Gang 144 – Smartphones & SmartScooters? is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

Hosts: Steve Borsch, Tim Elliott, Graeme Thickins, Phil Wilson and Julio Ojeda Zapata
Music: “Even Meaner” by “Mean Gene Kelton & the Diehards“ via the podsafe Music Alley.

Discussed during the show:

• Steve Jobs’ passing (Julio’s excellent post; New Yorker article: “Steve Jobs at the Pearly Gates”; Wall Street Journal about: Who Will Be the ‘Next Steve Jobs’?; Mike Evangelist’s blog, Writer’s Block 
• Apple iPhone 4S; Why iPhone screen is 3.5 inches 
• Samsung/Google postpone Nexus Prime with IceCreamSandwich out of respect for Steve
• Minnedemo & Edutech & TECHCocktail
• Sprint betting the farm on iPhone?
• Best Buy unloads Napster. Sells to Rhapsody. (“Napsody”?)
• MN’s 365,000 VC-backed jobs. 8th largest innovator: “Putting Money and Ventures Together“
• Paradox of Choice 

Minnov8 Gang 140 – Heaven is no Apple Store is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

Ben Theis, Google

Our guest this week is Ben Theis, Field Marketing Lead for Google in Minnesota (and part of a team of five). He talks about what he’s doing here, initiatives that Google has underway in Minnesota, and some very interesting factoids about the lack of online presence with small businesses.

Hosts: Steve Borsch, Tim Elliott and Phil Wilson (Graeme Thickins is off).
Music: “Full Circle” by Clintone via the podsafe Music Alley.

Discussed during the show:

• Minnesota Emerging Software Advisory (MESA)
• Facebook F8: One graph to rule them all
• Best Buy in serious trouble? (be sure to read the comments); Best Buy CMO Barry Judges’ response; Best Buy’s Cowboom 
• Google Claims $1B of Economic Impact in MN in ’10; Google Adwords Express; Google Adwords 
• Multiple iPhones in October? Al Gore says so 
• HP Names Meg Whitman President and Chief Executive Officer
• English Books for Thai School – Can You Help? 

Minnov8 Gang 138 – Fate…or Plus? is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

Mobile is changing dramatically and the strategic-level changes are a challenge to stay on top of, which is why we have Lisa Foote on as our guest for this podcast. No one in the Twin Cities is on top of the mobile space like Lisa is, and the Gang did a lot more than our usual homework to prepare for our time with her. As such, there are several fabulous links below that you’ll undoubtedly find enlightening if you’re at all interested in the mobile market (and where the “OMG!” about the death of feature phones comes from).

Hosts: Steve Borsch, Tim Elliott & Phil Wilson (Graeme Thickins is off this week).
Music: “Only the Bird Knows” by Kelly Richey via Music Alley.

Discussed during the show:

PAST WEEK: 

• AT&T to implement data throttling in early October
• Robert X. Cringeley on ISP Bandwidth Caps are Really Rate Increases
• Sprint signs with Lightsquared for LTE
• Is Best Buy’s CEO “overpaid”?
• Taking it slow in the midwest. Pando study of download speeds

GUEST SEGMENT: Lisa Foote, CEO and Co-Founder of MixMobi (Twitter)

• Worldwide Mobile Phone Market Grew >11% in Q2; Feature Phones Decline
• What do Nielsen’s latest numbers tell us?
• ATRIX smartphone/laptop
• Lightsquared
• Nokia smartphone sales down 32 percent in Q2 2011, profits drop 41 percent 
• RIM COO Retires & Layoffs 

UPCOMING EVENTS

• CoCoMSP Kickoff Party on Saturday, July 30th
• CoCo Minneapolis Hackathon (held weekly), August 3rd

OTHER

• Porkys, the movie (Phil’s all-time favorite?)
• Amazon.com Announces Second Quarter Sales up 41% to $6.57 Billion
• Amazon in 2011 is where Walmart was in 1991

Minnov8 Gang 133 – OMG! A ‘Feature’ Phone? is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

Hosts: Steve Borsch, Tim Elliott, Graeme Thickins, Phil Wilson, & Julio Ojeda Zapata
Music: “Just Got to Boogie” by Matt Thorpe via the podsafe Music Alley.

Discussed during the show:

• Google+; Cosmic Panda
• Google+ to Brands: Not So Fast
• Facebook CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, and his first reaction to Google+
• Facebook, Skype and Microsoft’s Savvy Investment
• Apple 15 Billion App Store Downloads
• Apple Supply Chain Advantage
• About the Baby Boomer generation
• Google Makes Facebook Look Socially Awkward 
• Wifi Storage for Tablets and other devices
• UPCOMING EVENTS:
• Hacked! – Why You Should Care about Privacy in Social Media
• WordPressMSP July 28th meeting on Gravity Forms

Minnov8 Gang Podcast 130 – Tablets, Schmablets is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

Hosts: Steve Borsch, Tim Elliott, Graeme Thickins and Phil Wilson.
Music: “Draggin’ Down” by Angie & the Car Wrecks via the podsafe Music Alley.

Discussed during the show:

• Tough start for Best Buy Music Cloud (also here & link to Best Buy’s Music Cloud)
• Best Buy to Downsize Brick-n-Mortar Footprint
• Apple, Android Users Diverge on Wifi Usage…But Why?
• SEC’s Final Rules on Venture Capital Exemption
• HP TouchPad & CRN regarding pre-order problems
• Mpls-StPaul Business Journal “Brand Madness” article & the one on Latvians Arrested for StarTribune Virus-Ad Scam
• Steve Jobs WWDC 1997 Closing Keynote

Minnov8 Gang 128 – Cloud Money is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

With all of the hoopla surrounding Microsoft buying Skype, Facebook hiring a PR firm to plant negative stories about Google, and the Google I/O conference releasing a lot of new opportunities with their platform technologies, it’s pretty clear that the ‘table stakes’ to be in the internet/web game are rising…quickly.

Hosts: Steve Borsch, Tim Elliott, Graeme Thickins and Phil Wilson.
Music: “Straight To The Light” by Alex is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0).

Discussed during the show:

• Microsoft buys Skype and a Reuters article on how investor/analyst reactions
• Google I/O developer conference. Visit their announcement archive here. Some interesting articles reacting to these announcements:
  • Microsoft could lose billion’s in sales to Google’s Chromebook
  • Google Would Like To Wirelessly Control Your Lightbulbs With Android@Home
  • Google’s Music Beta first look: it’s miserable
  • A fun video by Best Buy CTO, Robert Stephens, recapping the conference
• Facebook Plants Fake Stories about Google
• The Minnesota Cup
• The Internet of Things
• Upcoming Events:
  • May 13: MIMA “iOS Strategy, Design, and Development Workshops” (what, SOLD OUT?)
  • Friday May 20th. SMBMSP Social Media and Higher Education. Moderated by Phil Wilson
  • Friday, May 20th – Saturday, May 21st: DrupalCamp
  • Thursday, May 26th: WordPressMSP Meeting

Minnov8 Gang 123 – The ‘Table Stakes’ are Rising is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

That old black and white photo above of the woman holding some sort of portable videophone is from this surprisingly prescient Modern Mechanix article from 1956 that starts out with this:

“ON SOME night in the future a young man walking along Market Street in San Francisco may suddenly think of a friend in Rome. Reaching into his pocket, he will pull out a watch-size disc with a set of buttons on one side. He will punch ten times. Turning the device over, he will hear his friend’s voice and see his face on a tiny screen, in color and 3-D. At the same moment his friend in Rome will see and hear him.“

We can now laugh at how quaint this seems coming from a 1956 perspective, but when you think of the collision of technologies available to us today (e.g., GPS; fast wireless networks; Wifi; voice apps w/video; tools to develop and create apps) and the huge numbers of people rapidly acquiring mobile devices that are ‘always on and always connected’, you can understand why so many ‘marchers’ were marching forward at Mobile March. See the full 1956 Modern Mechanix article, scanned and on their blog, here.

Hosts: Steve Borsch, Tim Elliott, Graeme Thickins and Phil Wilson.
Music: David Bennett Cohen is the artist & the song is “Blues for a Summer’s Dream” via the podsafe Music Alley.

Discussed during the show:

• QR Code definition and 50 Creative Uses of QR Codes
• Lisa Foote MixMobi
• Mobile 3D presenters and specific mentions of Locate my Deal and Scrimmage
• Apple XCode & Appcelerator Titanium
• WordPress plugin: WPTouch (free/pro); TurboCSV & MapPress Free/Pro
• From 2006: Borsch’s Rise of the Participation Culture (PDF)

Minnov8 Gang 115 – Mobile March Marchers Marching is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

Joining us on this episode of the Minnov8 Gang is Justin Grammens, co-Founder at Recursive Awesome, LLC, owner of Localtone, LLC founder of the Mobile Twin Cities User’s Group, and co-founder of Mobile March. Justin covers the startups that will be demonstrating their mobile apps next Friday evening (the night before Saturday’s MobileMarchTC) during the Mobile 3D event.

Hosts: Steve Borsch, Tim Elliott, Graeme Thickins and Phil Wilson.
Music: John Gilliat is the artist & the song is “Nylon Heat” via the podsafe Music Alley.

Discussed during the show:

• Social Media Club
• CNN tsunami live blog
• Windows Marketplace hits 9000 apps, to reach 10,000 app milestone mid-Marc
• Mobile Nation
  

Upcoming Events:

• Saturday, March 19th: MOBILE MARCH. New part of this years mobile event…Mobile 3D (Note: An additional 25 tickets just released!)
• Wednesday, March 23rd: Cloudcamp MSP
• Thursday, March 24th: MSP WordPress User Group meeting
• Saturday, March 26th: Overnight Website Challenge
• Monday, April 11th: MinneWebCon

Minnov8 Gang 114 – Racing Toward Our Mobile Future is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

In today’s online media, content must be shareable, give me added value world, “On” is a brilliant strategy to be deeply involved in delivering high value content for a variety of needs and create even more reasons to lean on Best Buy for ones technology.

There is a lot of content at Best Buy On, but we went there today specifically to seek any content related to the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) going on right now in Las Vegas. Take a peek at this CES press preview where the Best Buy crew shot video:

CES is THE place for most manufacturers in the world to rollout their new gadgets and tech. Today we’ve been viewing videos, listening to podcasts and reading blog posts about all the hot introductions at CES in anticipation for tomorrow’s recording of the Minnov8 Gang podcast.

Here’s the potential problem with how easy it is to be plugged in to CES’ introductions: Consumers who are interested in knowing what’s coming in the near future are consuming that exact same content! I’ve often wondered: wouldn’t consumers knowing the next generation technology shown at CES this week virtually kill the sales of the current products on the Best Buy shelves today? It stands to reason that if someone sees the next, hottest, must-have gadget in some CES recap online (and we can safely assume that that product will be on store shelves within weeks), wouldn’t consumers just wait to buy that new one?

Maybe…maybe not. Since the the watchword for any retailer is “sell what’s on the shelves,” peek at this CES-centric video and see how beautifully Best Buy has simply mentioned CES with scenes ostensibly showing a glimpse of the future, but instead emphasizing what they have in store, in stock, right now:

OVERALL IMPRESSIONS

The Good: The site is beautifully done and easy to navigate. The categories of videos and other content are nicely targeted. The open source Kaltura player they use for playing the videos is embeddable for easy content sharing by bloggers and social media users. The content is very fun to watch and is quite entertaining.

The Bad: Video is maybe too slick and too high level. As I viewed several of the videos, blog posts and other content on Best Buy On, I realized that my reaction was that I was pretty certain that I’d probably not watch any more of them. Nor would it be likely I’d pass any of them along to the “newbies” in my life since the content is too “lite” to properly educate a newbie. Though I’ll check back in a few weeks to see what new content is up, the current videos are, unfortunately, as informative as a spec sheet or pamphlet.

What I’d *really* like to see are deep and comprehensive How-To videos that literally walk someone through challenging integrations in the home and are solutions-oriented. When I bought my home theater setup with new HDTV at Best Buy Eden Prairie, I’m enough of a geek that there was NO question in my mind I’d set it up myself but it turned out to be A LOT more complex than I’d anticipated.

It seems that the HDMI copy protection, Sony A/V receiver that didn’t pass HDMI audio through to the TV, a Sony BluRay player that didn’t output audio with interactive DVDs without significant changes to the settings, and a few other “gotchas,” were obstacles to a simple setup. It also made me realize why “Joe SixPack” needs the Geek Squad, but that thought angered me since this shouldn’t be that hard and most non-geeks would be forced to pay to have all of this stuff hooked up for them.

Not that Best Buy On How-to videos would be intended to replace the Geek Squad, but I can see that it would be an enormous value-add for those of us capable of figuring it out on our own…but with a little help from “On” videos. Of course, a tech-literate future customer base is what Best Buy will inherit in the not-too-distant future and these tech-savvy consumers will demand that sort of help (and if I were Best Buy On management, I’d certainly pressure vendors to pay for those How-to videos for their products!).

All that said, I am continually impressed by the risk-taking and willingness to try different approaches by the team at Best Buy. As THE dominant player in the marketplace, many organizations would simply sit on their hands and enjoy the position of strength. But not these folks at Best Buy….they’re not only continuing to innovate, they’re accelerating their innovation!

Best Buy “On” Officially Debuts is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

Hosts: Steve Borsch, Tim Elliott, Graeme Thickins and Phil Wilson
Music: Opening version of the New Year’s Eve favorite Auld Lang Syne was performed by J.E.L.L.i., and the closing version of the song was performed by Mario Ajero. Both made possible by the podsafe Music Alley.

Discussed during the show:

• The Year in Review: Mobile Technology… The Rise of Apps, iPad, and Android
• Semantic Web
• Internet of Things
• Compellent’s sale could boost tech ecosystem
• Small Companies Look to Cloud for Savings in 2011 (WSJ)
• DemandMedia
• I, Cringely

Minnov8 Gang 105 – 2011 Tech Predictions is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

Hosts: Steve Borsch, Tim Elliott, Graeme Thickins and Phil Wilson
Music: Kahuna Kawentzmann & the song “Late Bird” via the podsafe Music Alley.

Discussed during the show:

• Google Zeitgeist and this YouTube video about it
• StarTrib story on Dell’s bid for Compellent and this one in TCBusiness Journal
• Social Media Titans winners
• Graeme’s post about Gazaro Protect
• Visi/ReliaCloud Links:
  • News Release on TDS Communications Acquiring VISI
  • Explanation of Data Centers and the Tiers
  • ReliaCloud comparison of their offering vs. Amazon and Rackspace
  • A cool, virtual walk-through of their Eden Prairie Tier III data center
• Split Rock Partners
• Springpad app
• Upcoming Events:
  • Dec. 15th: MIMA’S “Chrismahanukwanzakah” Holiday Party
  • Dec. 17th: SMBMSP #32: Social Event Planning
  • Dec 20th: SMBMSP Holiday Tweetup

Minnov8 Gang 103 – Surfin’ the Cloud is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

Maybe you’re thinking you missed out on the best prices on Black Friday or Cyber Monday? Well, get this: Gazaro’s research shows average pricing on featured products at Best Buy during the 2009 Holiday Season was actually lower in the week before December 25 than it was on Black Friday or Cyber Monday (see chart).  One in three products dropped in price during the holiday season, with an average price drop of about 15%.  Gazaro says its new service helps you take advantage of these price drops.

How does it work?  Using either Gazaro’s web site or its new iPhone app, Gazaro Protect lets consumer electronics shoppers lock in the lowest prices by letting them know when a price drops after they buy, so they can then go get money back. It’s a free web service and mobile app that automatically notifies you of these money-saving price adjustments after you buy. The net advantage, Gazaro says, is you get last-minute holiday prices without having to fight the crowds, or risk a product being sold out if you wait too long. 



It’s common for retailers to have policies to refund money to shoppers when products they purchase subsequently drop in price.  However, here’s the key: most shoppers don’t collect their price adjustments because of the manual effort to track prices. Of the shoppers surveyed by Gazaro in October 2010, fully 68% did not claim a single price adjustment in the last 12 months. 

The patent-pending Gazaro Protect service saves shoppers money by automatically notifying them of eligible price adjustments on the products they purchase.  In an analysis of 2009 Holiday Season pricing on 120,000 consumer electronics products, including computers, 15% dropped in price by an average of $25.61.  And if you doubt just how many products have price drops, check out this following chart showing just how high the percentages are, at several retailers (Best Buy included).

As the company points out, saving money is at the top of most shoppers’ minds in our uncertain economy. Check these stats Gazaro provides: 98% of shoppers surveyed stated they’re willing to claim a price adjustment if they’re notified of it, and 94% are willing to claim price adjustments of anything over $10 in value.

Gazaro Protect is free for shoppers, and is available by email, website, and as an iPhone app.  It is initially featuring only Best Buy products, made available through the BBYOpen platform (an open API), with Gazaro promising “increased functionality for shoppers in the near future.”

Here are three sample use-case scenarios the company provided:

• Mobile: Randy buys a digital camera, and scans the product’s bar code or enters the product’s UPC using the Protect iPhone app.  Gazaro registers the product, and automatically tracks the price drops against the store’s price match policy.  Randy returns to the store to get his price adjustment when Gazaro notifies him of a price drop. Notification can be by text message or email.

• Email: David buys a printer at the store’s website, and forwards the receipt to protect@gazaro.com. Gazaro automatically parses the receipt information to register the product, and automatically tracks price drops against the store’s price match policy.  David calls the store to get his price adjustment when Gazaro notifies him of a price drop.

• Web: Jane buys a flat-screen television in the store or online at the store’s website. She copies and pastes the URL or SKU of the product from the store’s website into the Gazaro Protect website. Gazaro registers the product, and automatically tracks price drops against the store’s price match policy.  Jane returns to the store to get her price adjustment when Gazaro notifies her of a price drop.

I spoke with Alexander Rink, Gazaro’s CEO, who said, “Gazaro Protect enables shoppers to buy with peace of mind, locking in low prices by getting money back if prices drop. And it helps retailers by removing shopper doubt at the point of sale, and by creating a positive experience that encourages customer loyalty.”  Rink sees his company’s technology as a natural evolution for retail. “It’s a clear win for shoppers — they will increasingly demand this type of service. They want to know they got a good deal. Traditionally, that’s meant looking for a good deal before they buy — which Gazaro also helps shoppers do at our web site — but Protect extends that to after they buy.”

Rink said that smart retailers are increasingly thinking ahead about converting transactions into relationships, “where they take care of the customer before, during, and after the purchase, and make it easy for them to return for their next purchase. Gazaro is the leading the way in thinking of the whole ‘customer lifecycle’ in this way.”

The Gazaro Protect iPhone app is now available in the App Store, and the company plans an Android app “in the near future.”  The Gazaro Protect web site is free to use for all online and offline shoppers, and online shoppers can also get protected by simply forwarding their store email receipts to protect@gazaro.com — as noted above, for purchases made on BestBuy.com.

“Gazaro stands for honest recommendations to help shoppers get the best value for their money,” said Sam Zaid, Founder and CTO, in the company’s news announcement. “Gazaro Protect leverages Gazaro’s cloud-based, real-time Retail Pricing Platform to provide a compelling free service for shoppers, and a customer care differentiator for retailers.”

For more about Gazaro, hit the company’s media page and its blog.  The company says it “enables shoppers to buy with peace of mind by certifying great deals in real-time, and protecting them after the purchase.”  It says it analyzes hundreds of thousands of price points on thousands of computers and electronics products every day, identifying great deals. Its intent is to guide shoppers to smart purchase decisions, and provide retailers with real-time pricing data and analytics.

I requested an interview directly with a manger at BBYopen about Gazaro Protect, but got a curt reply back from the company’s PR department saying it did not want to comment at this time.

Here’s a code for the first 100 people reading this post to get 50% off the price of the “Pro” version of the Gazaro Protect iPhone app: gazaroTSB50. The normal price for an in-app upgrade to Pro is $1.99, so the 50% discount will take that to $0.99. The Pro version unlocks the barcode scanner and gives you unlimited “protects,” while the free version of the app only allows you to protect one product.

(UPDATE: We were the first to break this story, but several other sites have since covered it, including CNet, GigaOM, and Lifehacker… so Gazaro tells me they’ve decided to get more generous.  They’re allowing our next 250 readers to upgrade to the Pro version of the Gazaro Protect iPhone app for FREE.  Just first download the free version of the app, then upgrade in-app using this code: FREEMONEYTSM.)

Waiting for a Better Price Before Purchasing at Best Buy? Now You Don’t Have to – There’s an App for That is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

Even though two of the Gang are off this week, we’re joined by the always delightful Julio Ojeda Zapata to talk tech and we cover a lot of ground while also revealing the QR code.

Hosts: Steve Borsch, Tim Elliott & Julio Ojeda Zapata (Graeme Thickins and Phil Wilson are off).
Music:  Scott McLean & his song “One Sweet Dream” via the podsafe Music Alley.

Discussed During the Show:

+ Past week:

- Julio’s adventure: Without Any Sense of Irony, Almanac Hosts a Panel on New Media and TPT’s Terms of Service
- Julio’s upcoming iPad book: iPad Means Business
- Apple announces new: OS X Lion; MB Airs; iLife ‘11; Mac App Store (Yep, Apple Killed The CD Today)
- Windows 7: 240 million licenses sold; do Windows tablets have a chance vs. iPad?
- Windows Phone 7: Julio’s first impressions & Edward Tufte‘s learned opinion
- HP’s Slate. Engadget review
- Google TV blocked by networks, Hulu cuts price in half
- Space Vidcast
- MediaFly
- This Old Nerd

+ Gang Mentality: The Big Three: predictive analytics; location awareness; presence awareness (Steve’s post).

- Best Buy Deploys QR Codes to Enhance Shopping Experience
- CueCat
- itizen, a St. Paul startup

+ UPCOMING EVENTS:

- Magnet 360 Exec Briefing – October 26th
- Social Media Breakfast, Social Media Meets Travel & Tourism moderated by Gang member Phil Wilson – October 29th (SMBMSP’s new website)
- Tekne Awards – November 3rd
- Wordcamp MSP – November 13th
- Startup Weekend II – November 19-21

Minnov8 Gang 99 – Pssst…got the QR code? is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

But, this day, I thought it would be a great opportunity to let Robert tell us about the new role I knew he’d recently been promoted to — that of Chief Technology Officer, reporting the CEO of Best Buy.  I knew something was coming, because he hinted so in a meeting with me and my colleague Steve Borsch during the summer.  There was no Best Buy press release announcing his appointment, which I guess is common for them, but I actually confirmed it a few weeks ago when I hit Robert’s LinkedIn page. (He told me he didn’t want any hoopla around being named to his new role, that he’ll be happy to get recognition when he has some results to talk about.)

We recorded a 21-minute interview, where Robert touched on an array of topics.  He talked about technology trends, and how his job is translating those into actionable intelligence for Best Buy.  He spoke about his developing relationships and partnerships with companies like Google and Facebook, and how he really finds Best Buy a dynamic place to work, giving him a “palette, and a canvas.” He also tells the inside story about how was first asked to be CTO, involving a trip to New York with CEO Brian Dunn on the company jet to meet with Eric Schmidt of Google. Robert also talks about what motivates him, how he thinks more like a startup guy, but has the unique advantage of such big resources at Best Buy — and the abilily to open doors anywhere. “I have the best job,” he says. “I get to travel the world and visit all these companies.” He said over the next five to ten years, “we’ll be exploiting the four screens.” In that regard, he talks in particular about how one of those, TV, is coming into an new exciting phase. “I like sitting on the main chess board,” he said.

But let’s get to it…

Robert Stephens Talks About New Role as CTO of Best Buy is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

The Gang has Julio Ojeda Zapata on this week to talk about a bunch of stuff…including Google’s killing of Google Wave.

Julio is the Pioneer Press’ consumer-tech reporter and writes a Tech Test Drive column about gadgets, apps and social media (among other things). He is the author of Twitter Means Business, one of the first books about Twitter (and his new one coming out tentatively titled, “iPad Means Business”). See his Posterous geekstream or contact him by e-mail or on Twitter.

Hosts: Steve Borsch, Tim Elliott, Graeme Thickins and Phil Wilson.
Music: Big George Jackson Blues Band & song “Tell Me” via the podsafe Music Alley.

Discussed during the show:

• Robert Stephens’ LinkedIn page showing he’s “Chief Technology Officer, Best Buy. Founder, The Geek Squad”
• Google kills Wave
• Rapportive for Gmail
• MailPlane
• Google.me
• FastMall
• Webcams.travel
• LogMeIn Ignition
• ChromeOS
• Jolicloud
• Quite differing views of the onrush (deluge?) of information—and our access to it via the internet—and what Nicholas Carr & Clay Shirky each think of how we’re dealing with it as humans.

Direct link to the show.

Minnov8 Gang 88: Google Waves Goodbye is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.