Blog ... technology on the rise

Domino's Don't Make Me Think (school boy error)

Amusing incident when getting a treat pizza from Dominios tonight. Buying online we noticed the 555 offer. Order any three 9.5" pizzas for £5.55, a great price.

We decided to go for the 555 promotion, we selected our three 9.5" pizzas and filled the basket. But strangely no discount was forthcoming. I tried this a number of ways but always the same ... No discount? This was some what vexing and we were all getting hungry.

This reminded me of a promotional problem I had seen before ... The issue is two fold (1) the inability to recognise the contents of the basket; (2) not anticipating the varity of user interactions.

The solution to both our basket and hunger problem took a little time to work out ... Looking at the interface again I noticed a DEALS tab ... Clicking on this took us to a page where all the promotions were listed with the ability to place an order, Yea!!!! The order was placed and we just needed to wait for the notification to pick up the pizzas.

While waiting for the green light to pick up the pizza we mused that dominos would be getting into a trouble with customers. They would see the 555 deal but be unable to make it work. This is a UK wide promotion so You would have to assume this is goi to be a big problem. This was semi confirmed when we went to collect the pizza, an argument about the promotion was already raging. I think it's safe to say there will be update requests to the site.

 Domino's Don't Make Me Think!

There's a great book by Steve Krug entitle "Don't make me think" ... to paraphrase what it is saying ... it's advice is that an interface should be obvious and not require un due amounts of thought. This is the oposit of what i was faced with at Dominos. 

Possible Improvements

1) The 555 promotion banner links to the DEALS page ... this is the obvious and easiest fix. It also let's customers see what other promotions are available.

2) The 555 promotion banner links to the 555 promotion order page. This is a more appropriate fix for just the 555 promotion, however linking directly to the 555 order page effectively hides the other promotions ... one of which might be more interesting to the customer. For this reason I think we rule this option out, unless perhaps there is another link to the DEALS page.

3) Configure the promotional engine to work correctly - but my guess is that this is a more complicated issue and will require a fix.

4) Fix the Ecommerce promotional engine so that it can detect and correctly apply promotions to appropriate orders (this may be v.complicated).

Olympic Ticket Mistake ... continues II

Quick update: 12 days later and the 2012 Olympic ticketing is still some way from being 100% ... they've relaunched but this time they are only buying tickets back. They are not relisting them ... they functionality will come at some point in April.

Ticket resale update
You can now submit to the resale programme any tickets which you purchased through London 2012 but are no longer able to use. You have until 6pm on 3 February to submit tickets. These tickets will be made available to the public from April 2012. For more information please read our  Frequently asked questions. We are sorry for any inconvenience caused.
http://www.tickets.london2012.com/homepage

Interestingly LOCOG Commercial Director Chris Townsend some how thinks that

"purchasing the tickets back from customers now, and offering them again from April, will result in a better customer experience for everyone".

Some how I feel this Mr Townsend has missed the point, or he's used a very unfortunate choice of words.  Very simply put, what the customers wanted (and they are in their thousands) was to either sell back tickets or to purchased ones that had been re-released. What they have got isn't even close. With the world looking at us it's a shame to see this happen, especially as it seems this could of been avoided.

• telegraph.co.uk - London 2012 Olympics LOCOG blames unprecedented demand for ticket exchange crash - "a quarter of a million people were searching for Olympic tickets when their resale website crashed at the beginning of the month"

The Wikipedia Blackout

Jimmy Wales the founder of Wikipeda and a staunch proponent of net neutrality and freedom of speech took the remarkable step of taking down the Wikipedia website for 24 hours in protest against the anti-piracy legislation. If you still doubt how serious a matter Wikipedia think this legslation to be, then consider the title on their web site "Imagine a World Without Free Knowledge". Wales expects an estimated 100 million visitors to be affected by a Wikipedia black out.

Many websites have also spoken about how negatively the proposed legislation would make their businesses difficult or impossiable. Here are some comments i've taken from a number of the supporting websites:

• googleblog.blogspot.com/ - Don't censor the web. You might notice many of your favorite websites look different today. Wikipedia is down. WordPress is dark. We're censoring our homepage logo and asking you to petition Congress. So what's the big deal? ... ... Because we think there's a good way forward that doesn't cause collateral damage to the web, we're joining Wikipedia, Twitter, Tumblr, Reddit, Mozilla and other Internet companies in speaking out against SOPA and PIPA. And we're asking you to sign a petition and join the millions who have already reached out to Congress through phone calls, letters and petitions asking them to rethink SOPA and PIPA.Posted by David Drummond, SVP Corporate Development and Chief Legal Officer
• reddit.com //  Dear reddit, Today, for 12 hours, reddit.com goes dark to raise awareness of two bills in congress: H.R.3261 "Stop Online Piracy Act" and S.968 "PROTECT IP", which could radically change the landscape of the Internet. These bills provide overly broad mechanisms for enforcement of copyright which would restrict innovation and threaten the existence of websites with user-submitted content, such as reddit.
• wordpress.org - Many websites are blacked out today to protest proposed U.S. legislation that threatens internet freedom: the Stop Internet Piracy Act (SOPA) and the Protect IP Act (PIPA). From personal blogs to Wikipedia, sites all over the web — including this one — are asking you to help stop this dangerous legislation from being passed. Please watch the video below to learn how this legislation will affect internet freedom, then scroll down to take action.
• http://www.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox - Today Mozilla joins with other sites in a virtual strike to protest two proposed laws in the United States, called SOPA and the PROTECT IP Act. On January 24th, the U.S. Senate will vote on thePROTECT IP Act to censor the Internet, despite opposition from the vast majority of Americans. Join us to protect our rights to free speech, privacy, and prosperity.
• http://newyork.craigslist.org/ STOP PIPA (Senate 968) & SOPA (HR 3261). Imagine a world without craigslist, Wikipedia, Google, [your favorite sites here]... News Corp, RIAA, MPAA, Nike, Sony, Comcast, VISA & others want to make that world your reality. 80 Members of Congress are in their sway, 30 against, the rest undecided or undeclared. ? ? ? Please take a minute to tell your Members of Congress you OPPOSE PIPA & SOPA ? ? ? CLICK HERE for MORE INFO & EASY ACTION ITEMS PS: corporate paymasters, KEEP THOSE CLAMMY HANDS OFF THE INTERNET!
• See a list of more companies: https://www.google.com/landing/takeaction/community/ 

The Huffington post reports that 7k sites are taking part in the blackout.

This clip gives you a good overview of what the legalisation is about, it also describes how crippling it would be to current and new online businesses, and even individuals.

PROTECT IP / SOPA Breaks The Internet from Fight for the Future on Vimeo.

Despite the fact that this all about USA based legalisation this is something we should all be aware and concerned about. After all what happens in the US is often followed else where

A final, amusing thought ... no one is above the law ... it seems US Congressman Lamar Smith and author behing Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) is actually infringing images on his own website, and he's not the only one, read about other violations.

Links:

• static.googleusercontent.com - Congress can you hear us, Google
• en.wikipedia.org -  Wikipedia: SOPA initiative Learn_more
• dailymail.co.uk - Wikipedia blackout Google change homepage refuses dark SOPA protest
• techcrunch.com - Yes, Google Will Protest SOPA on its Homepage
• craigslist.org/about/SOPA - Corporate supporters of Senate 968 (PIPA) and HR 3261 (SOPA) demand the ability to take down any web site (including craigslist, Wikipedia, or Google) that hurts their profits -- without prior judicial oversight or due process -- in the name of combating "online piracy."
• bbc.co.uk - Wikipedia joins blackout protest at US anti-piracy moves
• huffingtonpost.com - Wikipedia Blackout: 11 Huge Sites Protest SOPA, PIPA On January 18 ... 7,000 websites take part in the blackout

Olympic Ticket Mistake ... continues

6 days later and the 2012 Olympic ticketing system provided by Ticketmaster. I think it's safe to be that the thousands of people who have ran into problems when the system was live, and who have been unable to buy tickets now would all into question even the title of the technology company ... Ticketmaster NOT! The official ticket website is reporting the following on it's site:

Ticket resale update
We have temporarily suspended the ticket resale system while Ticketmaster investigates issues that some customers have experienced. Therefore no tickets are currently eligible for resale. Further information about ticket resale will be released when Ticketmaster has resolved these issues. Thank you for your patience.
http://www.tickets.london2012.com/homepage

What is curious is that there is no log of messages, just the above statement. I would of thought a more transparent approach would of been more in keeping with the Olympic spirit? We all know technical issues are part of live, its a shame that some people seem to have to waste time relearning other peoples mistakes.

nb.  London Organising Committee of the Olympic and Paralympic Games (LOCOG)