Yes, The World Does Need Another Staffing Software Solution

If you look at lists of staffing software vendors on sites like Capterra or Recruiters Network, you may well wonder why the world needs another vendor in this space. Well...because may of these companies have been around for a long time. Their software is "robust"—which one of my bosses in a former life said is an acronym for "really old but ultimately stable techngology."

But needs change and technology (constantly) changes, which is why four former executives of TempWorks recently formed Avionte Software, a new staffing software company dedicated to producing recruiting software that's web-based, fully integrated with other front and back office applications, and that's actually easy to use.

Staffing types can check out the new software at its official launch at Staffing World 2007 in San Antonio, October 9-12.

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Magenic Community Blog - Excellent Stuff

Though a lot of technology companies now have blogs, I'm constantly amazed at the number who don't realize what a key driver blogging is for thought leadership (which enhances credibility and, indirectly, increases sales). There are a number of excellent corporate tech blogs out there of course, such as Dave's Blog, written by NetApp CEO Dave Hitz.

Another outstanding tech blog I recently came across is the Magenic Technologies Community Blog. Magenic, a Microsoft-focused IT consulting firm with five offices across the U.S., has a great developer blog covering topics such as IT events, SQL Server, code testing, .NET, system mods, C# and other software development subjects. Definitely worth checking out.

The main page is actually a collection of postings from consultants such as Jeff Knutson, Aaron Erickson and Sean Schade. Doesn't look like there's a FeedBurner feed for the main blog page, which is kind of odd, but these guys are smart—I suspect this will get added sooner than later.

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"Onshoring" Support - A New Trend?

In a drive to reduce costs, IT companies have increasing turned to offshoring in recent years, to countries such as India and the Philippines. First went development, and later tech support. But while offshoring support has been popular among IT vendors, it has been less so among customers, who often have difficulty understanding the heavy accents of offsore support personnel.

Now, some vendors are bucking the trend. Redundant Internet access appliance maker Astrocom even makes its onshore tech support a selling point. As one customer put it, "If you can understand a Minne-soowta accent, you can understand their tech support people."

Finance and accounting (FAO) outsourcer API Outsourcing understands that it is handling sensitive client data as it processes payments, invoices, billing and other backoffice documents. While some competitors seem to have no problem sending such work overseas, API seeks to protect this information by doing all of it's backoffice processing in Minnesota and Wisconsin (okay, some Vikings fans may consider Wisconsin a foreign country, but most Americans accept its statehood).

Finally, enterprise content management consultant MBS Technologies avoids the accent problem by providing tech support from South Dakota.

Smaller tech vendors are often more nimble than their larger counterparts; could there be a trend here?

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Fiefox Ad-Blocking Plug In Raises Questions

Per this article from the International Herald Tribune:

"Adblock Plus, an easy-to-use free addition to the Firefox Internet browser that deletes advertisements from Web sites is still a niche product for the niche browser. But it is potentially a huge development in the online world, and not because it simplifies Web sites cluttered with advertisements."

The article goes on to point out the dilemma this raises for Microsoft, which is both a major beneficiary of onlind ad revenue as well as, of course, the most widely-used browser. Microsoft has opened up IE to third-party extensions, but would be unlikely to tolerate an effective ad-blocker.

A few questions and observations of my own:

• This strikes me as unnecessary. Pop-up blockers are one thing (both Firefox and IE now have affective blockers, and pop-ups really ARE annoying), but most website ads are reasonably non-intrusive—they don't prevent a site visitor from getting the content he or she came for, they just sit off to the side to the clicked or not, based on interest.



• The first step is another technology arms race. If ad blockers become more common, advertisers will develop workarounds, which would require a new round of ad-blocking technology to address. The advertisers ultimately have more money to throw at this development.



• Be careful what you wish for. If effective ad-blocking ever does become widespread, publishers would have to find a new way to monetize their content. This could lead to greater reliance on subscription revenue. As is usually the case, the pioneers would take the arrows, but eventually most if not all publishers would have to follow suit. Everyone has to eat.

The bottom line is that ad-blocking plug-ins may be clever programming, but they are a bad idea. Looking at a few ads off to the side of content is a small inconvenience for keeping the vast majority of web-based content free.

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