Pulling MLS into the 21st Century

MLS challenge could change the way houses are sold - The Globe and Mail

Funny, the MLS real estate site has been around for 10 years on the internet. It’s proprietary, exclusive and so very web 1.0. It was handy in the 1990’s, but is in desperate need of an upgrade. The Canadian Real Estate Association has built a walled garden for Canadian real estate, and in doing so has limited innovation and revenues. There are a handful of alternative web sites that offer real estate sales, but they don’t have the coverage of the MLS. Some are just eye candy that pulls details out of the MLS database (considering how anal the CREA is, I’m surprised that they’ve allowed this).

A smart person could scrape the MLS database and make a very innovative, creative, interactive Real Estate application. I want a real estate site that will do more than provide static information on housing sales. I want to be able to search for VERY specific things: lot size, finished basements, mature landscaping, distance to water. I want to see the other houses on the street that have sold in the past 18 months. All this information is in the house details, it’s just not part of the searchable database. Silly. I also want to know how long a house has been on the market. Imagine adding the ability to pop an offer right onto the site. I’m thinking eBay for housing. :-) (Sorry Alex, I know I’ve just hit you right in the pocket book).

Yes, I realize that’s quite a grocery list, but for gawd’s sake. It’s the 21st Century. I want to do my homework. I want to do it effectively and quickly. I’m even Ok with paying a monthly service fee for a cooler website. I’m all for needing a real estate agent when I want to sell my house, but I can do a pretty good job on my own for finding a house :-) C’mon CREA, get your act together and let your hair down…  

Tags: realestate, Canada, CREAL, MLS

Facebook Threat Gets Boy Banned from Internet

While on probation, the teen will not be allowed on Facebook or MSN, and is only permitted to use the internet to do school work.

CBC News - Prince Edward Island - Facebook threat gets boy banned from internet This story hit my funny bone this morning....We as a culture have gotten to the point where the internet is no longer an *optional* tool, or a perk, but has become an accepted part of the educational kit bag. The boy who threatened his school has been banned from Facebook and instant messaging, but can still use the internet for school work. Seriously. Seriously!?!?!? Now facebook and messaging are considered perks. The internet is table steaks. Two questions pop up:

1. Who is going to police his internet usage?
2. Who is going to lock down all computers that he's got access to?
3. What about the internet applications on his phone?

Chances are that his parents are not terribly internet or computer savy... I hope they are, but the odds are that they have left the *internet* stuff to their savvy son. Wouldn't it have been a more tangible punishment if he'd been blocked off the internet altogether? Gee, it would suck to have to do research using..... the library. There are SO many loopholes in this punishment. What was the judge thinking? And what are the punishments going to be when it's discovered that the kid is back on Fb and messenger? I don't think our Criminal system is ready for the 21st century :-(

Tags: Facebook, MSN, InternetThreats, PEI

The Best Buy *IS* at Best Buy

After a week of agonizing over which new phone to get with his $200 TELUS phone credit, yesterday my husbandly-type person, aka The Wiz, ventured out to the new Aurora Best Buy to see how the new Blackberry Bold 3G stacked up against his Ist Gen Storm. A few minutes of playing around, and he was sold. He upgraded his phone hardware, and extended his contract a year to boot. It was a good deal on both sides.

It wasn’t until Jay, the wireless sales manager started to ring up the damages and transfer the existing services over to the new phone that things started to slip sideways. There’s a new levy on the 3G network of $5/month. This is a consistent charge across all carriers if you want to upgrade to take advantage of the 3G network. Unfortunately, it’s $5 more than The Wiz’s existing plan was. Also, the closest “new plan” to his existing plan only allowed for room for 3 voice mails to be stored at a time… a big downgrade from his current 10 voice mail package. To upgrade to 10 on the new plan… another $5 increase. At this point, The Wiz is less excited about his new phone, and Jay can see that there’s a bit of duress. There shouldn’t be duress, wireless should be fun, in theory.

Jay worked some magic. He was able to provide the upgrades voice mail plan for free. $5 down. The Wiz understood that the $5 3G network upgrade made sense, and that Jay didn’t really have the power to alter that charge. That being said, to make up for the fact that it wasn’t a straight swap of monthly plans and rates, he went the extra mile, providing some very decent discounts on some accessories for the Bold. Discounts on a case, a screen protector, a skin. Happy, Happy, and  Happy. The Wiz left with a skip in his step, whistling a happy tune, as a pleased TELUS customer as well as an ecstatic Best Buy customer.

If you’ve recently gotten an upgrade notification, and have a credit just burning a hole in your pocket, The Wiz highy recommends chatting it up with Jay at the Aurora Best Buy, he’ll see you straight, and make the migration of services and hardware easy an painless. YAY Jay! 

PS — The Wiz left his data cable with you, he’s got to to get it back this week! :-)

Automobile Recalls: Of Mountains and Molehills

Toyota has been taking it on the chin as of late with their vehicle recalls. Three highly publicized recalls in as many months.

Take a deep breath folks.

Did you know that there have been 65 recalls for the Pontiac Grand Prix? The Chevy Equinox had twenty eight recalls. Thirty eight recalls on the Dodge Grand Caravan. The Ford Escape suffered through thirty nine recalls.

Have a little perspective.

Go ahead, see how many problems *your* car has had :-)

Bragging Or Complaining: Olympic Broadcast Media Consortium Worries About Social Media

In 2009 I was at the Canadian Telecom Summit, and was able to hear of Canada’s broadcast plans for the 2010 Olympics. I’m not a fan of the Olympics, but the broadcast plans were creative, inclusive and multi-pronged. It sounded VERY neat. The Media Consortium was excited to leverage social media and user generated content to augment their coverage. It was planned to be a very interactive project with spectator sharing, commenting, photos and videos.

This morning, I’m unfortunately not terribly surprised to read that “Social Media Set to Spoil Olympic Opening Ceremonies”

You can’t commit to leveraging social media for corporate gain in one breath, and then slam it in the next breath…. Certainly that was the plan of the Consortium —- hitching its wagon to the millions of spectators who will bet facebooking, twittering and YouTubeing during the Olympics……All that content, all that conversation, all that buzz, all for free.

The Media Consortium had planned to juice up it’s coverage of the Olympics on the backs of content provided by spectators. Now it’s complaining that user coverage is going to spoil the surprise of the Opening Ceremony.

Talk about wanting to have your cake and eat it too.

Social Media and the New Transparency

I love it.

Transparency, that is. You are who you are, and you do what you say you will do, and you act accordingly. Knowing that there is the potential for the whole world to see what you are up to is a potentially daunting realization when delving into social media.

That being said, you can’t avoid it. And to ignore it is to do so at your own peril.

I’m a self-proclaimed social media freak. And proud of it. You name it, I’ve got an account on it. Even Plaxo. :-)

I’m on Facebook roughly 6-7 hours a day. Some of those hours are during work hours. (Hi boss!) Transparency is important here. The world knows what you are doing, and when you’re doing it. Why am I on Facebook during work hours? Here you go:

• I am friends with my customers, vendors, partners and competitors. My customers, vendors, partners and competitors are on Facebook.
• I am a fan of MANY fan pages, especially those of key industry players, customers and even competitors. I am using social media tools to stay current with what is going on all over the place.
• I am friends with some very neat people. People who say and post very important and timely things. People who are key in their various industries. People I can turn to when I have a challenge, problem or need a push in the right direction. These smarties are now part of my social network. These are people who know people!

I use twitter sporadically, but only because I’ve yet to find the perfect twitter tool. I’m sure I’ll get to it. I mostly appreciate my FB friends tweeting in their FB status to try and stay abreast of issues.

I’m on LinkedIn, but that’s table steaks if you’re in business. It’s how you keep track of the people who haven’t yet thrown over to Facebook.

But what happens when you aren’t ready for transparency? If you aren’t embracing the transparency?

You get in trouble. Full stop. Anything you say can and will be used against you. In a court of law. At work. With the various and sundry boys/girls you may be dating who suddenly discover that it *is* a small world after all.

Embrace the transparency. Govern Yourself Accordingly. Be Free.

Skilled Workers --- Hard to Find

As low-skilled, unfulfilling jobs move off shore, the Canadian population is going to realize that it's worth it to spend a few years in college or university to learn the required skills to get a satisfying job. Off-shoring is going to continue, and you are going to see more and more low-skilled jobs going to areas of the world where these jobs are still considered challenging and desirable.

In the Globe and Mail, skilled jobs are going to be in very high demand. Very High Demand.
Is your job going off shore?
Are you sure?

If you're working in a role that can easily be done by someone with little to no training, chances are someone else, somewhere else can do the job for much less than you. If you want to ensure a continued demand for your labour, you need to make sure your labour is worth the asking price... It's that simple. Even workers need to stay competitive, valuable and desirable. If there's a glut of labour on the market, then it's an employers dream. Supply and demand. Just make sure you are in high demand, because the days of skating by with little education are over.
Technorati Tags: off-shoring, skilled labour