Ever get a call from your pharmacy telling you that a prescription is ready for pickup? Cool, huh. Ever get a call intended for someone else because their database is out-of-date? Uh, not cool.

Simple solution: Use your CID detail to call back the store. Speak to a pharmacist. Inform them that the computer is automatically violating HIPPA laws.*

They might be confused at first but they will take the time to solve your problem. The day I thought of this it took me 3:00 minutes including speaking to someone else first. Post a comment if you beat my high score and how you improved the script.

Why did this work for me? My theory is that the problem of spamming you with a phone call on a Saturday morning (causing you to run down stairs) is less important than the CVS problem of violating HIPPA Laws by informing you about another person’s medical history (without their consent).

// Insert Picture of CVS Pharmacy by Paul Mobley //

*I am a customer not an attorney.

Back in August 2008 I wrote an article about Pandora. I mentioned that while the service was currently free they would likely go to a subscription format in the future. That day has arrived. (insert I told you so).

You can now subscribe to Pandora for $36/year and enjoy an ad-free experience.

Previously they only used web ads (which were easy to ignore). Now they’ve started to deploy audio ads inserted into your music station(s). They appear to only be a few seconds in length but they’re much more noticable.

Coldplay :: Good Idea – Provide a free album as a thank you to the fans.

Coldplay :: Bad Idea – Failure to test your system. Online album unavailable due to a technical glitch.

It’s a wonderful idea to give a free album every once and a while. However, you need to test the system to make sure that it actually works and does not anger or frustrate the fans. Coldplay announced last Friday that the new live album LeftRightLeftRightLeft would be available for free. You have to provide an email address and then it directs you to a download page. When you click “download” all that happens is that it prompts a request for a “Username” and “Password”. No album available… Just frustration.

Anyone planning on doing something viral remember that you want people to talk about how you did something cool, not how you screwed up. We don’t appreciate incompetence.

urbanspoon is an entrepreneurial success story that is worth talking about instead of all this fear mongering stuff (that I’m guilty of too). It’s a company that is lead by three guys Ethan, Adam, and Patrick. From what I can tell back in November 2006 they landed on the concept of collecting information about local restaurants and had launched their “proof of concept”. Since they lived in Seattle they started there and did all they could to get information and timely reviews about all of the Seattle restaurants by real people.

With the advent of the app store for the iPhone they really began to get some notice. By then they had expanded to multiple cities across the world and they kept it small with the three of them doing the bulk of the work. In early November they were in the Top 10 Free Apps with more than 1 million downloads. You may have seen the Apple commercial that started playing within the last 30 days. After that they doubled the downloads.

Here is the timeline that I was able to parse together:

Nov 2006 – urbanspoon.com in Seattle only
July 2008 – Free App on iPhone
Nov 2008 – 1 million downloads
Dec 2008 – 2.2 million downloads

I’ll admit, I didn’t know about it until the commercial. At the time I was in Anchorage, AK and was eating some pizza. I instantly downloaded it from the App Store and when I shook it for the first time with no insight beyond my GPS location it recommended Moose’s Tooth Pizza. The exact place that I had gone with some locals. Later I showed it to another local and the first shake gave the place they had dinner that night. Very cool.

Ethan said in a recent interview, “Advertisers are pushing their own iPhone apps, and a very few take advantage of the location-based nature of mobile, but for the most part they are still thinking about the iPhone as a small-screen web page. I think that will change. Mobile has immediacy, location, intimacy — a bunch of things the web is missing. Over time advertisers and publishers will figure out how to take advantage of all that.”

Their business model is simple. Solving one of life’s problems (like suggesting a place to eat) and doing it well. Food is a local business but it takes a more global approach an leveraging the power of technology to make a difference.

Most of there revenue is generated by advertising but they’re also building a community even if they don’t know it. Well done Ethan, Adam, and Patrick!! You deserve all the success that you’ve received.

Let’s start with a really good idea. One that I hope is successful financially although there are some major risks. Pandora started as an idea called the music genome project and has become an internet radio service.

[We] set out to capture the essence of music at the most fundamental level. We ended up assembling literally hundreds of musical attributes or “genes” into a very large Music Genome. Taken together these genes capture the unique and magical musical identity of a song – everything from melody, harmony and rhythm, to instrumentation, orchestration, arrangement, lyrics, and of course the rich world of singing and vocal harmony. It’s not about what a band looks like, or what genre they supposedly belong to, or about who buys their records – it’s about what each individual song sounds like.

Source: Pandora.com

They allow you to create your own “station” that playes only the music you like. Including ones that you’ve never heard of before. You tell them artists or songs that you like and they begin streaming music for you that is taylored to your specific tastes. You can even learn more about the attributes of the song you’re listening to or more about the artist. Check out my own station Mobley Radio or create your own.

Their primary known revenue is from selling songs that have been bookmarked while listening to a station (Amazon mp3 or iTunes). Secondary known revenue source is from advertising (graphic ads on the web page not audio ads). Even though I have other sources for purchasing music I’m inclined to purchase it thru their affilate program since they’re the ones who introduced it to me.

An unknown source of revenue, that may actually be their greatest channel, is through sales of the market research that they appear to collect seamlessly. A label can come to them with new music; they identify the characteristics; match it to fit with the style (based on the “genome”) of multiple “stations”; and record the thumbs up / thumbs down responses of the listeners. That would provide a good gauge if that artist would be successful. Pair that with basic demographic data like age, sex, zip code, etc that they already know and it could be quite powerful and valuable data. To me this seems like their best funding source.

The risk is that the costs in classifying large amounts of music costs a lot of money unless they found a way to automate it. Also, the revenue from music sales and ads may not cover the licensing costs for the music streaming service. If they are unable to maintain the free model they will likely switch to a “subscription model” or “listener supported” format.

Hopefully they make money and continue to imporove the service. In our book Pandora gets an “I Like It” or what we call a “good idea”.

This is the start of a new section. Here we’ll look at good and bad business ideas and how their executed Please send in your ideas and they’ll be reviewed and possibliy included in upcoming posts.