F'd Companies by Philip J. Kaplan

Despite having lived through the "Dot Bomb" years of 1999-2002, I'm still fascinated by the overindulgence and rampant bad ideas that venture capitalists poured their dollars into before the bottom fell out of the market.

Better known as "Pud", Philip J. Kaplan was the brains behind FuckedCompany.com. This website was a "must read" as it chronicled the abuses of employees and general wrong-headedness of countless start-ups. Sorted and collected in F'd Companies, this 2002 book gives a few paragraphs to hundreds of dot com companies that burned bright, aimed for an IPO, and imploded taking millions with them when "the bubble burst."

Filled with far too many masturbation and auto-fellation jokes, CAPITALIZED RANTS, and cross-references, this thin tome still manages to provide some valuable insight and successfully captures an era of American capitalism. It's amusing to read about the original myspace.com (a file storage location) and see the ideas that just won't stay dead (Yahoo Answers is the current incarnation of a zombie-like internet idea). A good afternoon read, F'd Companies is lesson for all still working on the web.

Staffing Services - Are They Worth It?

I’ve got resumes on file at all the staffing services (aka Freelance Houses) I could find after I parted company with my last company. Overall, they didn’t do me a lick of good. Has anyone else had good experience with them?

I got a lot of talk, some smoke and a few mirrors. I took some tests and proved my mettle but nothing ever came of it. The same thing happened the last time I was between jobs (or about to be between jobs), which leads me to believe that they’re just not for me.

BTW, I'm not in the market. This is an older post that I hoped would spark some commentary but it seems like the blogosphere is dead lately. Almost makes me miss 'eprizer'.

Googlicious

The 25 Secret Perks of Working at Google.

Google’s coming to town (Ann Arbor, that is) in a big way. Before you apply you should know a few things. First off, they’re not the best place to work if you’re a woman. Secondly, it’s not a place to work unless you’ve got a “big name” on your college diploma. I’m waiting for the day that someone sues them for discrimination based on education. Apparently, if you’re up for a promotion or even a perk and the other person in line has a “better” education (that is, a better name on their diploma such as Stanford, Harvard, etc) then your ivy league competition is going to leave you in the dust.

Applying to Google isn’t going to do many folks too much good when they make the move to Ann Arbor, I reckon. They’re probably just going to tap into UofM, hiring college kids for slave wages with just a few open positions for managers to try and sort out the younglings. That’s my theory, anyway. Needless to say, I won’t bother sending over my resume any time soon.

Thus Spoke Zarathustra

I'm sorry, I just can't help it. After reading the description of "ePrize 2007 Space Odyssey" I just couldn't help but try and imagine the unveiling of this year's company theme. I picture a huge purple, red, and green monolith surrounded by upper-management dressed in ape suits, beating each other with bones. Cue Strauss's "Also sprach Zarathustra" and kick off the big party with lots of chocolate covered coffee beans ("Get it, Caffeine!!" cackles the marketing person who quickly earns the new nickname 'Captain Obvious').

That probably wasn't the case but it sure makes me smile to think of it.

By the way, I find it very ironic that so much time, money, and effort were poured into ePrize having a proprietary analytics tool and I see that there's such a thing as "emetrics.eprize.net" but I'm also seeing Google analytic code on the Caffeine homepage. Are the rumours of an ePrize and Google partnership true?

There are some other surprises on that page such as a lot of empty tags (<div class="bulletImage"></div>) and some strange uses of <br /> tags for vertical spacing (<div align="center"><br /><br /><br /><br /></div>). Now, don't quote me, but I think that <dig align="center"> has been depreciated for a while now, though I suppose this is okay as the Caffeine site isn't done in XHTML and doesn't pretend to be W3C compliant. Just call me "Captain Code-Nazi."

Fan Mail

Just wanted to share this note I got today:

I really hope that this bellyaching blog is written by Mike White. It would just make it so right. He made it through all of the firings in the early days of ePrize because he's the biggest kiss ass in the company's history.

White was so about conformity and towing the company line that he used to rally to have the entire SE staff fired when their supervisor stuck up for them for being round pegs in a company of square holes. He was passed over for promotions quite a few times and just didnt' get the hint. Ass kissing can only take you so far before you actually have to have talent.

The company's only gotten better since White got fired. Coincidence?

What's So Wrong With Peace, Love, Understanding & Bagels?

ePrize never was one of those "bubble companies" like those we used to laugh and dream about being at when reading FuckedCompany.com. There were no on-site masseuses, champaign wishes, or cavier dreams. The biggest perks we got were some snacks and five-cent soda. When things got tight when Rare-Medium pulled out funding the snacks went away but we always kept the cheap soda. The one thing we didn't have was bagels.

One of the project managers was determined that giving employees bagels on a regular basis would be a tremendous morale booster -- not that he ever brought (m)any in on his own. My boss scoffed, if not openly mocked, this notion. Even years after this PM departed you could still hear my boss chuckling to himself, "Bagels... Ha... what a crazy idea... Nice..."

The funny thing is, I was talking to a former coworker of mine who has come to work for a company that does a regular weekly bagel day. Without prompting he waxed romantically about those perk those little, round, dense, chewy, doughy rings of goodness. I guess sometimes those little things do matter. Food for thought.

Caffeine Is Nearly Here

The all new SweepsXpress is nearly here. Now called Caffeine", the idea-that-never-dies behind this new branch of ePrize is the creation of DIY (do it yourself) sweeepstakes that tie into the pooled... well, here; I'll let Shaun McCormack and Christopher Heine explain back from their March 8th, 2001 article in the Detroit News titled "ELotto Program Dangles $1 Million Carrot":

Marketers can showcase tickets on their home pages, in banner ads, in pop-up boxes, through e-mail messages or on e-commerce pages.

SweepsXpress lets marketers launch a fully licensed and legal sweepstakes promotion on their site in 24 hours.

"This normally takes 30 to 60 days," Linkner said.

SweepsXpress is a prepackaged Internet promotion designed by ePrize. Marketers need $950 to launch a sweepstakes as well as one line of HTML code in order to integrate it with their site, Linkner said. The cost includes technology, sweepstakes licensing and prizes.

With SweepsXpress, several marketers take part in the same promotion and can share the cost of one expensive prize. Sweepstakes entrants can come from any Web site, but there is only one winner.

"Odds of winning are spread across multiple sites, so it reduces the cost to marketers," Linkner said.

SweepsXpress promotions run for 90 days and attract consumers using a three-year lease of a Porsche Boxster, a cruise for two to Hawaii, a Sea Doo GTI personal watercraft or a year of mortgage payments up to $1,500 per month.

"We feel the best way for marketers to break through the clutter is to offer big, sexy, exotic prizes," Linkner said.

The key difference appears to be that Caffeine will run on Flash rather than HTML. I wouldn't be surprised if the good brains of Terry May are behind the architecture there as he's frighteningly smart. Going through one of these promotions for Fathead.com, I would only advise that the page loadtimes even on a T1 are pretty darn slow. Hopefully that gets addressed before the official launch.

Though Caffeine has been in "Development Hell" for ages, it looks like key players are pulling it out of the Stygian depths for an immenent and successful launch. Congrats!

Amusing Comic

Thanks "Year of the Chump"! BTW, I'm curious to hear what the theme of 2007 is! I hear that the holiday party is coming up. It's a little after the Holidays, isn't it? Or is this a pre-Tu B'Shevat party?

The ePrize Video

Wow. I can't recognize 95% of the folks in this video. The hiring boom continues. Are all of the folks featured here still working at ePrize? Glad that Matt and Jeremy are on the poster frame. :)

"Maybe you should seek therapy"

Move on with your life. I just don't understand why you are so obsessed with the place...

What some don't seem to understand is that this blog is my therapy. One may choose to participate in it or not.

Undoubtedly, those who feel that I'm unduly "obsessed" with this place so long after my departure have never been betrayed by someone they love. To put it metaphorically, think of it as coming home to your loving wife of many years to find her in bed with someone else. She professes that she's never truly loved you and that the life you've been leading is a lie.

After an experience like that one may find oneself dwelling on the past and trying to sort out truth from fiction. I find there are times when I knew that there was deception afoot but, as the song says, "I'd rather go on hearing your lies than to go on living without you." But other times I get angry about the betrayal. I think I have a right.

The online therapy will continue, no doubt, thought it is lessening. As news develops and certain dirty tricksters still play out, though, I plan to post about it.

One notes that the holidays are a time of reflection and redoubling of effort. Happy New Year, everyone.

We Save Lives Every Day...

When I was working hundred hour weeks and weekends I felt inspired. I felt like I was doing something important.

I didn't know any better.

Branching out into the real world of advertising agencies it's funny to me how much sweepstakes, games, loyalty programes, et. al. are treated out here. They're an afterthought. They're a good way to get some traffic due to the "sweeps whores" of MyInstantWin but those oh-so-valuable names and addresses that are collected are viewed as being completely unviable. Yes, even those from people who "opt-in" to promotions, electing to be marketed to. We get the data... and then we don't do anything with it. They are simply "Unqualified Leads" and tossed out with the refuse.

So, while I felt like I was answering a higher calling by giving my blood, sweat, and literal tears to Online Promotions, I wasn't doing anything earth-shattering or that needed to be treated like brain surgery. Just thinking about this on my week off from work and thinking about how it was of dire importance that I needed to work on Christmas last year when I was still at "The Prize". Ahhhh, sweet memories.

Who shot J.R.?

Been hearing some strange rumors about the old homestead lately. Talks about hygene at meetings aimed at stinky IDs? And then I read this today: http://frogboy3.livejournal.com/.

The author discusses his aggressive recruitment and, subsequently, that ePrize went incommunicado. He turned down a job in the interim only to get mixed messages about being hired versus there not being a Dallas production office entirely. Add to this the HR director at ePrize resigning and you've got a very troubled lad and a very perplexing situation.

HR director leaving? No Dallas office? What's happening over there? It's funny these days as I interview people and mention my background I get a lot of unsolicited criticism and concern about the old red, purple and green. Looks like I'm not the only one not getting any phone calls, letters, or emails returned when trying to get in touch with folks over at 404 East 10 Mile... unless the people I'm trying to contact have been fired. 'Tis the season!

Addendum: Word on the "ex-Prize grapevine" has a key Dallas player being benched recently. Seems that the extra-marital behavior of "Mister Odd" finally caught up with him.

Resolving Workplace Conflict: An Exercise

Got a great e-mail the other day from a former ePrizer who saved this document:

We are currently in a state of flux here at ePrize. The schism of the DT role into Technologists and HTML specialists has been a source for confusion, consternation, and concern.

The following is an example of dissent among the ranks. Please read through this carefully:

Is this your fabulous writing? “Functionality--Viral Error -- I am unable to refer friends, apparently. Being given a butt ugly page that has two headlines and two sets of body copy that says I'm missing either my friends name or friends email. That text is VERY awkward as it should be either "Friend's name / friend's email" if they've referred one friend or "Friends' name / friends' email" if they've screwed up more than one. We don't have the ability to check this so I would recommend rephrasing those headlines.”

Yes, that's mine. The Butt Ugly gave me away, I imagine.

I'm going to type this and not say it out loud for your benefit: Don't ever feed stuff like that to the PMs. Ever.

LOL! What part was objectionable? The functionality assessment or my concern about apostophes?

I hate to break it to you, but I'm not laughing about it. I'm sick of your charade. There's a fine line between constructive criticism and attacking someone's work. And you continually cross it and aren't taken to task for it. Don't ever do it again.

Woah, woah, woah. What's the criticism? I'm so not seeing what the problem was. No charade intended -- please explain your complaint to me as if I were completely in the dark -- because I am.

Well, I'll use the Sony promotion and this as my examples. The words you use are completely uncalled for. "butt ugly", "WTF," etc. You need to watch how you say thing, because they are easily misinterpreted and it's going to take you quite awhile to live down the Sony e-mail.

If you're going to harp on older mistakes that I felt have been rectified, we'll never get anywhere. Is there such a thing as Tabula Rasa to you? That "butt ugly" comment was aimed at the HS, not the Technologist.
As we both know, the HS is the person in charge of the "prettiness" of a promotion -- I am 99% sure that this page was not complete -- nor was the promotion -- when handed to me for review. That was a way to call big attention to it for the HS who worked on it next to get on it pronto. Not a personal attack on you. Or a professional attack on your work.

Whoever said everything was an attack on me?

You're acting that way. The "charade" statement. When I write to my team, I use very brusque language. I was unaware that the "butt ugly" thing would be assigned to you -- you need only worry about the functionality, I would think.

It's assigned as a technologist task in the breakdown.

And I'm responsible for that how? Again, sorry if I offended -- that comment was not intended for you but for whichever HS was assigned those changes -- even if it were me.

I'm sure that the PM assigned it to you due to the functionality issues, not breaking it into parts as it should have been. I'll be sure to phrase any functionality problems in a nicer tone.

---

Questions:

1. What is the nature of the conflict?
2. Has this conflict been resolved?
3. How could this conflict have been avoided?

---

There's no doubt in my mind that the "conversation" documented here is real. I'm just not sure that the questions that followed it are. It was presented to me as if it were a worksheet of the conversation with three follow-up questions. My comments are the ones here in italics. The rest came from the word doc I was sent. Sorry, tough to communicate this via the limited formatting.

Incommunicado

Something to remember if you ever go from being an ePrizer to an exPrizer -- your email will be filtered into your former coworkers' SPAM folder in Outlook, so good luck getting a message to anyone there.

While this is probably a precaution against people dropping inappropriate emails on anyone, it's quite a bite when you're writing to anyone in HR trying to get information on your benefits or any other loose ends that weren't tied up before your departure.

It's not you -- it's the filter. Just let your fingers do the walking.

Behind Closed Doors

I'm having a bit of a crisis of faith... My current employer recently hired one of my former ePrize colleagues. He's finally in a position that he wanted to be in at ePrize for years but never managed to get into.

I worked with this person for years. When he came in, he pretty much formed an entire department by himself. After that, he was put under someone from a completely different department with the typical excuse that he was a good "worker" but not a "leader". Despite this major slight, he kept on. After a while, he wanted to move to project management (why I'll never know).

At this time I was having one of those meetings I've written about before; a lunch with the leadership team. Upon hearing that this guy wanted to make a move from his department to project management one of the big wigs said (with surprising force), "He will NEVER be a project manager here." I never found out the reason for this reaction or prohibition.

Rather than being a PM, he was moved into another fledgeling department. "Either he makes it there or we let him go," came the word. Talk about setting someone up to fail! But, he didn't fail. Instead, he came in and rocked the house.

At another manager's lunch his new boss was beside himself, "I don't know what to do! He's been in my department for six months and he's already far more advanced than [the guy that had been there for over a year]!" As if tha was a problem? To him it was. Better to have two semi-compitent workers than a superstar and a guy with a "good heart" but not much of a head on his shoulders. The superstar might make him feel bad.

That was where it stood when I left there. And now he's at my new place of business, hired in as a PM. So, do I tell him why he was never given this chance before? Or do I just bite my tongue and keep the backstabbing and backroom politics to myself? Perhaps if I knew why there was such a negative reaction to the thought of him being a PM... It's not like it was such a position of prestige. After all, that was the place for cousins and babysitters of The Purple Gang for a while; and the perfect place to put someone if you want them to fail.

Time will tell if I hold my tongue or not, I suppose.