Social Media Controversy: Yelp

I have been updating my Dandyid lately. I also switched my mobile phone to the iphone. Those two things led me to discovering a few new Web 2.0 and social media services.

For examples, I have signed up for accounts on Goodreads.com (a social media site for logging, reviewing, and sharing books), Fring (a mobile phone federation client for voice, video, and text communications), and keep enjoying last.fm as my favorite online radio service. However, by far, my favorite entertainment has been around Yelp.com

I learned about yelp last year when I was in California and read an article in a local newspaper about it. In a nutshell, there has been a lot of controversy around this service; as a matter of fact, a year after reading that article, I still can't believe how or why it's becoming popular at all.

Yelp.com is a site for writing reviews about local businesses. They are localized (i.e. think craigslist style) and literally every business (retail, restaurant, or service) exists in the site. You can go there and check (or write!) reviews on any business in your neighborhood. The controversy is around the fact that Yelp.com reviews can significantly impact the small business owner. Be it negative reviews can send you out of business, or many positive reviews can boost sales.

The big deal is that multiple business owners have reported that after declining a paid subscription to Yelp.com's service (offered by a Yelp.com sales person to business owners) all or some positive reviews suddenly disappear and negative ones move all the way to the top. This has been denied many times by the founders of the site; however, it is impressive how many business owners in many different places claim the exact same argument. Amazing, in my opinion.

Some very nice reads are:

• Inc.com - great article explaining everything
• Inc.com's dedicated advise for Small Business Owners on Yelp
• US News and World Report
• Yelp.com Forum Post (with samples on the typical Yelp user and what they think about the controversy)

Installing and Configuring Nexus 1000V in UCS

To conclude the technical series in UCS, I've created a 3 part session on install, setup, and configuration of the Nexus 1000V distributed switch in the UCS platform.

Part 1: Installing the VSM (Virtual Supervisor Module)

Part 2: Setting up the VSM and connecting to the VEM (Virtual Ethernet Module) in the VMware host

Part 3: Configuring a simple Port-Profile in the CLI

Installing VMware ESX 4.0 in a Cisco UCS B Series Server

Two self explanatory videos. No need to comment much on them:

(1) Installing an Operating System in a Cisco Unified Computing System

Just launch the KVM, map an ISO or disk, and install the OS.

(2) Installation of ESX 4.0 in UCS.

Nothing different from installing VMware in any server platform. It is the exact same process.

UCS Video: Service profiles creation

Continuing with the Unified Computing System posts I wanted to touch on the concept of Service Profiles in UCS. Service Profiles is a logical construct that makes the UCS stateless. In other words, servers are logical entities that reside in a hardware platform. These logical servers can be associated and dissociated from the physical hardware with the click of a mouse. With them, you can replace, provision, and enable a server in a matter of minutes.

Quoting the configuration guide: "Each service profile serves a specific purpose: ensuring that the associated server hardware has the configuration required to support the applications it will host. The service profile maintains configuration information about the server hardware, interfaces, fabric connectivity, and server and network identity. This information is stored in a format that you can manage through Cisco UCS Manager. All service profiles are centrally managed and stored in a database on the Fabric Interconnect."

Some important characteristics of Service Profiles:

• It is a self-contained definition of server and connectivity configuration and identity.
• It applies to compute resource via direct association or via pools.
• It can be migrated with no local dependencies.
• It can be created into a template and it can be cloned.
  
• One server can host one and only one service profile at a time.
• After you associate a service profile with a server, the server is ready to have an OS and applications.
  

The exact and official configuration guide can be found here

I tried to create a smooth illustrative video of how to configure Service Profile and apply them to hardware. Here's my attempt at that (my excuses in advance for the going back and forth in the video):

Cisco UCS Manager GUI for Mac vs PC

I just wanted to show some comparison screenshots of the UCS Manager in a Windows PC vs a Mac with OS X. The UCS Manager runs on top of Java, so it is no surprise that it runs on Macintosh.

Let's see if you can tell which is which...

For all the things that I tested, everything worked in both Mac and PC Java clients. I have not had a chance to test extensively, but I expect something to not work exactly 100% in the Mac. The only detail that I found was that some windows that pop up were not sized correctly - workaround: drag the corner and resize manually.

A quick look at Cisco Unified Computing

I got my hands into a Cisco Unified Computing System (a.k.a. Cisco UCS) and thought of creating a quick video to show the GUI and take this post to a more technical level.

The UCS is managed via a UCS Manager interface, which resides in the Fabric Interconnects. If you are familiar with the architecture, you know that UCS has many components:

1. A Pair of Fabric Interconnects that manage and connect everything
2. The I/O or Fabric Extenders that reside on the chassis and provide connectivity from each blade server to the Fabric Interconnects
3. A server/blade chassis
4. Half width or full width blade servers
5. A Mezzanine card with 3 options for server I/O: VIC (with support for VNTags), CNA (for Hardwre based FCoE), or a software based FCoE NIC.

The management of the entire system (whatever number of blade server are connected thru a single pair of Fabric Interconnects) is managed via the UCS manager. The fabric interconnects form a cluster with 3 management IP's: one for each interconnect, and a cluster IP.

To initiate the UCS Manager, just open a browser, and point it to the Cluster IP.

Note: Watch in full-screen for a better experience

10 key questions for every company leader

Forbes presents questions that businesses should never stop asking. These resonated with me:

1. What is our purpose for existing?
2. Who is our target customer?
3. Why does anyone need what we’re selling? 
4. How are your employees holding up?
5. What were our competitors up to?
6. Can you reduce expenses--without harming the product?

Note how these apply to all sizes of businesses. Even if you do not have a high leadership role, you should be asking yourself these questions for your particular role, to keep yourself on the edge.

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Google Empire is misunderstood

Google's Chrom OS was announced and a first look was available for download. Everybody thinks that Google is unstoppable and its taking over the world; the reality is that most of its products and solutions are misunderstood.

A perfect example is the operating system that they are launching. Google's OS (touted Chromium) is not a direct competitor to Windows or Apple's OS-X, as many people think. As a matter of fact, it is not even designed for being run on regular laptops and PCs. It is not targeting any chunk of the desktop and laptop market share, but rather new thin devices that don't exist yet - i.e. picture even more inexpensive netbooks and other embedded computers, or maybe even television sets.

The Wall Street Journal has a good explanation of it.



In the end, Google has many products and market adjacencies that seem to overlap. The EU is starting to pay attention to them.

Here's my quick first look at Google's Chromium OS

Social media missconceptions

This month's issue of Inc magazine includes a list of the 19 best business blogs to read. I decided to make my own pick and started reading a couple.
The most interesting post this week was from Penelope Trunk. Her post was titled 4 Lies about social media, and I concur with her 75%.
Her list is as follow:

Lie #1: LinkedIn is for networking.
Lie #2: Twitter is for conversation.
Lie #3: Blogs are personal journals.
Lie #4: Social media is no place for business.

I agree with the fact that LinkedIn is, in reality, not for networking but really for relationships. LinkedIn doesn't have features that enable you to socialize with your network, or to make it grow. Groups and discussions try to give it that social aspect, yet most people use it for advertising themselves or looking for potential employees/employers. What LinkedIn is great for is to stay informed on the whereabouts of people you have worked with or have relationships with.

I disagree that Twitter is not for conversation; to me that's one of the best uses. If you follow 250 people, you can't possibly process all their tweets. So it is definitely not to stay informed, unless you are lucky to be looking at it when the tweet shows up. It is great for asking questions and getting quick to-the-point answers. It's also great for customer service and support. With my friends, twitter is definitely a good conversation mechanism.

The last two are more obvious: Blogs are not personal journals (though they can certainly be used for that), and it is proven that Social Media and web 2.0 is definitely a place for business. Ask dozens of specialized consultants and marketing companies out there.

Bloggers must disclose endorsements

The South Florida BizJournal reports on how the FTC is to regulate Bloggers for their endorsements: Interesting policy regarding the liability of bloggers for product endorsements and reviews.

Feds: Bloggers must disclose payments for endorsements - South Florida Business Journal