The Seattle-PI has an article today about “Ads coming to textbooks”. Seems that Freeload Press, a startup textbook publisher, is providing free downloadable text books supported by advertisements.

I was just speaking with Claes-Fredrik this morning about ad-supported revenue models vs. more traditional product pricing. Exbiblio technologies potentially affect every printed or digital document that you access, including those which are not currently the target of advertising (for example, a business plan or a novel).

It seems that the world has trended toward advertising supported services. Google is the poster child for this, but there are many others. Those hosting the ads say that ads are as valuable as the content itself if they are well targeted (and the more user behavior that is tracked, the more accurate the targeting).

Personally, I try to create a lifestyle with fewer ads as they usually encourage discontentment and greed, which are not qualities that I wish to promote in myself. For example, I pay for my e-mail service instead of using an ad supported one, I’ve upgraded my Flickr account to one which doesn’t show ads, and I don’t own a television (though I sometimes buy shows I like on DVD). I definitely don’t want ads delivered based on all the digital and printed documents in my life even if it means paying more for an Exbiblio style product.

Some would say that ads can be optional. Users who don’t want to see them can pay a higher fee (Flickr for example). My question for this approach is which users are going to opt out? Probably the ones who can afford it, right? Well, who are the advertisers targeting? The ones who can afford it… This seems like a lose, lose. Their are a bunch of people getting ads that they can’t afford to act upon and advertisers are missing the folks who are willing to spend money.

There is some interested discussion in the comments of this blog about whether Freeload sponsors will want to pay for textbooks distributed to third world countries where they are unlikely to build a customer base in the near-term…

I’m not sure what the answer to these questions are. They are tough issues. But, I’d appreciate your thoughts in the comment section.

I’m very pleased to see that Neville Hobson has picked our blog as one of his top ten cool sites of the moment. Just in case you are wondering, I don’t know Neville personally, but I do drop by his blog frequently and sometimes leave comments (but no bribes).

He’s put us in the company of 9 really cool sites indeed. I’ll pick out three that I think will go down particularly well with Exbiblio people. They chime in with the company’s obsession to create an ultra cool product that will do plenty of good in the world, perhaps best expressed by Claes-Fredrik recently.

Presentation Zen is by a former Apple employee. It’s much more than a design blog, and looks at all things presentational, including stand-ups in front of a conference hall. It fits in with Exbiblio’s mission to leave beauty in its wake. As I’ve mentioned before, Apple is much admired around the office. I recommend this post on the Steve Jobs style at doing Macworld summer presentations. He points you to one you might not have seen recently – the 1997 vintage.

Creating Passionate Users The name speaks for itself. Exbiblio’s hardware / software project is seeking out passionate users. Try reading code like a girl to see if that gets some office debate going.

The Institute for the Future’s Future Now. You’ll find plenty of wacky inventions here, for example the Synthetic Gecko suit that would help your window cleaner climb up the wall like Spiderman.

I speak to Noah the day after it has been decided – by mutual consent it seems – that he is to leave Exbiblio in a week’s time. His view is that the parting is for the best. His primary interest is in User Experience, and he is trying to get away from his earlier career writing code (previous to his Master’s Degree in Technical Communication). Exbiblio would now like him to concentrate on coding. The split seems inevitable, although rather sudden, at least by my European standards. He leaves on what he calls “generous” terms.

Noah doesn’t believe that Exbiblio has a strongly implemented process for product development, and that as a result, his User Experience skills cannot be fully utilized. But first I ask him to explain what User Experience is all about.

“It’s partly Demographic. Who do we believe the audience is? How much money are they willing to spend? What are the comparable tools that they are using? What are the tasks the users are trying to achieve? What are the problems we are solving for them? This is at a different level from asking what features they want – they don’t know what the choices are – but they can tell you what they want to get done in life. They won’t say that they need a scanner pen – but you can watch them work and how they collect quotations from various papers and draw conclusions from those observations.”

At the next stage of development, he sees User Experience as being central to the creation of an effective product experience – its features, interface, and flow – based on the information that has been gathered.

“To do the second half well requires good research from the first phase, as well as knowledge of fields as diverse as graphic design and cognitive psychology. All of these aspects contribute to the creation of a superior product,” he says.

I press Noah a little (It should be remembered that the brief of this blog is total transparency) and he admits to some frustration with the Exbiblio approach to product development, and the way that it rapidly changes its mind about who the early adopters of its technology will be.

“It’s reached the point where if you were to ask most of the development team who is our main audience, they may or may not be able to tell you. It’s an issue if you don’t know who it’s for, because you don’t know what their needs are. It doesn’t make it impossible to make a successful product, but I think it makes it more difficult.”

He believes that if Exbiblio went through a different sort of design process – asking more questions about the users and their problems before throwing resources at product development – there would be a continuing role for him at the company.

For a different view, see the post on this blog by Claes-Fredrik Mannby For Love of Product

After completing his degree in Physics in 1995 at Reed College, Noah worked for a year at a small company in Portland, Universal Algorithms: “Actually, there were some interesting parallels between that company and Exbiblio. They had a brilliant founder with strong ideas about how to do business. In that case his direction ultimately led, in my opinion, to squandering some amazing IP and opportunities.”

He followed his intuition and left Universal Algorithms to join another local start-up, Quando, which was eventually bought by Infoseek and Disney. He moved with the company to its new headquarters in Seattle. He had spent his time at Quando – which has a highly specialised search technology – working as a coder, but he says that he had been very aware of design for a long time. This led him to take his Master’s Degree at the University of Washington, where his thesis was entitled Generation of Complex Diagrams: How to Make Lasagna Instead of Spaghetti.

He came across Exbiblio at a jobs fair earlier this year, and was attracted by the company’s vision, its technology, and its approach to business. He joined in April and is leaving with warm feelings about the company .

“It’s a remarkable work environment. People seem pleased to be here. The character of company, its way of doing business, treating employees well, treating partners well, its environmental awareness, and the sort of people it attracts – all of that is remarkable in these days when most companies focus on this quarter’s returns, short term gains and stock market price. But perhaps it’s a little too much vision- guided. Perhaps if it more focused on ensuring success, there might be a different approach to the process. ”

On another occasion, Martin King (Exbiblio’s founder), has told me that experience suggests that the average start-up will part with one in three of its hires. He says it’s the normal course of events, and that there is no shame in it for either party.

On the way to the airport, I give Martin a brief idea of what Noah has said and remind him that he has the right of reply. He has his own views on the problem that Exbiblio is trying to solve, and on how to go about creating a product. His views will surely work their way onto the blog by one route way or another, sooner or later.

A few snaps I took while wandering up 1st Avenue last Thursday evening.

I spoke to Ian just after an employment contract from Exbiblio had landed on his desk. He has been working as a freelancer here since April – an experience which he compares to dating before marriage.

“It was an opportunity to make sure that we had same intentions and same desires and could tolerate each others’ quirky behaviour,” he says.

I remark on Ian’s unmatched red and yellow socks, but he says his quirkiness goes further than them: he doesn’t posses a good poker face, he says, and wears his emotions on his sleeve. Today he seems to be in a buoyant mood, talking rapidly while fidgeting with a springy plastic toy.

“I like lots of explicit communication,” he adds. “So when Ed [Mahlum] came to me and said ‘We want to make you an offer’, I was happy to be invited to be part of the tribe: I like that, but I had a lot of concerns because our relationship is going well, and why change it? How is our relationship going to be different after this change?”

Ian wanted to iron out any potential misunderstandings with his new employer along the lines of:

“If you are imagining I’m going to be come in at 8 in the morning because I’m an employee, then that’s interesting for me to know. And if I imagine that you’re going to put me in charge of strategic development now that I’m an employee, then that’s interesting for you to know.”

I point out that under the laws of Washington State, employees have no more protection from being fired than contractors (I have this from no lesser authority than Exbiblio’s founder, Martin King, himself). Ian agrees, but he sees the contract as being “statement of intention” to make the relationship long term.

“So long as we’re in a contracting relationship, the implication is that we are just sleeping together: it doesn’t mean a thing and I don’t want to meet your family. This (employment) is the way in our culture that you say I like your tribe. I want to be part of your tribe, and I intend to stay with you.

Ian admits that he sometimes has less than smooth relations with Exbiblio’s founder, Martin King. He says it’s nothing more than the usual run of things, but adds that this “statement of intention” protects himself from a rash decision on his own part to leave suddenly. He also believes it protects Martin from a rash decision to fire Ian. But he concedes it gives him no long term employment security.

“If a contractor is feeling upset, it’s easy to say, ‘You know what? I’ve got other things to do. God be with you. I’m on my way.’ As an employee, Ian says he will “ride things out for a while,” when they aren’t going well. He hopes that a fast growing company will give him plenty of opportunity to move around and develop. He can work on both software and hardware and he would like to manage projects.

Ian’s been in a management roles before, and he recognises that managers value reliability and predictably more than technical brilliance. A manager wants to know that an assignment is going to be done, and if it isn’t, to be warned in good time and given a reason. This can be difficult in a technical environment where the tendency is to do “cool thing” and really stretch to pull something out of the hat at the last moment.

He says that Exbiblio is unusual because the financial backer is the “wacky inventor” in the person of Martin. Usually shareholders or venture capitalists are pushing for a safer and more boring approach. Martin is always shooting for the heights. Ian finds that it’s new for him to discover that he is taking a more conservative view than the manager. But that’s one of things he likes about Exbiblio. “In the end, I want a story to tell. A good story is either a massive success or a massive failure, but not putt, putt putt putt…..’

Seattle has more than a smattering of world famous businesses: Boeing, Amazon, Starbucks and Microsoft. Are the citizens of Seattle justly proud of their global titans? Not if the employees of Exbiblio are anything to go by. In particular, Microsoft and Starbucks don’t have a great name around the office. In contrarian spirit, here’s a defence from a visiting Londoner of these two Seattle home-growns.

Microsoft
No self respecting Exbiblio staffer would be seen dead with a PC type laptop in his/her hands. Apple is the constantly worshipped at the Exbiblio shrine. By implication, and sometimes more explicitly, Microsoft is given the thumbs down. But I would argue that the raw, competitive capitalist drive of Microsoft has done more good for the world than almost any other company over the last 20 years. The combination of Windows and a PC box has has brought cheap computing to the world. Factories in Taiwan and elsewhere in Asia turn out millions and millions of low cost PCs that are affordable for ordinary people, ordinary schools, ordinary hospitals. Those Asian PC assembly businesses would never have taken off without an operating system that they could use as just another component. Microsoft has brought us close to the vision of a PC on every desk and has truly changed the world for the better.

By contrast, what has Apple done for the world? It’s produced admittedly sleek and stylish computers with nice interfaces that look really cool – but at a price. In truth, Macs are fashion statements for rich bohemians. Apple is greedy. It wants the margin from the box and the software. It charges a premium for looks. Apple never has had and never will have the democratizing effect of Microsoft.

Starbucks.
I admit that this Seattle business does not make the best coffee ever tasted, but it has spread the coffee culture around the globe. Before the arrival of Starbucks in London, the “greasy spoon” culture reigned supreme. You were offered of a strong cup of tea (the color of coffee) and egg and chips. Starbucks has spawned many imitators and those who have sought to improve on its formula. But the original Starbucks still has one of the best reputations as an employer and it shows. Here in Seattle you do at least get served in Starbucks. At a more trendy coffee shop I waited almost 20 minutes for just a cup of coffee. I couldn’t understand how they get any repeat custom, but passing by the next day I saw they that drew a crowd of customers patiently waiting to be served. I happily walked past to my friendly service, comfy-armchair, and mediocre cup of coffee at Starbucks.

All in all, I think Seattle should be proud of its contribution to the world via these companies. You don’t have to agree with me – that’s what the comment box is for…

Tommy describes himself as an “all purpose engineer”. He notes that you don’t see many job advertisements for someone with such a broad qualification. Usually employers are looking for someone to fill a specific role. Still, he believes there is real value in being able see the big picture, and find trade-offs between the hardware and the software. With the perspective arising from a background in mathematics and physics, Tommy has found more similarities between the disciplines than differences.

Tommy is a freelance consultant who is helping Exbiblio with its hardware project. During his career, he’s had many jobs, both employed and freelance. His first job in 1969 was with a company that was trying to make a commercial success out of holography. It didn’t. Later he worked for a firm in Florida that was doing lots of things for the “secret guys” during the cold war. He moved to Texas to join Datapoint, one of the first companies to network computer terminals together. He saw the onset of IBM’s PC and a whiff of scandal destroy Datapoint’s value from $800m to next-to-nothing.

“I got to watch what happens when greed takes over in a company, and people start to do stupid things. Sometimes wealth and position don’t imply wisdom,” he says.

Another lesson for Tommy over the years has been that when the going gets tough for a company, the R&D people are the first out on the street, but he’s learned that he can survive the ups and downs of working in the technology industry.

Here in Seattle, Tommy has worked for the city’s richest and most famous son: Bill Gates. He was part of the team that developed the technology for Gates’s house. He worked on the tracking technology that follows people around the house. Among other things, it switches around the pictures on the walls. The spec for the project changed as Gates acquired a wife and child before the house was finished. He was present at some meetings with Gates and saw his style at first hand:

“He would ask a few narrowly focused question to make sure everybody was on their toes, provide a little bit of feedback, and then he got out of the way.”

Tommy says that the fast schedule of the Exbiblio project is fairly typical for a start up. As the deadline approaches for the first prototype of the scanner pen, Tommy predicts how it will turn out:

“I’ve seen it happen dozens of times. Everybody feels that it’s looking good. You’re on schedule. The parts come in. It looks nice and there are pretty pristine circuit boards. And then you turn it on and smoke comes out – that’s figurative smoke. Then usually there are several days of sleepless panic. You rummage through and find all the little things that are wrong – they are usually relatively minor problems, but they can be hard to find. Finally it works, but those circuit boards aren’t so pretty anymore and there’s a hole in the case where you don’t want it.”

A second version will clean up the major issues. A third will sort out some of the commercial problems, factoring in cost and making it practical to produce in large enough quantities: “That third generation is the one that you can have a reasonable expectation of being a successful product.”

As for the potential for Exbiblio’s product, Tommy says, “I think if we can get it out in the market place most of the anticipated uses will be greeted with “okay that’s nice”, and the one that really takes off will be thing that nobody ever thought about – that will be a surprise and it will be fun.”

Where Tommy thinks Exbiblio is more unusual is in its setting out of its corporate culture and values from day one: “Usually that happens by default and the company will take on the personality of the founder or the most dominant person. Here the corporate values seem to be set in place by design not default. That’s unusual for a company of this size where success may be some years away.”

Tommy interests include cycling (he pedals 11 miles into work) and chamber music. He and his wife both play early woodwind instruments, including the recorder, the crumhorn, and the rackett.

“When I was at college I found an old recorder lying around the house. I noodled on it, and still do. Playing chamber music is very satisfying when you are in the right group.” – hence the muscial notes on his t-shirt.

For my first post I wanted to jump into the blog with my own experience of this unique work culture.

One of my first steps has been to interview folks around the office to gather up views on and ideas about the audiences and purposes for our site. Technically I’d call these stakeholder interviews, but one of the things I like best about working at Exbiblio is that we really are “folks” more than we are “stakeholders,” even though I’d say we’re all deeply engaged in our work.

The term “stakeholder” differentiates those in a company who have a vested interest in something from those who don’t. It separates those who have a say from those who don’t. Those polarizations don’t exist here at Exbiblio, and so I don’t like to use the term when I’m conducting my interviews. When I approach my coworkers it’s with a great amount of respect for their knowledge and experience, but not with a sense that they have more or less of a stake in the Exbiblio project and process. We all have a stake in this project… so perhaps what I’m doing are more like “folkserviews”.

By Ariel van Spronsen

Greetings and salutations. By way of introduction to the occasional posting I’ll be doing here in the near future, I wanted to take a moment to introduce myself. My name is Ariel van Spronsen, and I’m heading up the Exbiblio website redesign effort.

Though Seattle has always been the place I call home, my story is an amalgam of experiences living in places as diverse as Michigan, Saudi Arabia, Texas, New Jersey, and most recently, San Francisco. A keen interest in the wide range of urban social systems I encountered led to a BA in Urban Studies at Vassar College. My grounding in communication systems combined with an innate tendency toward organization has translated more recently into a passion for information architecture, and I am now pursuing an MS in Technical Communication at the University of Washington.

I’ll be posting periodically about the nuts, bolts, and discoveries in my work here at Exbiblio, and about the larger topics of information architecture and communication.

By Ariel van Spronsen

Lauren runs Exbiblio’s HR and is the office administrator, working primarily with Henry “Hap” Happel, but also helping out everyone when there’s a need.

She was the fifth person to join Exbiblio, back in March just before the company moved to its current base in a stylish former hotel on Seattle’s 1st Avenue. She admits that she and some of the other newcomers did not fully understand what the project was about at the time of joining. Fortunately, Janinne (formally a big part of Exbiblio who moved on recently) did a good job of persuading her that it was going to be exciting. Lauren recalls that the early days involved a great deal of discussion about the project’s direction, but soon the developments started roll, and the prototype designs started appearing. New ideas started to emerge at virtually every company lunch – traditionally held on Wednesdays.

Lauren has used the third party C-Pen to scan notes for the research project into Word. Although this is only the very starting point of Exbiblio’s vision, it was the point at which it all became real for her.

Appropriately, she loves gadgets. Her latest favourite “toy” is the sleek Motorola SLVR phone which incorporates iTunes music software and lots of other “cool stuff.”

Exbiblio’s idealistic culture helps her to feel comfortable working here. “I grew up with my mother who was a nurse. When I first graduated I worked for a medical company where the definite purpose was to make money – I didn’t enjoy that. I enjoyed working in academia where was more a social service.” Lauren respects the way that business is done at Exbiblio – for instance, in her role she can see at first hand that creditors’ bills are paid promptly – instead of leaving payment for as long as possible – an all too common business practice.

Lauren and her husband run a design studio out of their home, and she handles the sales from their website. Her husband has designed concert posters for the likes of REM and Wilco – the latter being one of her favourite bands. Lauren graduated in journalism, and still enjoys writing for herself – mostly essays – and reading social commentaries.