Fitting the square peg into the round hole
21 Jan 2011
As my colleague was turning the office upside down looking for a USB lead adapter specific to a particular brand of kit, I asked myself for the millionth time why there aren’t universal standards in such fields. I’m talking camera memory cards, phone chargers and the like. The computer industry has long recognised this and USB has become a standard interface used the world over. I guess I can say goodbye to the rather large cardboard box I have in the garage full of obsolete adapters, leads and cables, not to mention the bag full of mobile phone chargers which I have amassed.
It’s
not only separate companies using their own system –in my household we have two Blackberries and the chargers are non-compatible. That simply makes no sense whatsoever.
Whilst initially I am sure each company benefits from the situation by obliging customers to stick to their own products, this has also had adverse results – I as a consumer have avoided certain products as their own accessory range was exclusively unique to them. Mentioning no names, I am of course talking about Sony digital cameras which insist on using their own format SD memory cards thereby rendering any cards you may have from a previous device wholly incompatible unless you have been “Sony for life”.
A quick search for “universal phone chargers” in your favourite search engine shows you that the industry decides to create a universal charger with frightening regularity. It always seems to be lurking on the agenda somewhere but is never actually implemented. Apparently this device is “due for imminent launch” – as it was in an article from 2007 I read recently – so I personally won’t be holding my breath.
How does this relate to us? Well we like to think our hosted CRM solution can be used as a universal adapter to suit your business management requirements. As a web based solution you forego the need to invest in in hardware or software and whether you have 1 user or 1000 using 2 or 25 modules we are able to help you out without the need for any interface or interim solution.
Before I got my start in the tech industry as part of Apple’s UK Mac launch team, I was a professional drummer (notice I didn’t say musician). But once I got in, I was hooked and I’ve been involved in the tech industry, primarily software development, for over 35 years. I founded this company and I now have the enviable title of System Architect (as well as Managing Director) here at OpenCRM.