Verified by Visa FAIL
May 21, 2010 at 8:49 am
I take umbrage at being forced to use sites that fail. Take for example, Verified by Visa. You’d think a large financial giant like Visa would have the cop on to put some basic functionality – like a ‘login’ button on its login page, but no.
For anyone who’s not on Visa, Verified by Visa is this additional level of security that is put in to protect the banks. The way it works is this – you’re buying something online, you’ve done all the steps, put in all the details, you’re at the very last step, then up pops this verified by Visa box that requires additional user name and password. This can be very frustrating when you’re trying to do things in a hurry – like when I was trying to buy tickets to The Specials earlier this year, the time it took me to complete the verified by Visa thing saw most of the tickets sell out and I only got to buy one in the Gods instead of two in the front like I wanted.
This morning Gorillaz tix go on sale. They are my favourite band of the moment so I’m definitely getting tickets. I got on to AIB to ensure that my verified by Visa details are all in order – they have an irritating habit of resetting your password if you haven’t used it in a couple of months…
- AIB Phone Banking weren’t able to help
- AIB Credit Card centre were able to point me to the screen I needed to go to, this one. Apart from the dodgy CSS around offers in the navigation bar, does it immediately leap out at you how to access verified by visa here?
Go to the bottom right. Click on ‘go to’ – a sure sign that this page was constructed by developers with no wish whatsoever to take users into account.- Next up you are presented with this screen. If you’re already registered and you are lucky enough to know your user name and password, what do you press? There’s no sign of a login button. Take a punt – click on the unintuitive option, ‘Account Manager’.
Now you’re presented with a screen in which opaque language instructs you to choose a personal message – but it doesn’t tell you what the personal message is for!! Nor does it set down any rules on what form your message might take. I had to try twice before I hit their desired message length and format.- Now I’m in and free to use my own credit card to buy things I would like …
Verified by Visa is like adding a disability to customers who shop online. I do not wish to use it. I don’t understand how Mastercard customers are allowed to shop without it. And even with Verified by Visa, the bank still stops your card if you’re in Brazil or other areas they deem dodgy territory and you’re on a bit of a spending spree.
I’m all in favour of banks protecting me, but please – invest a little in usability and make the whole process a bit more intuitive.
Tags: AIB FAIL, Verified by Visa
Is Facebook Going The Way Of Westbourne Park Grove?
May 20, 2010 at 3:03 pm
I used to live in Notting Hill, London – back in the day before ‘that movie’ was made… when you’d easily see Rastafarians and 4 wheel drive merchants living side by side. It was a great place and I really enjoyed my time there. I left in 1997 and only came back in 2001 on my way back through Europe. I was dying to see Westbourne Park Grove again, all the little funky boutiques and art shops, organic food places and local kitschy cafes. I was so disappointed because in the time that I had left, that magical little area had changed. The big stores had moved in, rents had gone up, and the small shop and cafe owners who had made the place what it was were pushed out. If you walk down Westbourne Park Grove today you’ll see the Guess Jeans shop, Pepe, Starbucks… which sucks.
Now I’m afraid that the latest change in Facebook-land will see the same thing happen.
On Monday, Facebook changed it so that page owners can no longer default landing tabs to anything other than wall or info tabs… well you can… but you’ve got to have more than 10,000 fans or an account manager (ie. you’re spending more than $10,000 on ads). This effectively blocks the little guys from promoting their competitions or apps. Read more detail on the change here.
Whatever about the changes made late last year that blocked little guys from running competitions without use of an app – I can see the logic in that from a legal point of view. Now this latest change will hit smaller brands and businesses hard… you’ve invested in an app that you’re hoping will drive substantial likes, and now you can’t directly promote it. You can refer people to it on your wall, but it’s 1 more click away and we all know about the attention span of the good citizens of Facebookland. I do hope this doesn’t push out the funky boutiques of Facebook and leave us with a generic environment with the usual suspects: Pepsi, Coke, Levis, etc. {yawn}
Tags: facebook changes, facebook fan page
How To Write For Blogs
May 20, 2010 at 11:48 am
I’ve made it to WordPress TV – wow!! Featuring *newly coined* words that came straight out of my head on the day, such as:
- “Easily cognicized”
- Blobby bullets
- Scannability arsenal
Note that this was a totally adlib affair. I had spent ages on preparing a lovely Flash show, but the projector wasn’t working, so this was a flipchart and marker affair out of my head! Watch the vid.
View the slides:
Tags: how to write for blogs, wordcamp ireland, Wordcamp Ireland Kilkenny 2010
Gorgeous Little Spending App
May 13, 2010 at 9:18 am
Well done to iQ Content who created this tidy little personal budgeting app that makes coming to terms with your spending habits actually kind of fun. It hits the right notes design wise and of course it works well. I was thinking mid way through it ‘hmm how much more?’… all I had to do was glance up and I could track my progress.
Here’s a post about the thinking that went into it.
And here’s the Spendometer app.
Tags: spendometer app
What Did You Do?
May 11, 2010 at 9:28 am
In years to come, when economic historians look back on this period and our children are still paying for the mistakes and excess of recent years, what will you say when you’re asked “what did you do?”
“I was too busy working to pay an exorbitant mortgage. In those days we were glad to have a job…”
-Nobody forced you to take out a mortgage you couldn’t afford. True you had to work, but in this age of connectivity you have choices and options in getting your voice heard. The good news is this evening, a sunny May Tuesday when, let’s face it, there’s nothing on the telly – you can get out and protest the old fashioned way. Head to the Garden of Remembrance at 7.30pm and add your voice to the crowd who will be there to be make a stand and express dissatisfaction with the way things are being handled.
I’m going because it’s not just a Trade Union / Socialist Workers Gig.
Speakers include:
- Fintan O’Toole (Journalist)
- John Kidd (SIPTU Firefighters)
- Janette Byrne (Patients Together)
- Walter Cullen (Unite trade union)
- John Bisset (Canal Communities Project)
- Professor Kathleen Lynch (UCD)
- Siobhan O ’Donoghue (Community Workers Co-op)
I feel very strongly that the Government is bailing out the banks and not dedicating the same resource to making sure that businesses get looked after in the same way. Weren’t we all led to believe after the first bank bailout in Sept 2008 that banks were open for business and would keep lending? Yeah right! I know of many businesses who are on the rocks because they cannot get finance to keep afloat. My own brother who is a true entrepreneur is unable to continue expanding his operation which employs close to 50 peoeple – because he can’t get the banks to match his own investment in his enterprise. And sadly, we’ve all heard the shocking statistics of small businesses closing. These aren’t just numbers – these are people’s sweat and hard work – gone in a moment because there is no-one willing to help them.
Ireland got praised yesterday for being ahead of Spain and Portugal in terms of the austerity measures taken in Budget 2010. But the truth is that Budget was an anti-youth budget. The very strong message I heard was if you’re under 25, and without a job, feck off because we don’t want ya. We’re about to engage in a truly horrible social experiment. One in which we’ve seen working class areas transformed through employment these last years. Young fellas had bright futures as carpenters, plasterers, plumbers. They jumped at the opportunity and worked hard. Now that’s all come crashing down and the next generation is facing the same old shit that’s been available for time immemorial – unemployment or emigrate.
I finished college in 1993 when there weren’t really that many jobs. At least we had the option of going to the bright lights of London or New York. I chose the former and made my way there. Today’s graduates have no such choices – they’ve been hauling themselves through college while the Celtic Tiger has been dying around them… and now they don’t even have the safety net of London or New York to go to. I’d hate to be 22 again….
Yet my niece of 25 says she’d hate to be my age … because we all jumped into the property market and have mortgages around our necks.
We’re all sitting around feeling sorry for ourselves and each other. We’re happy to moan about what’s happening, being forced to do more with less in our jobs and our lives. Well tonight at 7.30pm you can join a bunch of like-minded people who want to show that they are not happy with what’s going on. I’ll be there – I’m the one with the bump!
Tags: Bank Protest Dublin May 2010
Proactive Use Of Twitter – Careful Now!
May 10, 2010 at 4:53 pm
I’m a firm believer that Twitter, when used correctly, can be a great customer service tool. For example, Tourism Ireland has notched up plenty of successes from engaging with people who tweet about coming to Ireland. Imagine this – you’re sitting at home in Washington and you comment to your mates that you’re looking forward to your vacation in Ireland. Next you get a tweet from Discover Ireland (who have checked your profile, see that you like hillwalking) suggesting some ‘off the beaten track hill walks’ that you might be interested in. You’re pleased. You respond with a question about them, and so a conversation begins.
This is how to do it.
In response to a tweet about ’9 days in Ireland in June’, read from bottom to top:
Here’s how not to do it!
Read this from the bottom up…
Sorry eircom! While it’s to be applauded that you’re using social media, I think your team need a little more training in what steps to take before actually engaging. It’s not a numbers game where you tweet to as many people as possible. It’s important to read the person’s profile on Twitter, click the link to their blog/website and get a feel for who they are. If you had done this, you’d know that Jon Handelaar is a very tech savvy person indeed who would not respond well to being marketed to during his busy day. 
Tags: proactive twitter, twitter fail, twitter for marketing
Me in Sunday Business Post
May 3, 2010 at 5:05 pm
A quality Sunday paper!
Be The Master of Your Own Domain Name
