#CurmudgeonFriday (The Sun Has Got His Hat On)

After what seems like months of rain in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland the people of that fair land woke this morning to see a strange shiny yellow object in the sky so perhaps it’s a little unfair to end this short working week^† with the (now) traditional #CurmudgeonFriday post but I’m afraid it’s going to be a bit of long rant…

^[1]

• You shall not give false testimony against your neighbour. Inurface Media ^[2] in a press release announcing some one-man band piece of shite digital signage software and announcing their stand at #ScreenmediaExpo are guilty as charged with their quote, and we quote “We selected Inurface Media because they were able to tailor their digital signage systems to our exact requirements and provide us with the support we felt no other digital signage company could give – Subway.” A testimonial is not worth anything with no name attached or indeed, any genuine official endorsement. As Real Digital Media’s Ken Goldberg so aptly put it on twitter ^[3] “InurfaceMedia adopts deceptive ploy of pretending big co. is client after installing 1 unit at cousin’s single franchise.” Joshua Bunce at Inurface has got it wrong on so many levels here.
• False weights and measures— the LORD detests them both. Madrid based Fractalia ^[4] claims to be Europe’s leading software company in large-scale IT infrastructure management systems. Personally I doubt very much whether that is true though I don’t care too much about that BUT what I do take issue with is their ludicrous claim that “Fractalia Media is the most powerful, flexible and efficient managed platform for handling and distributing Digital Signage content” and that “Up to 27,000 digital signage screens in more than 6,000 different locations are now managed with Fractalia Media”. If those numbers were true it would mean that every digital screen in Europe was powered by them. For a powerhouse like they describe it was odd to find these claims on a dingy LinkedIn group where they were begging for lead generation, we quote “If you think you can generate leads for digital signage solutions in any of these countries, whether you are a person or a company, Fractalia Media is a great opportunity for you.”
• For we take thought beforehand and aim to be honest and absolutely above suspicion. What is it with all the (non-exhibiting) companies who think that they can mass mail those who have put their hand in their pocket (and spend thousands on taking exhibition space at #ScreenmediaExpo) and ask for a meeting on their stand (OmniTapps ^[5], RSR ^[6], JHDD (Digitalvue) Ltd. and VISCOM Paris to name just a few) to sell their wares? In a similar vein I hate seeing the notes (over on LinkedIn mainly) from folks like ComQi saying they will be at Earls Court and asking for meetings when they are not exhibiting or sponsoring. It’s simply not on and as we have said repeatedly before if everyone tried this there would be no show to network at.
• But when you are invited, take the lowest place, so that when your host comes, he will say to you, ‘Friend, move up to a better place.’ Then you will be honored in the presence of all your fellow guests. Intel’s goal next week at their very select shindig ^[7] and we quote “to continue to facilitate a frank exchange among industry leaders” was laughable in the extreme. Not only had they not invited any of their partners of note (we won’t list them here BUT they were all up in arms when they saw that they were not considered as worthy) and their so-called panel of experts is exactly that, ie. so-called (in fact let’s just say ‘self-labelled’ shall we). Intel has now extended invites to some partners (but not all and not us as we are deemed to be ‘press’ and shock / horror to attend we would have to sign an NDA). This is quite simply a PR fiasco in the making and it demonstrates how out of touch Intel in Europe are with the industry as a whole. Mind you, NDA or not, invite or not, we very much look forward to hearing how the event goes AND will be reporting on it next Wednesday.

With that rant over we bid you all a good weekend and look forward to seeing many of you at #ScreenmediaExpo.

^†Monday was a bank holiday in the UK and Tuesday was a holiday in France – something to do with them winning a war, though what war that actually was I have no idea.