Sometimes newsagencies are terrible gossipers!

Does our databases with more history cause users slower speeds? No, no and no.

Over the last few days the rumours have been flying around that one of our competitors’ can only store three months of data before the system runs slow. Him being the person he is, automatically assumed the rumour started with us. He then abused me. When I asked him to prove any of this allegation, thinking once done I could issue a denial to fix this problem I was told bluntly “It was none of my business!” Which got me wondering if it is none of my business, why contact me at all? Anyway it appears today he is still upset about this issue as he has decided to blog about it. Like me he wants to put it to rest. In a way I can understand that as it is an important issue.

If you do not understand what is the problem let me explain. Every system has two sections, one is the program which does the work and the other is the database which stores the data. The program asks the database say for stock item “NEW IDEA”, the database takes some time to wake up say X time. It then looks at its index to finds the stock item and then goes to the needed information. Obviously the more information you store the longer it takes to find the information. To simplify the problem say you have one month of history it will take X time to wake up plus Y time to find the NEW IDEA the time taken = X+Y. If you have two months it takes X time to wake up plus twice Y times to find it the time taken here = X +2 x Y. If you have three months it takes X time to wake up plus three Y times to find it the time taken here = X +3 x Y. Eventually in a retail environment where speed is so critical, you might reach a point where it just takes too long. All systems have this problem. Obviously if you are going to keep history you need to lessen Y time to the absolute minimum.

Still I suspect that this rumour has some truth to it as I do recall someone complaining here that to get a decent speed on my competitor’s system they could not store much sales history. I do know a developer that did some work on the same database. He stated that it was good but it was extremely delicate and to get decent speeds they continually fine-tuning the database otherwise the speed degradation was significant as conditions changed. Every system needed a different set up.

Since there are always two sides to a story it may not be the database! There could be many reasons that have nothing to do with the system at all. Maybe viruses or spyware. Maybe this complainer’s system ran slow with more data because the computers hard disk were fragmented and needed a defrag. Another possibility is that it was set up badly at the start with no plans for future growth. Maybe the data was full of errors. Another issue might be that his network was not properly tuned. I do not know all I can say it was the same complaint.

Anyway today I got clients contacting me with comments like “Does our system too slow down like that?” This is why I am writing this entry because obviously this rumour has spread to our clients.

Well the good news for our clients is that our software was designed to store large quantities of data from the start. That is partially why we adopted Microsoft SQL. This database was made by a huge development team. You just cannot match that effort. I could just go on and on about the advantages of this product. It was made to work in a huge organisation like government departments and banks. We are talking of the “Rolls Royce” database. The only product that I think comes close is Oracle. If someone said to me money is not an issue on a project what database would you use, I would say Microsoft SQL.

Another good piece of news because we often use servers, we simply send it to the server and your machine is ready to do the tasks you need now. Also we often scheduled many things of to run automatically at night when no-one is around. Effectively most the daily tasks take no time for you. Lastly as I stated Microsoft SQL is fast. That is why our databases can be so large.

However our old DOS system cannot do these automatic functions. On that we use an old Microsoft database which is extremely fast. On top of that we have added a QTREE. Knowing our clients often have large databases we set everything we could on that system to maximum for speed at the start. We wanted it to run fast.

With an average machine stand alone, a P4 with Windows 2000 with a database of six years of history with a large newsagency. I looked up a NEW IDEA history in less then a second. I did in the cash register sale of a “NEW IDEA” in a second. I processed 1300 customer statements in 15 seconds. I did a run sheet with 200 deliveries in fewer then 5 seconds. I processed an automatic order for a supplier with over 2000 items in fewer then 70 seconds. We do not clear old sales history from a client’s site to get faster processing speed. No-one wants to sit around waiting while the machine churns out, no-one.

So to reassure our clients we have already looked into this issue extensively.

There is a major shareholder conflict at the West Australian Newspapers Holdings Limited (WAN).

Kerry Stokes's conflict with the West Australian Newspapers has gone Cyber public. I never saw anything like it. Stokes has made a website ([Link removed]) which issues a steady stream of statements, interview transcripts and videos.

He claims to support the Western Australian newsagents’ recent arguments, among other issues. Does he think that newsagents have forgotten Canberra when he was there?

It is a great chance to read up on the conflict in a major newspaper from the top view. Enjoy.

There is a current catalogue file released by Simson cards for importing into our system. It is not correct. This problem, as in several other newsagent suppliers, is caused partly as each product has to be right even the obscure products rarely used and partly as these files are manually made and people make mistakes. So this is a recurring problem.

Normally this would be a major issue however we have been working with Simson on electronic invoicing (DDO) though E-mail. As those DDO files are made by a program not manually they should always be right. Plus it is easier on your end as electronic invoice files are commonly put into your system and everyone knows how to do it. So there will be, we hope no worries any more about the recurring problems with their files.

To register for their electronic invoicing please contact

Suzanne Fontaine
Sales Administration Manager
29 Westside Drive, Laverton North Vic 3026
Tel: (03) 9316 0700
Fax: (03) 9316 0701
E-mail: [email protected]

It is great too that they are sending by E-mail as many people don't use Xchangeit so they can benefit too.

I look forward to other suppliers following Simson's lead and going electronic!

ASX corporates must release information to the public if it might materially affect them. Since I am very interested in what is happening with the case between newsagents in WA and the Western Australian Newspaper, I went to see what the company WAN announcements on it website are on this issue. Well clearly the whole issue of delivery fees is not considered materially important as they have not released any information about it. That said a lot in itself. I think what the newsagents are asking for is so small that even if they get it, it is not expected to have any material impact on the Western Australian Newspapers.

Harvey Norman's have done what they said they would do and started a new stationery chain, Ofis.

[Link removed]

I confess that I did not think it would make it to court but right now the West Australian Newspapers are in a Supreme Court hearing in dispute with its newsagents and delivery contractors. The newsagents and delivery contractors there want a higher delivery fees.

Problems were reported with the GNS data listings for the upcoming 2008 #2 brochure.

As a result emails and telephone calls have been going back and forwards. After several tests and consultation with both the reported newsagencies and GNS, no one now has found any errors in this listing.

So we don’t know whether it was a problem now fixed or whether there been some misunderstanding. But just in case, I suggest that you use the current version here.

For this and other supplier files please visit here

Note this sale starts 07th April 2008 and ends 06th July 2008.

NEWS CORP in Victoria have stated that

The over-riding requirement for newsagents is that they must be able to transmit home delivery files automatically to HWT each week by the end of the 07/08 financial year

Currently we have finished a new trial version of DOS 35E. This version will automatically send HWT each week the home delivery information. It is not yet ready for general release as it is now with News Corp for testing. Then we expect in a few weeks, it will be ready for general release. Until then it is strictly invites only.

The version is up now but if you have a dramatic need for this function please contact either us or HWT to advance you in the trials!

On your end now to make it work you need a broadband connection with at least windows 2000 although we prefer XP. If you do not have this, NEWS CORP will give you an interest free loan up to $10,000 to upgrade your computer system. Included in this $10,000 can be other items such as data conversions, computers, modem, broadband contracts, software agreements and training. Whatever is takes to allow this to happen! This is a lovely carrot!

However it does come with a stick. My understanding is that after March 2008, in Victoria NEWS CORP will state at any proposed newsagency transfer the newsagency software is not satisfactory if it does not have this automated function. After June 2008, NEWS CORP intends to take action against newsagents with unsatisfactory software by using penalty clauses in the existing contracts.

To our clients I can say proudly that we ahead of schedule for them.

Although like everyone we are still waiting on some suppliers for more information, we cannot wait any longer. The documentation on how to do certain functions for Easter has to go out now.

So we have written it up quoting what we do know as examples so you can follow the process if there are any other changes.

Much of the documentation has already gone out, some is still waiting for final testing but it should be out tomorrow.

Don’t be surprised if some last-minute changes do occur and therefore I suggest that you do the changes on your end at the last practical time as there could be some unnotified changes in some publication.

Easter is only a few days away yet we are still chasing up newspaper distributors on what is the score. Unfortunately these have a habit of leaving it to the last-minute. They also have an annoying habit of answering only exactly the papers you ask about and no more. So the conversation goes what about the Financial Review? You get your answer. So you say okay now what about the Melbourne Age. You get your answer. So you say okay now what about the SMH etc.

Also we are reluctant to issue information sheets early as some newspaper companies have a history of changing their mind in the last moment. So when we get calls now we are saying it is all coming!

It is about time the newsagency associations follow the Queensland newsagents and did something. It should not be this last-minute rush every year as it is mucking up the whole newsagents home delivery and subagent system. The greater the warning the better a newsagent is able to manage.

Having said that we are now issuing information sheets as we get confirmation! So information sheets are being issued today.

We have been having discussion with News Corp (HWT) about their latest requirements for the home delivery subscription transfer of data.

The main issue is dial-up. Although our clients were among the first to install broadband, I can remember a Optus technician ringing me up with a comment “Hey this is the first newsagency we have done!”, the reality is we still have a few newsagents on dial-up. Their main reason for not changing to broadband I suspect is partly the cost. A dial-up cost about $10/month now plus a few telephone calls while going to broadband often needs a new computer and modem plus a plan of about $40/month. Over a few years that would add up to a few thousand dollars. The other is the bother as it needs some mucking around on something which appears now to be working fine for them.

However, the result of these discussions are that News Corp is now saying that all home delivery newsagents in Victoria must get broadband because it is “always on”. That means they do not have to worry about whether a newsagency remembers to send the subscription data. It will just happen automatically.

As this decision, I am sure will soon spread to all states. Soon all newsagencies will be on broadband. This will have a dramatic impact in newsagencies as it means that all newsagents' email will always be on. Once that happens, we will experience a dramatic change in business practices in our industry. I know one large pizza chain in Australia claimed that when it demanded that all its suppliers have broadband, their administrative costs was reduced by third. I suspect a similar effect in newsagency suppliers will occur. Which is going to make as a distribution channel newsagencies much more competitive although I suppose a cynic could argue how much is it costing newsagents not to have broadband as almost everyone else does now!

http://www.paperplus.co.nz/

Well according to the latest news A&R; Whitcoulls Group Holdings stated today that they would not be buying Borders book shops. I was stunned now after they have spent so much money to drop out is strange. Probably borders want too much.

That leaves only New Zealand's Paper Plus left in the bidding for borders. Paper Plus are the largest newsagency, stationery and book franchise in Australasia. They are New Zealand based with about 175 shops roughly equivalent to Supanews here. They are huge with a total sales turnover approaching NZ$200 million a year and obviously their expansion plans include Australia. It would mean that another major player is about to enter the newsagency market here.

Here are some promo material from paper plus on one of their shops.
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Because of the news corporation latest requirements we have been today working on information sheets for modems and routers.

They are now here in a hardware information section.
 

http://www.followthemedia.com/spots/frontpage07032008.htm?PHPSESSID=08d…

When almost everyone in the industry is complaining about covering up the front of the paper with advertisement when I first read this article I thought it was a joke but it is not. It is an interesting article.

If newspaper publishers are really serious about seeking new business models so they have the money to produce a great local editorial product, thus maintaining and increasing circulation, then in non-competitive markets maybe now is the time to dump news from the front page and give all that prime space to advertising.

Heresy, you say! Not at all. It is just going back to the good old days. Have you ever wondered why so many newspapers had in their masthead the word “Advertiser”?

There’s such a hue and cry in the US every time another newspaper dares to give some front page space to advertising. But the true question is, in a non-competitive market, why not hand over the front page entirely to the advertisers. It’s prime real estate. Advertisers will pay true premium rates for it, and does it really matter if the top news of the day doesn’t show up until pages two, three, or four (if you’re going to sell the entire front page then you might as well try and sell pages two, three, and four as well.)

So by now you think this is all a big joke. Far from it. Very serious. With newsrooms being decimated and digital not taking up the financial slack for some years to come something drastic has to be done, so why not go back to what worked in the past. All too often at our peril we forget from history what has worked before.

Would it surprise you that the august Times of London ran only personal classified ads on its front page until 1966? Would it surprise you that it was until well after then that in Finland the first few pages of metropolitan newspapers used to be entirely display advertising sold at very premium rates – talk about a license to print money!

And since many newspapers today are in non-competitive markets what difference does it make what’s on the front page? You either subscribe to the paper or you don’t, and in those non-competitive markets there’s not that many newsstand sales made because the headline catches one’s attention.

Like I said the article is very clever and worth a read here.

Maybe we all have to rethink the reality of what is happening with publications in this digital age.

There is nothing in newsagencies that causes large legal cases as lotto does. I suppose no-one will go to court over a dollar paper but in lotto, millions are at stake.

For those not aware of this case. A person Mr Reinhold bought an Oz Lotto ticket at the Macarthur Newsagency at Campbelltown on September 19, 2005. Because of some problems the ticket did not print correctly so Mr Reinhold was given another ticket. Later the given ticket was cancelled under instructions from NSW lotto. As Murphy's Law would have it that cancelled ticket had the numbers for the $2 million jackpot. As it was cancelled Mr Reinhold could not collect his winning, so he went to court. Mr Reinhold won two million dollars.

Okay who is going to pay that $2 million dollars in allocating blame the NSW supreme court decided that since it was

"Lotteries that controlled the computer system and had the means of searching within it. The Newsagents could do nothing except give information to Lotteries and wait for Lotteries to give them a number to use as the TSN of the ticket to be cancelled. The shortcoming of the Newsagents was to fail to volunteer information that should have been volunteered. Nor, of course, was that information requested by Lotteries as it should have been."

In other words, the newsagency failed to volunteer the required information even though NSW lotto official did not ask for it, so the court has decided the newsagency must pay 10% of the two million dollars to Mr Reinhold plus interest. That sum now totals $ 246,011.14, the remaining amount NSW Lotto will have to pay.

The full decision is available here. It is worth a look for some unexpected risks you can come up in selling lotto however be warned it is 24 pages long.

Reinhold v New South Wales Lotteries Corporation [2008] NSWSC 5

Note whether the case is over remains to be seen but this is where is it now.

Several of our DOS clients in Victoria have already contacted us about the News Corp (HWT) automation requirements. Early we announced that we should have it completed by the end of the March, then after News Corp approves it hopefully we should be able to beta test it in some sites soon afterwards then we expect to roll it out between then and the end of June 2008. I am pleased to say we are on schedule.

The main problem we expect is with the roll out. The new system uses broadband. Nothing we can do about that as it is part of the requirements but unfortunately a lot of newsagents don't have broadband. Furthermore, some of those newsagents machines are really old. I don't know how we are going to get broadband going on a DOS machine. For those with old windows systems like 95 and 98, who can run broadband, I expect we are going to have trouble too. It is only with windows 2000 that we got a decent plug and play so I expect many of the newsagents systems are going to have to be updated or replaced. That alone will be causing problems.

Finally, over the years the DOS system has improved and changed dramatically for example in 2007 it went though 27 versions and 7 patches. Now many people will be jumping years in versions. They will need training just to do functions that they already use. For this reason now we are organizing user meetings and information sheets.

Overall we expect an eventful few months of work.

Our benchmarking although in early days is now just starts churning out data and we can see that soon we will have a global perspective of many newsagents. It will be an extremely powerful tool. It will be extremely exciting as it will be the first time ever newsagents have had the ability to do what majors can do now with benchmarking.

In magazines the critical issue has always been the range. There are just too many magazines in the system. Over the last few days I have been looking at computer reports trying to see about how we can help to automate the selection procedure.

But it is difficult to figure out what needs doing. So today I decided to check with other retailers. If they have done it why reinvent the wheel? So I booked a meeting in a few weeks with our benchmarking expert (Andrew) and me at Coles Myer to check out their systems. From what I understand they use consultant company software which they don’t know the formula. No doubt we will have to make our own formula but we need to know an overall sense of what is needed first before. Meanwhile I found out that one of my clients in a former life worked in that department at Coles Myer so I am going next week to be talking with him about how it worked.

So much time and effort is being spent on magazines now and the recent evidence is a real worry as it suggests that it is on a decline. This means that people will not be able to justify the work they put into it now. We have to get smarter here and automation is one important tool.

Yesterday and today we engaged with BrownTrout Publishers to get their catalog file correct. It is frustrating. These files are standard and used by many companies in the card industry now for many years and BrownTrout has produced them on numerous occasions yet each time for them it is new. There is always someone new doing it. Invariably they do about twenty attempts, then give up and then we do the task. It should not be like that as suppliers should have systems now that automate the process and so they should be able to send a catalogue file on demand.

Still it is necessary work as both of us realize as connecting the supplier and retailer through data sharing is now a necessity.

For this and other supplier files please visit here

While talking to a group of newsagents in a meeting yesterday, I noticed several did not know about Supanews.

It has 41 stores, a turnover of over $100 million a year, and is growing rapidly. It is innovative and owned by a huge company, A&R Whitcoulls, which has a group revenue of AUD 394.9 million. This group is also the biggest bookseller in Australia.

Supanews considers itself to be the most professional, successful and leading newsagency retailer in Australia.

It claims that it has newsagents worried and there is much truth in that although my meeting showed not everyone.

It is vital to the industry that this sales data gets to the magazine suppliers. In this day with the growing power of huge corporate companies, for example, Coles and online magazine websites more and more the newsagency industry has to prove itself to the magazine producers that it is a viable channel. So it is important is to get as many people as possible to send sales data though XchangeIt as if we can give them that an extra few percent let us do it particularly as it costs us nothing. The more people that send sales data the more valuable the sales data becomes.

Last year towards the end of the year, I contacted many people on behalf of Xchangeit to get this happening even to people that were not our clients. One guy, in particular, left a bad taste as he had time to write letters to complain publicly over his magazine orders but no wish to help to do something like send in his sales data. Overall it was neither easy nor pleasant but it is something the industry needed. That marketing campaign was extremely successful. So much so I have been asked to do another one as we need a 100% so I am going soon to start again a new campaign.

If you are not sending sales data and using Xchangeit we have an information sheet explaining how to set up sales history .