04/02/2012

Hi there at Path, please get more responsive and fix your issues with Facebook.

11/12/2011 By

Path 2.0, the smart journal app for iOS and Android phones has been praised a lot after its first complete reincarnation in late November.

I also agree with everything Erik says about the app over on TechCrunch, rewarding it with two “Flys” (watch the video for the complete review). With more than $11.0M in funding and a rejected $100+ Million acquisition offer from Google, the Path team must be pretty confident.

One thing though bothers me: As a company, Path seems to be relatively unresponsive if not even antisocial.

As an example, last week Path faced some serious service outages causing journal entries, photos and comments to vanish. No word about it on the very polished Path blog. Communication through the @Path Twitter account regarding the issue has been pretty limited, too.

It really gets worse when it comes to Path for iOS ongoing issues with cross-posting to Facebook (find a solution below). The wall on Path’ official Facebook page already reads like a complaint center. And not a single response from anybody over at Path. Twitter is full with users experiencing the same issues.

When I sent out a tweet about the broken Facebook integration last week, Danny Trinh, a designer working for Path immediately responded just to disappear again a few tweets later. Did he get muzzled by some official product marketing folks?

With Path playing in the field of social media and applications, the company should urgently become more responsive to its users. Running a Facebook page and a Twitter service account (@PathService) means you’ve got to make sure that your company embraces social at its core. Currently, from the outside it doesn’t feel like that with Path.

Now, if Path on your iPhone has stopped working with Facebook, here is what you should do:

  • Uninstall Path on your iPhone.
  • Uninstall Facebook on your iPhone.
  • Uninstall Facebook Messenger on your iPhone. (This is essential. If you only uninstall the main Facebook app, the fix will not work!)
  • Press and hold the Home and Power button until your iPhone reboots. This makes sure that iOS clears all cached data.
  • Reinstall the Facebook app. Do not launch the app, yet. Stay logged out.
  • Reinstall the Path app.
  • Visit your Facebook account from a PC/Mac (= no mobile browser). Go to Account Settings > Apps. Find the Path app and completely remove it from your Facebook account.
  • Launch the Path iPhone app and sign in.
  • Add Friends and chose Facebook as the source.
  • This should start the re-authorization with Facebook.
  • At any time, reinstall Facebook Messenger on your iPhone.

I hope this helps. And maybe somebody from Path will pick it up and cross-post it to all of the various outlets, that the company is so unresponsive with these days.

Filed Under: Digital Life, Featured Tagged With:

The 2010 List of best known German Serial Entrepreneuers

02/11/2010 By

I’m feeling honored that Germany’s renown Business Magazine WirtschaftsWoche added me to the 2010 List of best known German Serial Entrepreneurs.

Starting your own venture, strongly believing in your ideas and working on it with a highly motivated team is what always drove me – and I admit, I’m somewhat addicted.

I often hear: It only happens in The Valley. Well that is not true.

Here’s the 2010 List of best known German Serial Entrepreneurs:

(Click to enlarge)

Filed Under: Featured, News, Personal Tagged With:

MLOVE 2010: It’s all about the people

25/06/2010 By

Over the past couple of days, I’ve been extremely lucky to attend the MLOVE ConFestival.

There’s much one can say about this outstanding, extraordinary event and I likely will. Later, once I had a chance to digest all the good stuff.

For now, there’s one common theme, that crosses my mind again and again, when thinking about MLOVE: It’s all about the people.

When Peter Giblin and Harald Neidhardt set out on their journey to create the MLOVE concept, there was one key driving factor: Putting the people back into the center of everything. Many, if not all, business events and conferences are grouped around the central concept of an audience and speakers. Two distinct roles. Some who listen. Some who talk.

While “a great chance to network” is on every agenda these days, I never quite experienced it as intense, as enriching as during the MLOVE days. Both, for work and for my personal life.

MLOVE has been truly interdisciplinary, crazy, funny, encouraging, motivating, eye-opening and passionate for me.

With the youngest participant aged 15 (Jerome Nadel’s son) up to the 31.5 years old :-) UNICEF Chairman Oliver Rothschild the diversity and genuinely multi-cultural view points couldn’t get any better for, I’d say, any discussion.

Yes, we discussed mobility. After all, that’s why it’s called MLOVE. But mobility in a much broader sense than on any other industry event I’ve yet been attending. How can we bring power and education to the developing countries? Is education the key to most privacy concerns? Can noise be valuable? What’s the overall role and responsibility of the geeks?

The way the event has been structured and executed put the participants in the center of it all.

The notion of audience vs. speaker has only been there during a few (outstanding) keynotes – thanks Shaherose, Nicholas, Jonathan, Aape, Jerome and everybody else. But most of the interaction happened between us. The first day’s Open Space was just fabulous. And Jonathan MacDonald’s moderation unparalleled.

What’s the most important learning from MLOVE for me? It’s to do everything, to surround yourself with great people.

Whether it’s your private life or professionally. Try to incorporate different perspectives into everything you do. Seek for masters in their respective disciplines. Hire the ones, who are even better than you and greatly stimulate thinking out-of-the-box.

Do not accept the status quo. Never.

I’ve started to create the ultimate MLOVE 2010 attendees twitter list. You can follow the MLOVE attendees here. If you’ve been there and are not yet on the list, do let me know, please.

Filed Under: Featured, News Tagged With:

One of my favorite games for the iPhone, now available for free!

17/06/2010 By

Just a heads up that The App Dojo, an iPhone developer buddy of mine, will reduce the price for one of my favorite iPhone games to exactly zero very soon.

If you’re like me an like the puzzle genre mixed with some action, go checkout SIZZ (iTunes Link). It should be free by the time this post sees the light.

Here’s a quick how-to-play/making off:

Filed Under: Apps, Featured Tagged With: ,