Digital gold mine

Today, I was introduced to MyMileMarker via one of my favorite sites, Lifehacker. MyMileMarker (MYMM) is a way to keep track of your car's mileage and use of gasoline. Anyone who cares about their car or their wallet knows that doing these things is prudent. Well, MYMM has made it easy for people to do just that. I have had this idea for quite some time. The thing that MYMM does that no one else (that I know of) has been able to do is provide both a web interface and a way to update your information via text messages.

Text updates are really important because people will always forget to write down their mileage on their gas station receipt or just forget to go online and update their account when they do or something like that. Being able to send a text message each time you fill up with your current mileage, gallons pumped and price per gallon is an important step in helping people keep track of a major source of yearly spending.


For commuters around the country, this is a needed tool to provide real-world information about their cars. Why? Because most people don't realize how much they spend on gasoline, and many more don't know what kind of MPG they are getting. Sure, the EPA has guidelines that are used by auto companies to determine the average MPG for a certain car. But how does your car, with your options package, your commute and your driving style actually perform? Who knows? It's time people had an easy way to do that.

Why is this called the digital gold mine? Because this is exactly the kind of information that can be used to create an invaluable database of information about cars and drivers. If MYMM can build up its user base, it will be sitting on a digitial gold mine. Imagine if you could go to Edmonds.com, and when you compared cars it presented you with average MPG of real drivers in your city, or with your commute. Many people will notice that the car rated at 29 MPG actually gets 21.

But other than Kelly Blue Book and Edmonds, and sites like Yahoo! Autos and eBay Motors, car manufacturers themselves could really benefit by having this kind of real-world information. A database like this could provide them with customer usage data they can only extrapolate right now.

The greatest benefit could go to companies that are in the high mileage/alternative fuel vehicle race game. A company like Tesla Motors, whose cars run solely on electricity could use the information to show how wasteful internal combustion engines are and how great their electric vehicles are. A company like Toyota or Honda could probably play that same game in a slightly different way considering their creation of relatively fuel efficient vehicles.

The real question is whether MYMM will be able to build up the user base needed to make it marketable to much larger companies, if not for purchase then at least for partnership. I think there are enough people out there who want an easy way to keep track of their information that the market is there. I have set up my account, and can't wait to start downloading reports about my vehicle. I just wish I could have started using this a long time ago so that I could have seen my car's progress as it accumulated the 70k miles it has now.

The most on four wheels

Last Saturday, I had a chance to go to the qualifiers of the San Jose Grand Prix. It was a great day to see and hear some cars burning high octane fuel.

Although the race was not until the next day, there were plenty of people in attendance and things to keep them occupied. There were everything from merchant booths, comedians, raffles, and a silent auction (of which this Ferrari was a participant).



Although I almost made it to the pit area (before the security guards looked too intimidating to test), there was a very large building with the team trailers where they were doing repairs on the cars. Being around these trailers and taking pictures like these:



reminded me of when I helped design and build this beauty in 1998:



Our car (on the left - notice the lack of sponsorship stickers) built for $2000 compared to our neighbor's car, from Purdue University (they didn't start the project unless they secured $45,000).

I have to admit that the most fun race was the drifting competition. It seemed that the racers were really having fun. The fan favorite was definitely the drifter whose car was made up to look like a police car, with the flashing lights and everything. Later, I thought that his ploy only really works if he is never in the lead. Oh well.

More unfortunate Ford news

The Detroit Free Press reported that a man committed suicide by jumping off the 10th floor of the Regent Court Building in Dearborn. The Autoblog identified the building as Ford's Marketing HQ.

Although the suicide was not work related, it can't be good news for Ford when it has announced huge losses and that it is selling off Aston Martin.

Even on the marketing side, it seems that rival car companies are coming up with creative campaigns. Nissan is now engaged in a viral marketing campaign with fake car keys being left in popular hang outs with a tag that says the new Altima doesn't need a key due to its push button start.

I hope that the money they are getting from the Aston Martin deal will help implement their latest turn-around plan. I'm skeptical because it was just over 10 years ago that "Ford 2000" was supposed to bring the company into the 21st century and allow it to take the world's #1 auto maker position from GM. It didn't. Unless Ford is investing its new funds and energy into remodeling itself from the inside (i.e. less focus on headlines and more on internal processes and flawed operations) it will not be able to overcome the decades of entrenched thinking to pull itself out of the hole.