2.6¢ : Sticky Sony

When you hear someone said they are in the market of buying a new camera, you most likely think they are looking for a digital camera. Indeed, 35mm seems like such a distant memory. Digital cameras are probably one of the few high tech gadgets that have crossed the chasm into mass production. Among the big players, Sony is known for always creating its own standards, from early day's Beta VCR to Mini-disc. While the capability of digital camera expands, the capacity of data storage needs to increase as well. Currently, Sony creates the memory card so differently than any other existing technology. There are a lot of customer complaints posting on the web. Andy Pennell’s blog is one example. "Rant: Sony Memory Sticks: what are they thinking?"

The blog is hosted by MSDN, Microsoft's Developer Network blog which offers help for developers in writing applications using Microsoft products and technologies. IBM, Sun and HP also have similar employee blog to better communicate with the technical community. However, this particular blog didn’t mention anything about Microsoft’s product; just expressed the author’s frustration of Sony application design strategy. I found myself following his trend of thought very easily, unlike some other blogging reading experience. The author talked about several incidents that people are confused by Sony memory card naming convention. Not only the author’s friends, but also the author himself (should be a very technical guy) have trouble finding the compatible memory card for his Sony electronic device among all the offerings:
Memory Stick
Memory Stick (with memory select)
Memory Stick MagicGate
Memory Stick Duo
Memory Stick Duo MagicGate
Memory Stick PRO
Memory Stick PRO Duo

Since MSDN attracts technical community, I assume people who make comments to this blog probably have similar technical background or at least look for technical information. Hence, blogging becomes a mean to reach the audience that usually not reachable by conventional marketing.

Most of the consumer probably only looks for the basics of digital camera, such as resolution, optical lenses, or the appearance, but for more advanced users; they may start to look into compatibility or software interface and friendliness. Sony’s products have a lot of great features and superb quality, but its different-than-mainstream design standard always baffles new customers. Since product cycle seems to be pretty short (different naming/standard is created every 6 months), Sony should have posted the latest update on the web and make sure the link is printed on every instruction of Sony electronics package. Although Sony product "differentiation" strategy may not change in a short run, customer experience can be improved by simply the due diligence.