Mr. President, take a Peek

By Carl Ford

As usual, I am writing about a subject, with sincere doubts that I am going to influence change.

While President Obama has been fighting to keep his Blackberry, I have been thinking of starting an effort to figure out the president's Blackberry messenger ID. For those who don’t know, Blackberry’s have an individual handle that can be used to send text messages back and forth. A crowd sourcing effort to identify the president’s id would be fun, but ultimately unsuccessful. Too many people will ignore it, or claim to be the president. But for thoughts like these, I justify the CIA’s concern. And of course it’s a tracking device the president has put on himself.

So I am here to offer a compromise. It’s called a Peek (see http://www.getpeek.com), and it’s an email only solution that is incredibly simple and inexpensive. The system is $79.95 and the monthly cost is $19.95. Peek comes with its own service, and it is in the same basic structure of most Blackberries with an easy-to-use keyboard. The system costs less because it only has to service e-mail, so there is no browser or bricks game. It is a specific purpose machine that does exactly what it is supposed to do: Let you peek at your emails and make decisions in a timely manner.

The lack of a browser and the inability to read attachments is a draw back, but it is also may be the right choice for people who just want the communication. Obviously, that is not necessarily a Facebook crowd. So what is the market for Peek? People who are serious about email and not necessarily traditional Blackberry users. Maybe, but what if we thought of the Peek as an upgrade from the SMS messaging on the phone. I am aware that the young do not really use the phone part of their device. They are mostly texting. And Peek provides the service cheaper than text and to more people.

In my test run, I took the Peek with me into the mountains where my signal is so weak, my phone was not available. The Peek was a fine tool for about 70 percent of my emails. The other 30 percent I knew I would need my laptop to view and respond to. Then again, browsing the Internet and looking at attachments on mobile devices has always been a frustration. My mother always told me that delayed gratification is good. And I have been waiting for this device for a while. Amol Sarva was a speaker at an event I did in 2007. He had been an exec at Virgin Mobile, and I knew he had some plans for another MVNO. The Peek team is made up of former execs from Virgin Mobile and the history of how Amol came up with the idea is cute (It’s on the community page). So, my advice Mr. President is to take a Peek and give one to the rest of the family.