It seems like yet another New Zealand government’s websites is under fire, just after SPARC debate/controversy. This time it’s NZLive.com.
NZLive.com is a New Zealand government funded website for “connecting you with New Zealand culture – art, performance, music, books, film, festivals, heritage, sport, recreation and more.” (from NZLive about page).
Event Finder, a New Zealand privately-owned IT company, has claimed that government has been wasting tax payers money to try to implement features already are existing on Event Finder’s system. Event Finder set up a website dedicated to this called whynzlive.
There is a rather lengthy discussion at the New Zealand PHP User Group mailing list. And there is also a computer world article about this.
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It has been predicted since the beginning, and lo and behold, it became a reality! Ferrit.co.nz, an online shopping website started and owned by Telecom was closed at 5pm, 14 January 2009 after around three years of business. NZ Herald post featured 11 pages of users comments about the closing of Ferrit.
So what’s wrong with Ferrit?
- Lack (if any) of word of mouth referrals. Most if not all web 2.0 success relied on this factor rather than bombardments of TV ads.
- Annoying TV ads
- Poor choice of name. People do not associate it with online shopping
- Telecom’s bad public image
- It was seen as a response to Trademe which was at the height of its success
- Bad website interface and design
- Seen as just providing links to retailers websites
- Telecom was trying to run a business outside their expertise
A blogger commented that although it is not a successful business, Ferrit should not close down. I agree to some degree, it costed Telecom NZD $30m to setup, and it’s only been three years!
The closing of Ferrit saw Telecom’s shares went up in value, but only to drop again the next day on announcement of “Commerce Commission commences review of backhaul”.
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