Everyone has to win. I believe that about most exchanges in life, and more so when talking about business. I have spent a lot of my life arguing with brilliant software engineers and developers about the need to create the administrative back end of software as easy and beautiful as the user interface. “We must make it Martha friendly,” is my cry around the office. Years ago we developed software for a church who hired a sweet lady named Martha to work it. Well, Martha was not computer savvy. That’s an understatement—she thought the mouse was a foot pedal the first day she looked at her terminal. Martha did us a big favor. She forced us to make things simple; very simple. And from then on, every time things start to get complicated, I dig Martha up (she’s not really dead, only gone from her old position). “What would Martha do?” is the infamous question my team is probably tired of hearing.
Last week we debuted our online MediaMachine. This application serves multimedia to users of websites that require a lot of different “moving parts and options.” It presents the user with an organized and simple way to enjoy
- video,
- audio,
- notes
- pictures
- live chat
It also allows website users to embed our clients’ custom branded video player on their blogs, social network sites or to send any of the media to a friend with a personal message.
However impressive the feature list is, MediaMachine’s true power comes from its back end prowess. Our developers have been working hard to make it possible for a web novice, the Marthas of our world, to be able to manage this thing with less than an hour of training, forty-five minutes is our goal.
This aggregater will take input from multiple sources and present them through a very sleek format. For example, if Sally is only approved to upload the notes for a teaching series, she’ll log in and only see her notes uploader option. Bob, on the other hand, has the ability to upload video and audio and images, so on his log in screen, he’ll see all these options. The interface is totally customizable.
MediaMachine’s back end uses a lot of Ajax technology (no, not the kind you wash dishes with) which makes the whole process much faster and elegant for the user.
We created this tool for churches and organizations that would like to share their media content but can’t afford an in-house, full-time Webmaster. Pricing is very accessible and is scaleable with volume, so to make it affordable to organizations wanting to have a presence that, previously, only large churches were able to have. To me that makes MediaMachine a winner.
Today they’re starting a new challenge: 50,000 pairs in 50 days. And they’re doing it through social media. It sounds like a lot of shoes, but for $5 you and I can help change two lives with the gift of shoes–giving them comfort, dignity and even health (in Africa, people are getting sick from worms who enter the body thr0ugh their feet).
