Mr17Hz

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Everything posted by Mr17Hz

  1. If the USPA DID require dropzones to allow fun jumpers, guess what would happen next: Those dropzones would begin allowing fun jumpers to jump at their dropzone, for the rate of $70/jump. Guess how many fun jumpers would jump there. What's next, will you be lobbying to have the USPA regulate prices? Too many rights would be taken away from business owners if the USPA decided to spend resources towards going down this path (and a lot of resources would need to be spent, not to mention lost revenue.) I firmly feel that from a political perspective these decisions should be left to the business owners. the ONLY time when I feel that the USPA should step in is if a Tandem Only dropzone is interfering with the ability for a fun jumper dropzone to do business. In otherwords, if an airport will only allow one DZ business and that DZ will not allow fun jumpers - then there is a problem where the USPA should step in to fight to allow the second DZ. However if a DZO decideds to operate a tandem only dropzone, but is cooperative towards anyone who was willing to invest in a business that allowed fun jumpers - that's their american right as a business owner. What you're proposing is similar to the state government telling a Gas Station that they cannot operate unless they provide a quick-mart as well, because it is not fair to the dude down the street that he doesn't have a place to buy his ho-ho's without going another 2 miles to the local 7/11. If demand were high enough to justify funjumpers, some guy would open up another gas station across the street on the same intersection. The states job is to make sure that regulations are followed to operate an enviromentally freindly gas station. The USPA's jop is to make sure that regulations are followed to operate a safe skydiving operation - which in turn keeps skydivers in the air. Nobody is stopping a new business owner from coming along to the same airport and opening up a fun jumper DZ - so in my opinion the USPA does not need to get involved. The USPA is there to help that second operation open its doors. Again, my PERSONAL feeling is that I don't like the idea of a Tandem Only dropzone, what i'm saying here is whether I like it or not - I do not feel that the USPA should take it upon themselves to make business decisions like this. By all means, however, if you open up that gas station across the street and give me a place to buy my ho-hos, you won't see my buying gas at that other place! Matt Matt Christenson [email protected] http://www.RealDropzone.com - A new breed of dropzone manifest software.
  2. I voted yes. First off let me say that I agree that the tandem factory style dropzone does less good for the skydiving community than a fully functional dropzone. That having been said, I also feel that no matter what happens in the USPA, these tandem factories will continue to exist. The USPA does not have the political power to shut these dropzones down just by excluding them from group membership. Furthermore, by excluding such a large amount of dropzones, the USPA would significantly damage it's political grip on the industry as a whole. Without USPA membership backing, these tandem factories may not feel as politically pressured to follow USPA guidelines which have been designed to promote safety. The USPA is "helping keep skydivers in the air" by supporting any type of skydiving, tandem or not. It is up to business owners and competition to drive what individual drop zones can do or not. It is not the right of the USPA. In my opinion, the only thing that a USPA member DZ should have to do is follow the license and safety regulations set out by the USPA. If the USPA starts setting questionable rules then people will loose respect for their rules as a whole, and not respect those that are really important. Matt Christenson [email protected] http://www.RealDropzone.com - A new breed of dropzone manifest software.
  3. I think that everybody would benefit from knowing which manufacturers you're talking about, in our industry word of mouth is an important aspect to keeping a business running and allowing those who put the effort in to succeed where others will not. If you don't spread your good / bad stories word of mouth with who you consider to be good and who you consider to be bad; then it will come down to whoever spends the most money to advertise in parachutist will make the better living... I am not completely sure why you felt compelled to censor which manufacturers you spoke of. Matt Matt Christenson [email protected] http://www.RealDropzone.com - A new breed of dropzone manifest software.
  4. Eule, First off, thank you for your feedback. I have removed most of your quotes and will instead answer your questions in complete sentences. In regards to your concerns about the ability to support a product like this effectively, I have 7 years experience in enterprise application support, and 4 in full lifecycle development. I completely understand what I am up against. Because the idea of licensing the product out instead of charging a large initial investment, my success will depend completely on the ability to not only gain customers, but keep them for a minimum of 3-5 years so that I might see a return on my initial investment. I have also been on both sides of this fence, and I feel quite confident with my ability to provide a long-term solution that will financially benefit all parties involved, the drop zone, their customers, and RealDropzone. The dropzone and their customers will need to see a return before I will. By “complete control”, I do mean that staff will be able to do all of their normal daily business activities. The reason I pointed out the obvious here, was to distinguish it as different from the web based organizer user interface, and other kiosk style components of the solution. There will be staff based security that could prohibit certain staff from making account credits of type “compensation” or “complementary”, allowing them only to produce cash or credit card account credits. Any discrepancies between the cash drawer count at the end of the day would red flag any misuse of a cash credit, and credit card credit is self managing in that it cannot be applied until an authorization code is returned from the payment gateway. In addition to this, any account credits of type ‘compensation’ or ‘complementary’ will be summarized individually in the end of day report that is automatically emailed each night to the business owner and operation managers themselves, so that employees can be closely audited. The difference between credit types “compensation” and “complementary” is that compensation can be converted into payroll, complementary cannot. Both account credit types will not be refundable. For the purpose of flexibility, it will be possible to create a paid credit (refundable) in a situation where cash is not physically accepted; however this option will also be restricted and flagged in the end of day report. When I say refundable – this is strictly at the credit/debit layer, there are additional business rules that can be defined that further restrict in which situations a refund can be given, and these situations can also be restricted on a per-staff member basis. While these security features will exist, I expect that smaller dropzones will want to give their employees the ability to have full control over accounts, and audit end of day reports closely at the end of the day to identify discrepancy problems; which is why a great deal of effort is going init creating very useful and easy to glance through reports; in addition to verbose reports that identify every single action that happened throughout the day/week. The downfalls that are associated with web based applications include, but are not limited to; the inability to do business as normal in the event of an internet failure, slower response time to requests, most of the time user interfaces are ‘wizard’ based and not as flexible or intuitive as OS based user interfaces. Performance itself can also sometimes be an issue. As a whole, web based user interfaces take longer to do every day tasks. Fun jumpers will be capable of making credit card or check payments at terminals that will provide card readers. These readers will also function to allow tandem reservations to “log in” using a credit card that has been issued to their name; similar to how self check-in terminals at airports work. The dropzone can decide whether or not to allow funding on their public website, or on their intranet website accessible by users with their own computer with wireless capability. A dropzone may not wish to enable this feature because these transactions would be considered “Card not present” transactions and will cost around 0.7% more in bank fees. The wireless based service for people with their own laptops will work with any existing wireless internet access. Access will be restricted by IP addresses, so that only requests from local IPs will be allowed “on-site” functionality. No additional access points or SSID will be nessisary. The purpose of this feature is to allow dropzones that cannot afford or justify the cost of kiosk terminals to still allow customers to help themselves. It will be particularly useful for load organizers; who the dropzone might decide to provide cheaper laptops to for use on-site. The idea is to be flexible with start-up costs. Many dropzones already have wireless internet access and this would be available to them at no additional infrastructure cost. Both public and local hosting will need to be hosting using the windows platform, however clients using any browser or operating system will be able to access the sites. The local site will be hosted on the local windows server, required for the system to work; and the public internet site will be hosted by us. The cost for hosting will be included in licensing, and will not cost any more to the dropzone. My goal for bandwidth requirements of the dropzone is to allow functionality on a 128k ISDN line. Messages going back and forth between the web hosting environment and the dropzone will be small requests like “my event registration availability has changed, this is the new info”, or “This is a new tandem reservation”. Each night the full database will be compressed, encrypted and transferred. This allows us to resync completely; as well as offer offsite-backup services included in the price of licensing. At this time I can not make solid bandwidth claims, however I would be very surprised if a 256k DSL line would not support the software. A static IP will not be necessary at the dropzone, 2 way communication will keep the web hosting environment up to date with which IP to use to contact the dropzone. The gift certificates may be printed; however record of each one will be in the system, customers may also purchase certificates online and print them out. They will be identified on the system by a unique number that can be pulled up to redeem the certificate. Certificates can be per item, or dollar amount. The can also be configured to expire. They may expire from a “Tandem Skydive” into a dollar amount first, and then later expire completely. This allows for you to guarantee a price for a certain period of time (1 year?) and after that point a customer would have to pay the difference between what the value is and what the new price would be. They can eventually (after 2 years?) expire completely and no longer be valid. Gift certificates can be configured to be tied to a specific user, or be available for any user to use. The 8000 jump/yr limitation is for beta (happy?) implementations only. These dropzones will be receiving the product at a significant discount for the first year of operation, and the purpose is for me to make sure that the product is running optimal before I officially make it public. The ‘resident geek’ requirement is also for beta implementations only, and if I find it to be difficult to find participants who meet this requirement I will lower my requirements, however I have already have had a very good response, and don’t feel that I will need to do this. While old technology isn’t always bad, new technology can further improve systems. All currently existing products (in my opinion) have a common weak point, which online integration. The internet is a very powerful marketing tool that is being underused in our industry because nobody has been willing to make a heavy initial investment. Those who have made the most powerful investment have done so in a way that has hurt the industry by lowering its credibility amongst non-skydivers by using what I consider to be unscrupulous business practices. I feel that there is room for competition in this area launched by the dropzones themselves; and without taking advantage of unknowledgeable customers, or outright theft. RealDropzone is the first step in a process that will enable businesses to step up in the online marketing world. Entering a Credit Card into a computer is something that you can choose or choose not to do. I find myself among the tens of millions of people who are not concerned; Credit Card companies themselves have taken the burden of dealing with the costs of fraud, and this makes me comfortable with making online payments, however offering this feature allows millions of customers to help themselves. As far as using a dropzone computer to replace a stand alone CC machine; everything gets encrypted in the same way it does on the machine itself. The encryption happens in protected threads that do not allow worms or other malicious software to see the values until after they have been encrypted. All communication between the dropzone and RealDropzone’s servers will be encrypted and not sent over insecure means such as email. As for the trust you put into RealDropzone to keep your information confidential; it is the same trust you would have to put into any company that will provide you with IT solutions. The idea of pro-active system monitoring is a key factor in what is going to allow me to provide this solution and support it at a price that makes it feasible. When it comes down to it any time you’re working with a custom software provider they have a full view of your business and your data whether you think they do or not. VERY few companies ever spend the time and resources necessary to really lock down access for people internal to the companies network, a lot of places just avoid the topic and issue. The risk is there one way or another; I feel that taking advantage of it in order to lower prices makes more sense than beating around the bush. Because then the IRS sees it. :) The IRS sees what you report to them, and reports can be generated on what you want to report to them, however in the event of a full audit, if a company is cheating on what they’re reporting the IRS is going to be able to identify it quickly and any estimate they come up with you can bet will be rounded up if you can’t prove they’re wrong. Paying an employee internal benefits instead of pay is not a crime; do you think that cell phone providers get penalized over giving out discounted or free cell-phone plans to employees? allowing the employee a lot of power (on a per paycheck basis) over what his/her pay agreement will be between benefits and cash may be a newer concept made possible only by the ease of doing it with computers; but I’m not the first to suggest it, large companies like Motorola and Microsoft all take advantage of this capability. Allowing a professional skydiver to skydive is a completely legitimate business expense that goes under the category of professional training. If you kept better numbers about how much of your jet fuel goes to professional training; you’d find that a tax accountant could consider that to be a business expense that would lower your taxable income for the year… Up until now coming up with the paperwork to claim how much has been spent on this type of continued professional training has not been easy enough to risk having to prove yourself in the event of an audit, however this system will allows you to produce those solid numbers. I think you still have to provide a human or a kiosk though. Some people don't have laptops, or don't have a wireless card, or whatever. Also, is the manifest-yourself application browser and OS agnostic? The idea behind the wireless based intranet website is to allow some functionality to dropzones who don’t want to incur the infrastructure costs of adding a kiosk. Adding a kiosk is a business decision the dropzone would need to make. They will always have the option to do so at no additional software cost to them. This application will be web based and be browser and OS agnostic. These concepts are extremely similar as they both have a big impact on how you do business, and individually have costs associated with them. One of the things I justify the license costs required to make this all possible, is by saving in overall business expenses. Why pay for two places to host your website? All emails sent will be opt-in and users will be able to unsubscribe at any time. Plenty of users don’t care if they’re sent this kind of emails and opt-in to anyplace the sign up for an account. RealDropzone will respect those who wish not to receive specials or updates in their email box. All software is being developed in Microsoft Visual Studios 2005, MSSQL Server 2k5 will be used for the backend in larger operations on-site, MSSQL Server 2K5 Express will be used for smaller dropzones to avoid license fees. MSSQL Server 2K5 Standard will be used on the hosted website; and the hosting server will host with IIS 6.0. Each dropzone will need a dedicated server, smaller dropzones will be able to get away with an older machine, 1.0GHz with 1GB of ram should be adequate; larger ones will want to consider 2GB of ram and a faster processor. Windows client software will run on anything around a 1GHz machine with 512MB of ram… probably even 256mb of ram. It will only support any operating system that Microsoft still offers support for (currently 2K or higher) After I am able to lower startup costs by providing video tutorials for training, full manuals, and cover at least some of the equipment and hosting costs of start-up, I will be able to provide the software at a lower initial startup cost; however the cost per jump will remain the same, possibly a few extra cents per jump to reward those dropzones who invested in a package with a larger start-up amount. I appreciate your response and the time you put into it, you made a lot of good points. Matt Christenson [email protected] http://www.RealDropzone.com - A new breed of dropzone manifest software.
  5. I think that the major reason for the drop is the increased fuel prices and other economical pressures. One more thing to consider may not be new people entering the sport, but loosing some of our old-timers to retirment. Remember, the baby boomers are retiring right now - maybe we're loosing membership from the other end of the age group faster than we're gaining members; but new members are still increasing year by year? The USPA has the facts to be able to answer this question. It is also worth mentioning that the number indicated reflects USPA membership. It may be true that some of the political issues regaurding certain dropzones being removed from USPA membership have lowered some skydiver's priority on sending in yearly fees. I personally hope this is not the case; does anybody have any solid numbers on non USPA member dropzone's and their participation? If a non-traveling skydiver has been skydiving at a dropzone, maybe those dropzones are allowing them to continue jumping without renewing USPA membership? Matt Christenson [email protected] http://www.RealDropzone.com - A new breed of dropzone manifest software.
  6. I see the value differently than you do. How do you see the value differently, please explain Any good business does not budget its finances on a month by month basis, they're financing for quarters and years, and 'the future'. Any cost that will pay for itself in one year's time while providing the potential for capability and benefit substantially beyond the initial investment is money well spent. Investments like this do not get in the way of "more important priorities", but provide for a means to address those other priorities more effectivly. Matt Christenson [email protected] http://www.RealDropzone.com - A new breed of dropzone manifest software.
  7. I can't claim to have been writing everything by myself, however I am acting as the senior architect on the project and have paid out of pocket for any work that's been outsourced. At this point in time the initial investment of time and resources is being split between Skydive Chicago, and myself. Matt Christenson [email protected] http://www.RealDropzone.com - A new breed of dropzone manifest software.
  8. Mark, What I was suggesting is that if the dropzone that you are hosting the boogie at is running RealDropzone, the dropzone would be able to provide the registration service for you to use at no additional cost to them. They would configure a "Special Event" Titled "Rainbow Boogie 2007", define the date range, when to begin registration, registration cost, preregistration discount, preregistration date, and any jump ticket discount or price override to be applied to registered boogie participants when they manifest. That's it. the whole process takes about 10 minutes to configure the event... As soon as the event is configured their website automatically gets updated with a new event on the calendar, and participants can go to the dropzone's website, create an account (or login to an existing), and register for the event. participants can also pay for other participants. As soon as one participant signs up and RSVP's, they become an "unconfirmed participant", in order to become confirmed you must pay (full or deposit, as defined in event settings). You can RSVP and then someone else can pay for you by submitting your name or email. Your account (you as the event organizer) could be configured with organizer permissions for that event, which would allow you use the dropzones website to view registered participants, as well as add people to the list at no cost or your predefined cost, etc. When the event was over; the dropzone would run a report to deturmine what revenue the event generated, take out whatever fee they charge you (probably at least their merchant account rates, maybe an additional service fee), and write you a check for the event. All of this stuff has already been coded for and tested. The idea behind the functionality is that it gives the dropzone more value to offer; with almost no effort they can solve for you a problem that would cost you a lot more time and money to solve. This feature would also work for smaller events, such as canopy courses, etc... and can obviously be used for local events where the dropzone themselves is the organizer. Matt Christenson [email protected] http://www.RealDropzone.com - A new breed of dropzone manifest software.
  9. I have considered the option you suggested and have learned through experience that pricing structures like that do not provide a very secure business model. The amount of resources that it takes to split a software component up into modules that can be enabled and disabled takes extra time, and adds unnecessary complexity to the total solution. I would rather focus on business rules than restricting access and spending time worrying about who owes for what modules. By having one version of the software available and distributed I also lower my support costs; both in implementation and making sure that I don’t need to support old versions. By pricing licensing based on the number of jumps manifested, I am able to create a simple structure that allows for every size business to acquire the software at a cost that is directly proportional to the value they gain from it. By providing bulk rates instead of monthly fees, I am able to provide discounts to customers who wish to pay for more up front. If I added complexities like that to my model, I would have to be charging more overall: which means less value for everyone. Matt Christenson [email protected] http://www.RealDropzone.com - A new breed of dropzone manifest software.
  10. I see the value differently than you do. That is exactly why I am working on a solution that solves all of the needs of a dropzone business, and providing a license model that allows for small and large businesses to both make use of the full featured product and support; there is no reason why everyone can’t equally split the costs and benefits of a solution that saves and makes everyone money that could not otherwise exist. I have 100% support from Skydive Chicago, which is a substantially large operation. The project was defined after I was hired to provide them with business consulting services that led to me making the decision to make a significant investment in my time and money to provide the industry with a solution that is not already available on the market. This thread is the first public note that I’ve made of the solution and it’s availability; I am not concerned about selling the solution, I am very confident that it will sell itself; and that I will make back the resources I’ve put into it over a 3-5 year period. I’m not trying to get rich fast with this; if I can’t or don’t provide the support necessary to make the product worth it, guess what happens? Customers find other solutions and stop paying license fees; which means I never see a return on my investment. The purpose of this thread was not to be a sales pitch on the product; it was to find interesting dropzone owners and operational managers who already identify the potential value, and would like to be involved in a pilot implementation between the months of November and February of this year. I’m not trying to convince people to see business the way I see it, I’m trying to find people that already see it the way I see it, and are looking to work together to make it a reality. Matt Christenson [email protected] http://www.RealDropzone.com - A new breed of dropzone manifest software.
  11. I appologise to those who feel that I have violated the no advertising policy on these forums. It was my understanding that the "no-advertising" rule on this forum, as well as other public internet forums, was to avoid flooding of "non-dialog" style product plugs, ussually of the cut-and-paste variety. I had felt that the manner in which I was discussing the product (which I am not actually selling yet) was non-disruptive and non-offensive. I also felt that my project was close enough to a reality that I might benefit from multiple opinions about the usefullness and desire for specific features and solutions. I also felt that by keeping the discussion to a single thread and stating the purpose of the thread in my original post that I was being respectful of the community. I have been asked by forum moderators to no longer discuss product pricing or availability. If anyone would like to participate in further discussion about RealDropzone, please email me at [email protected] where we can continue a dialog without breaking forum rules or offending anyone. -Matt Matt Christenson [email protected] http://www.RealDropzone.com - A new breed of dropzone manifest software.
  12. When/Where is Rainbow Boogie 2007 scheduled for? If it is July or later, I may be able to help you out, by implementing RealDropzone at the dropzone you’ll be hosting at. Solving problems like this is the reason for RealDropzone, already considered is the ability for a dropzone to schedule “Special Events”, in the configuration properties of those special events, it can be specified that the dropzone itself will not be keeping the profits from registration, but that the total amount will be recorded so that a check can be written to whoever hosted the event, minus a percent fee set by the dropzone (usually to accommodate merchant account fees, but optionally to collect additional profit). When developing this concept I had Brian Germain and Scott Miller’s canopy courses in mind. Unfortunately it would be hard to justify a solution specific to a once-a-year boogie, as I expect setup costs to me to exceed what I actually make on product licensing for the first year or so that a dropzone would be implemented. I will be pricing this product on the idea that I want to break even paying for development costs after I have a handful of dropzones (~15-20) that have been paying licensing fees for 5 years, or ~30-40 dropzones paying license fees for ~3 years. As far as your idea of a perfect world, that is exactly my long-term thinking. Because the dropzone’s local management software and the website will be driven out of the same database and structure: it would make future inter-dropzone functionality capable. My long term strategy goes along these lines: If I succeed with this initial part of my business plan, and I find myself with 20-50 clients, the next step will be to develop a social-networking based website (friendster, myspace, etc) for skydivers at RealSkydiving.com. Here skydivers can create information profiles that contains information like emergency contact info, address, billing information, etc. Skydivers will be able to opt-in to a service that will make this information available to RealDropzone enabled dropzones through encrypted means. The skydiver will have complete control over what fields will be available to dropzones. Dropzones will be able to create customer notes about a customer that will be shared with other dropzones, for example if a customer is grounded due to medical reasons – and then tries to go to another dropzone, that dropzone will see the notes, who made them, and be able to make their own decision about whether or not to allow the jumper to jump. Skydivers will have an online “Logbook” that will automatically be updated with any new jumps made at RealDropzone enabled dropzones, configure who they jumped with, will be able to post pictures and movies, and will be able to look up cool facts like “have I ever been on the same load as skydiver-x”. Who knows, maybe I can even get the USPA and other parachuting governing bodies to work with me on something universal. I don’t plan to make inter-realdropzone communication a proprietary feature; I plan to expose a secure web driven API that allows anyone the dropzone authorizes access to certain information. All of this stuff is just a daydream for me right now, though; no promises yet :) Matt Christenson [email protected] http://www.RealDropzone.com - A new breed of dropzone manifest software.
  13. All of the scenarios mentioned above have been considered in the specification of RealDropzone and will be a part of the first public release. Matt Christenson [email protected] http://www.RealDropzone.com - A new breed of dropzone manifest software.
  14. But you're planning to have it done until 2007! How big is the US market for this? 50 dropzones out of the 200? Dare they ask the price? It will be implemented this year, however I do not want to offer it publically until I know that i've worked out any bugs or support problems, because supporting one business is easy, but supporting a lot can be a headache and resource drain for even the smallest bug. Pricing will be reasonable. I have not made any decisions yets, however my current thinking looks something like this: Pricing info removed by slotperfect to keep the post within the parameters of the "no advertising" rule. I confidently feel that whatever pricing I end up settling on will actually SAVE the dropzone more money, and GENERATE more additional revenue than the product will cost them. I've identified what I feel to be a win/win/win situation for the dropzone, their customers, and real dropzone. Included with the license fee will be many fees that dropzones are already paying to other services that will be no longer nessisary. Matt Christenson [email protected] http://www.RealDropzone.com - A new breed of dropzone manifest software.
  15. I went through extensive research and have reviewed all of the products on the market. All of them represent decent products of yesturday's technology. It's 2006 now, and there is no reason why a reasonably priced dropzone management solution cannot answer all of the questions that regularly get asked about the competition: • Why do I have to enter a customer's information someplace when they already did it online when they signed up? • Why does our online reservation system force large groups to have deposits paid all by one person? • Why does our online reservation system not attempt to collect all of the customer information required at manifest, so that customer registration takes less time? • Why can't our online reservation system process security deposits immeadiatly, but then automatically charge the remaining full price 24 hours before the reservation (after a confirmed group number has been generated so an acurate discount price can be deturmined). It takes so much time running credit cards! • Why do I still use this stupid credit card reader machine, it takes more room on my desk, makes me think i'm still living in the 90s, and causes me to enter an "Amount Paid" value into both the credit card machine, AND my computer, and possibly into some manual log book because my computer is sometimes buggy? I don't trust it to remember the important stuff by itself. • Why can't daily auditing and logging be so easy and intuitive that I actually use it to find out what's going on in my office and on my website, because i'm not overwhelmed with all of those numbers that mean nothing to me. • Why can't my software development company be notified immediately when I recieve an unexpected error or something looks wrong with my data? Staying involved with my daily process will help prevent me from coming up with workarounds that allow me to get my work done but take away from the value of the overall product. • Why do I not have a system that keeps track of “unconfirmed” tandem reservations? Those with that just show up with their rainchecks or certificates but don’t actually have a deposit down. Why can’t I give these customers a decent view of when the best time for them to come in would be while they’re on my website? • Why can't my tandem masters sign online to view all scheduled reservations? • Why can’t tandem masters automatically get emails if it looks like capacity demands are short on instructors? • Why can’t I easily allow fun jumpers to pre-register for boogies online, building their account information and paying their registration fees ahead of time, so that the office doesn’t get swamped on Saturday mornings and I don’t need to keep staffing additional people for these situations? • Why can’t I maintain a very powerful interconnected web/windows enterprise system but still be able to operate if I loose my internet connection for a day? • Why can’t I have locally installed software whose version and security updates are managed by the software developers? • Why can’t tandem students register themselves at a kioske, using their credit card as a sign-in; where they can take care of everything except for cash payments and waiver signature verification themselves? Especially when I have groups of 30 people come in at 3:00 in the after noon, and all of my morning jumpers are already upset because it’s been raining all day long, they want rainchecks (which is way more of a process than it should be – since a simple “issue raincheck item credit” button is all it should take. • Why can’t my jumper / classroom capacity be automatically calculated based on: o What planes I will have available to fly o What pilots I will have available to fly planes o What planes each pilot will fly o How often does a plane need to refuel? o What is the time from wheels up to wheels up on a hot load with no fuel? o How many tandem masters will I have available o How long does each tandem master need between loads (personal preference) o How fast can my packers make sure gear will be available? o When does the sun set tonight? • Why can’t I keep better track of what a Dollar is? Where did the money come from, was it from a paid source (cash, credit card), was it complementary, was it work compensation? How can I make sure to allow refunds to fun jumpers who leave extra money on their accounts without accidentally handing out money that didn’t physically come in? I need it easy and reliable enough that I don’t just decide to not allow refunds based on not being able to keep track of my money well enough. • Why can’t I manage my jump packages separate from account balances, so that I know how much money would be eligible for refund before charging penalties? • Why can’t all work compensation pay go directly onto their jump accounts, but employees then log online to configure what percentage, or exact amount of their pay will be deducted from their jump account and entered into the payroll process? • Why I can’t I also configure “exchange rates” between payroll compensation and account credit compensation, so that $15/hr credit can be converted into $8/hr payroll, and my employees can configure for themselves how they will be compensated, and, and change it on a weekly basis without causing any administrative headaches or extra work for me? • Why can’t fun jumpers manifest themselves, and designated organizers manifest groups of people; for as long as they have a balance on their account? Why can’t they do this using their own wireless laptops in the hangar or packing area, to lower my own hardware costs? • Why do I have so many Merchant accounts to handle credit card transactions?! Can’t I just have one! How can I manage to reduce the amount I’m paying to the bank, they’re rich enough already, I’ve seen their lobby! • Why can’t I edit my website content easily without calling in my tech junkie, and without accidentally breaking anything important and racking up support fees? • Why can’t I edit my website content so that changes will take place in the future, so that I can spend my free time on Thursday preparing Monday’s look and feel? • Why can’t all tandem customers who have provided an email address be automatically emailed a customer survey so that I can increase the number of testimonials I can put on my website, increase sale rates of any second jump specials, and increase company branding. • In fact, there are a ton of ways that automatic emails and responses could both help me from the advertisement angle and also customer appreciation. Why can’t I do things like automatically email fun-jumpers the activity that happened on their account over the weekend? • Why can’t all customers be emails automatically with Birthday special! advertisement 2 weeks before their birthday? • Why can’t fun jumpers who have not showed up for over 2 months be given custom specials like “1 Free jump on Saturday the 16th”, to help encourage them to come back and enjoy the fun. • Why can’t all of these email specials happen automatically, but reports be emailed to me to see how my marketing ideas are working? There is honestly no good reason why the answer to all of these questions cannot be changed, and done in such a way that it is affordable. RealDropzone provides so many time saving and intelligence collecting features, and some features that just would not be possible to do without the help of software. Business practices are changing. Software should not help a buisness do their everyday tasks faster, software should redefine the everyday tasks that a business does. Matt Christenson [email protected] http://www.RealDropzone.com - A new breed of dropzone manifest software.
  16. To all dropzone owners and managers, I am currently in the process of developing an extremely extensive dropzone software package, RealDropzone™, which will address all of the shortcomings with existing dropzone management solutions. In addition to providing all of the functionality that is to be expected with a dropzone software product, RealDropzone will change the way dropzone’s do business. Why? The RealDropzone system represents three tightly integrated software solutions: • A locally hosted client/server application for staff use. This component features an extremely easy to use user interface designed to allow office staff to have complete control over the business. It does not come with the downfalls associated with web based applications, and is modeled around software packages that most computer users are already familiar with, like the Microsoft Office products. The windows based user interface has been designed to both reduce the time necessary to do common tasks, but also to be intuitive and self describing to make uncommon tasks easy to accomplish by someone who has not done them before. • A locally hosted web based application for local kiosk or wireless notebook based self check-in, account funding, and manifesting. “Organizer” permission can be granted to customers trusted to manifest groups of others; however will be restricted from actually financial information. Jumpers could use a dropzone provided kiosk, or bring their own wireless based computers for self manifesting. This component can also feed wired TV displays, or wireless handheld computers with real-time manifest information, useful to loaders, pilots, and jumpers alike. • A remotely hosted web site / application that features the most advanced tandem pre-registration module ever created; focused around groups and solving all of problems related to accepting group payments and setting confirmed group rates. The registration module also makes it very easy for fun-jumpers or anyone else to organize tandem groups and reward them automatically for their efforts. Fun jumpers can view account history and make credit card payments online. Customers can also pre-register for scheduled events such as boogies, training classes, or special jumps. Advanced replication between the remote database and local database has been developed so that if a dropzone looses its internet connection, both the dropzone and their public website will continue to operate; only a small amount of web functionality will be lost. Great effort has been placed into the product that allows for an extremely flexible and intelligent pricing system. Pricing so advanced that the computer can accurately determine group rates, targeted marketing specials, second jump prices, special event rates, online order discounts, pre-registration discounts, etc without operator intervention for almost all advanced scenarios. The system seamlessly handles advanced gift certificates and rain checks that maintain their price for a given period of time, but then eventually expire into a dollar amount, and potentially after that expire completely. … I could talk forever about the features, but I will cut it short here, a full feature list will be available with sales documentation by spring/summer 2007 when the product goes public... This software is currently being developed for implementation at Skydive Chicago this fall. After a successful implementation, I will be looking for a small group of dropzones interested in implementing this product before it becomes public. The purpose for this small initial group is to allow me to offer great support while building self-help documentation and fixing user interfaces where any confusion may exist. I will also spend this time to make the installation and implementation as efficient as possible, so that when the product goes public, product support will be exceptional. I have set up some restrictions for being involved in this initial pilot group: • Dropzone must manifest over 8,000 jumps per year • Dropzone must have a very technically competent IT person regularly available. This person must be familiar with small business networking, Microsoft Windows Server, and understand concepts in internet communications. • Dropzone must have staff available November-February, and running at least light operations. • Dropzone must have been operating for a minimum of 3 years I am looking for volunteers to participate in this pilot to come from a variety of existing operations. Dropzones using existing software products, or operating on paper systems are all welcome to apply. Anyone that is interested please send an email to mattchristenson at realskydiving dot com. All initial participants will receive special license pricing options. Thanks! Matt Christenson Matt Christenson [email protected] http://www.RealDropzone.com - A new breed of dropzone manifest software.
  17. Ground yourself for three months to get your ears straightened out. See if the steriods your doctor gives you helps out any - get over the allergy season that may be causing extra fluids... find something else to do: Skydiving isn't the only thing you can spend your weekends doing. It's not worth how your hearing might effect your skydive (pain could cause you to not act correctly). It's also not worth how your skydiving could effect your hearing (damage the tube further, cheating it of any chance it had to get better). Seriously, find something else to do for a few months, and get back into the sport when you're healthy. If you give your ears 3 months and things arn't any better, then you might think about giving it a try anyhow.. but give yourself that three months. You're not an instructor - so you don't depend on jumping to keep your bills paid, you're doing it for fun... keep it fun. Matt Christenson [email protected] http://www.RealDropzone.com - A new breed of dropzone manifest software.
  18. I don't know why everyone on this forum is jumping so quickly to assume that there is no way this could work... If it can be done with one person one time over the english channel with no baggage, why can't it be improved? problems with exit? What is stopping the government from designing a plane or modifying an existing plan to make exiting these easier by ejecting them horizontally? Problems with taking up too much weight? What is stopping them from creating airodynamic baggage, or making the wing a few feet wider? Problems controlling the wing? What is stopping them from using solid-state gyroscopes to computer control the flaps on the wings, to force an unstable pilot stable and to force the wing at an angle that generates the best lift? I recall seeing a popular science or popular mechanics magazine around a year ago that had a special on unmanned spyplanes... most of them are not very wide at all, and carry a lot of weight in equipment, equipment with camera and other sensor equpiment that needs to be on a circular mount on the bottom of the craft to support 180 degree movement. If we can launch missles that can fly and navigate by themselves why couldn't we become part of that missle? Sure, all of this initially means very little for the skydiving community, because the costs involved are just too high; but there should be no reason why a $150,000 - $2,000,000 wearable ring would not work to deploy soilders behind enemy lines. Pass or fail, it is "crazy" and "impractical" ideas like this that have put all of us in the sky... Where do you think skydiving would be today if it wasn't for government money? Would there have been enough demand for a plane like the twin otter if government money wasn't funding scientific experiments in the arctic circle, and require a rugged smaller plane to get equipment in and out of tight spots, but still make it further on a tank of gas than a helicopter? Would there be enough suplus equipment and expeirenced jumpers coming out of the service to make the sport a sport, instead of a daredevil stunt? What do you think test pilots said the first time they heard the goverment was goign to use parachutes to deploy vehicles and people into war? Matt Christenson [email protected] http://www.RealDropzone.com - A new breed of dropzone manifest software.
  19. I'm very happy with the Liquid lens from cookie composites. Matt Christenson [email protected] http://www.RealDropzone.com - A new breed of dropzone manifest software.
  20. I second the notion to check out Brian Germain's new book "Trancending Fear". Also, his parachuting class has a 6-8 hours section that deals only with the psycological side of things. Very worthwhile. Matt Christenson [email protected] http://www.RealDropzone.com - A new breed of dropzone manifest software.
  21. I wanted to separate this post from the recent suicide thread, but would like to make a few points. I really hope that we don't see a bunch of people in the sport panic and spend all kinds of rescources and make all kinds of rules that help "Prevent" suicides. Suicides are like Terrorist attacks. THEY ARE GOING TO HAPPEN, and the best thing we can do is keep our eyes open, act smart, and as a society try to provide social services that help poorly educated and mentally il people. Suicides do little harm to our sport. To be able to say "x percent of skydiving fatalities were suicides" just takes those out of the "risk" statistics. Sure... if somebody forgets to leave those facts in their report, it could be misleading.... but anybody that wants to prove that skydiving is a high risk and dangerous sport is going to have no problems doing so with or WITHOUT suicides being part of the statistics. No safety device in the world will stop a man/woman from taking their own life. All that can help is support or help from friends or family. AND MOST OF THE TIME NOT EVEN THAT WILL MAKE A DIFFERENCE. Drugs only help so much, also, and for some people make the situation worse. I morn for everyone that's had to make the decision of taking their own life, it is a tragety. But it has NOTHING TO DO WITH THE SPORT OF SKYDIVING. Our planes are just another gun, bridge, building, rope, or bottle of perscription medicines... Our equipment does nothing for these people, it is not our equpiments responsibility to do so. Matt Christenson [email protected] http://www.RealDropzone.com - A new breed of dropzone manifest software.
  22. I'd like to start a thread about the PC1000 that is NOT compairing it to other cameras but instead discussing how to get the best footage. What are everyone's comments about how to configure the camera before a jump? Manual modes? Automatic modes? Lenses? Widescreen or standard? Cinematic mode? Thanks for everyones opinions and advice! Matt Christenson [email protected] http://www.RealDropzone.com - A new breed of dropzone manifest software.
  23. I incorrectly used the term frame - what I mean is each time the recorder starts/stops recording. I know that certain software products can save each portion as its own AVI, and then a DVD could be burnt from that - but that creates two different processes that have to take place... I would like some way to start the capture and have it automatically go right into creating a DVD with chapters at each clip. Basically, I if i start/stop the camera once per jump; then i could burn a DVD that had one jump per chapter from my raw footage with mimimal configuration... Without having to go back to the computer after i've captured the video and start the DVD burning process. I'm going to put together a workstation that I will be donating to the hanger for people to use to easily replace the function of a VCR with a device that can make and copy DVDs... but before i decide for sure that i'll donate it I want to make sure that I have things set up as easy as possible to be used by people who may not be familiar with particular software products. Matt Christenson [email protected] http://www.RealDropzone.com - A new breed of dropzone manifest software.
  24. I'm looking for software that can create a DVD from a 1394a firewire port in a hands-off process that automatically creates each frame as its own chapter on the DVD. It is not important that it's 'real-time' per say, just that after I start the process it is a hands off task... So far, I have had a hard time finding software that will do this, every one i've found the chapters have to be manually configured, or it puts all frames into the same looong chapter, or you can configure a new chapter every X number of minutes... Any ideas? Matt Christenson [email protected] http://www.RealDropzone.com - A new breed of dropzone manifest software.
  25. It would not be hard to make something yourself by wiring an existing toung or bite switch to the Rf module that he's got; or possibly directly to the camera based on the interfaces it provides. How much does the RF module cost and how easy it is to take apart to see the contacts? If you're not good with electronics and want a quick walkthrough on how switches / contacts work and how to use an ohm meter to confirm what to connect to each other, send me a PM and i'll go into more detail. Matt Christenson [email protected] http://www.RealDropzone.com - A new breed of dropzone manifest software.