The Wizards have worked their magic and made the Tex Factor game available on Facebook. This time it is even more addictive as there is a high score board and a chance to win up to 9 free Texpert credits. If you already have a Facebook account give it a go.

There is also a Texperts page, Texperts group and even a secret group only available to those that pass the original Tex Factor. Get involved!

The questions coming in to Texperts can be, and are, on any subject under the sun, but I spend a reasonable portion of each shift answering directory enquiry type questions. Whilst researching the answer for one of these questions I came across the 192.com ‘I don’t use phonebooks anymore’ campaign

192.com asked the UK public its opinion on the 75,000 million tonnes of phonebook waste generated every year.

The results of the UK phonebooks survey included:

4 out of 5 survey respondents backed a petition to make phonebook delivery in the UK optional.

My initial thought was that it was a PR campaign to make people switch to online directory services, which it probably is. But then I realised not only can’t I remember when I last used a phone book, I have no idea where they even are! The Good Human blog has many people in a similar situation.

A lot of customers use Texperts for “enhanced” directory enquiries, requesting a map, directions or opening hours along with the phone number and address. At home I use the internet to find that information for myself, and when out and about the Texperts. Phone books simply don’t give enough information, but while companies keep advertising in them rather than investing the money in their websites do we have any choice?

Breaking news! Texperts CEO and one-woman army Sarah McVittie has stormed into another award short-listing, this time in the “Rising Star of the Year” category of the inaugural MediaGuardian Innovation Awards.

The panel invited nominations from MediaGuardian readers, and from the many hundreds of entries Sarah has emerged as one of the three finalists. The awards ceremony will be held at IndigO2 on March 6.

Texperts has a distinguished history of grabbing prestigious awards in a variety of categories, from innovation, to management, to HR, to cutting-edge technology. Sarah is delighted with the MediaGuardian Innovation nomination, saying “it’s a real honour to be shortlisted for the MediaGuardian award, especially in the inaugural round. At Texperts we take great pride in our track record, and I’m proud to lead this exceptional team of innovators.”

According to Mac users, Mac users have always had more fun. But now they have “empirical” evidence to back it up. So, are they enlightened operators and creators or smug, brainwashed androids?

The technology news site Tom’s Hardware recently reported that according to Mindset Media, “open minded liberal thinkers” are more likely to purchase a Mac:

Open minded people are more likely to purchase a Mac, according to a new survey released by Mindset Media. The company interviewed 7500 people and found that liberal thinkers were 60 percent more likely to buy a Mac. These same people were also less modest and more sure of their own superiority than the rest of the population.

Other stories constructed from Mindset’s press release state that “these purchasers are also more liberal, less modest, and more assured of their own superiority than the population at large.” This information raises a whole lotta questions, and it led me to wonder (if that’s a mental process that cuboid PC users such as myself are capable of) if this survey didn’t say more about Mindset than it did about Mac?

The presentation of the data available on most news sites is woolly at best. The survey was conducted using Nielsen’s Online panel with 7,500 survey respondents, but as Tom’s Hardware point out, very little has been said about the actual methodology. How were these more-liberal/more-smug respondents selected? Self-selected, or company selected? And how were they distinguished from the rest of the population? What were the purchase options? Such technicalities are of course less interesting than manufactured either/or scenarios, especially during Macworld 2008.

It’s a well-conceived release on the part of Mindset, coinciding with Macworld, with millions of Mac fans combing the web for the latest offerings wanting to have their purchasing habits re-enforced. Mindset even alerted me to a buzzword - psychographic - to distinguish psychological profile from the reams of other factors that comprise consumer populations. Here’s what they offer:

So what kind of people identify with your brand? Assertive? Creative? Spontaneous? [...] You may see any of the dozens of MindsetProfiles we’ve already created, or you can work with us and Nielsen Online to create a custom MindsetProfile for your unique target.

What person would not identify with those adjectives at one time or other? And what company, I wonder, would identify their target group as dull? Obsessive? Thick? Impulsive? Or flustered? Categories that we all fall into at one time or another, but which some marketers are loathe to broach. Market profiling is apparently a necessity these days, but I have to wonder whose interests, apart from marketing agencies, it serves to perpetuate this kind of self-congratulatory pseudo-science?

Presumably, Mindset can match a predetermined target group with the product in question and create a series of protocols & strategies for marketing to that group. Yet Apple surely doesn’t need it, having a marketing department who wrote the rules on technological branding. Still, Mindset have proven that they can tell people what they want to hear. It’s no secret Mac users associate deeply with the aesthetic and technical attributes of their chosen computing platform, and releasing a survey confirming that link is surely like shooting fish in a barrel. What about other brands though? For instance, what kind of psychographic buys piles medication?

But I digress. I still haven’t answered the original false dilemma posed in this blog, namely, are Mac users confident creative types or brainwashed prats? The answer is of course both/and rather than either/or. No, just kidding. We’ve got 4 dedicated Mac users in Texperts Towers, and I’ve conducted my own rigorously empirical survey to see what makes ‘em tick.

Fred Cheung, one of Texperts’ fabulous wizards, is actually a developer for Mac and I can confirm that he’s a creative and effective individual who, though frequently quiet and slightly eccentric, will never turn down a chance to assert his own superiority. And he’s right. How irritating.

Darrern Brierton is a talented graphic designer, web monkey, and former philosophy lecturer. He also fits the profile. Dammit.

Henry Addison is another whiz-bang techie who plays by no rules other than those created by him, Henry Addison. But he’s not particularly brand conscious, our Henry. He digs things wot work consistently and quickly. Creative? Does rowing count? Of course it does.

And finally, Texperts CTO Paul Butcher is also a technical ace, as you’d expect, as well as sagely and imaginative. But he’s also a former pc user. What gives?

I find his Mac conversion the most interesting one. As an experiment, he calculated the amount of time per day that he lost waiting for his mighty PC laptop to fully start up and shut down. It came out to a whopping half hour. He purchased a smokin’ Macbook shortly thereafter, and has not looked back. Rather than any brand identity, then, Paul opted solely for functionality. But given some of the limitations that beset the first release of the iPhone, why was Paul first in line when they were unveiled in the UK? I was going to launch into a clever, ‘ah, see, they got you to buy into their image after all’ jibe, finally trouncing Texperts Towers’ arch-pragmatist with a ’style-over-substance’ riposte to dismantle his consumer aesceticism once and for all. But as I should know by now, the answer was a simple, eminently sensible consideration. After persistently cursing various Windows smartphones, Paul wanted a device that did most of the things it was supposed to very well, rather than something that did everything badly. Its styling and cool web interface were merely bonus features. Or so he claims…

So with all of its talk of ‘brand identification’ and aesthetic infatuation, functionality has something to do with the equation after all. That’ll be £1.2 m. You want psychographics with that?

The Texperts message continues to spread amongst mainstream newspapers with two articles published recently. The Sunday Times (December 30th 2007) has an article on how to find accurate information on the internet, and gives the option of enlisting the Texperts to find the answer:

If you’re in a hurry, or simply can’t find what you are looking for, you can always ask an expert. Texperts (www.texperts.com, or 66000 from your mobile phone) is a service that delivers answers to mobile phone; a response to the old chestnut “Why is the sky blue?” was concise, prompt (given within three minutes) and, most important, correct. Answers cost £1, but if you are unhappy with them you can follow up free of charge, and if the Texperts can’t answer your question you don’t have to pay the next time.

The Daily Mirror (January 2nd 2008) features senior Texpert Claire H in an article on earning extra cash in the New Year. Claire talks about the advantages of working from home and the flexible hours, and I have to agree it is totally different from a 9-5 office job.