I came across Passwork today and was really impressed with the presentation as well as focus of the product. This is the kind of product that I would instinctively sign up for and test drive… but for an unrelated reason I started poking around on their site to find out more about the company.

It became clear that the company is Russian and this fact alone represents a major impediment for any company in the security software space. In all fairness I am making this assumption off factors like domains and language… the company itself provided no contact information on their website, which is itself kind of weird.

There is obviously a lot of good tech that comes out of Russia but there is an intractable problem when going global and that is the ambiguity about the extent to which Russian government activities encroach on the activities of commercial companies. The same can be said of China and in the interest of being fully objective about this topic, the same can be said of the U.S.A. as more attention and disclosure was put on NSA, FBI, and other government agencies. Selling globally I know this is the case, companies not based in the U.S. have significant objections about domiciling data in U.S. datacenters.

The problem for companies in Russia (and China) is that of the perception of egregious bad actors, including overt criminal activity. It’s one thing to have the government accessing your data, it’s another altogether to believe you would be exposed to criminal industrial espionage. I simply would not try to build a security software company in Russia if I have an aspiration of selling to a global enterprise market. Kaspersky Lab is a notable exception here when it comes to endpoint security but it’s clear that the company is aware of this and also the rising tensions between the U.S. and Russian governments.

Passwork is also, apparently, aware of the obstacles and goes to lengths on their website to highlight open algorithms, data security and privacy. In addition to addressing these issues up front, they also offer a version of the software that is on-premise. I’m not sure any of these measures really overcome the perception of risk, which in many ways is a binary condition.

As much as I liked the marketing for Passwork, I didn’t sign up.

Flipboard launched a private magazine capability this week.

With today’s release, there’s an exciting new way for people with shared interests to unite on Flipboard: private group magazines. Now you can collect stories together, and comment on them, in a closed setting.

At Ping I used a Flipboard magazine to collect industry news along with competitive information. The intended audience for this magazine was everyone in the company, with a focus on the sales teams, and I was successful with that goal with close to 100% of the staff getting the magazine on their mobile devices (everyone at Ping has an iOS or Android smartphone, it’s essential for 2 factor authentication).

View my Flipboard Magazine.

However, I have been limited in the commentary I could attach and I was reluctant to post competitors-sponsored content that was directed at the company. Why would I promote competitive content that was not educational in nature?

The Flipboard format is really compelling for internal corporate communications. Visual and mobile centric, it is also easy to manage with the tools that Flipboard provides. The lack of commenting is not an issue because the sharing tools allow for dropping of content into full blown collaboration systems.

Private magazines resolve the biggest limitation for enterprise usage, good move on their part. I can see many consumer applications for this but the ability to use Flipboard as a communication tool for businesses is the bigger opportunity for the company.

I gotta give Nike credit for this, it’s edgy and pushing a boundary of what athletic apparel for women should be.

Predictably, the outrage factory spun up and without a hint of irony this BI piece (well it is BI) has decided to represent all women in the headline. I have no doubt that Nike has access to women athletes, so I would put strong odds on the idea that not ALL women are outraged.

“The Sacai collection is undoubtedly a vanity project for Nike, but its premise — that female athletes prize style and appearance over functionality and performance — is completely tone-deaf,” writes Megan Wiegand for Slate.

Yeah, I’m sure all that LuLuLemon stuff is being bought on the basis of performance alone…

Let’s imagine a world where companies play it safe and design to the lowest common denominator of what every segment of a demographic wants; in that scenario are women consumers better served than one that caters to individual preferences? No. Fashion is personal and women – outraged or not – will simply vote with their dollars.

Starbucks found itself in hot water this week after encouraging baristas to write “racetogether” on coffee cups and discuss race relations with customers. And of course their is a #racetogether hashtag campaign. Sigh.

I give you Starbucks leadership team… you can’t blame them for being so white, there aren’t many sun