by Veit on January 3, 2010
As more and more electronics enter our lives, so do subscription services. Some come with mandatory subscriptions, such as the iPhone. Others require none or you can pay as you consume. Add to that the “incumbents”, such as subscriptions to Cable TV or landlines, and it adds up. Thus, I decided to reduce my subscription expenditures by 25% this year. Why 25%? It is an arbitrary number, but it is big enough so I need to think about my lifestyle and what adjustments I need to make in order to reach this goal.
I’m not sure where to start yet. Obviously, Cable TV is one big expenditure that will undergo a stringent review. So is the iPhone (my contract will be up this year) – do I really need to be connected everywhere or is it just convenient to be so? If I were to replace my iPhone, how could I reduce the subscription amount for a new mobile service? Maybe the combination of a Verizon MiFi and a prepaid mobile phone would be the trick, since it would allow me to connect multiple electronic devices under one subscription.
This also means that any new acquisitions will be evaluated how they help me to reach my goal. As stated before, I will most likely get the Apple tablet, if it comes without a subscription, but will definitely not get it if a subscription is required. There might be other gadgets that will have to go through a similar evaluation. This should also serve as a warning to gadget makers: The days when you can simply slap a subscription to a gadget are over. Not with me.
Oh, and my New Year’s Resolution for 2011? It’s already decided: Any subscription service must improve its value by 10% year-over-year (if they raise prices, the percentage of the raise will be added to the 10% value improvement) or it is on the chopping block. Yes, it can be this simple…
Nope, not that season. This is the other season – it’s summer in California, which means it is the season for Heirloom tomatoes!
These succulent tomatoes are called heirloom, because seeds are not hybrid and have typically been handed down within a family through generations. Thus, they are grown locally, are available only during a certain time of the year and their taste is much better than your usual greenhouse tomatoes that you can buy year-round in a supermarket. Heirloom tomatoes are a treat and if you’ve never had one, come on over and try some. We often eat them with just some mozzarella cheese, basil and a bit of extra-virgin olive oil sprinkled on top. Or as part of an heirloom tomato salad, with olives, onions and feta cheese, or even with some pesto.
So go to your local farmer’s market or visit your Whole Foods or other supermarkets and indulge as long as they are still in season!
by Veit on March 28, 2007
As Business 2.0 reports in a story called “How To Sell With Smell” in its April 2007 issue, Walmart will be rolling out “Smell-o-vision”, experimental DVDs with scent wavers that release odors at precisely timed moments during a movie. Can’t wait to smell a Western shoot-out or the nice smells of the Venice lagoon when I watch the next time.
The only problem is: I don’t buy DVDs, I rent them from Netflix. So how will they be sending me the wavers? In additional red envelopes? Do I have to send them back together with the movie, otherwise the movie doesn’t register as a returned movie? Or can I keep them until they are used up? Do I have to go to a Walmart store, since they probably have exclusives? And if I get them there, will these work with Netflix rentals or do I have rent my movies from Walmart as well?
Questions over questions — I cannot wait for answers!
by Veit on January 27, 2007
Not too often do you hear about new tech initiatives that might sound boring initially, but then become more intriguing and exiting the longer you think about them. Such was the case with the announcement of SanDisk’s USB TV initiative, which was pretty much drowned out in the noise of CES and MacWorld. The initial list of members include LG, Mitsubishi and Pioneer, among others.
How does it work? In short, rather than connect your TV to your PC through a network and a DMA (digitial media adapter, such as Netgear’s Digital Entertainer or even an Xbox360), do it the old-fashioned way: Copy the digital files to a memory card, stick the card into a cradle connected to your TV or even memory card slots built into the TV and fire up the content on the screen. Sounds easy? That’s exactly the point!
So why would you need a Sneakernet TV in the age of wireless home networks and DMAs/Xbox360’s that can stream content from your PC to your TV? I can think of many potential reasons, from portability (can take it to my Mom’s house where there is no wireless network and certainly no DMA), reliability (has your neighbor’s pre-N Wi-Fi router taken down your network again?), flexibility (no hassle for the occasional user), ease of use (”copying” files manually between machines typically works) to price (I hope USB TV compatible devices will be less expensive than a DMA). However, my biggest hope is for support of DRM (Digital Rights Management). Being able to take about any digital media file to my TV might be a huge selling point for USB TV compatible devices. Not only do I expect that I can play back unprotected media files, but I also hope for broad support of DRM implementations and speedy upgrades to enable support for new DRMs as they become available.
We will see over the next 12 months whether this initiative fizzles or rocks, but it certainly is one to watch (pun intended)!
