Spring is early this year in Seattle, and one of the cherry trees in my front yard is already in full bloom:
Archive for the ‘Every Day Life’ category
Cherry Blossoms
February 28th, 2010
Quote of the Week
February 20th, 2010From “Bones,” Season 1, Episode 18, “The Man with the Bone”:
“Greed is the real curse.”
Moving Pictures, the Netflix Way
January 20th, 2010
Saturday I mailed a dvd back to Netflix.
Since Monday was a federal holiday, I expected to Netflix to receive the returned DVD on Tuesday, then ship the next dvd in my queue to arrive on Wednesday.
But – no.
Netflix emailed me Monday morning they received the dvd I mailed them on Saturday.
Later that day my updated dvd queue noted the next dvd would ship on Tuesday and arrive on Wednesday.
Instead, it arrived TUESDAY.
Netflix gets a lot of things right – which is in line with its entertainment product offerings – but even better, sometimes its efficiency is magic, too. <G
Related content:
… would be a killer app – and in more ways than one; streaming more than one movie would easily eat up most people’s iPhone minutes package on AT&T without making *any* calls… Today, from TechCrunch, via Hacking Netflix: Rumor: Netflix Streaming Coming To The iPhone by MG Siegler on August 3, 2009 One big story …
Comcast Takes on Hulu in the Battle for TV to be Everywhere
Via CNN.com today: Comcast rolled out a Web-based on-demand television and movie service on Tuesday that gives customers access to more than 2,000 hours of television and movies. – more – The service, named Fancast XFINITY TV (formerly TV Everywhere), is getting mixed reviews on Twitter, and is in beta, with limited …
I’ve been broadcast/cable tv free for about a month now, with only mild withdrawal symptoms (having really re-run episodes of NCIS makes great white noise for me when I work from home; so now I have to improvise….). Even so – the combination of watching/running Netflix offerings in the background is …
When I still had cable tv, I loved my Tivo, even though I never upgraded my Tivo 2 box the Tivo HD. Why not? Pricing. I had a lifetime (of the Tivo 2 box) subscription, so upgrading would have been very expensive for me – first because of Tivo’s high pricing …
Here Today, Gone Tomorrow; or Redundancy, x 2
Last week a “minority” of T-Mobile Sidekick users learned the “Rule of Data Redundancy” the long, slow, hard way – and through no fault of their own. Sidekick users who stored their data locally (on the device) or backed up their data on a PC through a sync still have their …
How the Netflix Prize Was Won…
Not surprisingly <G>, Wired has an interesting follow up story on how the Netflix prize was won – and notes real progress was made in the contest’s goal to improve the Netflix movie recommendation algorithm by 10 percent only after the leaders joined forces with members of some of the also-ran teams. The …
According to Silicon Alley Insider, with data partly from Comscore, 38 million people watched Hulu at least once in July - a viewership which easily topped Time Warner Cable’s July viewership of 34 million. That same month, only DirecTV (47 million viewers) and Comcast (62 million) pulled larger audiences: While impressive, Hulu.com has a long way to go before reaching the cable companies’ …
Tags: queue, moving pictures, product offerings, netflix, efficiency, entertainment product, federal holiday, monday morningTime Warner Cable shows subscribers how to cut cord
January 7th, 2010As we are in the worst recession in 70 years, only three things are guaranteed: death, taxes, and a yearly 5% or more increase in cable subscription fees.
So – as a consumer, witnessing the on-g0ing scrimmishes between Broadcast TV providers and premium content (cable) providers is also entertainment.
Although this year’s skirmish between Fox and Time Warner was resolved at the 11th hour, Time Warner’s detailed instructions which show its customers how to watch Fox online, for free, with the suggestion viewers head to the likes of Hulu, Fancast, or any search engine–to find their favorite shows.
Time Warner Cable’s instructions on “How to Connect Your PC to Your TV” can be accessed by clicking on the image at the bottom of this post.
Still, no matter how this resolves, the danger for both sides is that consumers really do take up Time Warner Cable on its offer and start watching Fox stuff on the Web, since Fox definitely wants people keep paying for cable TV since Fox really covets subscription fees from cable TV providers.
To paraphrase Douglas Adams: Corporations, who are almost unique in having the ability to learn from the experience of others, are also remarkable for their apparent disinclination to do so.
Related content:
… would be a killer app – and in more ways than one; streaming more than one movie would easily eat up most people’s iPhone minutes package on AT&T without making *any* calls… Today, from TechCrunch, via Hacking Netflix: Rumor: Netflix Streaming Coming To The iPhone by MG Siegler on August 3, 2009 One big story …
Comcast Takes on Hulu in the Battle for TV to be Everywhere
Via CNN.com today: Comcast rolled out a Web-based on-demand television and movie service on Tuesday that gives customers access to more than 2,000 hours of television and movies. – more – The service, named Fancast XFINITY TV (formerly TV Everywhere), is getting mixed reviews on Twitter, and is in beta, with limited …
I’ve been broadcast/cable tv free for about a month now, with only mild withdrawal symptoms (having really re-run episodes of NCIS makes great white noise for me when I work from home; so now I have to improvise….). Even so – the combination of watching/running Netflix offerings in the background is …
When I still had cable tv, I loved my Tivo, even though I never upgraded my Tivo 2 box the Tivo HD. Why not? Pricing. I had a lifetime (of the Tivo 2 box) subscription, so upgrading would have been very expensive for me – first because of Tivo’s high pricing …
I seem to be thinking mostly in images these days, when not thinking in terms of databases… Related content: Help Wanted: Zookeeper with a Good Attitude. Most job postings are dry. Really dry. And – they usually include “must haves” which require skills and/or experience with everything but being able to both plumb AND …
According to Silicon Alley Insider, with data partly from Comscore, 38 million people watched Hulu at least once in July - a viewership which easily topped Time Warner Cable’s July viewership of 34 million. That same month, only DirecTV (47 million viewers) and Comcast (62 million) pulled larger audiences: While impressive, Hulu.com has a long way to go before reaching the cable companies’ …
For Whom The Bell Tolls… or, Another Business Model for $0.00
From Techcrunch, last week: At first this announcement appeared to be a good candidate for “News of the Weird:” Microsoft Officially Retires Soapbox, The Poor Man’s YouTube by Leena Rao on July 21, 2009 Microsoft’s YouTube clone Soapbox is officially shutting its doors, according to reports today. Soapbox, which was launched in 2006 as a hub for downloading …
So – the featured speaker at the July 2009 Seattle Chamber of Commerce’s speaker at this month’s “Author Speaker Breakfast” is Chris Anderson, author of FREE: The Future of a Radical Price: FREE: The Future of a Radical Price by Chris Anderson the bestselling author of the The Long Tail In his revolutionary …
Free is Sometimes Free: The Future of a Radical Price
For those not able to make the Seattle Chamber of Commerce breakfast tomorrow, featuring Chris Anderson talking about his book Free: The Future of a Radical Price, his presentation at Wired’s “Disruptive Business Conference” is available online, for free: Related content: Free is Not Always Free. So – the featured speaker at …
Free: The Future of a Radical New Price is now…Free!
Late last month, Chris Anderson released a free downloadable unabridged podcast/audiobook version of his book, Free: The Future of a Radical New Price as zipped mp3 files, and via iTunes. It chapter is an individual podcast; all of which are narrated by Chris. [caption id=”attachment_1506″ align=”aligncenter” width=”162″ caption=”Free: The Future of a Radical …
Tags: cable tv providers, iphone, cable providers, techcrunch, time warner cable, googleA Salute to Colonel (Retired) Harry Shoup, USAF (1917-2009)- Norad’s 1st Santa Tracker
December 25th, 2009Sometimes the best things in life begin by accident.
From Norad’s Santa Command website:
Why we track Santa
For more than 50 years, NORAD and its predecessor, the Continental Air Defense Command (CONAD) have tracked Santa’s Christmas Eve flight.
The tradition began in 1955 after a Colorado Springs-based Sears Roebuck & Co. advertisement for children to call Santa misprinted the telephone number. Instead of reaching Santa, the phone number put kids through to the CONAD Commander-in-Chief’s operations “hotline.” The Director of Operations at the time, Colonel Harry Shoup, had his staff check the radar for indications of Santa making his way south from the North Pole. Children who called were given updates on his location, and a tradition was born.
In 1958, the governments of Canada and the United States created a bi-national air defense command for North America called the North American Aerospace Defense Command, also known as NORAD, which then took on the tradition of tracking Santa.
Since that time, NORAD men, women, family and friends have selflessly volunteered their time to personally respond to Christmas Eve phone calls and emails from children. In addition, we now track Santa using the internet. Last year, millions of people who wanted to know Santa’s whereabouts visited the NORAD Tracks Santa website.
Finally, media from all over the world rely on NORAD as a trusted source to provide Christmas Eve updates on Santa’s journey.
“I have the greatest admiration for Col. Shoup and found delight in his remarkable humor with taking the first-ever call regarding Santa’s whereabouts back in 1955. His kind and thoughtful gesture will forever be a legacy at NORAD, and with the millions of people around the world who follow the NORAD Tracks Santa program each year. Truly, forever in the minds of millions he will be fondly remembered as the “Santa Colonel” and his legend will live on forever.”
General Victor E. Renaurt, Jr., USAF
Commander, NORAD
Commander, USNORTHCOM
A Salute to Colonel (Retired) Harry Shoup, USAF (1917-2009)- Norad's 1st Santa Tracker
December 25th, 2009Sometimes the best things in life begin by accident.
From Norad’s Santa Command website:
Why we track Santa
For more than 50 years, NORAD and its predecessor, the Continental Air Defense Command (CONAD) have tracked Santa’s Christmas Eve flight.
The tradition began in 1955 after a Colorado Springs-based Sears Roebuck & Co. advertisement for children to call Santa misprinted the telephone number. Instead of reaching Santa, the phone number put kids through to the CONAD Commander-in-Chief’s operations “hotline.” The Director of Operations at the time, Colonel Harry Shoup, had his staff check the radar for indications of Santa making his way south from the North Pole. Children who called were given updates on his location, and a tradition was born.
In 1958, the governments of Canada and the United States created a bi-national air defense command for North America called the North American Aerospace Defense Command, also known as NORAD, which then took on the tradition of tracking Santa.
Since that time, NORAD men, women, family and friends have selflessly volunteered their time to personally respond to Christmas Eve phone calls and emails from children. In addition, we now track Santa using the internet. Last year, millions of people who wanted to know Santa’s whereabouts visited the NORAD Tracks Santa website.
Finally, media from all over the world rely on NORAD as a trusted source to provide Christmas Eve updates on Santa’s journey.
“I have the greatest admiration for Col. Shoup and found delight in his remarkable humor with taking the first-ever call regarding Santa’s whereabouts back in 1955. His kind and thoughtful gesture will forever be a legacy at NORAD, and with the millions of people around the world who follow the NORAD Tracks Santa program each year. Truly, forever in the minds of millions he will be fondly remembered as the “Santa Colonel” and his legend will live on forever.”
General Victor E. Renaurt, Jr., USAF
Commander, NORAD
Commander, USNORTHCOM
Tis the Season…
December 21st, 2009Some folks may be familiar with several charity websites, which offer netizens an opportunity to contribute to different causes by “clicking to give,” with the actual donation coming from the site owner (CharityUSA.com) donating its revenue from sponsors.
The “click to give” causes sites include The Animal Rescue Site; The Hunger Site; The Breast Cancer Site; The Child Health Site; The Literacy Site; and The Rain Forest Site.
Since donating via one of these sites really only requires a minute of or two of my time, I’ve worked hard to build a habit of visiting each once a day to ”click to give.”
By doing this, I’ve discovered netizens seem to favor feeding stray animals over feeding starving people; since more people click to donate food to animals via CharityUSA.com’s sites than click to donate food to starving people.
Wow. I believe in helping people and animals; I hope you do too. If so – be the change you wish to see in this world, and ”click to give” to one or more of these sites each day, and on a generous day, maybe buy something via one of your chose charity site’s stores, too.
Tags: stray animals, breast cancer, hunger site, animal rescue site, charity websiteslife, the universe, and other awesome douglas adams quotes
December 20th, 2009
Writer Douglas Adams (1952 – 2001) left behind some of my all time favorite quotes:
A common mistake people make when trying to design something completely foolproof is to underestimate the ingenuity of complete fools.
I love deadlines. I like the whooshing sound they make as they fly by.
I may not have gone where I intended to go, but I think I have ended up where I intended to be.
He attacked everything in life with a mix of extraordinary genius and naive incompetence, and it was often difficult to tell which was which.
There is a theory which states that if ever anybody discovers exactly what the Universe is for and why it is here, it will instantly disappear and be replaced by something even more bizarre and inexplicable. There is another theory which states that this has already happened.
I may not have gone where I intended to go, but I think I have ended up where I needed to be.
Anything that happens, happens. Anthing that, in happening, causes something else to happen, causes something else to happen. Anything that, in happening, causes itself to happen again, happens again. It doesn’t necessarily do it in chronological order, though.
Tags: ingenuity, chronological order, left behind, fools, universeIt’s not the fall that kills you; it’s the sudden stop at the end.
Comcast Takes on Hulu in the Battle for TV to be Everywhere
December 15th, 2009
Via CNN.com today:
Comcast rolled out a Web-based on-demand television and movie service on Tuesday that gives customers access to more than 2,000 hours of television and movies.
- more –
The service, named Fancast XFINITY TV (formerly TV Everywhere), is getting mixed reviews on Twitter, and is in beta, with limited availability.
Customer access of XFINITY content is tied to the tiered level of service they subscribe to; a customer must subscribe to HBO via Comcast to be able to watch HBO content on XFINITY.
At least for now, Hulu’s offering has is superior, in regards to both technical quality and also value; but I look forward to the continuing battle between broadcast tv and the web.
Related content:
… would be a killer app – and in more ways than one; streaming more than one movie would easily eat up most people’s iPhone minutes package on AT&T without making *any* calls… Today, from TechCrunch, via Hacking Netflix: Rumor: Netflix Streaming Coming To The iPhone by MG Siegler on August 3, 2009 One big story …
I’ve been broadcast/cable tv free for about a month now, with only mild withdrawal symptoms (having really re-run episodes of NCIS makes great white noise for me when I work from home; so now I have to improvise….). Even so – the combination of watching/running Netflix offerings in the background is …
When I still had cable tv, I loved my Tivo, even though I never upgraded my Tivo 2 box the Tivo HD. Why not? Pricing. I had a lifetime (of the Tivo 2 box) subscription, so upgrading would have been very expensive for me – first because of Tivo’s high pricing …
I seem to be thinking mostly in images these days, when not thinking in terms of databases… Related content: Help Wanted: Zookeeper with a Good Attitude. Most job postings are dry. Really dry. And – they usually include “must haves” which require skills and/or experience with everything but being able to both plumb AND …
Hulu-baloo.
According to Silicon Alley Insider, with data partly from Comscore, 38 million people watched Hulu at least once in July - a viewership which easily topped Time Warner Cable’s July viewership of 34 million. That same month, only DirecTV (47 million viewers) and Comcast (62 million) pulled larger audiences: While impressive, Hulu.com has a long way to go before reaching the cable companies’ …
Tags: comcast, broadcast tv, Web-based, technical quality, twitter, television, hbo, beta, cnnProud as a Peacock?
December 3rd, 2009
Comcast seems to be overflowing with joint ventures this past year; it invested approximately US $1.2 billion in WiMax , and this week announced it will become majority owner of NBC Universal.
Comcast is spending $13.75 billion in cash and assets for a 51% ownership of a joint venture that will own two broadcast networks, over a dozen cable networks, a major movie studio and several theme parks.
Empire building on that level requires a lot of revenue; I’m starting to understand why my Comcast internet bill risen so quickly.
It will be very interesting to see whether Comcast’s gamble pays off – and how it will impact broadcast media – including Hulu.com’s – efforts to bring the cable-TV subscription model to the Web and other platforms.
Will this be the start of new era – or of a consumer revolution? And what will Netflix add into this mix?
“Colors fade, temples crumble, empires fall, but wise words endure.”
– Edward Thorndike (1874 – 1949)
Related content:
Some Broadcasters Doth Protest Too Much.
Change is certain, progress isn’t as internet media business models morph by the second in the never ending search for profitability. Yesterday Erick Schonfeld posted an interesting article on TechCrunch, Leaked Email: Quincy Smith Of CBS Wants To Counter “Reckless Hulu Streams,” which included a Contentinople piece quoting members of a recent Advertising Week …
When I still had cable tv, I loved my Tivo, even though I never upgraded my Tivo 2 box the Tivo HD. Why not? Pricing. I had a lifetime (of the Tivo 2 box) subscription, so upgrading would have been very expensive for me – first because of Tivo’s high pricing …
According to Silicon Alley Insider, with data partly from Comscore, 38 million people watched Hulu at least once in July - a viewership which easily topped Time Warner Cable’s July viewership of 34 million. That same month, only DirecTV (47 million viewers) and Comcast (62 million) pulled larger audiences: While impressive, Hulu.com has a long way to go before reaching the cable companies’ …
Free is Sometimes Free: The Future of a Radical Price
For those not able to make the Seattle Chamber of Commerce breakfast tomorrow, featuring Chris Anderson talking about his book Free: The Future of a Radical Price, his presentation at Wired’s “Disruptive Business Conference” is available online, for free: Related content: Free is Not Always Free. So – the featured speaker at …
Free: The Future of a Radical New Price is now…Free!
Late last month, Chris Anderson released a free downloadable unabridged podcast/audiobook version of his book, Free: The Future of a Radical New Price as zipped mp3 files, and via iTunes. It chapter is an individual podcast; all of which are narrated by Chris. [caption id=”attachment_1506″ align=”aligncenter” width=”162″ caption=”Free: The Future of a Radical …
It’s Official: “BellKor’s Pragmatic Chaos” Team Wins Netflix Prize
Today Netflix Corp. awarded its long-awaited $1M Grand Prize to team “BellKor’s Pragmatic Chaos,” which consisted of Bob Bell, Martin Chabbert, Michael Jahrer, Yehuda Koren, Martin Piotte, Andreas Töscher and Chris Volinsky. The 3-year crowdsourcing contest motivated self-forming, unpaid volunteer teams to compete for one $1 million dollar prize by creating an …
The Roku Channel Store will roll out 10 new (and free, at least for now) channels to users within the next two weeks: Pandora, MotionBox, MediaFly, blip.tv, TWiT.tv, Facebook Photos, Revision3, framechannel, flickr & MobileTribe. More channels are promised “as they become available.” Tip for Roku: adding Hulu would be a lot more …
Tags: empire building, edward thorndike, internet media business, comcast internet, owner of nbc, silicon alley, comca, consumer revolution, time warner cable