Will AT&T burn you with the new iPhone? June 19, 2008
Posted by Bryan in : Apple, New Products, PDAs/Smartphones , 2 commentsAre you one of the loyal AT&T customers who will have to pay full price to upgrade to the new version of the iPhone?
The jaw-droppingly low, AT&T subsidized rate for the newest iteration of the iPhone was one of the biggest announcements of Job’s keynote speech at Apple’s WWDC. But don’t get caught up in the hype. $199 is a great price for an 8 gig iPhone, but a whole lot of people won’t be able to get it. Ironically, this group is the one you would expect AT&T would least like to ostracize - their loyal customers.
In a discussion with an AT&T representative yesterday we confirmed that the $199 (8gb) and $299 (16gb) prices are only for new customers or customers eligible to upgrade based on their time in contract. A large group of people who recently upgraded are going to be out of luck.
The first version of the iPhone was clearly a product for early adopters who were willing to pay a premium for the new, cool gadget. In terms of market targeting, this version *should* be the version for the mass adopters - and the price suggests they are ready to target that group. But the usefulness of such a price drop is lost when a majority of potential purchasers will have to pay full price. By making this offer unavailable to the current AT&T masses AT&T has effectively reduced it’s target base to the three people in the US who don’t already have a cell phone and the small percentage of people who are available to upgrade at release.
A review of the ShoppingAds and AuctionAds services December 28, 2007
Posted by Bryan in : Coding, New Products, Reviews , 1 comment so farI’ve been testing the AuctionAds and ShoppingAds services for several months now. Despite some promising results early on (as mentioned in this post), I am very disappointed with the overall results. Over the past six months, I tested a variety of AuctionAds and ShoppingAds ad blocks from in numerous positions on various sites. As a result of real world obligations I haven’t devoted much time to site development lately and the ad blocks remained in place longer than their performance warranted. Bad for my bank account, but good for testing purposes. The final result? In over six months of testing I made less from these services’ combined totals than I typically make from AdSense in one day.
Both AuctionAds and ShoppingAds allow for product images in their ads and this is one of the reasons I expected them to be successful. However, Google’s targeted ads clearly outperform AuctionAds’ and ShoppingAds’ keyword based ads despite AdSense’s lack of product images.
Unfortunately, I can’t rule out issues with the AA/SA backend as the cause for the low earnings. For example, I received several clicks on the referral based service (AuctionAds) but none on the CPC service (ShoppingAds), a fact that is inconsistent with all other ad blocks during the same period and suggests a problem with unrecorded clicks. Additionally, earnings appeared and disappeared rather frequently on reports from both systems. Bugs are to be expected in new products, but frankly, if I have to devote a significant amount of time to double checking earnings reports, it’s just not worth it for me.
My current recommendation regarding these services is to fight the urge to be an early adopter. Wait until these services become more mainstream and work out the bugs. Currently they require more effort than they are worth given the viability of other alternatives.
Bridge the gaps in Outlook October 19, 2007
Posted by Tara in : New Products, Reviews , add a comment
Timebridge has released a web-based, public scheduling manager into beta that may cut down on the amount of “back and forth” it takes to schedule a meeting through Outlook. If you have ever scheduled a meeting through Outlook, you know that it may take several emails and cancellations to get a time that works for all attending parties. With Timbridge, you are allowed to pick up to 5 possible meeting times that attendees can pick from. And you’re not restricted to Outlook, as Timebridge also interfaces with Google calendars. (more…)
Desktoptwo: It could be the next big thing July 30, 2007
Posted by Bryan in : New Products, Reviews , add a commentOnline desktops have the potential to change the way we use computers as much as or more than any other technology that has recently emerged. What, you’ve never used one? I’m not surprised. The basic idea behind them is very sound, but so far their real world implementations haven’t been.
Online desktops provide internet-based services that allow you to do all the things you could do while you are at home sitting in front of your desktop, from any computer connected the the ‘net. Specifics vary from product to product, but generally there’s some sort of online storage, a few applications, and an interface that emulates an operating system.
Sounds like a great idea, but (more…)
See it all at once with the Pertelian X2040 July 23, 2007
Posted by Tara in : New Products , add a comment
The Pertelian X2040 PC Assistant is a device that condenses the various tasks running on your computer and puts them into a central location right in front of your eyes. The device itself is a small LED screen that connects to your PC via USB port. The screen scrolls at a speed you choose, and updates the information that you program into it.
I am a Pleo stalker July 16, 2007
Posted by Tara in : New Products , add a comment
In talking with a friend of mine the other day I discovered a great toy that apparently has a growing sub- culture all its own. In her own words she is “stalking the toy”, so I had to dive in and see what its all about. The toy is called PLEO and it is “autonomous robotic life form” based on a one week old Camarasaurus dinosaur (a lizzard from the late Jurassic period)Â
Watch it now on Netflix July 7, 2007
Posted by Bryan in : New Products, News , add a commentNetflix has launched a new feature that allows members to watch full-length videos online.
After logging into your account click on the “Watch Now” tab. Pick a video, click “Play”, and you’ll be prompted to download a player.
Not all of their catalog is available. Right now the selection consists of mostly older movies and TV series, but this is still good news for people who like to watch videos online or who feed video to their TV via their computer. The number of hours you can watch is determined by your Netflix plan.
Bad news for a good portion of the internet though, the service currently requires Windows and Internet Explorer (i.e. no old school Apple or Firefox).
Ning Social Networking: Wordpress meets MySpace June 15, 2007
Posted by Bryan in : New Products, Reviews , 1 comment so far
In a recent post in the forums reader olhaok mentioned the Ning social networking site. My first thought was, “That thing’s still around?” When I first came across Ning several months ago it was very rough around the edges. The concept was interesting but the implementation was very poor. I expected it would soon get lost in the flood of new social networking sites that were emerging at the time.
The idea behind the service was good enough: to offer a full-featured, free, online content management system and social networking service (think Wordpress meets MySpace or MyBlogLog), but it just didn’t seem like it could recover from some serious design flaws. (more…)
5 gifts for Dad under $60 June 13, 2007
Posted by Tara in : New Products, Other Stuff, Reviews, Tips , add a commentWith Father’s Day rapidly approaching, I decided to to put together a mini gift guide for those of us who want to show our appreciation for dad without breaking the bank. Each one of these gifts is under $60 and is user friendly, as we know sometimes parents just don’t understand. The first gift is one I know for sure my own dad would like:
1. The Humminbird SmartCast RF30 Wireless Remote Fish Finder
Retails for $59.99, designed as a wrist mount, this little gadget has a 75-foot remote operating range and 100-foot depth capability. It has a 1.25-inch high-visibility display with 48 x 32 pixels of resolution. It is obviously waterproof and has one touch menu navigation for ease of use. (more…)
AuctionAds filling up fast June 10, 2007
Posted by Bryan in : New Products, News, Site News , 1 comment so farIf you run a website and you haven’t yet tried AuctionAds, it’s time to get off your ass. A recent post on the AuctionAds blog noted that they had met and surpassed their initial year end goals for new registrations in their first three months. For those interested in getting referral credits, the number of people who haven’t yet signed up is decreasing quickly everyday.
The AuctionAds service grabs eBay listings and posts them as ads on your site. When people click through and purchase a product, you make a percentage of the sale. Additionally, if people register for the AuctionAds service via your site, then you get a little extra percentage for referring them (at no cost to them).
As you may have noticed, we’ve been running AuctionAds on our site for about a month and a half. Since this site makes most of its money from the ad revenue it generates (will the new store change that?), I was initially concerned about them detracting from our big breadwinner - Adsense. I started them out at the bottom of the page to see what would happen.
One of the great things about AuctionAds is that the ads show product images. People like to get a sense of what they’re clicking before they commit to it. I’m not sure why Google hasn’t yet developed anything with this approach, but even at the bottom of the page, AuctionAds click-through rates were beating Adsense click-through rates considerably.
The first few weeks were slow, but now the service is really starting to take off. The AuctionAds perform so well that I am comfortable leaving them at the bottom of the page AND replacing the Adsense ads with some different, more risky, CPA links. Essentially AuctionAds have freed up an Adsense block (since you can only have three per page) and given us the ability to try out some new income generating options.
If you have a blog or other website and haven’t yet tried AuctionAds, I definitely recommend it. The service is structured such that the more people that register, the more money people make. However, if you’re interested in getting that referral bonus, it’s best to get in as early as possible before everyone else has already signed up. To register (and give us some credit) click here.
