I don’t know what best describes the photostream of Pete Zarria—urban decay, rural iconic, or something else. The Davenport, Iowa, native primarily shoots signs and buildings across the U.S. Midwest. They give a sense of […]
Discussing Chromebook’s Success
One of the problems with bad news reporting: Those of us who strive to be responsible and accurate are lumped in with the lumps of coal, and the black powder rubs off on us. Illustrative: The excellent exchange I had over at BetaNews to the version of my Dell Chromebook 13 story posted there.
Commenter Joe HTH bristled about bloggers overstating NPD data and making Chromebook’s success much larger than it really is. I agree that this occurred about 18 months ago. But he levels his accusations at my reporting , which I assert correctly stats and interprets newer data that the analyst firm released just a few days ago. What follows is his comment and my response, in red and blue rather than block-quoted. I put story titles to my links, which are presented differently in the commenting system.
Dell Chromebook 13 means Business
The strangest, and largely overlooked news, coming out of the tech sector this past week was Dell’s Microsoft betrayal. This isn’t the first time that the PC maker strayed. Linux joined the product stable long ago, and last year an educational Chromebook debuted. But this newer and larger model, which will be available September 17, raises question: WTF?
Dell’s core PC market is business—small, large, and everything between. Windows, and that smattering of Linux, is core, and longstanding loyalty to Microsoft’s application stack. But the Chromebook 13 announcement, as positioned by the OEM and Google, is all about the competing cloud app stack. Interestingly, selling prices rival Windows laptops, which is another head scratcher: $399 to $899, depending on configuration.
Flickr a Day 228: ‘Two Visitors’
Searching for photos to feature, I come across many stinkers. The worst offenders are those with greatest potential: Composition is excellent, but the image is blurry—perhaps being out of focus or because of camera shake. […]
I Don’t Trust Travelocity, Should You?
On June 29, 2015, I received email from Travelocity thanking me for creating an account. I did no such thing—or, wait, did I have an account already? Sure enough, I set up one in 2006, according to my archived emails. Why this notification now? I wrongly assumed the thank-you message was a mistake, or even a marketing ploy, to get me to sign into the account. But who remembers a password from 9 years ago? So I clicked the forgot password link and had a new one sent.
I wouldn’t understand until later that someone in Florida created a new account using my email address. But Travelocity never sent confirmation to verify that the email address was valid or belonged to the person who signed up for the service. As such, by resetting the password, I had access to someone else’s account, which, fortunately, contained no personal information (like credit card numbers). But I didn’t understand this circumstance until later, when, in a routine check of my online accounts. I discovered an itinerary for a hotel stay that had just passed.
Flickr a Day 227: ‘Curious Minds’
The photo service now owned by Yahoo shed some early adopters. David Tomic is among them. He joined Flickr in June 2005 but stopped posting the following year, despite clear enthusiasm as a “self-taught photographer”. […]
Flickr a Day 226: ‘White Flint Mall’
My daughter grew up going to the enclosed shopping center in Kensington, Md, where we lived for nearly a decade. There once was a kid’s play place on the third floor that was affordable and fun. Gone. We bought manga books, calendars, and tasty treats from the Borders. Gone. Molly trick-or-treated store to store on Halloween. No more, kiddies. My wife and I bought our wedding rings in a jewelry store that also is gone. The 850,000 square-foot upscale consumer cathedral closed earlier this year. Demolition is underway, and a court case brought by Lord & Taylor against the center’s management went before a jury earlier this week. Our memories, and those of others, are all that remain.
I chose self-titled “White Flint Mall”, which Mike Kalasnik shot on June 30, 2012, for its timeliness to current events. He used iPhone 4s, and for the first time in this series I slightly cropped a photo (to remove yellow road lines). Vitals: f/2.4, ISO 64, 1/2404 sec, 4.3mm. Mike, who joined Flickr in July 2007, runs the “Dead and Dying Retail” website, which offers startling look at urban decay.
The Paywall Problem
This week the long-dreaded Washington Post renewal email plunked into my inbox. So ends a glorious year of reading the digital newspaper on PC and tablet. My cheap thrill ride is over: “Your subscription will be renewed for a year on Aug. 26, 2015, at the rate of $149/year. As you’ve requested, payments for your subscription to the Post are automatically charged to your credit card”. I requested nothing. The Post imposed auto-renewal, which I cancelled the next day. My sub now ends on August 26.
Twelve months ago, the Post made an amazing email offer, good for just 24 hours: “Get a Full Year of Unlimited Digital Access FOR AS LOW AS JUST $19!” Wow, what a deal. We splurged and went digital on any device for another ten bucks. Washington Post is worth $29 a year—and it’s a good value for $149, too. But all the paywall news sites want that kind of cash or more from me. I’m willing to pay for good journalism, but my budget can’t accommodate them all.
Flickr a Day 225: ‘They Exist’
Sometimes the right self-title makes the photo—”They Exist”, which Boris SV shot on May 10, 2010. “Well, they did not welcome the UFO”, he says. “As you can see, I was among them but turning […]
When Google Goes Down On You
Two days after Google created Alphabet as the primary company, under which the search engine operation is now a subsidiary, Urban Dictionary has a little fun. Word of the Day is “alphabet“, and I will […]
Measuring Apple’s Laptop Sales Success
Through the U.S. consumer retail channel, Macs notebooks reached rather shocking milestone during first half 2015, according to data that NPD provided to me today. You can consider this a first, and from lower volume shipments. By operating system: OS X, 49.7 percent; Windows, 48.3 percent; Chrome OS, 1.9 percent. That compares to the same time period in 2014: OS X, 44.8 percent; Windows, 53.1 percent; Chrome OS, 2.1 percent. The data is for U.S. consumer laptops.
While data junkie journalists or analysts often focus on unit shipments, revenues, and subsequently profits, matter much more. Looked at another way, Mac laptop revenues rose by 10.9 percent during the first six months of 2015, year over year, while Windows PCs fell by 9 percent, and Chromebooks contracted by 9.5 percent.
Flickr a Day 224: ‘Piercing’
Our selection is so odd, or my ability to process the elements so lame, only the photographer’s explanation can make sense of it. “I went to the Institute for Contemporary Art today”, Nicholas “Nic” McPhee says of self-titled “Piercing”, captured on June 30, 2105. “As we passed through the Boston Financial District on our way there, we stumbled across ‘As if it were already there‘ by Janet Echeman. This is a big, glorious public art sculpture installation in the sky above a park—the Rose Kennedy Greenway”.
The suspended structure went up in May and goes down in October. So don’t delay getting to Bean Town if you want to see it. “This is actually a brightly colored—if the light catches it correctly—net/mesh of high strength fibers and LEDs that actually lights up in quite brilliant color at night”, Nic says. “I highly recommend the wonderful pictures on her website, which include some cool night shots”.