Posted by Jeremy Scott | 0 Comments

Americans Are More Wired Than Ever

I know, I know… duh! Yes, folks, here’s another finalist for Most Obvious Survey Results of the Year award.

Deloitte & Touche has released the findings of a new survey and–drumroll please–people like using cell phones, the internet, and other tech gadgets!! Look at the woman in that picture, she’s using the internet and a cell phone all at the same time!! And even the baby is wired!

Seriously, who is the genius that pitched his bosses on this survey (who then sat back in his cushy corner office for three months playing World of Warcraft)? I mean…. easiest. Job. Ever.

“Hey boss, I want to do a study on hybrid cars. You see… I think people are buying more of them today than they were ten years ago.”

“Were they even making hybrids ten years ago?”

“I doubt it. But the only way to know for sure is to perform this study.”

“Make it so. Here’s a million bucks for having the genius idea.”

Okay, okay. I’m going on and on a bit here. Sorry. I just can’t believe some of these surveys and studies get done–or that someone feels they need to be done.

Apparently, according to this Earth-shattering new report, 38% of Americans are watching TV shows online, 36% use their cell phones as entertainment devices, and 45% are creating their own online content such as a blog or a website. The degree to which Americans are “wired” has jumped 50% since the last incarnation of this survey eight months ago.

What?! They did the same survey eight months ago? Well now I’m absolutely convinced that some lucky guy has the very best job in the world. Just crank out useless surveys with obvious results year round. Whoever that dude is, he’s laughing all the way to the bank.

Did anyone really think that these results would show fewer people watching online TV, using cell phones, or creating websites? That’s what I thought.

Oh well. Thanks for letting me rant.

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Posted by Jeremy Scott | 3 Comments

Wal-Mart Pulls the Plug on its Movie Download Serv...

What’s that? You didn’t even know that Wal-Mart had its own movie download service? You never even got a chance to try it out?

Well, too late. It’s dead. Let’s all observe a moment of silence for the death of one of the revenue streams of the world’s largest retailer. (Sniff).

They claim that HP discontinued their software which had powered Wal-Mart’s service. That may be true, but I’m guessing that part of the reason for Wal-Mart’s move is due to the fact that they simply weren’t making enough money on the thing.

iTunes and Amazon have pretty well carved up the marketplace on digital movie downloads, splitting it between them. I’m not sure that tech-savvy audiences were really ever going to turn to a discount big-box merchant for their movie download needs. Look, I like buying things online and not having to leave my house or put on shoes to go buy someething as much as the next guy. But why would I download a movie from a store’s website, when I can probably drive to that store’s physical location and get the same film on DVD from the $5 bin up near the registers? But what do I know?

Wal-Mart’s digital music download service is still alive and kicking. Hooray for them. More money for Wal-Mart! That’s something we can all be happy about, right?

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Posted by Jeremy Scott | 4 Comments

Information Overload… Don’t Add to it

It’s fun sending email, isn’t it?

Especially those funny stories or videos where you carbon copy all the names in your contacts list.

Wait… no. That’s wrong. Those are not fun, those are annoying.

Apparently, Basex Inc.–a web analytics firm–agrees with me. They named “information overload” as the number one problem for the coming year of 2008. Seems that workers get disoriented and distracted every time they receive a new email–keeping them off balance and off-task. And people, I guess, just get endless amounts of joy from hitting the “Send” button, so we’re sending more and more email every day. From the article:

“It’s too much information. It’s too many interruptions. It’s too much lost time,” Basex chief analyst Jonathan Spira declared. “It’s always too much of a good thing.”

Hang on a second….I just got the most hilarious email forward that I have to go check out.

(2 hours later)

Still there? Good. Sorry about that. Now where was I?

Man, I guess these Basex folks are right… email can be a distraction. In fact, They estimate that this “information overload” cost employers about $650 Billion in 2006. Yikes! Their advice? Resist the urge to reply immediately to all incoming messages, and tone down the instant messages and use of the “reply to all” feature.

Or at least make sure the folks you’re emailing constantly don’t have a full-time job to be distracted from.

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Posted by Jeremy Scott | 2 Comments

Medical Myths Debunked–Even Doctors Believed...

The web is on fire wih the news that many pieces of medical advice that doctors have long prescribed have now been debunked by the British Medical Journal.

The only problem I have with this is that I’ve got one group of doctors (the Journal writers) telling me that another group of doctors is wrong.  Who am I to believe?  It’s like I’m caught in the middle of a tug-of-war.   Remember when eggs were bad for you?  Then they were good for you again?  Yeah….it’s like that.  Expect to come back here in six months and see a follow up story that reads “Debunked Medical Myths Now Rebunked.” 

Anyway, you know how mother always said that reading in dim lighting would ruin your eyesight?  Yeah, not so much.  Those warnings about cell phone use in hospitals being so dangerous?  Not really.  That claim that humans only use 10% of their brains?  Nope.  The distraught man in the photo has just been told, “You know that thing I told you about needing to drink 8 glasses of water a day?  Yeah, turns out I was wrong on that one.  Sorry.”  You can see why he’s so upset.  You’d be mad too if you drank 8 glasses of water a day for 20 years. 

Seriously, though, here’s what we learn from all this:  whatever we think we know for a fact…is probably wrong, and it’s at least not the certified gospel truth like we think it is.  Humanity has a long and well-documented history of realizing we were really WAY off on what we thought we knew.  So add these myths to the rest of them, the Earth is flat, the Sun revolves around the Earth, eggs are bad for you, and reading in dim light will make you blind. 

Or not.  Depends on what day it is. 

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Posted by Jeremy Scott | 2 Comments

Cell Phones are Popular

Here’s another entry in the “Well…duh” category:  a new survey finds that consumer cell phone spending has overtaken landline spending. 

First, I would have guessed that this had already happened… a few years ago.  But apparently the tipping point only just recently was reached.  In an age where even middle-schoolers have their own cell phone, this is not a surprise.  I cannot think of a single person that I know who does not have a cell phone. 

In fact, the only thing keeping landlines in the conversation is dial-up or DSL Internet service–which uses phone lines to connect to the web (and it is, of course, the phone companies that are offering and pushing DSL Internet service). 

Mobile phones are, well, mobile.  You can receive all your calls without having to sit in the house all day.  Cell phones are not only popular, they are more capable.  Cell phones can double as mp3 players, GPS devices, web browsers, PDAs, and much more. 

For more on this earth-shattering study, go here.  And stay tuned for the sequels:  “Computer Use Outpaces Typewriter Use,” and “More People Drive Cars to Work Than Ride Bikes.” 

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