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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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Jetpacks Are Real…No Seriously
Words can’t really describe this video.
Okay, maybe they can: Jetpacks are real now, and in 2008 you can own one.
Jetpacks International is the company that has spent millions of dollars and five years developing their Personal Flying Machine. Granted, some of the models will only fly for 30 or 45 seconds. But the consumer model they plain to sell next year can fly for 10 miles (I certainly hope that it’s not 10 miles in 30 or 45 seconds!).
I think I speak for men everywhere when I say, “Where’s the line?” I mean, seriously, who hasn’t dreamed of owning their own jetpack? The only trouble I can forsee is how we’re going to regulate these things. Sure, the price tag is sure to serve as a regulation method all its own for quite a while. But once these things come down in price, how are we going to keep any sort of order in the skies with hundreds of these things flying around? Oh well, I’m sure we’ll all just get along fine, politely waiting for other jetpacks to pass.
Go here to see Jetpack International’s website.
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Google Has Lists Too!
Hot on the heels of yesterday’s release from Yahoo on their Top 10 search queries from 2007, Google has decided to have a little fun with lists as well. Now we have the Fastest Rising Search Queries of 2007.
So these are theoretically the most buzz-worthy searches…queries which were not so popular last year but this year are on fire. (This is not to be confused with Google’s own year-end Top 10 most-searched list, which will be released later this month–and will no doubt have Britney Spears near the top).
So what’s got people’s tongues wagging? The iPhone…surprise, surprise. Also, apparently people can’t be bothered to type the phrase “.com”, because four of the Top 10 Rising Search Queries are website names: MySpace, YouTube, TMZ, and Facebook. See, what I mean is…typing “.com” after any of those phrases, and putting it in the URL address bar of the browser instead of the Google search box, would just deliver you to those sites you’re seeking–filtering out that pesky extra step of finding it in the search results. I mean, with their supposed 200 Million users, you’d think MySpace would have pretty decent name recognition now…such that people don’t need to use Google to find MySpace.com. But you’d be wrong.
The rest of the list is a bit of a mix of the strange (“Club Penguin”, which is a sort of virtual penguin world for kids) and the predictable (“Transformers”). I’m really suprised that “Keystone Blog” wasn’t on the list; maybe next year.
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The World is Still Obsessed With Britney
Yahoo has again published its annual list of the most searched. And in 2007, “Britney Spears” is still the nation’s most frequently searched phrase.
Glad to see we’ve grown so much. Oh wait…we haven’t. Hey–how can the most-searched person on the web have trouble selling her new album?
Rounding out the top ten are some sports-related queries (“WWE” is #2, and “Fantasy football” is #8) and more female celebrities (“Fergie,” “Jessica Alba,” “Paris Hilton,” “Beyonce,” and “Lindsay Lohan” all make an appearance). So yeah…we’re a nation with a one-track mind, and a seeminlgy insatiable appetite for tabloid starlets.
It’s enough to make me want to move to Canada, where their YahooCanada top-ten list at least has the NHL at #1. Unfortunately, “Britney Spears” is on the minds of our northern neighbors as well, coming in at #2. Canadians are strange, too, because “American Idol” is their third-most-searched phrase.
I’m convinced that Yahoo only releases this information to make me depressed. I know that the lion’s share of internet users in this country are teenagers, but let’s give the Britney thing a rest, folks–she’s been at # 1 for six of the past seven years!! That’s ridiculous. Sooner or later we’ve got to reach the Britney Tipping Point, and I for one am hoping it’s soon.
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Get Your Questions Answered at Amazon’s New ...
Askville is a new site from Amazon that promises to let users ask and answer questions. You can see that site here.
Now, this is merely the latest in a line of sites that aimed to be a one-stop repository for all information. Google tried first with their own Answers product. It actually let you bid on what price you’d be willing to pay for the answer to your question, and then if any of the corps of “answerers” were interested in doing the research to find your answer, they’d take the job. It ultimately flopped, because…as it turns out…people want answers; they’re just not willing to pay for them.
Yahoo has an Answers service as well. I experimented with it a few times. It’s devolved greatly into a MySpace-like haven for teenagers to ask things like “What color dress should I wear to prom?” or “Is my boyfriend cheating on me?” or even “Which football team will win tonight’s big game?” Sure, there are some “legitimate” questions and answers on Yahoo Answers, but they are few and far between.
Pardon me for wondering aloud here, but…if Yahoo and Google (two of the most recognizable web brands) can’t make an Answers product work, why does Amazon think they can do any better?
It doesn’t matter why–clearly they think they can do better.
You have to sign up to even use the thing, which isn’t too bad, I guess. I went ahead and created an account because, hey…who doesn’t like free answers? Since I’m in the market for a piece of exercise equipment, I asked a question about product recommendations. However, after submitting my question, I was told that I will receive “at least 5 answers in the next 7 days.” Yikes! So it’s not a fast service, then, eh?
In contrast, the Yahoo Answers site I just ripped on a second ago returned a very useful answer to the same query in about five minutes. So…you can come back here in seven days to see if I got any decent answers, or you can just use Yahoo Answers. Or Wikipedia. Or your really smart uncle.
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