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Spring LCD Television Price Slide
Electronics | Apr 26, 06
We're approaching the season of graduation again, and what better way to reward the scholarship of the young than with a flat panel television capable of displaying the kind of mind-numbing drivel sure to counter-act any solicitous effects of education?
After a period of relative price stability (as I described in "For Flat Screens, Popularity Equals Price Stability"), LCD televisions have undergone significant price drops in the last couple of weeks. Consider the most popular such item on PriceSCAN.com, that currently being the Sony KDL-V40XBR1 40 inch BRAVIA XBR High Definition LCD WEGA. As can be seen from the graph below, this 720i HD model was going for at least $2.900 around the beginning of the year, and now may be had for about $500 less. That's a decline of approximately 17% in less than four months. Many other LCD models are showing similar dramatic price declines, perhaps indicating a desire by manufacturers to make this technology more competitive versus cheaper plasmas and other televisions (see "Big Panasonic Plasma At Sharp Discount To LCD").
So now, it's far more affordable to give your newly minted diplomate a panel of pabulum to hang on the wall along with that sheepskin.
Time Period: 9/19/2005 through 4/17/2006
Each tick mark represents one week
Red = High Price, Blue = Average Price, Green = Low Price
Posted by jeffrey.trester at 6:54 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Psst! Wanna Buy A Soon To Be Obsolete iPod or Playstion?
Electronics | Apr 23, 06
Rapid innovation makes the purchase of technology an investment in approaching obsolescence. In the spirit of that realization, it's worth noting some recent news from Apple and Sony. Last week, Apple's CFO reportedly said his firm expected this quarter's average iPod price to fall from the prior quarter's level, and Sony announced a $20 cut in the PlayStation 2's suggested retail price, to $129.99.
Now Cupertino rolls out new iPod models with such frequency that, even in the absence of explicit new product announcements, the market might be expected to "price in" the coming replacement of the top of the line. And indeed, we've been seeing a noisy process of iPod price decline for the last few months – see for example the PriceTrend graph of the iPod Video 60 GB-5G below.
Time Period: 10/17/2005 through 4/17/2006
Each tick mark represents one week
Red = High Price, Blue = Average Price, Green = Low Price
By contrast, Sony's introduction of the next generation PlayStation 3 has been put off until November (see "Sony To Offer Cheaper PlayStation Portable As PlayStation 3 Release Delayed"). Curiously, this development stall may have helped Sony hold the line on PlayStation 2's price, with the lowest price offered by vendors on PriceSCAN.com hovering close to the old suggested retail price. But the PS2 must compete against Microsoft and Nintendo systems, and Sony may have felt it needed to reduce the price of its aging system to preserve market share ahead of its delayed new product.
In any case, if you buy either product now, you'll be getting a discount. And, at least for a little while, you'll own the state of the art.
Posted by jeffrey.trester at 2:24 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Now Solve The Puzzle And You Can Watch A Few More Minutes Of "Lost"
Electronics | Apr 13, 06
Continuing Big Media's program of using the web to offer inferior versions of its existing products, Disney's ABC has announced they'll stream much of their television content for viewing by broadband users. The shows are free, but you'll have to watch mandatory commercials that you can't fast-forward through, as you could if you simply recorded the show on a VCR, DVR or Tivo.
Further, the ads (three of them, all from the same advertiser), may take the form of an interactive game. This raises the possibility of the viewer as lab rat – navigate the maze of this little game and you can have the cheese that is "Desperate Housewives". Sort of a Marshal McLuhan meets B.F. Skinner thing. And ABC intends to set up online chat rooms where viewers can share their thoughts on the edifying experience that is primetime television. Will these chats be monitored, I wonder? Then they'd have a Margaret Mead angle as well ("fascinating to watch them socialize, isn't it, Doctor?"). Not that there aren't scores of such sites around as it is, which makes you wonder just how much free time the average American really does have on his or her hands.
Now having a season available on demand does have its advantages, but then many cable services provide this service for the offerings of HBO, Showtime and the like, and without making you a part of their Orwellian experiment. Over all, there's something kind of familiar about all this, kind of like the rather lame movie download schemes Hollywood has bee proposing of late (see "Hollywood's Download Model: Less Content, Less Versatility, Higher Cost"). Sooner or later, I suspect the media conglomerates will have to learn to embrace the web's strengths, rather than continuously attempting to use it to turn back time and take back advantages long offered by older technologies.
Posted by jeffrey.trester at 12:00 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Windows On A Mac – The End Is Near
Computers | Apr 7, 06
To devotees of the cult that is Apple, the idea of running Windows XP on a Intel-based Mac must seem a bit like taking a dry-aged porterhouse and smothering it with Cheez Whiz. Hey, even the transition to Intel chips was anathema to some purists, but the fact is that Cupertino's new openness toward the Beast from Redmond may turn out to be a strategic coup.
Virtually all computer users have acquired some familiarity with the Windows operating system, albeit sometimes against their will. Those who have chosen to follow the Mac path are unlikely to abandon OS X just because they can now run some Windows apps that are unavailable for Tiger. The BootCamp software that allows Windows to run on Macs is more likely to persuade current Windows users to consider switching to Apples. After all, they've been immersed in the iPod-fueled culture of Jobsian cool for years now. What's been holding them back but the high price of the Mac and the fact that their Windows-based software won't run on it, making the switching cost even higher.
Now, Windows Vista's consumer release has been pushed off into 2007, and reportedly the need to maintain back-compatibility is a main reason for the delay (see “Looking Backward, Dark Vistas”). Meanwhile, OS X already offers many of Vista's promised advanced features. With BootStrap, the Mac can run those Windows applications (by booting up with XP) that Microsoft is struggling to make work with Vista. What better time to make the transition to the Mac as painless as possible, and what better way than to render the new Macs platforms that preserve the usability of Windows apps? And if Apple can increase its market share from its current, relatively paltry 3%-5% level, more developers are likely to offer Mac versions of their software.
None of this is going to bring down Bill Gates' empire, and it's not clear how many Windows users will pay a premium for a Mac, even if it can run XP. But BootCamp could allow Apple to make a dent in Microsoft's hegemony, and its introduction suggests interesting strategic options for both firms. If making XP-compatible software run on Vista proves an intractable problem, Microsoft might steal a page from Apple and facilitate running both operating systems on the same machine, letting users keep their old programs while transitioning to Vista apps. As for Apple itself, its duel OS strategy is unlikely to allow it to make much headway into the world of servers, now dominated by Windows and Linux. Of course, OS X does have that Unix-like kernel, and there's all that enterprise software written for Linux....
Perhaps its time for Cupertino to think about compatibility with one more operating system. After all, as anyone who's ordered a Philly cheese steak know, if you're going "with whiz", you might as well throw on some onions.
Posted by jeffrey.trester at 1:50 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Hollywood's Download Model: Less Content, Less Versatility, Higher Cost
Movies | Apr 5, 06
So who says the studios are refusing to embrace the web? The Associated Press reports that two Hollywood-backed movie download services have just started selling downloads of major motion pictures. Of course, new releases will go for between $20 and $30, nicely north of many DVDs. And you won't be able to burn that download onto a DVD for playback on your DVR, nor can you play that file on an iPod; portable playback may become available later this year. Want those little extras you've come to expect from DVDs? Better learn to live with less – these downloads are refreshingly special-feature free.
Now the two services in question are Movielink, owned by Universal, Sony, MGM, Time-Warner and Paramount, and CinemaNow, heavily backed by LionsGate. The former is offering the products of its owners plus that of News Corp's 20th Century Fox, while the later is selling films from LionsGate plus Sony and MGM (and neither is selling Disney movies though talks with the Mouse are said to be ongoing. From the restrictions and curtailed content offered by these firms, it seems like the titans of DRM-crazed Tinseltown are almost trying to discourage consumers from looking to the Internet for their cinematic needs. Studio honchos are reportedly concerned that downloads could cut into DVD sales. Remember when they were concerned about DVDs cutting into VHS, and both of these cutting into box office, and now there's Blue-ray and HD-DVD and downloads –oh, my!
It never seems to occur to these folks that their sales might be down because, independent of format or viewing venue, much of their content sucks. Who'd want to steal most of this stuff, anyway? Maybe they ought to consider spending less time worrying about rights, and putting a bit more thought into creating films whose rights are worth protecting.
Posted by jeffrey.trester at 2:00 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Still Shuffling, Loudly
Electronics | Apr 3, 06
Reportedly facing a chorus of consumer complaints and legal threats louder than anything that ever came out of a pair of earbuds, Apple released software updates for its most recent iPod models that allow the user to limit volume to safer levels. Parents can now use a code to lock the device's maximum volume below a pre-set level. The free upgrade is available for the Nano and Video iPods.
The curious omission here is the iPod Shuffle, and one has to ask why. Is the possibility of hearing impairment just part of the wacky randomness that makes Shuffling so darn funky, or, as users of an older model, are Shuffle owners not cool enough to deserve ear protection? In fairness, it's not at all clear that iPods are any louder than some other portable music players. And Apple may be the victim of its own popularity, its huge sales numbers attracting the interest of class-action attorneys in the way that chum lures sharks. And, after all, Cupertino has been shipping its product with warnings against excessive listening at high volume. But can iPod users really be expected to read cautionary language in some dry manual when there are iTunes to be downloaded? And hey, how hip is reading, anyway? I mean, maybe if they posted that warning in a blog or something...
Posted by jeffrey.trester at 6:53 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
