Published at August 14, 2007
in Life.
Attention iPhone owners: Does the following still happen to you?
“Is that an iPhone?”
“Yes it is.”
“How do you like it?”
“I love it!”
“Really?”
“Yes.”
This happens to me all the time, particularly in places where I’m “forced” to stay and talk: gym, waiting in line, plane, etc. Not that there’s a problem with this, but sometimes it would be nice to just the damn thing without being a unwilling PR rep. 
It’s amazing for Apple to have a created a product so appealing that strangers flock to you like magnets, which then puts me on spot to give a brief personal review. I explain all reasons why I love the phone, and also list the few shortcomings it has (e.g., lack of contextual menus, copy/paste, etc.) and elaborate on how those are fixed with software updates. I have yet to find one person who walks away unimpressed.
Even my 65-year old cousin (definitely not an Apple guy) was impressed with the device after playing with it for a few min. That alone must mean Apple did something right.
[tags]iphone[/tags]
Published at August 13, 2007
in Random.
Karl Rove to leave White House - Yahoo! News - 6.5 years too late, but at least it’s something.
Published at August 12, 2007
in Tech.
Under what conditions does an advertisement become spam?
This could have been a great discussion/debate for this year’s Gnomedex. Unfortunately, most people seemed to focus on the Winer-Calacanis drama instead, and not the key underlying issue that ignited the public feud.
I can list a few conditions:
- Personal space - Advertisements through email are often diagnosed as spam. We treat our email as our own personal space over which we control what comes in and what goes out. Conversely, a flying-banner ad over the beach is not a personal intrusion, and thus doesn’t conjure much negative reaction.
- Target audience - Ads are meant to reach out to a certain demographic. Spam will try to reach whoever.
- Reiteration of message - While some ads are frequently occurring, they are often well-placed and cleverly thought through. Spam, on the other hand, will repeat itself ad infinitum.
- Sponsorship - Ads are usually the result of a sponsorship. It’s why we expect commercials on tv, magazines, etc. Companies invest good money for product placement. In this case, spam are free-loading ads.
- Deception - Phishing, slandering, plagurizing, etc. are usual trademarks of some spam.
- Perspective - The most important factor here. Maybe that email selling viagra is valuable to someone? Not to me, but you never really know.
I am really surprised that no one from Gnomedex07 has focused on this actual topic at hand. Instead, most people seemed to pick sides and focus on the feud.
Mahalo is an interesting concept, and I would have loved to learn more about what decisions went into defining what Spam actually is. Note: this is not an endorsment for Mahalo, as I feel it has some short-comings (e.g human bias and resources).
It’s somewhat ironic when the product itself is declared a violator of the very thing it is trying to eradicate.
[tags]gnomedex,gnomdex07[/tags]
Shaun Haber
