Techronization

Welcome to the Carnival of the Capitalists!

I am proud to be hosting this week's Carnival of the Capitalists weblog. I hope you find everything interesting, I know I did! If you have any comments or questions, please feel free to contact me at adam.siegrist@gmail.com.

Please scroll down, something happened with my table alignment for the post, so it is down below a bit. Thanks!

Retire at 30	Work Redefined	Working towards a common redefinition of work that more accurately allows comparison of one task to another and therefore highlights opportunity costs more readily.
Daily Dose of Opimism	Robots & Employment in a Service Economy	The Honda ASIMO robot has an impressive list of capabilities, and is already employed as a tour guide in Japanese museums. How much longer before a $40k robot is available to the public, and what will happen to employment when it is?
Harshly Mellow	Mirror as business weapon?	Why do so many folks think that pretty much any behavior can be excused by saying that it's "just business"?
Financial Methods	Five Secrets of Job Growth	A study by the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis offers five keys to job growth including an educated work force, low union membership rates, low wage levels, and a warm climate.
The Japan Stock Blog	Mark Hulbert on EWJ’s Sudden Increase in Popularity & Why Contrarians Will Get it Wrong
Big Picture, Small Office	Wholesale Change	Focusing on the fourth marketing P ‘places’ the Small Office in a quandary. Does it spin off its owned-distribution network or use it as leverage over its other customers?
Solitaire Trader	How to Watch CNBC
The Browster Blog	Basic Search as a "lower layer" device?	Comparing how today's search companies may be modeling themselves, functionally, after networking companies...with some emulating Layer 2-3 pipeline devices and some emulating Layer 7 application devices. Does this model work when none of these search companies seems to be actually *selling* products?
Photon Courier	The Power of Metaphor and Analogy	How verbal imagery affects decision making, with examples from the stock market and the battlefield.
Canadian Capitalist	Tax Cut Promises	Canadians will go to the polls to elect a new government in January. The leading parties are promising to cut taxes: one party plans to cut income taxes and another promises to cut the much hated federal sales tax. The post examines which tax cut plan is better.
Kicking Over My Traces	Something Old, Something New, Something Borrowed, Something Grew	End of year goals for the next year's online revenue growth.
Roth & Company Tax Update	S CORPORATIONS: WHAT'S A FAMILY?	S corporations have traditionally been thought of as having very small owner groups. No more. Recent law changes make us wonder whether some states might qualify for an S election.
Blog Business World	Visitor Logs: Helping your Viewers	Visitor referrer logs are valuable records to examine, from time to time. Of course, the definition of time to time can vary considerably. For many bloggers, the visitor log examination can take place almost every minute of the day.
Financial Options	The Week Ahead - December 3, 2005	The Pending Home Sales index is one of the newest indicators and potentially one of the most interesting this week. Many pundits are insisting there is a "bubble" in residential real estate prices and even Alan Greenspan has spoken of a bit of froth in the market. Home equity has been the fuel for this economic expansion in much the way that tech stocks were the fuel for the last one. The Fed doesn't seem as thoroughly bent on deflating housing values, but they certainly are intent on moderating growth in the sector. The Pending Home Sales index is a new indicator based on numbers of homes contracted for sale with the sale not yet closed (aka "in escrow"). Theoretically this index should lead the Existing Home Sales Index by 1 to 2 months, so this should give us a glimpse of what's coming in January and February.
Sophistpundit	What "real work", you ask?	An essay on W. Michael Cox and Richard Alm's "Myths of Rich and Poor"
Coyote Blog	Why Its OK if GM Dies	How wealth is destroyed by keeping poorly performing companies aritificially alive
The Common Room	Economics	You can make money without a good understanding of economics. But you can't make money if what you have is a *bad* understanding.
The Coyote Within	Coyote and The Warring Neighbors	Coyote helps his neighbors deal with two people who are working hard to keep their quarrel alive.
The Skeptical Optimist	Pie chart of who owns the National Debt	Here's a pie chart of who owns the USA's National Debt, including foreigners. I'm having trouble figuring out what's so scary about it.
Cumulative Model	Save Gas:Avoid Brakes	Fuel and time saving driving.
Lip-sticking	Jane Spotlights Innovation	Innovation - it's crucial to us all. Here are some innovative folks who should inspire the rest of us to get out there and shine...
The Big Picture	Don’t Believe the Hype: A Very Mixed Retail Picture	There are few things that make us more annoyed than bad data, lazy thinking or poor analysis. This weekend, the National Retail Federation hit for the inept cycle with their breathless reporting of holiday sales. The NRF erroneously trumpeted that the Thanksgiving weekend sales were “blockbuster,” having “surged 22% from a year ago to about $27.9 billion.” Further, they claimed 145 Million Shoppers hit stores and the web, up from 133 Million in ’04.
Capital Chronicle	They say I slept with 7 Miss Worlds	Fantastic expectations of a prolonged equity market rally into early 2006 could well come to serious grief.
Econbrowser	Facing the latest economic data	Here are a few thoughts about some of the economic news that's been coming in over the last few weeks.
Business & Technology Reinvention	Are You Listening?	One day, or one event, or one decision, or one person can change everything. Here are 4 ways to listen for the change in your organization.
Atlantic Review	Genocide: U.S. calls for more sanctions against Sudan, but Germany sees business opportunities	Capitalism is fine, but doing business with mass murderers is not. The post is about German governments doing business in Sudan and a chamber of commerce who characterizes the genocide in Darfur as "political disturbances."
Searchlight Crusade	The Three Day Right of Recission
View From a Height	Awash in Cash	What does all that cash piling up as retained earnings mean?
C. Frederick Wehba II Blog	Large Portfolios Benefit from Technology, Experts
Abnormal Returns	Frenetic hunt for alpha	The hunt for alpha is becoming ever more frenzied. Hedge funds are at the center of this movement. The challenge is generating alpha without taking on extraneous beta risk.
ProfessorBainbridge.com	Usury	Examines the Roman Catholic Church's nuanced teachings on lending and interest
Consumerism Commentary	Bank of America's Keep The Change	Flexo takes a look at Bank of America's (fairly) new Keep The Change program. Is it worth it? Who stands to win?
Gill Blog	Carnival of Hurricane Relief	Hurricane season is officially over.
voluntaryXchange	The Most Unexpected Voiding of An Implicit Contract	The Grateful Dead have had an implicit contract with fans for 40 years allowing recording and trading of concert performances.
InsureBlog	The “A” in HSA	Folks with HSA plans are really starting to see their dollars grow.
Political Calculations	Calculating Return on Invested Capital	Political Calculations offers a new tool for finding out what kind of return businesses are getting on their capital investments and puts it to use to look at Starbucks.
The Entrepreneurial Mind	The Big Chill of SOX Hits Even Small Businesses	Sarbanes-Oxley is creeping like kudzu and will soon cover even small private companies.
The Internet Stock Blog	Yahoo Squeezed by Craigslist and MySpace in Online Classifieds (EBAY,
Hit Coffee	Short Timer Syndrome	Learning to appreciate your job can save your job.
Fire Someone Today	Why I pay more to park at the airport	It is the little things that cost you customers; I switched parking lots at the airport to avoid an annoying form, even though I have to pay more.
Wordlab	Rapper 50 Cent	There hasn't been quite as manly a commercial opportunity since 1919.
Free Money Finance	Where the Pros Stash Their Own Dough	Want to know where investment experts put their own money? This series from Free Money Finance tells you!
Et Tu Bloge	Self-Congratulation As a Basis for Social Policy.	I was watching George Harrison's Concert for Bangladesh last night on PBS. I thought: "What great music! That famine really gave some awesome musicians a chance to get together and throw their hearts into quite a gig." But, did they really provide any long-term solution to that famine or have the Bangladesh Concert progeny done the same for famine and disasters in general?
Freedom's Fidelity	Deconcstructing Emissions	A post related to environmental economics. Which countries are following Kyoto and cutting emissions and by how much as well as how capitalism should be credited for creating the modern environmentalist movement. I've included some data on how eastern bloc countries emissions have drastically fallen as a result of the collapse of communism.
Pacesetter Mortgage Blog	Will Americans Spend the Wealth Created by the Housing Bubble Boom?	20 Year Mortgage Veteran warns of spending new found wealth from housing boom.
Blueprint for Financial Prosperity	Expect Housing Sale Price Drops As Rates Rise	As interest rates rise, don't be surprised when a $300,000 house sells for $270,000. A $300k mortgage at 5.5% has the same monthly payment as a $270k mortgage at 6.5%.
Et Tu Bloge	Ignorance Is Dangerous	A recent e-mail from a man who says that my writings have changed his mind notes that this has not been all to the good. He says he was perfectly happy as a liberal but now he is frustrated when he hears the kind of nonsense that he used to accept without having to think about it.
Triple Pundit	Goldman Sachs Speaks out on Value of Ecosystem Services	Triple Punditmentions an interesting development at Goldman Sachs - The recognition of "ecosystem services". This is of special value in that it starts a thought process that promotes the quantification of what the planet provides, free of charge, on a daily basis. It's not funny math, and smart companies and leaders are starting to see it that way.
Boston Gal's Open Wallet	Pursue your dream career? Only if you can afford it	Jane Dough explains why "Pursuing Your Passion" in your career is generally not a good idea. Often your passion does not pay well. Instead pursue a career with a steady paycheck and great benefits and work on your "passion" after hours.
Below The Beltway	Wal-Mart And The War Against The Poor	Do a Google search for "anti Walmart" and you get your choice of about 6,880,000 links. The search term "walmart hurts america" returns 537,000 results. Clearly, there are plenty of folks out there who don't like Wal-Mart. It hurts small business, they claim. It reduces wages, they assert. It contributes to suburban sprawl, claim others. As Sebastian Mallaby points out in today's Washington Post, however, Wal-Mart has been a positive force in the economy and those who attempt to use the political arena to slow its expansion are, in reality, hurting the poor.
Multiple Mentality	We Won	MM's Sethual Chocolate reports that Sony has failed in their attempt to curb piracy using illegal spyware.
Blueprint for Financial Prosperity	Auto Insurance 25 Year Milestone Analysis Revised	In this article I revise my original analysis of the auto insurance premium rate drop one can expect when turning 25.
The Real Returns	S&P 500 Earnings Estimates For 2006	Looking at the earnings estimate of the S&P 500 index for next year and considering 15 times the earnings as the fair value, the index is not priced terribly undervalued or overvalued.

The HTC Wizard: Look out, David Copperfield.

So today at work I was proud enough to hold an HTC Wizard, one of the newest and best Windows Mobile-based smartphones to date. Here's a bit of a rundown on what it has:

Windows Mobile 5.0
1.3 Megapixel Camera
Slide-out Keyboard
Wi-Fi
Bluetooth

....And all of this comes in a package small enough to reasonably fit in your pocket! Quite the convergence device one would like to see more often these days.

My task today? Well, we got these in from Europe, as they are (of course) unavailable in the U.S. until, well, forever. Now, despite the savings we enjoy by having an importer's license and bringing these from overseas, there's quite the catch involved: these devices all came to me in the German language- not exactly something that Americans are going to be looking for in their next smartphone. So here I am, sitting with more HTC Wizards than I'd care to count, they are essentially paperweights- which leads me to my task.

Now, while HTC is the manufacturer of the Wizard, it is seldom referenced by this name. HTC prefers to keep its name in the background, and allows several companies to brand it's products for themselves in the name of marketing. These companies are O2, T-Mobile, i-Mate, and Qtek. The ones we received in particular were O2 branded, and the Wizard is in fact called the XDA Mini S when branded by O2.

For obvious reasons of discouraging grey-market sales, the licensed branders have made it (to put it lightly) very difficult to go moving these devices around to different countries and just popping another language pack on them and making them work on any GSM network. I don't blame them for attempting to keep people using these branded phones on only their networks, but it is my job to find a way around this so we can sell them with a Worldwide English (WWE) language pack here in the states.

I won't go too much into the gory details, but I did in fact find a way around this in under two hours today- beating my previous record of 4 hours with finding a way to get an english language pack on an HTC Universal. A new twist that O2 included this time involved requiring the phone to be out of what's called "bootloader" mode, a type of "safe-mode" that most of these devices can be placed in while changing languages that fools the device into thinking it is in the proper country when turned on.

It is a great deal of fun dealing with these new products- not only do I get to see them within weeks or even days of their worldwide release, but I get to play around with them and learn about them- a pleasure that very few gadget-lovers like me get to be honored with.

A Three Company Joint-Marketing Disappointment

One of the most noteworthy disappointments I've seen while working in the GSM Industry these days is the recent introduction of a "new" phone from Motorola, Cingular, and Apple- The world's first iTunes Music Phone.

These three companies performed a joint-marketing campaign beginning on September 8th at 1:00 pm EST, and are marketing this phone as heavily as Motorola and Cingular have been marketing the Motorola V3 RAZR when it was released. At the same time, the websites of these companies released the phone on their front pages in unison, marking what I would call the biggest marketing campaign a cellular phone has ever seen.

And the star product? The Motorola ROKR, as it is called- a candybar style phone that will hold "up to 100 tracks" that can be either downloaded from Cingular's new music store, or loaded onto the phone's memory card directly from one's computer. Gosh, it's almost like having an Mp3 player and a phone in one!

The reality of the situation:

1. Motorola released this phone a long time ago. It was called the E398, and it was announced in the first quarter of 2004. A little old, don't you think?

2. This new version of the phone restricts the owner from ever placing more than 100 songs on it. That memory card slot? Doesn't matter how large of a memory card you purchase, the phone will not recognize the 101st song on the card. It locks them out.

3. Cingular's download service will cost a whopping $2 per song, as opposed to iTunes and comparable music stores charging $1 per song. That's a dollar for Cingular for every dollar Apple makes with iTunes.

I find it a bit ridiculous that these companies are attempting to release a product that preys so heavily on the ignorance of the American public. Most people don't know that this phone is old news, and will purchase it as a result of the marketing campaign billing it as the first iTunes phone- in essence, Cingular and Motorola are riding Apple's thunder here, and no one seems to care.

There are plenty of phones available that accept memory cards and can play Mp3's. Most of them are much better than the E398, a.k.a. the ROKR. At least when Motorola released a marketing campaign on the RAZR, there was something to be excited about- that was by far the thinnest phone of its time and is truly one-of-a-kind. The ROKR is none of these things- all this phone has is a marketing campaign, and companies backing it that are capitalizing on public ignorance... and it's going to work. No one knows that Motorola introduced this phone years ago because they only released it overseas. No one realizes that there are more than a 30 phones available that do as much or more than this phone. And that's why this marketing scheme is going to work - that's what frustrates me.

When will the Auto Industry Learn?

Okay, so I'm in the market for a new car. I won't go in to very much detail as to what I'm looking at, or the price range I'm going for, but I must say, I'm extremely disappointed in the lack of technology in vehicles as of 2005.

There have been a few steps in the right direction, such as BMW's iDrive, GM's standardization of an Aux input on all new vehicles, the ever increasing list of Sirius-equipped automobiles, and XM Radio's recent partnership with Hyundai. There have been some major improvements, but let's be serious- Satellite Radio is a premium service to a niche market, BMW iDrive was an initial disaster, this whole progression scale is seriously behind schedule.

I haven't really used a CD player since 2002. Call me an early adopter, but even the mainstream market has been using one form of Mp3 Player or another for at least 2 1/2 years, and that's more than enough time to start introducing something as simple as an Auxilliary input in all new vehicles lineups. I can't think of a single excuse that car manufacturers would have to prevent them from putting one in every single vehicle they offer as a standard option. It simply should be a part of every car stereo.

Mark Cuban posted recently about the impending death of the CD. I've seen this one coming for years, and I've posted moderate complaints about BMW's "iPod your BMW" before. At this point however, I almost feel like saluting them for even having said technology in their vehicles to begin with, compared to the drab stereos in cars these days. Oh, and a quick sidenote to you Manufacturers out there: If CD use is on the general decline, what good does offering a consumer a 6 disc in-dash changer do, when there's no line-in? It just doesn't make sense.

So back to the car hunt: I'm looking for two major things in the vehicle- stereo input capability, and hands-free capability for a bluetooth phone. Now I won't be too picky, and I'm well aware that only a few auto makers out there that offer built in bluetooth support for stereo surround sound hands-free. I'm more interested in the toys Motorola is kicking out, among which is a car kit that can be installed, and provide stereo integration as long as there is - you guessed it - an AUX INPUT on the stereo.

While I've narrowed my search down to a few choice vehicles, I must say I'm seriously disappointed with the industry as a whole. Multi-Disc players is not a technology upgrade, nor is an increase in the quantity cigarette lighters. I want in-your-face ability to directly connect my Mp3 player and my phone to the stereo system, and that should be a standard option these days, no questions asked- even if it's for no better reason than to keep people's eyes on the road.

The Convergence Factor

I work for a start-up company that sells GSM phones retail on its webshop, at ImportGSM.com. As a result, I have the amazing benefit of always knowing what will be entering the market in the next 6-12 months, and get to play with all sorts of prototypes to see just how good they are.

One of the hardest things for people to grasp these days is that cellphones are, in fact, becoming fashion. As a result, I have been watching the upwards trend of purchases of GSM phones in the $500 range and above- people purchase phones not only for necessity, but as a toy.

The most classic example of this is the Motorola V3 RAZR. The V3 became a popular phone because of its "Razor thin" looks, and has been one of the U.S.'s first fashionable phones. When the Black version of the V3 came out last week, prices soared from people willing to pay over $100 above the price for the original silver version, simply because it was a different color. Fashion.

Essentially, in the next year or so the general population in the United States will start to adopt this fashion trend- at this point, it is only the early adopters that are doing it- most people can't justify a $300-$500 phone purchase because they are used to seeing carrier-subsidized prices (the $50 phones you see Cingular and T-Mobile selling). These phones are not $50 to manufacture- they cost several hundred but the carriers receive a kickback that they pass on to the consumer while locking them into a 2 year contract on their plan.

However, the idea of an "Unlocked" phone is starting to become mainstream. GSM Phones in the U.S. (Cingular/ATT, T-Mobile networks) are "locked" to the carrier- meaning you cannot use the phone you purchased though Cingular on T-Mobile's Network if you switch. This does not often happen overseas; it is a U.S. born method of locking a person to a carrier. However, like all things with software, software engineers have found a way to unlock these phones (it is perfectly legal, as phones are purchased retail and then unlocked) so that they may be used with any GSM network.

That is what ImportGSM, among others, specializes in. Unlocked phones are sold at an escalated price so that they may be used on any network. It is amazing what people will pay for a phone, simply because they are looking for a fashionable phone that will fit their lifestyle- smartphones like the Treo 650 for the mobile professional, pen phones (like the Nokia 7280, pictured at right) for the nightlife lover who wants a small phone, and phones with full QWERTY keyboards for those who text-message all day, like on the Nokia 6820.

Far more impressive is the lineup of phones that are slated to come out before the end of this year. If you thought you'd always have a cellphone, a camera, and an MP3 player as separate devices, think again. The phones introduced in 2005 will sport up to 3 and 4 Megapixel cameras, memory expansion slots that allow them to hold hundreds of hours of music, and High resolution screens that allow for video conferencing. Sony Ericsson has the W800 slated for arrival by the second quarter- this will be the world's first Walkman phone, that will allow 30 hours of playback on it's built-in MP3 player. Are you starting to think a bit differently?

It is only a matter of time before the phone, camera, and MP3 player are one refined, well-designed device. That time is just around the corner- I'd expect impressive models to be out in Spring 2006 that have mastered all three, and allowed people to have multiple phones from which they choose one to use based on a given activity they will be doing for the day, simply switching their SIM card (a small card underneath your phone's battery that holds all of your phone numbers and settings, and can be easily interchanged with other cell phones) to the phone they'd like to use and heading on their merry way.

I, for one, love to be sitting with a front seat view of what is coming. Look out for very impressive phones in the next few months, and major changes in the way we buy and use mobile phones over the next year.

(A Side note: Sorry, Verizon customers, this will never be available for you. This is only possible on the GSM network, utilizing SIM cards and GSM capabilities to easily purchase phones and switch between phones that aren't offered by the carrier.)

Format wars repeat!

For anyone who has been following the new format wars over High-Definition DVD, I for one am smelling a repeat.

Remember back when there was a format war for VCR's? You could buy Beta or VHS- Beta, arguably, had better picture quality, while VHS was more affordable and allowed you to store more on a single tape.

Well, guess what. It's happening again.... and in case you didn't know, yes- High-Definition DVD is at your doorstep. We soon will have to go through the process all over again- this time converting DVD to High Definition DVD, instead of converting VHS to DVD.

So where is the format war, you wonder? Well, Sony, who owned the Beta format back in the VCR wars, has gotten their hands into a proprietary technology called Blu-Ray. They intend to have this format go head-to-head with HDDVD, the other format contender. It always seems to go this way... Sony just loves proprietary formatting. Think about it: Beta, MemoryStick, MiniDisc, and now Blu-Ray. I can almost hear the cash registers going off in Mr. Ando's head!

I just hope we get this one resolved. I still can't believe that we have to have dual-format DVD recordable drives out there, just because people can't make up their minds.

FM Transmitters with a Twist

So after Griffin Technology came out with their SmartDeck intelligent cassette adapter for the iPod, I started wondering what other ways there could be for sending information from your iPod to your radio, controlling it, etc.

I already wrote about USB connections in cars, but that's pretty far fetched, and we're always more focused on the here and now, so here's what I've come up with:

Almost all cars manufactured after 1998 have an OEM stereo that contains a data transfer service called an RDS, or Radio Data System. In effect, it transfers real-time information from broadcasting radio stations to your car stereo, so you can read the radio stations call letters, etc. on your displays readout. I've even seen this information updated for each song the radio plays, giving the user real-time information on the song: title, artist, and so on.

So why not apply that to the many FM Transmitters out there? It is a simple software addition to an existing product that, while not controlling the MP3 Player, will at least give information about the playing song to those in the car.

I'll admit it isn't much more than an eye-pleasing effect, but I think it's a step in the right direction as far as keeping driver's eyes on the road as much as possible.

USB your BMW?

Okay, so we all know that people like this idea of bringing their music libraries into their car. The iPod has certainly made this process simpler for the masses, so for a minute I'll focus on that.

There are over 400 aftermarket products made for the iPod, at least a quarter of which are different FM transmitters, mounting kits, or tape adapters intended directly for use within a car. Auto manufacturers are hopping on board, with Volvo, Alfa-Romeo, Mercedes Benz, Ferrari, Nissan, and BMW adding iPod connections built into their new models. But are these auto manufacturers selling themselves short?

I mean yes, the iPod does have a whopping 70% marketshare. But this is a heck of a lot of faith that these manufacturers are putting in Apple. They may be dominating the market in portable music, but nothing like this lasts forever.

So am I crazy, or wouldn't a simple USB connection and interface be more comprehensive?

Think about it: There are hundreds of cars out there that have a power adapter within a compartment, such as the center console. So why not apply the same principal to a universal interface? All portable media devices already have a USB dongle to connect them to your computer for transferring music. Add a USB connection to the inside of a compartment on the center console, an interface to communicate with the radio, and suddenly your car can connect to any music storage device, and control it from the stereo.

As much as I love Apple, I have to call the auto industry out on this one for hopping on the bandwagon. I really think they should have thought this one through. Limiting yourself to one portable media device is like welding the license plate to your car- things change, and eventually you'll have something else to take its place.

How will video find its way into portable players?

Well, I have to say that I'm quite impressed by the multitude of portable media players that Apple has released over the past 2 years. The 3rd and 4th Generation iPods, the Mini, the Photo, and now (I was one of the few fortunate enough to find out about it before the release date) the much awaited iPod Shuffle. Steve Jobs' keynote speech from the MacWorld conference detailed what has been a drastic turnover in marketshare since the launch of the Mini, which successfully took out the high-end flash based market for portable audio players.

...But what about video? Apple has already made it abundantly clear that they will not try to add video support to the iPod line. Microsoft launched their Portable Media Centers, but very little hype was involved, and there are a large number of restrictions as far as what can be put on the players. So what's the next step for deciding where video fits in?

Perhaps the largest barrier in the way of the video process is, again, the licensing. This is going to be SUCH a headache, but yes, we will more than likely have to go through something similar to the notorious RIAA lawsuits before various 'legitimate' forms of video files find their ways onto the sluggishly growing market of PMC's and the like. It will go something like this:

• Step 1 (already in progress): People realize that they can put video into files that will fit onto PocketPC's and other PMC's that either have hard drives or card slots for the flash cards that are now pushing 4 gigabytes.
• Step 2: The MPAA begins to get offended by loss of revenues from people downloading movies and videos for free when they ought to be paying, and begin sueing everyone (see Deja Sue, from PC Magazine)
• Step 3: Various forms of 'legitimate' files come about, such as apple's AAC and Windows' WMA formats, as well as monthly services to gain access to large libraries of content, like RealRhapsody and Musicmatch Jukebox
• Step 4: The market reaches some sort of happy medium, where a small number of pirated video files are passed around, and the mass majority either subscribes to a monthy service, or purchases movies and videos individually through the net.

Personally, I'd like to see this one turn out to be less cannibalistic than the RIAA's massive sueing sprees. There's also some talk about eventual streaming content to mobile phones, but it will be a long time coming for the screens and networks to support a respectable resolution. But, we'll just have to see.

More on this later.

Mobile Thinking

For as long as I can recall, I've been religiously following the trends in new technology. I'm interested in anything and everything- from new industry standards for wireless protocols to the newest gadget for all the mobile warriors out there.

Over the next few years, I believe we will all witness an incredible amount of convergence in wirless devices and mobile media. The everyday individual will be able to access their main house computer from the road, using any number of devices- mobile phones, PDAs, Laptops- and have seamless access to music, videos, and photos stored therein. Mobile phones will soon be comprised of OLED screens, hard drives, media card readers, and multi-megapixel cameras allowing media to be transported just about anywhere, through any means.

Personally, I'm looking forward to having an easy-to-use mobile phone with a decent camera, a card reader, and a hard drive with at least 4 gigs. And the best part is, it won't be long before this is a reality.

I plan to dedicate this weblog to my musings about new devices and the industries that are creating them. It's going to take some time to organize my thoughts, and at this point, I may just start talking about new devices that are coming out and what it means for consumers.

Check back soon.