Some good observations but inconclusive in my opinion. The customer relationship is exponentially more important than ever before in the Internet of Things world.
http://blogs.hbr.org/2014/10/the-internet-of-things-will-change-your-company-not-just-your-products/
Is it weird that I am trying to think of 20 friends who would be willing to learn this dance with me and make our own video?
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Time to break out the old book map.
The sun emitted a mid-level solar flare, peaking at 9:59 p.m. EDT on Oct. 21, 2014. NASA’s Solar Dynamics Observatory, which is always observing the sun, captured an image of the event. The same active region previously emitted an X1.1 solar flare on Oct. 19. Solar flares are powerful bursts of radiation. Harmful radiation from a flare cannot pass through Earth’s atmosphere to physically affect humans on the ground, however — when intense enough — they can disturb the atmosphere in the layer where GPS and communications signals travel.
http://www.nasa.gov/content/goddard/oct-22-2014-second-substantial-flare-in-two-days/#.VEnSyxnn_qA
Is Apple TV going anywhere?
Based on the company’s current strategy, the worldwide installed base of Apple TV devices will be 22.7 million at the end of 2014 and 73.4 million by the end of 2018. Sound OK? Well, not really when you realize that the installed base of tablets at the end of this year will be 427 million, rising to over 1 billion by the end of 2018.
Here are a couple of other trends that put Apple TV in perspective: smartphones and tablets are now the fastest-growing means of accessing and consuming internet TV content, accounting for 54% of program requests for the BBC’s iPlayer service in February 2014 – up from just 17% in January 2012 (in comparison, smart TV sets, gaming consoles and connected Blu-ray players hardly register). Meanwhile, the number of OTT service accounts is sky-rocketing, from nearly 600 million at the end of 2014 to what we project will be over 1.4 billion by the end of 2018.
With those numbers as a backdrop, Apple TV now seems to be moving at a glacial pace. But more than that, it also seems that Apple TV is developing in a vacuum or, to put it another way, it is heading in a direction that is orthogonal to the wider market.
It’s starting with watches and phones, and moving on to everything in your home. The so-called “internet of things” is all about electronically connecting everything together. This is one of the better reports on what to look for.
http://www.businessinsider.com/the-internet-of-things-bluetooth-devices-2014-10
“If you think about what mobile computing is right now, it’s portable, it’s great, and I call it ‘making your hand happy,’ in that you can hold it and it’s great,” Abovitz said. “Your hand is happy, but your eye is not. What I mean by your eye is not happy, if you step outside your office and look at San Francisco Bay, it’s just this visual feast, and there’s no movie theater, there’s no television display, there’s nothing that will ever match the grandeur of what our own brains can create in terms of visual experience.”
Anyone who says post sales content, experience and relationships are not worth investing in shoukd read this quote from VentureBeat reporter
Everything went swimmingly until the app detected a new firmware update. Dutifully, I hit “update,” and that’s when the wheels fell off. Suddenly, the app couldn’t detect any of the bulbs, and no amount of restarting the app or resetting the WeMo Link (or the bulbs) helped. If anything, it got worse as I ended up in an endless loop of trying to get the WeMo Link to reestablish its connection with my router — something it was apparently unable to do.
The app’s built-in help option drives to a non-mobile friendly Web page that simply outlines your options for resetting the different hardware components. It further advises that if these steps don’t help, you should delete the app and start from scratch. I did. And it finally worked.
Firmware updates are a necessary evil in the world of smart devices, but when they cause such a profound disruption, something is wrong. The average consumer, I’m convinced, would never have had the patience to do what I did and would probably have sent the bulbs back to the retailer in frustration.
I like to win. I am super competitive.
I am a Clipper fan. I have been a fan of the Clippers since 1996. While I pull for the Clippers to be winners I have never been a fan of Donald Sterling and when asked I always gave my opinion.
I went to an event once honoring Donald and 4 other notable figures in LA (my Uncle Dr. Katz was one of those figures). I fantasized what I would say to him if given the opportunity. He would be standing in line for a drink and I would say,” GO Clips, been a ticket holder for years” . What would he respond with? Maybe he would say,”oh yeah, where are your seats?” Or ” We have a good year ahead”.
I realized that what he would likely says was something like, “Thank you for your business”.
He viewed the Clippers like he did real estate. He would invest in assets and then find whatever way he could to maximize return regardless of the circumstances. He knew that if he had a bad team, the system would reward him by giving him early draft picks which he could sell, trade or otherwise monetize for self interest rather than the team culture and season success.
Balmer makes the Clippers the Winners.
Blake said it best”Personally, I love that kind of crazy. Ballmer wants to win no matter the cost. Donald Sterling didn’t care if we won — at least if it meant he had to spend money. It wasn’t just about spending money on players. For years, our training staff wanted to buy this sophisticated computer software that would let them scan our bodies and keep track of our progress throughout the season. Sterling wouldn’t sign off on it.”
That long-term vision, says Adeyoola, is for Metail to become the ‘Google of sizing and shape’. That’s because the startup’s 3D visualisation technology, which enables a clothes shopper to upload a photo and dial in a few basic measurements to create a virtual representation of themselves known as a ‘MeModel’, also creates a lot of data. In addition, a user only has to create ap MeModel once as it’s portable across supporting sites.
“These are powerful signals. And in tests we’ve run in the US, ads on Google Preferred channels show significantly higher brand awareness and recall.”
At the event, the company revealed that YouTube viewership is growing at 50 per cent YoY and over one billion fans are coming to YouTube every month.
It was also revealed that 45 per cent of all YouTube content consumed in the UK is watched on a mobile phone or tablet.
Robert Kyncl, head of content and business operations at YouTube said that the platform is “investing heavily to turn YouTube stars and channels like Zoella, Vice News and SlowMoGuys into even bigger household names.”
Zoella, YouTube creator, added: “I think people watch YouTube because they can watch whatever content they want – everything from learning how to apply makeup to changing a hoover bag – and the advice is from real people who they can connect with. We’re normal people and we’re just filming our lives.”
Pete Deutschman 