A little Sunday humor
Posted By RichC on August 21, 2011
Saw this photo on a friends G+ “Things that make you go hmmm!” post. Too funny.
Is there a way to financially plan for the future and sleep at night?
Posted By RichC on August 20, 2011
For those wondering what politicians should focus on (jobs) and what individuals should be doing in order to plan for a few years down the road, Jim Mccaughan of Principal Financial Group has a few ideas:
| James Mccaughan: His thoughts on Friday – 8/19/2011 |
Mr. James P. McCaughan is President – Principal Global Investors of Principal Financial Group Inc. He heads the Principal Global Investors segment of operations, has been President, Principal Global Investors of the Company and of Principal Life since December 2003. Prior to that time, he served as Executive Vice President and global head of asset management for the Company and Principal Life since April 2002. From 2000 – 2002, he was Chief Executive Officer of the Americas division of Credit Suisse Asset Management in New York, New York.
Financial markets down again, continuing the summer of pain
Posted By RichC on August 19, 2011
The Dow closes at the low of the day noting that few want to stay long for the weekend. Moving the market down was the misguided management at HP after their announcement yesterday (traded down 20% today and yanking the DJIA with it). Hard to believe an iconic American company with such deep pockets and the ability to finance about any project they want could continue to screw up so bad (over and over).
The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 172.63 points, or 1.6%, to 10817.95. The index swung nearly 250 points from its session highs to lows in a volatile session. The zigzag action comes after the blue-chip index tumbled 419.63 points on Thursday, putting it on track for a losing week and its worst month in more than two years.
Hewlett-Packard was by far the Dow’s biggest decliner, tumbling $5.91, or 20%, to a six-year low of $23.60 as investors fretted about the world’s largest personal-computer maker’s extensive plans to reshape its business model. The company is exploring a spinoff of its PC business and will abandon efforts to sell tablets and smartphones, a seemingly sharp reversal from management’s previous comments. It also agreed to buy U.K software firm Autonomy for about $10.25 billion in a bid to move further into data analytics.
Here’s a questionable video … but if you are an HPQ share holder or HP/Palm product buyer then the chuckle may be needed (thanks for the link Scott).
Tech Friday and QR codes for smartphones and tablets
Posted By RichC on August 19, 2011
I’m getting pretty geeky with this post, but then again it this is a Tech Friday post. 
Having recently installed a QR (Quick Response) code reader on my Palm Pre, I’ve been trying to figure out just how to use them effectively. Obviously people sitting on a computer don’t need to use their smart-phone to access digital content, 
but as someone who works in the ink on paper world, using the codes might help to sell “extra” content or as a way to enhance the information included on paper.
My first attempt was to use Kaywa.com to make a QR code for my blog (right) … which I’ve also included as a rotating icon on my Google+ avatar (just because its cool – FYI, you click on the photo to rotate through the images). If you have a reader for your phone, you might try taking a photo of the code to the right and see if where it links.
Other simple ideas off the top of my head would be to use them to enhance business/handout cards or making auto window stickers for an upcoming car show. I’m thinking of the TDIFest in Lexington Kentucky this year; it could be a way to mention CinciTDI or the TDIClub … including enhanced informational webpage. Maybe a bumper or window QR sticker would be a great way to offer information to those interested in TDI Volkswagen diesels? Hmm … I should get an adsense click for that!
A sad day for the future of HP/Palm webOS devices
Posted By RichC on August 19, 2011
I was disappointed to hear that HP lost its way as a productive technology company in this economic downturn and was caught off-guard in their decision to say “so long” to webOS. (business story LINK)
As a longtime webOS Palm Pre user (a “longtime” is a relative term for smartphones), I’ve been wondering just what has been going on over at HP headquarters while waiting for the molasses-like slow to market HP Palm Pre3. Obviously there hasn’t been much to cheer about in their tablet attempt, as the Touchpad was a dis-appointment with its “not ready for primetime” upgraded webOS; it wasn’t ready to compete with the big boys … meaning Apple iPad and the many Google Android tablets. In fact, according to most it was a mistake to try and hit a marketing date instead of having HP’s hardware and webOS software working in synergy (pun intended).
Here’s a little bit from Dieter Bohn’s editorial … I liked it.
The story of Palm and webOS is The Little Engine That Could, but some jerk ripped out the last three pages and we’re forced to read it over and over again. It’s frankly exhausting seeing this same narrative play out year after year, never seeing the top of the hill. webOS is perennially the little engine that could have.
Yet we keep opening that book at night, re-reading it. Mainly because there’s one key thing missing from that the litany of failures above: webOS itself. While the transition to webOS 3 and its Enyo underpinnings has been a little rocky, it still represents an intelligent, extensible, accessible, hackable, and above-all elegant framework. Yes, the original version that shipped on the TouchPad was critically flawed, but in general there’s more that’s right about webOS than what’s wrong. Now that HP has given up on making hardware, webOS may never get its chance.
Given the stiff competition webOS faced in the marketplace, it’s tempting to just say that webOS has failed. The truth is that we don’t really know if webOS could have succeeded given HP’s utter inability to execute on the basics of making smartphones and tablets.
I think it’s better to say this: HP failed webOS.
The good thing for me is that this new ‘now’ makes my decision to stick with webOS and hope for a Pre3 a lot easier. Good bye webOS and Pre3, you would have been a sharp smartphone (below) … Android … here I come!
Financial markets shaken: Stagflation or a double-dip recession?
Posted By RichC on August 18, 2011
The talk in financial circles has some pretty negative commentary on growing our economy. Traders and fund manager ran for low yielding safety today as the stock market was down and down big at over 500 points on the Dow just before the close. As the trading day ended, the stock indices were all red.
There is real fear that we’re in for a likely global recession with weak U.S. economic data and fresh concerns about Europe’s banks. Gold jumped to a new record of nearly $1,830 a troy ounce dipped below 2% in intraday trading for the first time since at least 1954 – investors were just looking for some refuge no matter how low the yields.
Perhaps the best quote on the day was: "If it’s not a recession, it sure feels like one. And if it feels like one, it doesn’t matter if you can prove it with statistics or not."
Hot inflation data sets up a grim morning for stocks
Posted By RichC on August 18, 2011
The news from Wall Street pre-market is not positive … although some suggest the possible morning downturn it an opportunity for those with cash to buy stocks of “cash rich companies” paying decent dividends?
U.S. stock futures slipped further into the red, setting up the market for a sharply lower open, after rising inflation and greater worries on unemployment added to concerns about the global economy and Europe’s ongoing sovereign debt problems.
Less than an hour before the opening bell, Dow Jones Industrial Average futures fell 218 points to 11163, while Standard & Poor’s 500-stock index futures dropped 27 points to 1163 and Nasdaq 100 futures lost 47 points to 2128. Prior to the data, Dow futures had been down 208 points, while S&P 500 futures fell 26 points and Nasdaq futures shed 49 points. Changes in stock futures don’t always accurately predict early stock moves after the open.
The declines came as new jobless claims rose above 400,000 last week, the latest sign of a persistently weak U.S. labor market. Initial jobless claims rose by 9,000 to a seasonally adjusted 408,000 in the week ended Aug. 13.
Meanwhile, consumer inflation resumed its climb in July as gasoline prices rebounded and food costs continued to rise. Consumer prices rose 0.5% from June, the largest monthly increase since March. Underlying inflation, which excludes volatile energy and food costs, rose by a monthly 0.2% in July, in line with expectations. On an annualized basis, consumer prices were up by 3.6% in July, above the Federal Reserve’s target.
via online.wsj.com
Drinking and driving (driving an actual beer case or cooler)
Posted By RichC on August 18, 2011
After hearing and seeing reports of an Australian man arrested for driving his beer cooler scooter, I wondered just how popular motorized coolers or cases of beer might be – they’re not as rare as you might think. A few years ago in Germany this cellphone video of this shirtless guy was uploaded to YouTube… crazy!
HP showing me the “Roadway Ends Here” sign
Posted By RichC on August 17, 2011
From the start, it wasn’t that hard to predict a slow go for HP in releasing their Touchpad. As a Palm Pre webOS user and sometimes enthusiast, the slow-motion releases in handset, webOS and tablet products have left existing users wanting and contemplating buyers asking “Why?” Couple that with the largest users base (Sprint) feeling ignored after HP acquired Palm … there isn’t even the built in first day release buzz to give HP’s new products free word of mouth advertising. I’m unsure who to blame for the Sprint/HP fallout, but the fact that original Pre webOS buyers don’t have a path or reason to buy a Touchpad “if a new webOS Palm Pre3 phone isn’t in their future.”
As an unhappy HPQ shareholder, heads should roll over the blunder that didn’t capitalized on the existing chunk of Sprint webOS users when releasing the Touchpad. Although I still like and use my first generation Palm Pre, I see little reason to be encouraged that HP management is currently on the right track with their webOS devices and carrier support. (perhaps I’m just a bitter Sprint Palm Pre user seeing a “roadway ends here” sign)
There’s an unsettling truth in the HP TouchPad price drop that we have to face: HP wouldn’t have dropped the price if the tablet was selling well as it was priced. A new report by Arik Hesseldahl of AllThingsD laid bare what we have long (for six weeks) suspected: the TouchPad isn’t selling as well as HP or any of their retail partners would have liked.
Staples saw a lot of success with their TouchPad $200-off sale, but it’s likely they only had a few in stock to begin with. A better barometer might be Best Buy, who has been selling the TouchPad at full price since launch. According to Hesseldahl’s report, Best Buy was sent 270,000 TouchPads by HP, and they’ve only managed to sell 25,000 of them (a number that another source said might be “charitable”). Does that seem like an unreasonable number? Recall the Woot sale of the TouchPad: they sold 612 at $120 off. Woot usually pushes thousands of any one item, HP computers included.
Best Buy is reportedly so livid about the sales of the TouchPad that they’re refusing to pay for all of them, instead insisting that HP take them back. A high-level HP executive is supposedly going to be meeting in person with these angered Best Buy executives to smooth things over, but when you’ve got masses of unsold inventory on hand, we can’t imagine that will be a very friendly chat.
HP reports their quarterly earnings tomorrow, and if these numbers are true, we expect that they will remain mum on the exact number of TouchPads actually sold.
via precentral.net
Smartmoney article: 10 Things Twitter Won’t Tell You
Posted By RichC on August 17, 2011
From “10 percent of users create 90 percent of Twitter’s content” to “ICanStalkU.com” … there are a few good reason to read Sara Germano’s SmartMoney article.
WSJThisMorning Sara Germano on Twitter
Here’s a tip on paying attention when uploading photos from your smartphone:
“… smartphone pics are embedded with GPS data, making it so easy to determine your precise latitude and longitude that "a first grader could stalk someone," says cofounder Larry Pesce. For its part, Twitter’s image-hosting service strips geotagged data from phone-uploaded pics, but third-party services like TwitPic are still vulnerable.
Here’s a bit about “news reporting” on Twitter (probably obvious, but a good reminder when considering RT (retweeting) fast breaking news stories:
The death of Osama bin Laden was tweeted by Donald Rumsfeld’s chief of staff Keith Urbahn more than an hour before President Obama’s official address to the nation and before most news outlets had posted it on their Web pages. That tweet turned out to be true. But as more top stories get broken on Twitter, journalists using the site to try to keep up with a never-ending news cycle sometimes rush to report information that isn’t accurate. Thomson Reuters, for instance, was among several news outlets that erroneously tweeted Rep. Gabrielle Giffords was killed in the Arizona shooting in January. (A spokesperson for Reuters says the organization is now enforcing a stricter social-media policy.)
Here’s a PDF of the entire story since it is difficult to read page by page on SmartMoney.
Desultory - des-uhl-tawr-ee, -tohr-ee
- lacking in consistency, constancy, or visible order, disconnected; fitful: desultory conversation.
- digressing from or unconnected with the main subject; random: a desultory remark.