KerryJ’s Neotenous Tech

I use the internet for many things — including researching products before I buy.

This afternoon we were looking for a cast iron, enamel dutch oven/casserole. Paul went to his favourite online site - http://everten.com.au and got prices on the shi shi stuff.

I went to an Australian dept. store chain’s web site as they claimed to be having a killer sale on cookware in their “Bargain Book”.

One item caught my eye — a Lodge enamel cast iron 6 litre casserole that was (wait for it, wait for it) $360 OFF! Yes, only $139.99!!! WOW!

I wanted to find out more about Lodge cookware, so I did a search.

Firstly, to Amazon. Where a Lodge 7 quart dutch oven (enamel, cast iron) was on sale for $US105.22 (regularly $US197.22). Hmmm. Even if shipping came to $100, still a much better deal than Harris Scarfe’s “regular price”.

However, Amazon has the economies of scale going for it. Wonder what the MSRP (manufacturer’s suggested retail price) would be? I went to the Lodge site. They are selling to the general public for $US197.95 plus shipping https://secure.lodgemfg.com/storefront/product1.asp?idProduct=4049

Hmmmmm. Argue about import costs and shipping all you like, but normally $AU500 now $1AU40?  Is there any wonder with the strong Aussie dollar at the moment that we have a trade deficit? Or, did my local retailer buy these years ago when the dollar was weak?

Sure buying locally is important and saving on shipping costs and the spectre of customs drawing your lot in the pain lottery that is customs duty — but if retailers want to compete for my dollar and, more importantly MY TRUST — they’d better start doing what more and more consumers are doing.  Do internet research before writing sales copy. Because now, no matter what argument or justification these guys put forth, I’m not buying from them.

Thanks to SilkCharm for bringing this to my attention.

This video is a jaw-dropper — Jim Stewart, the video blogger - is trying to educate the National Australia Bank that SPAM - however “well” or “poorly” executed by the PR agency is a sleazy business practice at best. 

He certainly made a valiant effort to put the point across that spam is a pain, it is not ethical to post comments of a commercial nature on someone else’s blog and that with profit running to billions, NAB could afford to actually PAY for advertising on blogs.  But the NAB’s rep continued to ignore the point.

Geeking Out!

Originally uploaded by kerryank

Just a quick (or should I say qik) post before bed time.

Tonight I tried using my Nokia 95 trained on a computer monitor to live stream video from Second Life to the internet using qik.com

By setting up qik on my phone for streaming rather than quality, I didn’t get backed up as I have in the past with qik.com.

Here is one of the videos:

Moms keep you honest. My mother and I cover a lot of ground in our weekly chats and this week we were talking about Internet Neutrality, how internet newbies can find sites to trust and RSS feeds.

As far as Net Neutrality goes, I was able to tell her I’d researched it and pointed her at a blog post of mine.

We had a great discussion about how people in her age bracket are digital immigrants and how these immigrants could start off with web sites of trusted providers with whom they were familiar and then using these as springboards to build trusted networks, using information literacy (which she pointed out is a skill she has as a librarian, but many people don’t have) and always researching and questioning sources.

When it came to web 2.0 tools and RSS, I told her about the great CommonCraft videos but she pointed out that between her 8-year-old computer and a dial-up connection, video just isn’t an option.  While she can access computers at her library, she wanted something at home to help her wrap her head around RSS and it had to be visual.

After searching for a bit — I decided to roll up my sleeves and write one myself.  It’s quick and dirty as far as graphics go.  Let me know if you think it would help your mom - I’ve just emailed it to mine tonight and hope she’ll set me straight if I’ve fallen short. RSS for mom.

You’d expect it from the Successful and Outstanding Bloggers conference (cheekily called SOBcon) web site, I suppose.

The clever little elements to this site — the fact that it’s a Wiki, the badges that people can put on their web site if they are speaking or attending, the prominent RSS buttons, links to the conference blog, etc — really worth checking out!