William Reardon’s Blog

I’ve been thinking of buying a new desktop. It’s been about 4 years since I purchased a new PC, so I figured I’d keep it simple & just get a Dell.

So far simple is the exact opposite of what my experience has been.

I log on to Dell, view desktop options, and find I have to figure out which of some 32 different Intel & AMD processors I want. Or at least I think that’s the main difference between all the models. Maybe the case? I have no idea and there isn’t much explanation on Dell’s site either.

I call Jimmy for advice and we walk through the multitude of options. We come out with a decent system, for about $1,300, around the price point I wanted to spend.

One question: Does it come w/ a wireless card?

I run back through the options. There’s an option for a modem… for firewire… for buying a tree?? But where’s the networking options? Not there.

I try to look at the product spec. Maybe it’s included by default?

No mention.

Screw it, I’ll call them.

Wait, it’s too late, the phones are closed.

Okay, I’ll see if I can contact them via email. It’s a simple question. Email should be fine.

Click on “Contact Us”, then “Sales Support”. Ah, an option even for the XPS line I want to buy. I click it and I’m asked to enter the ID of my Dell before I can proceed.

What?

Thinking I must have mis-clicked and ended up in product support, I find, nope, that’s the flow. WTF?

So I save my configured Dell in my shopping cart and come back to it tonight.

I enter “dell.com”, get the homepage and click login. Only it’s not login I clicked, it’s premium login. And apparently I’m not premium to Dell.

Bleh.

Yahoo! Answers is actually a cool product. I was doing my taxes today and had a few relatively straightforward questions, but couldn’t find the answers via Google. Within 15 minutes of posting each question on Answers, I had my answer.

(Question 1: Is there an income limit on making contributions to a traditional IRA? There’s an income limit on making contributions to a Roth IRA. There’s also a income limit on write-offs of traditional contributions. But is there an income limit to making traditional contributions (even if you can’t write them off). Turns out no — there’s a minimum income, but no max.

Question 2 related to 401k rollovers. If you haven’t done it, your old institution send you a 1099-R. This, despite you’re just moving money around & not really pocketing anything. In the end, you should declare it, even if the taxable income is zero.)

The general interaction is interesting. With search, you’re query is basically running through every document out there on the Internet to see if there’s any electronic document that matches it. With Answers, you query isn’t running against documents, but people. You’re basically taping the common knowledge of a very large group of people.

The reason all this surprised me is that Answers also has the most bone-headed marketing I’ve seen in a long time. When it was first launched, there where a lot of high-profile people asking, basically, un-answerable questions. Hawkings asking how we can survive another 100 years. Bono asking how to wipe out poverty.

Look, if anyone actually knew the answers to those, it’s not like they’re just been sitting at their computer, waiting to be asked.

Questions like that are good for traditional messages boards. Or rather beer & coffee. For discussion & debate. There’s no one “right” answer or one “best” answer. (At least none we’re all going to agree to.)

On the other hand, Answer’s strength seems to be the ability to get answers about things that are common knowledge in certain communities. E.g., my questions amongst CPAs, Tax Advisers and so on. You can imagine lots of other groups — things your mom always seems to know about handling stains, what the kid around the corner always seems to know about electronics and so on.

To me, that seems to be the way to promote. A college student asking about to iron a shirt before a big date, being answered by a mom waiting for an answer about setting up her new printer, being answered by a 13 year old asking a algebra question the college student answers.

After all, Bono’s just a musician. What the fuck does he know?

It’s that little bit of extra effort that makes me love my mac.

Jimmy, now a Googler, pointed out to me that Google is reporting subscriber stats for RSS feeds.

For my Calvin & Hobbes RSS feed, there are 197,543 subscribers.

Wow.

Mom’s in town. Mom likes Deal or No Deal so I thought I’d take Mom to see a taping.

Before going further, I have to say that tvtix.com sucks. (And no, I’m not linking to those bastards.)

1) The start time they gave was wrong. (It was 9:30am, not 9:00am.)

2) They were supposed to give us a print-out of tickets. They didn’t. (The page was kind enough to take the email confirmation.)

3) They said parking was free & we’d receive a voucher. The page confirmed this wasn’t the case & we would have to pay for it.

4) You have to call the day before to confirm your reservation. The phone number in the email confirmation is wrong.

They suck suck suck. (There. I linked to them. Go see how awful the site is. Notice the year of the copyright in the footer. Extend suckage to general experience.)

There was a special kicker, however. The day before I received an email saying our 10:30am start time was moved to 9am. I found out later the 2:30pm start time was moved to 3:30pm.

Big changes. What caused such a ruckus?

That, my friend, is because our show, the 9am show turned out to be the special 100th episode celebration!!! (Sorry for the multiple exclamation points. The pre-show warm-up, teaching when to clap & cheer, getting the crowed excited, has left me with a pavlovian response to certain phrases. “One Million Dollars!!!”)

So there we sat.

From 9am to 2:30pm.

No breaks.

No water.

No food.

For five and half hours.

The psychology of people in the audience was interesting too. These people are crazy as well. Ranging from emphatic “No deals!”, “Keep it low” chants with the type of vigor generally reserved for European soccer games, to commentary on strategy. My favorite comment, from a nearby audience member, was “What? Why would he choose 12 now? That don’t make sense. That’s just stupid.”

Since a lot of people ask me for lucky numbers, and this is generally regarded as a top pick for numerologists, I thought I’d share some secrets from the Special Deal or No Deal 100th Episode Celebration!!!!! Obviously, spoilers ahead.

• All past winner/contestants are brought back.
• The chick in the front row of former contestants really does dance all the time. That wasn’t just an act for when the cameras where on. She is actually crazy.
• The previous contestant who won $10 (the lowest amount ever won) is given a second shot. He looks a bit like the big, burly, bearded guy from Grizzly Adams, but with a southern accent.
• The zero in $10 is replaced with his face, both on the board and in the case. Is this comedy or what?
• The model with the case containing $10 had to open in 9 times as she kept moving the case. Believe me, the taping of each iteration was even more exciting than the last.
• Grizzly Adams really does suck. He manages to systematically knock out all the high amounts pretty quick.
• Grizzly heads up to stage to hug the model a few times. Each hug went a bit too long. After each, I think we all felt a bit uncomfortable as well as a need to shower.
• Grizzly rushes the little room where the “The Banker” is. That was kinda entertaining. (Well, when it happened it was. The 45 minutes after the show of taping audience reactions over and over and over again was less so.)
• Grizzly likes Ozzy Osbourne so there’s a taped greeting from Ozzy.
• There’s are other taped greetings from Leno, Ceiline Deon, Regis and other people I don’t care about. (All for the special 100th celebration!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!)
• Grizzly gets it down to $25, $200, $400, and $750. I think he leaves with $400.
• Howie didn’t really spend a lot of time talking to people. Each time there was a break, he was gone. Off the stage. I felt a little bad for Grizzly standing up there alone.
• There’s a big special cake the models get to have. Apparently there is a cake fight. The audience was offered none. This disappointed Mom.

So there you have it.

The magic behind the machine.

Mom loved it (despite not getting any cake), so I’ll consider it a success. But man, this makes up for my the pain of my birth or something.

As someone who prefers to buy DVDs, I never had any urge to join Netflix.

Hearing people tell me how great it was, how much they loved Netflix, the excited “me too!” when finding out someone else is a subscriber all just went around me. I’d feel like a unmovable rock or fallen tree in the middle of a flowing river as the conversation shifts to what each person has in their queue (as it inevitably does). While they talked, I’d remain silent, wondering if this is what it was like to hear other people talk about their Tivo. Or what women think of men and the Three Stooges. There’s obviously something there, but what is it? It just isn’t making any sense.

“You don’t have to go the movie theater!” But I like going to movies.

“You can watch movies at home!” I already have HBO & Showtime.

“You don’t have to go to the video store!” I just buy DVDs when they come out on Amazon.

But I finally decided to give it a try. What pushed me over, was seeing they had a $6 plan. (Actually, it’s $5.99 but I have no desire to help their marketing department.) It’s nothing like the plan all my friends have. No endless wave of DVDs. No three movies at a time, so you always have one to watch. No, my plan, the six dollar plan, is much simpler: one movie only at a time and two movies per month. Max.

For me, that’s fine. For six bucks, I’ll try it. So I signed up, created my queue, and about a week ago, my very first movie arrived, Equilibrium. A few of my friends liked it. Loved it, in fact. Raved about the story, the action, the gun fights. “You like the Matrix”, they said. “You’ll love this.” Plus it has Christian Bale. All-in-all, a pretty good bet.

So I watched it last night.

And I hated it.

It was awful.

Imagine a movie merging all the classic books about a futurist dystopia : Brave New World, Fahrenheit 451, 1984.

Have an image?

Okay, you’ve seen the movie.

That’s all there is.

And if you know these books, all suspense completely goes out the window. You really don’t wonder if Christian Bale will have issue with his enforcement of the law, if you’ve read Fahrenheit 451. There’s no suspense in who “Father” is, if you know 1984. And the problem is, the very audience who goes to see this type of movie is the very audience who has read those kinds of books.

Now, it’s not that I have a problem with derivative works. A lot of people claim The Matrix is just Dark City re-done, but it’s without question, one my favorite movies of all times. The difference between the Matrix & Equilibrium, is the Matrix at least brings a few new things to the table.

Equilibrium has a few well-shot gun fights, but doesn’t really add anything new. In a way, it’s like viewing a traced copy or paint-by-numbers version of the Mona Lisa. If they’re going to be that similar, why not go with the real deal?

Now here’s the unexpected part: Despite hating my first movie, I’m now in love with Netflix.

Why?

Because previously, had I wanted to see this movie, I would have bought it. Meaning instead of being out $3, I’d be out $20. So apparently that’s the Netflix hook for me. Not seeing more movies. Not avoiding trips to the video store. It’s buying fewer crappy movies.

Thank you, Netflix.