Aug 10, 2011 - By danseitz
Yes, the stock market is currently tanking thanks to political problems; yes, people are worried about a double-dip recession; yes, rioting in London is making people think the end times are upon us. But Apple is still the most valuable company in the world.
Not that it was unaffected: its stock price was dinged 1.46% amid the trading chaos. But everybody else, in every sector, got dinged worse, sometimes much worse.
This is pretty much contrary to what everyone insisted would happen. Apple was a luxury supplier. Apple didn’t provide necessities. Apple was going to fall and fall hard if the economy ever took a turn for the worse, and all the Chicken Littles (and PC fans) would be justified in insisting it was overvalued. Instead it’s stayed fairly consistent while everything else burns.
Consider what this means. Apple is bigger than food suppliers, bigger than oil suppliers, bigger than companies that turn out guns by the bushel. And they got that way not by selling what people need, but selling people what they want.
There isn’t a better, if perhaps a little disturbing, argument for Apple being the most important company of our time. Because, let’s face it, if this won’t ding their stock seriously, nothing will.
Aug 08, 2011 - By danseitz
The Dow dropped below 11,000 for the first time since November 2010, capping off two weeks where the market lost 15% of its value.
The reason? Due to gridlock in Washington, the United States’ credit rating has dropped from the best possible rating, AAA, to the second best, AA. And it might keep dropping: unless Washington can demonstrate an ability to get past political differences and work on reasonable compromises, another downgrade may be possible within two years.
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Apr 18, 2011 - By danseitz
Being a gadget nerd, I own a lot of computers, and, owning a lot of computers, I experience something breaking on them on a fairly regular basis. Even so, every time something does break, it’s a frustrating reminder of just what a rip-off the brick-and-mortar stores that want us to buy gadgets from them actually are.
In this case, the obscene prices they’re demanding for a power source.
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Apr 15, 2011 - By danseitz
A lot of companies have put out tablets, and the critical response has been, almost universally, blah at best, unless you’re the Dell Inspiron Duo, which was driven off of most gadget sits with torches and pitchforks.
Research In Motion recently put the Blackberry PlayBook up for review, and, well, the response was not what we call “enthusiastic”. Or even “friendly.”
According to the CEO of RIM, though, that’s because critics don’t understand the desire of Blackberry users for a crippled product.
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Apr 14, 2011 - By danseitz
If there’s one thing that’s annoying about having two major phone OSes in the marketplace, it’s that nobody cares about the small fry like Windows. Granted, Windows Mobile has a history of failure, clunkiness, and general pain, but it’s only got so much to work with.
Anyway, Windows Phone users are about to get a function almost as crucial as air to most people: Skype. And this after all that talk about it never happening!
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Apr 14, 2011 - By danseitz
Remember all that hype about Android being this incredible open-source platform that everybody forgot about once it was revealed that meant “only kinda open, and definitely not to the idiots we sell products to?”
Turns out Sony missed that memo: in fact, they’ve put up very clear and concise instructions on how to unlock the bootloader on select Sony phones and start modifying it to your exact specifications. They just disclaim any of the mortal harm that will almost certainly befall you if you do so.
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Apr 13, 2011 - By danseitz
One of the problems of living in Scunthorpe-on-Cribbage or wherever the heck the English keep their version of hicks is that England, being a socialist nightmare, has British Telecom, a monopoly that acts all hostile towards competition and stuff, not like our own American companies, especially that one that was never, ever a monopoly, AT&T. It makes getting decent Internet service a spot of bother (that’s British for “enormous pain in the ass”).
Fortunately, a ruling has been handed down to end this. Or, well, maybe not. Let’s have some schadenfreude!
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Apr 13, 2011 - By danseitz
We’re not generally fans of your cell phone handing out tidbits like your GPS location like they’re candy, because it offers the potential to be abused and quite frankly, most people who want that information don’t need it. Big corporations shouldn’t be able to track your movement any more than the government should.
Unless it means that YouTube video on my phone will stream more smoothly. Oooooh, kitties!
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