I tried to add this as a comment to my previous post, but for some reason I couldn't, so:
So today I got my new Sky City Movies 2 for 1 pass from Orcon as promised. I was pleasantly surprised, given the previous experiences, I didn't think I'd hear from them again.
As to the service I've had 8 days in the last 3 weeks where it didn't break down at all. Last night however the wireless router was playing up and killed me off in the poker tournament I had worked so hard to qualify for. One hand I had pocket Kings and bet 2/3 of my chips, by the time the modem reconnected instead of doubling or trebling up they were gone. $300 I won't be seeing.
I did have 2 bad days last week, one with 79 disconnections and the other with 362 and I still don't have Caller ID, otherwise I would have to say it was pretty good.
Read MoreI use to buy the odd thing from http://www.shopcity.co.nz but have gone off there stuff, so I unsubscribed from their mailing list. But a week later I get another email of their specials, so I unsubscribe agan. Another week passes and they spam me again.
If you visit http://www.shopcity.co.nz don't subscribe as you will go into there spam list for ever.
Why do NZ company's break the law of the land, it just shows how dodgy they are.
http://www.shopcity.co.nz = spammer
I sent an email, and they replay with this.
Thankyou for your clear and concise email. If you tell me what email address theWhy are they making it so difficult.
letters are going to or your ShopCity handle we will happily disable your account.
update: Thanks for all the help, I went to their website and had to fill in a contact us, which I hope has sorted the problem.
The unsubscribe on their mailouts, doesn't work.
Read MoreWellington Tweetup starts tonight at 5pm, at the Malthouse http://www.themalthouse.co.nz
I have shouted a few free beers - Epic Pale Ale
More Info
If you go send me a tweet or upload a pic to flickr so I can see what I have missed out on.
Cheers
Luke
http://www.epicbeer.com
Read MoreShould you send personal emails on your corporate or business email account? What about handling business using your personal email account? Well, there isn't really a cut-and-dry, yes-or-no answer to... Read More
I've been fascinated by the concept known as crowd sourcing for some time, so last night I decided to start an experiment. I'm engaging the techniques of crowd sourcing to obtain a logo for Cloud Labs (one of my business interests). Right now the pro... (more in the full post)
Read MoreRead More
Microsoft have finished of the first version of the new Forefront Threat Management Gateway (TMG) which replaces the current ISA Server 2006 product.This initial version is titled 'Forefront Threat Management Gateway Small Business Edition'... (more in the full post)
Read MoreRead More
http://www.stuff.co.nz/4695048a28.html
Yesterday, I was lucky enough to be at this event in the Vector Arena, where TelstraClear took the opportunity to outline plans, recall success and show off some truly impressive technology.
Actually I was on one of the stands talking about IP Gateway and Next IP
I was also fortunate enough to see the preparations first-hand yesterday morning (I arrived early with the Events Managers, so got a back-stage tour), and spoke to some of the folks that put the show together. Really cool stuff, and a real chest-thumping show.
The hologram of Rove was beamed in live across the Trans-tasman link, and there was very little delay - Rove commented that the delay was doing wonders for comic timing. He showed a picture of that mornings Sydney Morning Herald, although the sport section had fallen out of it.... maybe into a large rugby cup....
So a first for TCL, but also a real-revving of the engines at the core of the company....
NB: I work at TelstraClear
- A
Read MoreNew York, Paris, London, Munich
Everyone’s talking about, Slot Music.
At least, it finally hit the NZ Herald today . Beaten by downloads affecting retail store sales, major record companies inlcuindg Sony BMG, Warner and EMI have decided to make their music more accessible by putting it on 1GB Micro SD Cards.
They plan to still put them into CD cases and say that with the extra space, they can include the liner, liner notes and other information. They will be DRM free and you can even play your music on your computer by using the Micro SD Card with a dongle. The music will be in MP3 format at 320kbps they say on the info site, which they say is very high quality music. Really?
The say that hundreds of millions of phones, Personal Computers and in the future lots of car entertainment sytsms will be able to listen to this music.
Well hello! Do you think we consumers are thick? Let’s go back to the future and do a different thing in the same way and charge a premieum for convenience.
So here’s the thing. Back in the day we had audio casettes and vinyl. Audio casettes were cheap because they weren’t going to last long, especially on cheap walkman units that stretched the tape if they got dropped, got hot or for lots of other reasons. Vinyl was great, you got big liner art and photos, quite often big inserts with lyrics, interviews and more photos.
Then came the CD, which they said had far greater sound and extra space to put more information on. In the future, they said, they could include music videos, interviews, games, photos and much more. Of course we had to pay more for this amazing technology but it was going to be worth it. In many cases the quality was superior, even the nice ambience of the needle was no longer there.
But the extras? Well they are the exception rather than the rule. In most cases we got less liner information, because of the size. Inserts happened sometimes but not very often and the additional material? Sometimes there was a hidden track, that was fun. Occassionally someone would add a music video and a few like BB King, put out a CD ROM with interviews, games and lots more. I still have mine, it was cool. Of course I don’t play it any more, but I felt I got my money’s worth and was chuffed that an old timer like The King could do something so modern.
So here’s my take on this. I have large quantities of CD’s and DVD’s pressed, not of my music unfortunately, but for car navigation. I also have large quantities of SD Cards duplicated, also for car navigation. Firstly, even at volume pricing SD Cards are much more expensive than CD’s or DVD’s.
Universal Music is going to release about 30 ‘Slots’ to start with, from their eLabs Digital Music Unit. Sounds more like a test to me, but anyway, I do applaud them for trying new technology. I think it’s a good idea to try new technology, given that CD’s are losing ground rapidly to downloads.
Will they add extra information to the SD Cards? Maybe for some of those first 30, but then it wil be the same old story, new media for a premium price (for the convenience) and nothing more. If they had listened to people like me 10 years ago (Netguide wouldn’t publish my opinion), they could have reinvented a format giving loads of extra value, far more than people could afford to download and created a whole new generation of fans and collectors. But no, they just wanted to increase cash flow and profit. After all, they knew far better than we consumers, what was good for us.
In my humble opinion, they created the monster we have today where people download and share music for free. And it is a monster friends, because what is happening is people are downloading music for free and the poor songwriters and performers are getting ripped off. Sure there are big bands making truckloads of money for themselves and their promotors, but they are the minority. Most of the people in your favorite bands have to work a day job in order to be able to write and perform music at night. This might not be the case if they got fair remuneration for their work.
I ask you this. Do you work for free? Do you expect to go to work and build widgets or whatever you do and expect other people to reproduce them for peanuts and give them to your mates? Will you accept a 90% reduction in your income because people have found a way to clone your products? I didn’t think so.
Anyway, after that minor digression, this is a storm in a slot. Sure they will make some of these. Then they will cry foul when people copy them (if they can be bothered). They will weep when these cards don’t get sold, except on eBay, Craig’s List or Trade Me after people have copied the music onto their computers and shared them with their mates.
I love new technology, but when I can go to iTunes and for a couple of dollars, buy the only song as a track that I like (because I am happy for the band to make some money from it), why would I buy a little SD Card that I will probably lose.
In my humble opinion, the music industry got this one wrong. Can they redeem it? Only if they figure a way to genuinely add value. They want to offer the music on iGB SD Cards. (Interesting that I struggle to even buy 1GB SD Cards anymore.) Why not do something smart and offer us real value. Do what you should have done years ago and you might find a couple of years of legs in this yet. Use 4GB cards. Load it with the music, the live performance video, the interviews, the music video, lyric sheets (the mechanical rights people can still get a share) and a personal spoken message from the band or artist. You could sell that for a premium and create collectors items that people will want to keep.
Of course when real broadband arrives, people are no longer going to buy music in hard copy. I’m sorry but they won’t. Why would you. The other day I sat down in front of YouTube an had a great afternoon watching videos and listening to music of my favourite bands of the past and the present. All it cost me was a bit of internet access (and I do have ADSL 2 from Orcon so speed wasn’t an issue.
I think the future will be:
New York, Paris, London, Munich, Nobody’s talking about Slot Music.
Read More
No comments:
Post a Comment