9 posts tagged “consumer angst”

I bought a Bowflex Nautilus set of adjustable dumbbells (yes, it’s ironic to feel idiotic about buying dumbbells), stand, and weight bench.  I got them through the miracle of Amazon.com where I got the stand for free ($135 off), the other units at a discount, an extra 25% discount on everything because of an AMEX wish certificate, and nearly-free overnight shipping with Saturday delivery ($15) despite it all weighing about 200 pounds.  The only problem is that Bowflex Nautilus has no quality control — I’m guessing the just take the stuff off pallets from China and send them out.  Who cares that my weight stand has two left hand units (one thoughtfully labeled L for left and the other labeled R for right, despite their being identical).  As a result, I can’t finish assembling it.  DOH!

So, I start to put together the weight bench and find that inside one of the parts is broken and they just closed it up and shipped it anyway.  Double DOH!  Bowflex/Nautlius doesn’t answer their phones on weekends (when their customers might be home and need help), so I’ll have to wait until Tuesday to find out what they propose to do.  I don’t really want to pay to ship back 100 lbs of their defective product, so I guess we’ll see.  I’ll keep you posted.

My trusty iPod Nano (generation 1) served me pretty well.  I didn’t use it every day, but I did use it extensively on trips and in the car occasionally.  Yes, I did have to swaddle it in thick heavy plastic to protect its scratchable body and face.  Yes, I did have to use it with the backlight turned off in order to get more than 1/2 the promised battery life.  But, as my first iPod, it certainly was cool.  Now, it is dead.  When we got back from Hong Kong, I turned it on, and the display was all messed up.  The bottom half of the screen was frozen in a pattern that looked like a UPC code, and the right upped quadrant was blank.  I hadn’t done anything to it, but i figured that somehow the screen must have been broken (which seemed unlikely given its protective plastic suit that it wears all the time).  Well, I went off to class, and when I got back to my desk, the battery had gone dead.  I tried to charge it.  Nothing.  OK, not exactly nothing — a high pitched squeal.  It could have been the sound of a tiny whirring hard drive, except the Nano doesn’t have a disk drive.  I have no idea what it is.  It doesn’t charge.  It doesn’t reset.  It doesn’t do anything but sit in darkness or squeal when plugged in.  I guess I’ll take it by the local Apple store and see if they’ll do anything for me, but I don’t hold out much hope since they don’t even know where to lookup the meaning of “customer service”.  Oh yes, and it’s conveniently out of warranty.  Silly me, my wife is getting me a new Nano for Christmas and I got myself a matchbox-sized new Shuffle to work out with, so I’m hooked on iCrack.  R.I.P.  iPod Nano #1.  Long live iPod Nano #2 (or at least more than two months past its warranty running out).

I tried to go by my local bank, TrustOne Bank, to get some crisp currency for my godson’s present.  I dropped by just after 3 p.m. yesterday and found them locked up tight.  On the door was a sign, letting us customers know that they would be closing at 2 p.m.  Why?  Don’t they think their customers might need to transact some business before the long holiday weekend?  Maybe they should have even stayed open late?  Nope.  Yet another business that seems to place the convenience of their staff above the convenience of their customers.

Well, they’ve made me think about why I even need a local bank account if my local branch isn’t going to be open when I need them.  Maybe I don’t need them at all.

I figured out how to use the Semacode reader on the N80 to actually take a barcode and turn it into a URL that launches automatically in my browser.  COOL!  The trick seems ironically seems to be to not get so close that the barcode fills the camera viewfinder — it needs to take up only about 5-10% of the screen to work — more and it doesn’t work at all.
OK, now for the bad news.  My N80 and Symbian 60 v3 security force me to tell the system each time that it’s OK for the Semacode app to use the phone’s camera.  It would be very nice if I could answer that question once and have it remembered (maybe in a future firmware update).  Also, the decoding of the barcode is a little slow (waiting even 5 seconds or so seems like a long time when you’re just staring at your phone).  Finally, it can only launch the standard N80 WAP browser and not the super-cool N80 S60 HTML browser (that’s got some features even Firefox doesn’t have).  Again, hopefully this will come in a future firmware update.

I’m still really liking my new Nokia N80.

The forums are all abuzz about its short battery life.  Yes, this is a problem, but hasn’t been too much of an issue for me since I told it to stop looking for a Japanese 3G network in Memphis (there ain’t one, so quit looking), stop looking for a WiFi network when I don’t need one (hey, if I don’t need a WiFi network, I don’t need to know where one is), and stop using so much power when it does connect to a WiFi network (since I’m usually in a place with great WiFi coverage or no WiFi coverage).  Luckily, all three of these settings are easily accessible, and my battery life is about par for most cellphones.  True, I can drain it fast using all of the crazy non-phone functionality, but I can’t run my dedicated digital camera or my iPod all day on either of their batteries either.

What do I like about it?  Well, there’s all sorts of strange and cool functionality out there, if one is willing to download new applications for the phone.  I’m pretty adventurous, but knowing that the Official Nokia Service Centre for my Singaporean Nokia N80 is halway around the world, I don’t want to do anything too foolhardy.  Nonetheless, here’s what I’ve been adding and doing.

I downloaded and installed the Nokia podcasting application.  It lets you download podcasts when you’re on a WiFi network (you could do it on a non-WiFi network, but it would be slooow and expensive on my T-Mobile plan, so that’s not happening for me) and listen to it later via the phone’s music player application.  It works pretty well, though I was stumped for a while.  My favorite podcast from Barenaked Ladies (one-click subscription from iTunes) is apparently in some variant of the m4a format that my podcast application will download, but the music player won’t play.  I wonder whether it’s because they often use pictures embedded in their podcasts.  More conventional podcasts seem to download and play fine, so it’s something about BNL’s that’s strange.

I thought about downloading a new music player to see if that would help.  There’s an open source  music player called OggPlay currently in beta that works on Symbian Series 60 V3 phones (of which the Nokia N80 is one) and looks very promising.  However, after reading in the Readme notes that on some versions of the N80 firmware that the beta software won’t uninstall, I got cold feet and decided not to install it.  My other music is playing fine, and I’m not that desperate to hear the BNL podcast on my phone.

On the topic of strange software (at least for someone sitting nowhere near New York) is Nokia’s Parkcast software.  Nokia has put up WiFi networks in several NYC parks to highlight the value of having WiFi capability on one’s phone.  There is also a Parkcast application that allows you to listen to NYC CBS radio stations (NY Mets games on WFAN) and read the New York Times.  Yes, it isn’t very practical for me, but if I ever want a dose of NYC sports talk radio, it’s on my cell phone.

On the much more practical side is an application called Soonr that allows me to access files on my home PC via my mobile phone.  Soonr has a desktop component that runs on your home PC and lets you designate which files you want to make accessible to others via the web.  Phone users can open their web browser and access shared files from a Soonr PC, giving them access to those files from anywhere in the world.  This may not make immediate sense to many phone owners, but when you have a Nokia N80 that can read Microsoft Word, Excel, and Powerpoint documents, Adobe PDF files*, music files, video files, and photographs, Soonr becomes much more compelling.

In terms of cool, the neatest thing I’ve installed lately is Orb.  Orb also has a desktop component that lets you control the TV card on a PC and stream the video to any phone worldwide.  With the N80’s WiFi capabilities, the quality of the video is quite watchable and surprisingly good.  In fact, the download speed of my phone on a WiFi network exceeds the upload speed on my PC, so my home network speed is the gating factor.  You can access live video (changing channels on your PC) as well as videos that you’ve recorded using Windows Media Center.  This is very nice for when we travel to Japan and in an insomniac moment in the middle of the night want to watch something other than Larry King Live.

Agile Messenger for Nokia Series 60 V3 is a cool instant messaging application that allows me to talk to friends on MSN, Yahoo, AOL, and Google instant messaging all from within a single program.  It’s currently in Beta, which as far as I can tell makes it free to use now; however, when it becomes a finished product, Agile charges $30 per year.  I don’t IM all that much, but I might still spend the money because when I need it, I might really need it right then.

I downloaded a strange little application called S60SpotOn which allows me to turn on either the backlight or the camera flash of my phone indefinitely (or until the phone battery dies).  I don’t know that I’ll need to use my mobile phone as a flashlight much,but it’s free so the price is right.  Also, it was very useful in correctly positioning my Invisible Shield.  For those of you who followed my continuing saga with the Shieldzone people to get an Invisible Shield for the Nokia N80 that actually fits a Nokia N80, I finally succeeded.  The product is good, and they’ve got one conscientious and dedicated customer rep (Darryl), but the rest of their staff seems pretty clueless (I received three different shipments of Invisible Shields, none of which fit).  After the first two were sent and returned, they admitted that the size was wrong, redesigned it, and promptly shipped me yet another of the old (wrong size) ones via UPS 2-Day Air.  Finally Darryl took things upon himself and sent me the correct one.  It’s very cool, durable, and looks great.  After four shipments, I think they lost money on my $9.95 sale, but at least their N80 product now works (and I hope they’ve destroyed the old ones and aren’t continuing to ship them).  Their iPod products are probably awesome and fit correctly (since they have iPods), but since they don’t own all the different phones they sell shields for, they’re in the dark about exact sizing about newer or more difficult-to-find phones (the N80 having been both).

I’ve also installed then Mobipocket E-Book reader for my N80.   Mobipocket is a subsidiary of Amazon.  Given the choice between watching TV or reading books on the N80 screen, the former is much more attractive than the other.  However, Mobipocket has software to allow me to create my own E-books, so this might be a good way of packaging my travel research for easy mobile access.

Finally, there’s a version of Python for the Nokia N80 and other Series 60 V3 phones.  However, since I don’t have the time to mess with it right now, I haven’t installed it yet.

One disappointment is in the lack of themes for the N80.  There’s a very simple white theme for Symbian Series 60 phones, but it doesn’t work on V3 phones, so my N80 is out of luck.  And I’m too lazy to investigate theme writing.

Oh yes, and I still am nowhere on barcodes — Semapedia.org didn’t work on my N80 either.

The United States is safer now than it was before the Sept. 11 attacks, but must not relent in fighting terrorism in Iraq and elsewhere, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said Sunday.

The area where the threat of terrorism most directly intersects with my personal activities is in air travel. Are we safer than before 9/11? I think we are only marginally safer.

The three biggest factors making air travel safer have been reinforced cockpit doors, allowing pilots to carry firearms, and simply the post 9/11 change in attitude about hijackings. Before 9/11, the standard procedure for passengers during hijackings was to stay calm, submit to the hijackers’ demands, and eventually be freed. After 9/11, passengers and crew know that terrorists place no value on passenger lives and that passenger and crew survival depends on their ability to recapture control of the plane. I am fully confident that myself and my fellow passengers would do everything in their capability to make that happen, given the opportunity.

I’m not sure whether the air marshal program has made travel much safer because I have seen no data on what percentage of planes are covered now vs. before. In general, I think air marshals are a good thing (just as I seeing police on a subway car also make me feel safer), but I remain skeptical that the coverage is really what it needs to be.

OK, what about airport security? It remains the great placebo of safety. Is our government doing all it can to scan the cargo that rides along on planes along with us? NO. I’m even skeptical about the bags on the plane. The airlines and TSA say that they make sure the owner of each checked bag boards the plane, but I know that bags that are lost/delayed get put on later flights that their owners aren’t riding on. Isn’t that a problem?

Is our government doing all it can to put the best people at airport checkpoints and pay them what professionals with the lives of thousands of people in their hands should be paid? NO. Their uniforms are nicer and they seem somewhat more diligent than they did pre-9/11, but they still don’t fill me with confidence; I’m also not sure they’re getting paid much more than the person working the counter at the bagel place near Gate 12 (who only has cream cheese, not passenger lives, on his hands).
We scan shoes because a terrorist tried to put a bomb in his shoe. We confiscate bottled water, lip gloss, and liquid mascara because a terrorist tried to make a bomb from these materials. Do I feel safer because of this checkpoint voodoo? NO, who are they kidding? Do you? My mother thinks these procedures make air travel safer, but she never flies!

We’re still allowed to carry on computers, iPods, mobile phones, and PSPs and there’s no doubt in my mind that some terrorist could shove explosives up his/her ass and detonate themselves with any of those electronics (or a shaver, toothbrush, etc.) Isn’t it just a matter of time until this scenario is attempted and law-abiding passengers are subjected to body cavity searches and no electronics onboard? If/when that happens, air travel would grind to a halt (I know that my wife and I wouldn’t be flying 100K miles a year anymore) until the government acknowledges that IT’S THE PEOPLE, STUPID!

It’s odd that I would feel MUCH safer flying El Al or British Airways than any of the American carriers. I’ve never flown El Al, but they’ve got it right. Profile the hell out of flyers. Put smart people in charge of screening passengers and identifying the bad guys and pay them like the professionals they are. Question each flyer until you’re damn sure that they’re safe to put on the plane, even if it means their missing their scheduled flight. When I flew out of London (pre-9/11), the BA people questioned me thoroughly. They even made me, a law-abiding passenger and US native/citizen feel nervous with the thoroughness of their questioning.

THIS MAKES ME FEEL SAFER. IT’S THE PEOPLE, STUPID! If you let bad people on planes, they will ALWAYS be able to find some way to make themselves a threat, no matter what crazy combination of voodoo prohibitions/confiscations you put in place. OK, maybe if you took the RyanAir approach and made people fly naked things would be safe, but that’s not going to happen anytime soon.

Air travel is still dangerous as long as we rely on voodoo placebo screening and avoid facing the facts of what changes it’s going to take to make air travel safe. Face it, American air carriers (and international flights to the US) are now almost as big if not a bigger target than El Al flights; until our government gets that through its collective head and does what is necessary, the rest of this stuff is just play acting for people who don’t have the requisite critical thinking skills to see through it.

Screen the cargo and hire/train top quality people to work airport security. Until then, I guess I’m going to have to vote Democrat. It’s not that I have much more trust in them, but they can’t do much worse than the current folks in charge.

… [inspired on MSNBC’s Countdown with Keith Olbermann’s nightly feature “Worst person in the world”].

As you may remember from our previous episode, I made the unfortunate decision to purchase an Invisible Shield for my Nokia N80, a super-durable plastic sheet that would protect the screen of my wonderful new cell phone.

I ordered it on July 28th and waited patiently for it to arrive via US Mail.  It arrived, but the shield they sent me was too small to fully cover my N80’s screen.  DOH!  After having customer service person #1 doubt me and grudglingly agree to send out another one, I waited another week and… that one was the same size — too small.  Double Doh!
I contacted them again, and got a very helpful sounding customer service person, Darryl, who took down the dimensions of my N80 screen (that the previous customer service person didn’t seem interested in) and told me that they would send me one that would fit (unlike the first two).  Even more hopefully, I received an e-mail telling me that I was not alone in telling them that the Invisible Shield for the N80 wasn’t the right size.

Bruce,

I just wanted to let you know I received your email and the pictures.  I
have passed everything on to one of our designers.

Ironically we received an email with pictures from another customer
yesterday out of the blue with the exact same complaint about the Nokia N80.

We are working on it as fast as possible.  I will keep you updated as to our
progress.

Thank you for your patience and understanding.

All the best,

Darryl W.
ShieldZone Corp.

OK, now things were on track, and I would finally have my N80’s protective shield (crucial since I had almost unbelievably managed to keep it unscratched by keys/coins for over a month).  When I got home today, I got my new UPS-delivered Invisible Shield and rushed to install it — when I opened the package, I found… a shield the same size as the one I had been shipped twice before (triple DOH!).  This one might have been an eensy bit wider than the previous one (unfortunately it needed to be 2 full millimeters wider) and the height might actually have been an eensy bit shorter than the previous one (unfortunately, it needed to be 2 full millimeters taller).

I bought this based on Rich’s strong recommendation of their iPod product (which may be a fine product — they probably have iPods at their company to measure them against to make sure their designs are correct).  But when you’re selling mobile phone shields for phones you have never really seen in person (like the N80 which wasn’t even available in the US when I ordered the shield originally), getting the size right is really hard and these guys aren’t doing it (certainly not when it comes to the N80).

And, as Keith Olbermann would say in his booming newscaster voice… “making Invisible Shield… today’s WORST company in the world!”

I loaded the software on my phone, ran it, lined up the barcode in my viewfinder, and… nothing.

I got a variety of errors, usually involving being unable to interpret the barcode and other times just freezing for long periods of time until I restarted the phone.  I tried shooting the barcode with my phone vertically, horizontally, and even upside down, but none worked.  Regular or macro?  Nope.

A post on one of the forums says that the reason why the Nokia N93 is the only one with barcode software built in is the advanced optics of its camera.  That may be true, but it makes no sense — barcode readers are common on Japanese cell phones, most of which do NOT have Carl Zeiss lenses and fancy optics.

An article from Yomiuri Online quotes a survey of 1741 Japanese on their attitudes towards eating US beef.

“Asked whether they want to eat U.S. beef, nearly 90 percent of respondents had negative views, with 45 percent of the respondents saying they did not want to eat it, and 43 percent saying they would like to decide after more consideration. Only 10 percent of the respondents said they wanted to eat U.S. beef.”

At our favorite Japanese fast-food beef haunt, Matsuya, they’ve been serving Australian and Japanese domestic beef since the ban on US beef imports.  Prior to the import ban, US beef was a staple on the Matsuya menu.  I didn’t like the Australian beef I had at Matsuya (too fatty, though that could have just been a particular batch), but the Japanese beef (which is priced at a premium) was excellent.

US beef exporters are going to have a tough time breaking back into the Japanese market, but if the US beef industry were more responsive to customers’ concerns about food safety and less reliant on lobbying trade groups, they might have made a lot more money in the future.