Its a fine like between security and stupidity, a line that seems to get crossed quite regularly these days.  I know you all have heard about the TSA and its determination to fondle their way into a secure airport!  Yea, thats a little extreme, but it isn’t that far off the truth.  You just cant make invasive pat downs effective against the types of threats we all face now.  Long gone is the idea that a gunman or knife wielding manic is going to get very far on a plane…there are just too many people out there who will assume the worst and take them out.  These days its explosives we need to be hyper alert for, and as with guns, its better to identify the INDIVIDUAL likely to try such an attack, than to try and find them by fumbling around with said suspects genitalia.

Mike Thinks News 352 Don’t junk my Touch…or something like that TSA

We all have dreams, or at least goals that we know are probably not going to be totally realized. Its one of the hallmarks for a successful person, that they set goals that others will tell you are impossible to reach. These goals are the driving force behind many of the most exciting and innovative developments in human history. Sure, I don’t think that Benjamin Franklin set a goal to create a worldwide information superhighway, but he did manage some pretty impressive stuff. But when the RIAA and MPAA set goals that while seeming unobtainable, are still at the very least totally beyond reprehensible, even if only 10% is realized, this is where you must draw the line. I just can’t see how any sane human would ask for the government to put less resources to fight terrorism, so they can be sure the new Gaga album sells a few extra copies…but they are asking just that.
.

Sponsor: Hold your meetings online for just $49 a month Try GoToMeeting free.

.
Also this week, how Twitter has built an empire 140 characters at a time, encouraging developers to help it on its way, only to cast them asside when it get big enough to do without them. Surprising, no, but it sure does feel like a load of crap. And as always, we have this week in history, and news of the What the Fudge variety.

Do you remember when we did the story a few years ago on LifeLock?  Ya, know the one where the owner who likes to showboat around with his Social Security number on a truck billboard.  All the while claiming how safe he is because that may be his real Social Security number, but he is protected by LifeLock.   Recall how the wheels started to come off when he himself was the victim of identity theft, not by some high profile, high tech super criminal, but by some ordinary schmoe, who took him for a $500 credit card?  Well, it sometimes takes a while, but the Federal Trade commission has decided that maybe theres less truthiness in the adds than there should be.
.
BLOCKBUSTER Total Access click to activate coupon for $10 off your first month.
.

Also this week, we have a story that we really aren’t supposed to talk about.  You see, Apple has forbidden anyone  who creates apps for the Apple App Store from talking about the Apple App Store…or even commenting on the very agreement that forbits them from taking about the agreement…are you dizzy yet?

All that and This week in history, and the story you just cant afford to miss if you have a child in school, on Mike Thinks News

Its no secret that time marches on, every day we are reminded about how things change.  Some days these changes are small, while others have magnitude that may cause you to question the very foundation of your day to day beliefs.  Sue time works out well for most of our everyday common place experiences, but have you ever stopped to wonder why time is…or more precisely, why time is a one way street?  Physicists do, because in spite of all the equations and theories, nothing seems to explain why why it is that a fire can consume a piece of paper, but it never happens in the reverse.

.

((our sponsor))
GotoMeeting Hold your meetings online for just $49/mo. Try GoToMeeting FREE for 30 days.

.

Also this week, is your next HDTV going to cost a lot more because of a shortage of parts?  Reports are coming in that this is indeed the case, but its not just your high definition television, but also your computer monitors and to a lesser extent, your cell phone.  I also take a look at the poisoning of America…and I’m not talking figuratively, I am speaking about a delibrate and calculated move by the federal government to take an active role in poisoning thousands of Americans, sure if was 90 years ago, but still.

All that and more, on this weeks Mike Thinks News

Couples Retreat, writeup to follow

This week broke a few very interesting stories.  First we have Apple taking the fight against all things titillating and taking the now familiar step of banishing apps from the iTunes store aka super Jobs nirvana land.  Seems that someone had the nerve to make apps that had cleavage and bare chested men and such…who would have thought.  Good news is that Apple has got the mothership servers on full alert and are wiping out vast swaths of applications.  The bad news is, as usual, no one is exactly sure whats ok and what isn’t.  But come on, when your app can be rejected because its icon doesn’t meet the “aesthetic standards” of Apple, what do you expect?

.

((our sponsor))
GotoMeeting Hold your meetings online for just $49/mo. Try GoToMeeting FREE for 30 days.

.

But our main stories this week have nothing to do with Apple, no this week I take a peep at just what those school administrators in Pennsylvania call loss mitigation.  More specifically, why someone or more likely (if not unbelievably) several someones though it was ok to turn on the web cameras of laptops given to children without then knowing about it, while it was in child’s home, or more specifically bedroom.  Now so far its not as bad as that sounds, but its not much better.  The level of DUH this one required is hard to comprehend

Also a story this week about all the new 3d Televisions.  Apparently its not all a good thing, as some researchers believe that watching too much 3d may make a documented issue with watching 3d images on a screen called Binocular Dysphoria, permanent or at least last long enough to be a real issue.  I don’t know what you consider a real issue, but since a few million of these people are going to be driving within minutes of watching 3d stuff, I’d say its just a little more important.

Call the voicemail hotline (347)Bug-Mike    (347)284-6453

–Mike James

How many of you have owned your own business?  Even if you haven’t I’ll bet every single one of you have hear the phrase, “the customer is always right.”  This is of course not the literal truth, but more of an axiom for how you want your customers to feel.  In business, it’s imperative that your customers be at the very center of each an every decision you make.  When you make a product or service, the end goal is to have people pay for it, be happy with it, and think of you again the next time you want to sell them something.  In today’s world of instant results, and today’s bottom line is the only one that matters, it seems many companies have forgotten this all important rule.  They may think they “have to” protect their bottom line for the next fiscal quarter, but by taking short sighted actions today, they all but assure that there will be less money later.  Two companies have made it clear they have lost the concept that made them a success in the past, EA and Ubisoft.  Some of you may be thinking that it can’t be true, how can two of the biggest game publishers in the world be so wrong?  I can’t say how it happened for sure, I can only speculate that poor ineffectual management at the highest levels must be at the root.  A company evolves a type of feel, or culture that directly reflects upon the leadership at the top.  Good companies foster a balance between the needs to perform today and invest in tomorrow, while bad ones sell their souls grasping at the elusive last few percent of profits, apparently ignorant to what it means to the customer, and the companies future sales.

Earlier this year EA announced that they would be ending support for online play for many of their games, most shockingly EA Madden 2009.  Now, sure we just finished the 2010 season, so 2009 is about a year and a half old, but its also a game you could have purchased just a few months ago, because it was still on many store shelves (and likely still is being sold some places).  So what is EA telling us, well its clear they are trying to say “Please buy madden 2010″, the problem is what they are really saying to me is, “we got your money for that game, now give is more you moron.”  You see, they have just taken the value away from every single one of their titles, even brand new ones.  If I know that when I but an EA game the clock starts ticking, and in just a year or so I have a new drink coaster, well, that doesn’t encourage me to but your games, IT MAKES ME NOT WANT TO BUY THEM.  Now before you all start shooting out a few thousand emails about how you can still play the games, just not online, let me assure you I know that, but that is not the issue here, there issue is one of perceived value, and lost features.   When I make a decision to purchase a game, many things go into the is it worth the money equation, and the last thing you want me to be thinking about is how the company that makes the game screwed me over last year, and  that some of the game features may be broken in the near future.  I don’t expect EA to keep running servers indefinitely forever, but to shutter them so soon is a clear money grab that is destined to backfire.  The lost sales for the current years games long tail of Madden 2010, and next years Madden 2011 will most certainly exceed the cost associated with maintaining a few servers to keep customers happy.

Then we have Ubisoft, a company well known in the gaming community for poor management decisions when it comes to DRM.  The uproar caused by some of the choices they made several years ago actually seemed to work, as they dropped use of one of the most poorly implemented pieces of DRM code in the history of bad ideas.  One that destroyed DVD drives, made systems unstable, and was so important to them that they actually didn’t take it off when you uninstalled the game they were allegedly protecting.  So they learned their lesson right?  Sadly no.  UBI has announced that all of their future titles, even those that are 100% single player, will include a special form of DRM that will actually cause the game to crash (on purpose) if your computers connection to the internet or their servers is interrupted for any reason.  You lose any unsaved progress, and are sent to the “we think you stole our game” corner until you fix the connection issue.  Now online activation is problematic at best, because what happens when the authentication servers that bless you with permission to play the game you paid for are no longer running?  But to require a constant unwavering internet connection to play a single player game is so anti-consumer its hard to fathom.  If you are worried about lost sales due to piracy, you need to increase the number of people who want to pay you for your product, not reduce that number.  I can guaranty that you will lose a big chunk of the very people you want, the ones that pay to play your game, the moment they lose progress in a game because of a momentary hiccup in their internet connectivity, or your servers.  Every internet connection has minor hiccups now and again, it may not happen every hour, but it happens, and to call me a thief as soon as I commit the unbelievably heinous act of allowing my internet connection to laps  for a few seconds it unacceptable, and I will not stand for it.  Piracy is out there, and no matter what you do, someone is going to play your game without paying for it, but I can’t imagine why you want to take the people who wanted to pay for your game, and drive them to find a way to “fix” what you broke so they don’t have the game stop working all the time is the ultimate stupid idea.  One of two things is going to happen, either they cant find a way to get the game to work properly, so they never but another of your products, or they find a way to “fix” the game, and CONGRADULATIONS!!! You have just taught a paying customer how to pirate your game…good job UBI.

–Mike

I’m back from Vegas and the BWE/NME…with less MonEy…what are the odds!  Had a great time and really enjoyed the party put on by our friends over at Blubrry.  Theres just something about Vegas that makes you want to go back, plus, this year they didn’t have the show in August, but rather mid October.  For those that don’t know why it matters, thats a difference of about 30 degrees!  Got some great news stories this week,

.

GotoMeeting Hold your meetings online for just $49/mo. Try GoToMeeting FREE for 30 days.

.

including:

Neked in your kitchen

The current DUH level is Orange

Yong folks dragged kicking and screaming onto twitter

Is a Space Time rift damaging the Hadron Collider?

Toyota makes the bone headed move of the week…month…perhaps year