On Wednesday night, I had a long discussion with my friends about prioritizing life’s activities. Even when I get up early and aim to be productive all day, I find myself wondering at times if I really accomplished anything by the time I head back to bed. There are certain things I feel I should be doing, and I often realize, much to my own frustration, that many of these “priorities” are neglected until future dates. I put off paying a bill until the night before it’s due. I forget to call a friend before they fly off to Japan. I ignore my dog’s repeated requests for a walk until she gives up and falls asleep on the couch. [Read more...]
Mar
24
Clarifications
It’s always a bad idea to go grocery shopping on an empty stomach. The last time I did, I ended up with a grocery bill $50 higher than usual and wound up throwing out several meals’worth of food a few weeks later when it all spoiled. Even if I am in desperate need of food, I always make a point of eating a good meal before stepping into Safeway. [Read more...]
Mar
22
Product Planning Failure
This weekend, my younger brother bought a brand new netbook for work. It’s an amazing little machine. It has wi-fi, a great processor, more RAM than most desktops I’ve worked with, and comes pre-loaded with not one but two operating systems (Windows plus an ultra-light Internet-only platform). The one thing it doesn’t have is a CD drive … which is fine, because it boasts ultra-fast wi-fi and 3 external USB ports. [Read more...]
Mar
19
Ten Reasons eReaders Will Never Replace Paper Books
Don’t get me wrong, I absolutely love my eReader. It holds almost 200 books so far (of which I’ve read maybe 20) and has space for several hundred more without even adding external media! It’s truly a revolutionary device, but I would never go so far as to swear off my old-fashioned printed books. Call it nostalgia, call it stubbornness, call it whatever you want – I’ll never give up on the thick tomes that weight down that shelf in the corner of my room. They mean more to me than just their storied pages. [Read more...]
Mar
17
Me, Too!
When I first started consulting, my boss talked a lot about “ante in” product offerings. These are the kinds of things you are required to offer your customers in order to be taken seriously in the market. With iPod and Zune leading the market, anyone else who wants to sell and MP3 player needs to offer a rechargeable battery, a color screen, and basic in-player playlist control. If these are the only features they offer, though, it’s not enough. These are the features we expect them to offer, so we’ll gloss over that description to seek out what truly makes the new product purchase-worthy. [Read more...]
Mar
15
The Accidental Consultant
A couple of summers ago, I found myself in the small office of a tech start-up asking questions about my ambitions as a consultant. I had finished business school almost a year before, but my age still betrayed my actual skills as a marketer and started these kinds of questions with just about everyone I met. ”Why marketing?” ”Why consulting?” ”Why start-ups?” [Read more...]
