What is it with Western Union? Their service is used by almost every scammer, be it on eBay, spam emails, and now, nannying sites. It seems that they could do us all a favour and tighten up on their tracking and id requirements. Scoopit!
Author Archives: Lance Wiggs
Fraudband….
“Fraudband” – what a great word “THE Fairfax Media chief executive, David Kirk, has labelled broadband in Australia “fraudband” because it is too expensive and slow. “ Sad to see Australia go through the same issues as we have here. “Mr Kirk said the problem was not government policy but the state of the market, …
Wii winning
The Wii seems to be besting the XBox360, while the PS3 languishes well behind. While in Salt Lake City I dropped by a Best Buy – about 20 PS3’s were in stock and not moving – one every few days it seemed. Wiis were out of stock and would last 30 minutes each time a …
When will the penny drop? US Online Advertising 3-5 times here..
Just announced: 2006 US online advertising hit $16.8bn, showing a 34% growth rate over 2005. That compares to NZ’s $65m and 48% growth. One way to compare is by population – USA online ad spend was US$56 per person, and NZ online ad spend was $NZ$15.80 or US$10.80 per person. That US number equates NZ$81.60 …
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No such thing as a free chocolate biscuit
Mauricio is upset that free biscuits are on the way out for AirNZ domestic flights. I’m glad. I have no desire to pay for everyone else’s biscuits (coke, beer, hot meals etc.). If I am thirsty offer me water, but make me pay for everything else including food, alcohol and fizzy drinks (and you pay …
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TVNZ’s new site – crippled
Go Tui – who managed to sneak a look at TVNZ’s new site. Read/Write web has also blogged about how TVNZ.com will be positioned as a third channel. The site seems lovely to look at (looks like there is some nice ajax action, and the download speed tester recognises the constraints we have here) Tragically …
Can I Scoopit?
I’ve finally got the Scoopit links working – thanks to the Scoop folk for figuring it out. The question is now: is it ok to scoopit your own posts? Scoopit! (I’m going to scoopit this one..)
lancewiggs.com exists
lancewiggs.com now exists and redirects to here – so if you are one of the 14 loyal supporters then you may now find it easier to spread the word… I’ll rename the entire site presently…
eBay Homepage Design
eBay Homepages vary by geography – as Auctions is a fairly geographically and culturally constrained business. Still, it is interesting to see just how dramatic the differences are: Best homepage – the simplest by far, is Canada. The page is approaching Google simplicity, and it is abundantly clear what you have to do – enter …
Don’t give Telecom money…
Orcon has a very basic appeal to potential customers: Don’t give Telecom your money. It isn’t really compelling (well for most people…) as the prices are essentially the same, but apparently that too will change. Scoopit!
Kiva and Steers in Kenya
Disintermediate a Nobel Prize winning business and lend money to villagers around the world directly. There does not seem to be a revenue model for investors (i.e. the loans do not pay interest), and obviously there are verification costs, but it’s an interesting start – Kiva.org Even without a revenue model for investors there has …
Buffet on Newspapers…
Warren Buffet talks about the decline of newspapers in his latest missive. Some chilling words from the great investor. The money quote “Eventually, though, eroding fundamentals will overwhelm managerial brilliance“ The History “..when two or more papers existed in a major city (which was almost universally the case a century ago), the one that pulled …
His masters voice..
Warren Buffet speaks. Buffet’s annual missive to shareholders is required reading for anyone in the investing game. Warren Buffet has made 21.4% compounded annual gain for investors over a 32 year period, and has managed to solidly place himself as 2nd most wealthy person in the world. Moreover he will give it all away to …
Geekzone news…
Geekzone’s news feed seems stuck on Feb 27th… Hopefully they’ll fix this soon because it is a pretty good resource otherwise, though the signal/noise ratio can be a bit low.. Scoopit!
Who will buy TV3?
If PBL is part of a group that buys CanWest MediaWorks (Owners of TV3 and part-owners of Australia’s Ten network) then that lousy msn.co.nz site could get a whle lot better, as could TV3. However if Kerry Stoke’s Seven network wins then we’ll see interesting times online as the two rivals PBL and Seven will …
Lance Wiggs 