I have far too many photos of my more recent trips. This shows the aftermath of my luggage trying to escape while I was blasting down this road in the very south of Patagonia. It was scary – the box fell off but was held on to the bike by a plastic covered wire rope …
Author Archives: Lance Wiggs
Floating (ARM) rate mortgages are on the rise
CalculatedRisk has created a lovely chart of the rise in popularity of Adjustable Rate Mortgages in the USA. It is scary is that around 30% of mortgages in the last few years are ARM’s. This is bad as 1: ARM’s are easier for home buyers to get than fixed rate mortgages, indicating that the quality …
Continue reading “Floating (ARM) rate mortgages are on the rise”
Google Valuation
ValueCruncher tilts at Google – and finds the $500 per share market value wanting. It’s hard to justify the $500+ valuation based on fundamentals – Google made 1/64th of it’s market cap in the last 12 months, and expects to make 1/37th of its market cap in the next 12 months. Somehow analysts manage to …
A proctologist may be required to remove the splinters.
An amusing line that missed the editor’s scythe in the Stuff article I complained about above.
Stuff please shut up
I’m unhappy with Stuff’s relatively recent change that automatically kicks off audio commentary when I open certain articles. Perhaps it happens just on my setup (OSX, Safari), as I see a ‘listen to audio clip’ link by the title. I’m willing to give the benefit of the doubt for now, but please fix it…
US built cars less safe….
The USA car industry has seldom put safety first, and never drivability. Turns out the second affects the measurement of the first, as electronic stability control (ESC) was deemed required for those 13 vehicles that maxed out the rating standard in the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety crash tests. The winners include 3 Hondas, and …
Jeans that fit…
Can’t find jeans that fit? zafu.com matches jeans to your body shape and style. It’s not affiliated with any single brand of jeans, and they don’t actually sell jeans. They are claiming a 94% ‘we’ll make you look good’ rate – which is pretty amazing for a recommendation system based on self reporting of body …
Customer service – how to ensure phones are answered
Meg Whitman commented that in the early days Paypal customer support staff didn’t answer the phone – they were avoiding speaking to customers. I don’t understand why more customer service lines don’t follow Trade Me’s example. At Trade Me you pay$1.99 per minute when you call (a 900 or o900 number) customer service – but …
Continue reading “Customer service – how to ensure phones are answered”
Drop cover hold
Much like the drop and cover drill americans went rtghrough in the early cold war, we Kiwis too have our rituals. This aimed at earthquakes though…. I don’t recall it having such a snappy title though – for us schoolkids it was “get under your desks now!”
Surfing from work…
Personal surfing from work is bad, says the Deputy Leader of the Opposition in New Zealand. While this may be a great debating point for the chamber, Brownlee clearly isn’t thinking this one through. I certaibnkly wouldn’t want ot work for him, nor for any organisation that wanted such micro control over my activities. Better …
Business class gets even better
Singapore airlines have launched their version of the lie-flat standard business class. It is insane – not only lie flat, but look at the size of that seat! It seems to be begging for two people to sleep in it… The bed itself does not seem that wide at the top – it appears that …
that housing bubble is bursting….
That sharp drop on the right of the chart – that’s the sign of a bubble bursting. It is saying “Don’t buy housing, especially ‘investment’ property, and especially in your area, which is ‘different from the rest’.” econobrowser does a great job of monitoring the US housing market, amongst other things. and as the US …
Woz, Kawasaki and lousy flash video players
Great interview. Shame I can’t see it as the video player and my orcon/xtra broadband are lousy. Will flash video creators please realise that not only do people have variable speeds of internet access, but that we also have variable quality. Once I get a dropoff from a youtube or, it seems, a zbiz, video …
Continue reading “Woz, Kawasaki and lousy flash video players”
ShipBuktu – shop the USA
Shipbuktu alpha-launched today. The site is still in test, but the back-end logistics are set. essentially. I’m involved on an unconfirmed sem-official basis. Shipbuktu gives Kiwis a USA address, so you can shop the internet USA style. Amazon electronics, Gap clothing, and everything from telescopes to car parts are finally available to us here. Believe …
Post Secret
One of the most powerful uses of the internet – is PostSecret, which strangely enough relies on mail to deliver intimate secrets to the world. Each Sunday (USA time) a new batch of postcards containing secrets is released.
Lance Wiggs 