Month: July 2006

Over at “What’s Next?” Keshava Dasarthy (who I know from NextNY) blogs about the Convergence 2.0 conference.

As a media consumer, there is a signal in proximity (on tv it is temporal, while on a site, it is more spatial). We naturally assume that things near each other will be similar in some important measure. Coupled with inertia that keeps us in the same area, this can be a powerful effect. The networks have used that for years, as they leverage “lead-in” from one show to boost the ratings of another, weaker show (think of all the one-season wonders that followed Seinfeld).

Microchunking blows that proposition out of the water. It means that each piece of content has to stand alone and win popularity on its own merits.

Good stuff, but the real meat of the piece comes after this

If the power in negotiations is shifting from the distributors (Cable and RBOCs) to content (proxied by the networks), why wouldn’t that shift continue, and ultimately end up with the primary producers of the content?

I’m not going to spoil the ending – you go there and read it yourself.

My cell phone, a Verizon LG VX8100, needed a new battery. The old one was not giving me even a full day with normal usage and on Sunday it cut out as I was calling my cousin. Not good. I may have contributed to its decline by leaving it charging overnight once. Now, this is bad design – a normal activity like charging the phone shouldn’t hurt the battery, but the guy in the local cell phone store told me that was a major no-no. Note to cell phone makers – stop charging the battery when it is full.

This could, of course, be a tactic to get you to buy stuff later on.

My phone needs the Lithium Ion 3.7v 1000mAh LG battery. The local Verizon-affiliated store (not a Verizon store) wanted $59 off the shelf for it, but quickly dropped to $40 when they saw that was not going to happen. I thanked them and fired up google.

I found OemCellPhone.com and they had the same battery for $12.99 plus $4.95 shipping – 17.94 not $40. And they claimed that it was in fact the same LG OEM battery, not an off brand that will blow up on my belt, damaging vital organs.

I bought the battery with my AMEX, feeling that I could stop charges if there was an issue. To my delight, the battery arrived US Mail yesterday, and it was identical to the original one in my cell phone. I don’t have reason to believe that it is anything other than an OEM battery. It was ordered late Wednesday and arrived Monday – absolutely fine with me.

I’ve charged it up and it seems to be working fine. Thanks, OemCellPhone.com for helping me keep faith in small Internet merchants.

technorati tags:cellphonebattery, verizon, oemcellphone, vx8100, internet commerce, geeky