Jason's Blog » Technology

Searching the Usenet

jasongolod — Wed, 11 Apr 2012 02:44:31 +0000

The usenet is becoming a hot topic these days, especially with the younger crowd who apparently feels that they should not pay for anything. I am not one to talk, I can certainly remember when napster came along…it was complete pandemonium for a while there.

What I find most interesting is that the usenet still has a community of users, not the ones downloading movies illegally…I am talking about the original use of the usenet…sharing IDEAS. Yeah, having discussions. Imagine that?

Anyway, I remember my old VMS account at SDSU…that was one of the first things I really thought was cool. Today it still is. The only difference is that the tools today are much better. Searching the usenet has never been as easy or as fast.

It will be interesting to see how the next year or two plays out. I am not sure that more than a handful or two of people actually understand exactly how the usenet is built. Time will tell.

Yahoo Teams up With Tivo

jasongolod — Fri, 11 Nov 2005 15:57:02 +0000

I just made a pretty lengthy post and review of the Tivo and Yahoo! partnership over at my personal blog. The more I think about Tivo’s business model, it is really all about users. They are willing to give away the equipment for cost…or less just to get people to sign up for their service. They have been around long enough to know what percentage of people who sign up for their service will continue to use it. I would assume their rentention rate is higher than most other paid services’ rentention rates. Tivo is a great service and system and I have been a really loyal user for a long time. But, I think they really lost some vision the past few years, when they should have been attacking. If there is one thing that I have learned in my time in the business world, it is that when you find something that works, attack. What does that mean? Simply, that if you find a product, service, niche, something, anything that makes you money, creates user signups or whatever you are working towards doing, you must attack it with all of your resources. Tivo created a great product and built a loyal user base. I am sure they saw very big growth simply via viral methods. However, there is really a need to grow quickly at a certain point, and I am not sure what kept Tivo from making that jump. They probably felt that they did not want to take on some kind of VC or equity based funding and now we are seeing what happens when you don’t attack.

I fear that Tivo will be gone within a year or two as products like Microsoft’s Home Media Center take what Tivo started and run with it. It is sad and unfortunate, but one of the great benefits of living in a country like the United States. So, I bid you farewell my little Tivo box. May you enjoy your future in the big computer heaven in the sky.

Anyone want to buy a series 2 Tivo with lifetime subscription?

The Future of Journalism

jasongolod — Tue, 01 Nov 2005 02:05:19 +0000

I was talking to someone this past weekend about a project called Streethound that I am working on. My friend commented that he heard that blogs are changing and will revolutionize the journalism business. He said something like, “why will people buy newspapers in the future, when they can just read them on line?” Well, I think there is some merit to what he was asking, but at the end of the day, most people like to read for extended periods from paper rather than from a screen. But, I think what he was really talking about was the free nature of blogs vs. newspapers. I don’t really know what is going to happen, but one thing that newspapers do is aggregate local, national and global news very well. Yes, places like Google News, Yahoo News and a slew of other sites do this, but they get their news and information from traditional news sources. As soon as these sources see their traditional readership and subscriptions go away, they will change the way that they give out their news on line. Translation, they will make you pay. These guys aren’t going to give up the farm. They have been around for a long time and have plenty of resources to make sure that they do not become obsolete. So, while I think blogging has had and will continue to have a huge impact on how people learn about different topics, I don’t think they will be putting the big boys of journalism out of business any time soon.