Tech-Mania Revolution!

Filed under: Home Entertainment, Portable Audio

We fully expected that Ferrari logo and lacquered paint job to add a stuff premium to Meridian's F80, but this is undeniably insane. The "transportable home entertainment system," which has been hovering about since last March, is at long last ready to be purchased. Finding prospective buyers, however, will likely be challenging. The unit is now available in silver, yellow, white, black and the obligatory red, and each one will set you back a dumbfounding $2,995. We're thinking the unit itself would go for around three bills sans branding, but apparently Italian ponies aren't cheap.

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Nice gallery of a microwaved CD - so you don't have to... You can see the current vaporizing the aluminum in the CD as well as the arcs of microwaves, from what I understand the patches of aluminum become antenna-like.

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What if there was a way for you to increase customer satisfaction, get more repeat business, and multiply new business from referrals?

You’d definitely want to take advantage of any technique that could do all of that, right?

Good news! There actually IS a method of doing business that you can use to achieve all of those results. In fact, it is a method that you probably already know (but might have forgotten).

Are you ready? Here it is:

Listen

Listening… good listening… The real secret to increased customer satisfaction, getting repeat business and referrals is often to listen, really listen, to what your customers have to say.

It’s just that simple (and just that hard).

As freelancers, we talk too much. We’re so anxious to sell our services that we jump right into our spiel, often without really hearing what the customer has to say.

As you listen, see if you can understand what the customer really needs.

Five Answers To Listen For

As you are listening to your customer, see if you can find the answers to the following five questions about their project:

• What does the customer hope to accomplish? - Understanding the purpose of a project is crucial to ensuring its success.
• Why has the customer decided to pursue this? - Listening to the reasons why the customer is pursuing the project can give you key clues to what the customer really wants.
• Who is the customer’s audience? - Determining the target audience for a project is vital to the project’s success.
• How will the customer deal with the desired response? - Make sure that the customer has a plan in place for dealing with a successful project.
• Is there an example of what the customer has in mind? - You can learn a lot by examining an existing example of what the customer likes.

If you can’t hear the answer to these questions in what the customer is saying, then (and only then) you will have to ask the questions directly to the customer.

With these questions answered, you should have a clearer picture of what the customer needs and wants. Once you have this understanding, then you can follow through with specific questions concerning delivery:

• When do you want this?
• Who will be my contact on this project?
• How will you take delivery of the project?
• What are you willing to pay?

(The problem for many freelancers is that we START by asking the delivery questions, when delivery questions are actually the last questions that we should ask.)

Three Reasons It Makes a Difference

Good listening does make a positive difference in your customer satisfaction, here’s why:

• Your competition doesn’t listen. How many times have you heard someone say something like this, “when I got [it], I realized that it wasn’t quite what I needed.” Your competition doesn’t listen. Make sure that you do.

• Your customer doesn’t always say what they really mean. It’s true, they really don’t. They may think that they do, but they often leave out crucial details. That’s where effective listening comes in.

• Your results speak for themselves. By taking the time to really listen to your customer, not only are you letting them know that you value them, you are also much more likely to deliver what they had in mind for the project.


Good listening does makes a difference! By exercising good listening skills, you set your freelancing business apart and position yourself for success.

What’s holding you back?
Get out there and start listening.

Laura

******
About the author: Laura Spencer is a freelance writer from North Central Texas with over 18 years of professional business writing experience. If you liked this post, then you may also enjoy Laura’s blog about her freelance writing experiences, WritingThoughts.

Filed under: Misc. Gadgets

Apparently HP's gotten so desperate to connect with the youth market that they've actually hired on a "teen council" to help design a new line of products -- likeliest PCs -- from top to bottom. Will it be another bomb like the hip-e? Guess we'll find out when the line launches this fall.

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DesScorp writes "Popular Science has a piece on some outrageous ideas for weapons; some came to fruition, and other's didn't. And while some of the weapons (atom bombs, chemical weapons, bats with bombs strapped to them that seek out homes and buildings at night) are truly frightening, some of them are also kind of silly, such as the Gay Bomb, and the Frisbee bomb that was labeled the 'Modular Disc-Wing Urban Cruise Munition.'"

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Last fall he performed an unplanned EVA to help repair a critical solar panel on the International Space Station, this month he is attempting to summit Mount Everest. For emergency room surgeon turned NASA Astronaut Scott Parazynski the only way to do summiting Everest right would be to make sure you include as many people in the experience as possible.

It is all part of a new push to bring exploration into the 21st century. Congress just drafted an Authorization Bill for NASA this week that requires them to add participatory elements into their missions and Scott is helping to show how it's done.

In addition to being able to follow his podcasts, blogs and pictures from his summit preparation, you now can also post thoughts for Scott as he begins his summit attempt. Scheduled for May 21/22, weather permitting, Scott's summit attempt will put him on top of the world. What thought would you want to send with him? Post your well wishes, thoughts and comments for Scott online.

If you simply want to wish Scott "good luck, best wishes, etc." post that and I will do a head count. If, however, you have something a bit more expansive to say - please post it. Please try and make it simple so that I can condense it down to something I can efficiently convey to Scott and that he can keep in his oxygen-starved brain.

Scott will be the first human to both fly in space and summit the highest peak on our planet. What does this mean in terms of personal determination and endurance? In terms of exploration and pushing frontiers? As a preview of things to come - and of risks to be taken - on other worlds?

Ah, nothing like a deep thought to start your weekend on the right foot...

See Also:

• Astronaut to Climb Everest for his Vacation
• Photo Gallery: Astronauts' Risky Spacewalk, Step by Zero-G Step
• Risky Repair EVA Hopes to Save Solar Array from Junkpile
• Shuttle Leaves Station, Following Risky Fix-It Spacewalk
• Astronauts' Spacewalk, Construction Live on the Net

Photo courtesy of Scott Parazynski via OnOrbit.com (photo was taken this week from Everest Base Camp of the notorious Khumbu Ice Fall that Scott was climbing as part of this acclimatization).

alphadogg writes to tell us that the NSF is researching chain letters and how they travel. The results aren't quite what one might expect, showing a pattern of more selective and circuitous travel. "One surprising finding was that messages often took meandering routes between people who knew each other, often through as many as 100 intermediaries. Many email users also received copies from multiple social groups. The researchers concluded that because messages come from many directions, there's ample opportunity for the messages to be edited along the way."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Filed under: Wireless

Wondering what kind of radios are inside all those WiMAX-enabled laptops, ultraportables and MIDs (and, uh, sheets) we've been seeing lately? We've got a hunch they've all got something a lot like Intel's 5350 WiMAX / WiFi card tucked away in there, and now that it's hit the FCC, we're being treated to some class-A photography of the lil' bugger. Yep, still useless without a network -- but if that $12B Clearwire deal pans out, you might get to get familiar with the user manual located just beyond the read link.

[Thanks, Stephen]

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The Men Who Stare At Goats is a must-read 2005 book by UK journalist Jon Ronson about the US government's interest in very strange stuff, like Jedi powers, psychic spying, subliminal sound weapons, and the potential to kill something (like a goat, or an enemy soldier) just by looking at it. Fact or fiction, or most likely some of both, it's an absolute blast to read. (And Ronson's BBC documentary based on the book, Crazy Rulers of the World, is a lot of fun too! You can find it here on Google Video.) Yesterday, it was announced that Grant Heslov will direct a feature film based on The Men Who Stare At Goats. The star? George Clooney. From Variety:

Script was penned by Brit Peter Straughan ("How to Lose Friends and Alienate People"). The project has been around for some time, but international buyers only just received the script this week as the Cannes fest and market got started. Script topped the 2007 Brit List of best unproduced screenplays.

Link to Variety, Link to buy Men Who Stare At Goats

Previously on BB:
• The Men Who Stare At Goats Link
• Documentary: Crazy Rulers of the World Link

Cal State Fullerton will award an honorary doctorate today to one of its most famous graduates, astronaut Tracy Caldwell, who helped guide the expansion of the International Space Station last summer during her maiden flight aboard the space shuttle.

Caldwell, who earned a bachelor’s degree in science at CSUF in 1993, will receive the doctorate during commencement weekend, which also will feature an address by Robert Reich, who served as Secretary of Labor during the Clinton Administration.

The 38-year-old Caldwell began to dream of space travel as a young girl growing up in the California desert. She continued to think about it during her undergrad years at CSUF, and while earning a doctorate in chemistry at UC Davis. But she didn’t apply for the astronaut corps until the 1990s, and wasn’t selected for the job until 1998, while she working as a postdoctoral researcher at UC Irvine.

Caldwell made her first trip into space aboard shuttle Endeavour last August and helped guide spacewalkers as they expanded space station. She also helped inspect Endeavour for damage experienced during lift-off. CLICK HERE to read an earlier post about that mission.

More Sciencedude:

• Microquake in Mission Viejo
• Lots of jobs at O.C. universities
• Sharp drop in pollution in O.C. coastal waters
• Do cholesterol drugs make women aggressive?
• Earthquake Central (monitor quakes locally and worldwide)
• Science photo caption contest

Cal State Fullerton will award an honorary doctorate today to one of its most famous graduates, astronaut Tracy Caldwell, who helped guide the expansion of the International Space Station last summer during her maiden flight aboard the space shuttle.

Caldwell, who earned a bachelor’s degree in science at CSUF in 1993, will receive the doctorate during commencement weekend, which also will feature an address by Robert Reich, who served as Secretary of Labor during the Clinton Administration.

The 38-year-old Caldwell began to dream of space travel as a young girl growing up in the California desert. She continued to think about it during her undergrad years at CSUF, and while earning a doctorate in chemistry at UC Davis. But she didn’t apply for the astronaut corps until the 1990s, and wasn’t selected for the job until 1998, while she working as a postdoctoral researcher at UC Irvine.

Caldwell made her first trip into space aboard shuttle Endeavour last August and helped guide spacewalkers as they expanded space station. She also helped inspect Endeavour for damage experienced during lift-off. CLICK HERE to read an earlier post about that mission.

More Sciencedude:

• Microquake in Mission Viejo
• Lots of jobs at O.C. universities
• Sharp drop in pollution in O.C. coastal waters
• Do cholesterol drugs make women aggressive?
• Earthquake Central (monitor quakes locally and worldwide)
• Science photo caption contest

Filed under: Peripherals

iKey's done this whole rugged keyboard thing a time or two before, so when it builds one meant to operate like a champ around environments laden with grease, you know it means business. The new line of Membrane keyboards -- which arrives in a trio of flavors -- boasts a stainless steel enclosure, or customers looking to integrate can snag the OEM edition and do as they please. The board possesses a "hard-coated, textured, polyester film that is more rugged than industrial silicone rubber keypads," and it's designed to withstand "directed hose water, disinfectants and environmental contaminants." Seems as though you'll have to phone up iKey to find out what this Apocalypse-approved device will run you, but it should get along quite well with that impenetrable Iron Drive of yours.

[Via Coolest-Gadgets]

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Here’s a question that might provoke some interesting discussion over the weekend:

Which Social Bookmarking Site Would You Prefer to Hit the Front Page Of?

Would you prefer to hit the popular page on Digg, hit StumbleUpon’s buzz page, make it big on Delicious, Mixx or Reddit or is there some other social bookmarking page that you’d rather do well on?

Also - WHY did you choose the one you’ve chosen? Is it just about the raw numbers of readers, that it leads to secondary links, that it’s more focused and brings a higher quality of reader?

Now it’s over to you for your say….

Share This

A group of U.S. Senators are asking the FBI to explain a recent controversial National Security Letter sent to the Internet Archive. The Internet Archive was able to defeat the request with help from the EFF and the ACLU this past April. "The Internet Archive's case is only the third known legal challenge to NSLs, despite the fact that the the FBI issues tens of thousands a year -- more than 100,000 such letters were issued in 2004 and 2005 combined. But despite the lack of legal challenges from recipients at ISPs, telephone companies and credit bureaus, successive scathing reports from the Justice Department's Inspector General have found illegal letters and a willy-nilly culture within the bureau towards tracking their usage."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

It seems a given that mobile social networking is going to be “the next big thing”, but squinting at tiny text is still a pain on today’s phones. To deal with this issue, Blabnote, a British startup that is currently in private beta, has created what may be the world’s first “vocal social network.”

To login to the network, you simply call Blabnote from your phone, which uses caller ID to match you to your profile. From there, you can vocally enter any number of commands. For example, if I wanted to create a group for TechCrunch fans, I might say, “Create Group called ‘Team TechCrunch’”. Members can be added by saying, “add Mike and Mark”, and you can send messages to group members in a similar fashion.

Blabnote has no shortage of obstacles to overcome, to put it mildly. For one, the entire system is going to rely on voice recognition, which isn’t exactly a perfected technology. Imagine creating a very personal voice message and sending it to an ex-girlfriend on accident - the setup is ripe for disaster. And should you get sick of talking (and listening), you’re out of luck: there is no web management interface, though Blabnote says it will provide an API for third parties.

Blabnote could be a useful organization and notification tool for established groups, like soccer teams or clubs. But if it aspires to become a large social network, this company is going to be teetering perilously close to the DeadPool.

Crunch Network: CrunchBoard because it’s time for you to find a new Job2.0

It seems a given that mobile social networking is going to be “the next big thing”, but squinting at tiny text is still a pain on today’s phones. To deal with this issue, Blabnote, a British startup that is currently in private beta, has created what may be the world’s first “vocal social network.”

To login to the network, you simply call Blabnote from your phone, which uses caller ID to match you to your profile. From there, you can vocally enter any number of commands. For example, if I wanted to create a group for TechCrunch fans, I might say, “Create Group called ‘Team TechCrunch’”. Members can be added by saying, “add Mike and Mark”, and you can send messages to group members in a similar fashion.

Blabnote has no shortage of obstacles to overcome, to put it mildly. For one, the entire system is going to rely on voice recognition, which isn’t exactly a perfected technology. Imagine creating a very personal voice message and sending it to an ex-girlfriend on accident - the setup is ripe for disaster. And should you get sick of talking (and listening), you’re out of luck: there is no web management interface, though Blabnote says it will provide an API for third parties.

Blabnote could be a useful organization and notification tool for established groups, like soccer teams or clubs. But if it aspires to become a large social network, this company is going to be teetering perilously close to the DeadPool.

Crunch Network: CrunchBoard because it’s time for you to find a new Job2.0

It seems a given that mobile social networking is going to be “the next big thing”, but squinting at tiny text is still a pain on today’s phones. To deal with this issue, Blabnote, a British startup that is currently in private beta, has created what may be the world’s first “vocal social network.”

To login to the network, you simply call Blabnote from your phone, which uses caller ID to match you to your profile. From there, you can vocally enter any number of commands. For example, if I wanted to create a group for TechCrunch fans, I might say, “Create Group called ‘Team TechCrunch’”. Members can be added by saying, “add Mike and Mark”, and you can send messages to group members in a similar fashion.

Blabnote has no shortage of obstacles to overcome, to put it mildly. For one, the entire system is going to rely on voice recognition, which isn’t exactly a perfected technology. Imagine creating a very personal voice message and sending it to an ex-girlfriend on accident - the setup is ripe for disaster. And should you get sick of talking (and listening), you’re out of luck: there is no web management interface, though Blabnote says it will provide an API for third parties.

Blabnote could be a useful organization and notification tool for established groups, like soccer teams or clubs. But if it aspires to become a large social network, this company is going to be teetering perilously close to the DeadPool.

Crunch Network: CrunchBoard because it’s time for you to find a new Job2.0

Cool long-exposure photography using a two-wheeled Picaxe-powered robot as the light-source. I like the use of the CD jewel case as a bot body.

Lenny's Blog

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Cool long-exposure photography using a two-wheeled Picaxe-powered robot as the light-source. I like the use of the CD jewel case as a bot body.

Lenny's Blog

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Wired's posted a photo gallery from the new show of vintage Japanese robots opening at the Sci Fi Museum in Seattle.

Iconic graphic designer Tom Geismar, whose firm Chermayeff & Geismar has created memorable logos for Mobil, PBS and other U.S. institutions, has been collecting the shiny bots for decades.

The Science Fiction Museum and Hall of Fame in Seattle will exhibit toys from Geismar's collection in Robots: A Designer's Collection of Miniature Mechanical Marvels through Oct. 26. The vintage robots on display reflect Geismar's trained eye. "I've really restricted myself to ones that appealed to me as interesting, imaginative designs," he says.

Link

If you know me, you know I love bookcases built into EVERYTHING. This sofa (the Flexform Oltre) with bookcases in the arms: no exception. Link (via Cribcandy)

This 1958 Japanese tin toy features Laika, Sputnik 2's brave cosmo-dog. Poor Laika. Link (Thanks, Erin!)

See also: Laika - graphic novel tells the sweet and sad story of the first space-dog

Danny O'Brien from the Electronic Frontier Foundation sez,

Vista users are complaining that Media Center refuses to let them record broadcast digital TV shows on NBC.

Here's a screenshot of what they're seeing.

After we won the fight to stop the Broadcast Flag three years ago, over-the-air digital TV shouldn't have any copy controls -- and if it did, Microsoft shouldn't have to obey them.

Is it a bug in Vista's DRM systems? Did Microsoft and NBC cut a deal? What other receivers out there are going to obey the broadcasters instead of their owners?

Link (Thanks, Danny!)

Filed under: Laptops

With its minute keyboard, the Eee PC can be tough to use in the dark. Imagine, then, if yours had a backlit keyboard. The folks at Popsci have come up with -- and explained -- a way to add one of your own. And get this: you can do it in 3 hours for just $13.50. But before you go ripping apart your new Eee PC, mind this: this isn't the easiest mod in the world. You have to be cool with removing the keyboard, slipping some wires, and doing some light soldering. In addition, the hack plops a Techno Flash luminescent wire inverter on the outside of the case, so if you're big on minimalism, this might be a skip.

[Via Pimp My UMPC]

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It’s coming up on a year since the iPhone was released, and the second version appears to be just around the corner. So it’s a good time to check in with our readers and see just how many of you actually use the device.

Please take a second and let us know where you stand.

Crunch Network: CrunchGear drool over the sexiest new gadgets and hardware.