What do TVs and music sales have in common? They are both big businesses, and both markets are rapidly shifting the money from Old Business companies and business models to New Business companies and business models. And some major players are getting left behind.
They are not so common any more, but I'm sure you remember used record & CD shops. Now imagine them without the bricks and mortar. Or the bins. Or the records and CDs. Say what? Welcome to the biggest music-industry brouhaha since Napster.
How many times has this happened to you? You ask your car to phone Peggy, and instead it orders a pizza? Or maybe you ask for directions to Rochester and instead it changes your radio station? How come car voice systems can’t work as well as all the other voice systems we use? Ford asked the same question, and Alexa answered the call.
It seems simple enough. You wait in line, pay $15, put on the dorky 3D glasses, and watch the 3D movie. Popcorn costs extra. What you might not realize is the titanic struggle going on around you. And I’m not talking about the action on the screen. I’m talking about the theater owner who’s mad as hell at the movie studio.
Okay, children! Time for a bedtime story! Once upon a time, there was a little girl named Goldilocks. While walking through the forest, she came upon a quaint little village. In that village there were three ways to watch movies...
Some people listen to music while sitting in a concert hall. Some listen to music sitting in their La-Z-Boy. Still others listen to music while running the Boston Marathon, preferably while on the way to breaking the 4-hour mark. Surely you are among the latter. The Free Wavz is the earphone for you.
A few months ago, I described how a certain airline has devised a fiendish way to torment its passengers. That is, a type of torment beyond the usual run-of-the-mill torture of flying on any airplane. In a letter to the editor, alert reader Douglas Mandel commiserated with me but pointed out that I was overlooking another kind of torture that is much, much worse.
Claude Debussy composed some of the most sublime music ever written. Clair de Lune, Prélude à l'après-midi d'un faune, La mer, Pelléas et Mélisande - all are impressionist masterpieces. The maestro may thus be surprised to learn that his name has become a brand of a start-up company incongruently named Funky Sound Studio.
•GPS receiver with voice prompts •MP3 music and JPEG photo player •Optional travel and language guides •3.5-inch touchscreen •Text-to-speech synthesis •3.875 x 2.875 x 0.875 inches •5 oun