Archive for July, 2008

Higher Gas Prices? Are Hybrids Worth It?

Published at 7/30/2008 in Business & Career and Family & Personal. 2 Comments

I probably have changed my opinions on gas prices very dramatically in the last few months and it’s really not only related to the cost of gas right now.

I used to drive somewhat out of my way to save less than $.10/gallon. I then realized that for my car, a 1996 Toyota Camry, which has a 17-gallon tank, I was only saving at most $1.70. I will admit though, I’m usually always interested in saving money any chance I can get, regardless of the actual amount. But, is going out of my way, and using more gas, worth the $1.70? I doubt it.

The reason I say that is because there are hundreds of other places and situations where we spend much more than $1.70 and don’t even think about it.

  • buying a drink at a restaurant instead of water w/ lemon
  • using an ATM from another bank
  • going to Starbucks before work instead of getting free coffee at work

It wasn’t too long ago that my wife and I started looking at the idea of trading her van, which gets about 17 miles/gallon if we’re lucky. Oddly enough her van also has a 17-gallon tank, so we both spend about the same amount of money on a fill-up.

We thought about trying to sell the van and get a new Honda Civic Hybrid. The gas savings by comparison would have been tremendous. But with the increased and extended car payment, it would have taken a number of years to come out even.

Do you think it’s worth it?

Dave Ramsey’s Thoughts on Hybrid Cars

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Twitter and Customer Service - Now THAT’S Comcastic!

Published at 7/26/2008 in Business & Career, Computers & Technology and News & Current Events. 2 Comments

I still have conversations regularly with people who don’t understand what the deal is with twitter. Most of the time people make a comment about why in the world someone would care what you’re having for lunch or where you’re at? Although that is a part of what happens on twitter, along with the help of complimentary services like brightkite, it’s not even close to all the benefits twitter can offer the "real world".

A recent story in the Technology section of the New York Times talks about how Frank Eliason, a digital care manager, uses twitter and the web to take a pro-active assistance role for people who are having less than satisfactory results from Comcast.

Long before I got introduced to twitter, I had a personal interaction with Frank himself from recent comments on my own blog here.

After that contact and I began using twitter, I had a few more interactions with Frank where he took care of my questions, even after I was no longer a Comcast customer. I can tell you this, if for some reason I decide to leave AT&T U-verse, Frank has probably done enough for me to give Comcast another try. Plus, since I’ll be a new customer again I’ll be able to take advantage of their triple-play pricing again.

For anyone wondering, you should really read the NYTimes article, it may help you understand a little more what can be achieved with twitter and how other companies besides Comcast are making it work for them.

Comcast is not the only company trying to reach out to customers online. Using the social messaging service Twitter, Southwest Airlines answers customer questions about ticket prices and flight delays, Whole Foods Market posts details about discounts, and the chief executive of the online shoe store Zappos shares details of his life with 7,200 “followers.” Many other companies also monitor online discussion groups.

Although I don’t follow Southwest Airlines and Whole Foods, I do follow Zappos, and another company called ChoiceShirts which is making twitter work for them as well.

Frank, if you’re listening (and I know you are) keep up the good work. You are making a difference and more companies should model their customer service meaning and methods after what you’ve achieved so far.

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Empty WordPress Blog Comments

Published at 7/24/2008 in Computers & Technology. 1 Comment

empty-blog-comments

I’ve been dealing with a WordPress comment issue like the one above the awhile now. Initially I only got them every now and then and pretty much ignored them. This week however I’ve received probably 50 of them now. I used to only get them on my personal blog too, but now I’ve noticed a couple of them happening on other sites.

My initial though was just figuring out how to block them so I didn’t even see these kinds of comments come in at all. After talking to Doug though he wondered what if they were legitimate comments from people that the data is getting erased or lost at some point.

If you’ve visited this site and left a comment, but never saw it posted, let me know. I pretty much approve everything unless you use too much foul language or something.

Has anyone else seen this happening on your WordPress blog? Let me know because I really want to get rid of the messages or fix the problem if I’m losing comments.

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Be Douglas Karr’s Friend

Published at 7/24/2008 in Business & Career and Family & Personal. 13 Comments

doug-karr-the-bean-cup

I stumbled into fellow Indianapolis blogger, Douglas Karr, at The Bean Cup this morning. He seemed a little lonely. In this photo he’s standing by his good friend. He said he’s open to starting some new friendships but as a requirement you should probably plan on meeting him at his preferred coffee shop and expect to buy him a cup o’ joe.

I decided he looked too lonely for his own good so I decided to take him up on his offer. Sadly I still owe him a coffee, I’m sure I will catch-up with him later.

jason-bean-douglass-karr

UPDATE: Here’s where you can start playing the little game yourself. If you’d like to be Doug’s friend, just download the original photo (2.35MB) and Photoshop yourself into the picture as Doug’s friend. Then just come back here and share a link back to where we can go to view the image. Of course linking back to here and Doug’s site would be great too!

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Is My Local Newspaper Spying on Me?

Published at 7/23/2008 in Business & Career, Computers & Technology and Interesting Stuff. 0 Comments

indystar-community-bloggers

I opened my browser this evening and my normal two start-up pages were joined by a page with the information shown above on it.

A brand new browser session, but a new tab was now displayed with information from the website of our local newspaper. How’d they do that? It doesn’t really bother me, in fact I’ll probably submit some interest in their offer, but I can’t figure out how they took control of my browser to give me this little advertisement. Seems weird.

Has anyone else had this happen to them?

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