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Tech Gifts for the Holidays
MrCopilot pointed out that every year there are a slew of gadgets geeks desire for Christmas, and approximately 7 million web pages dedicated to compiling lists of them.
So why shouldn't we join in the fun. Here are stories from
Dallas News,
CBS News,
Seattle Times,
E Media Wire,
Detroit News and
MSNBC. So lets take a crack at your own list. There's still another day or two where things could conceivably be shipped on time for the holidays. I highly recommend Rock Band, although my aching hands might disagree.
The e-book thing is an idea that simply refuses to die. Every couple of years, we get more hype about it, but it's never really gotten that far. My personal take on it is that it's a solution looking for a problem. An e-book reader is not really any more convenient to carry around than a paperback book, and is less durable. The only real advantage is the ability to carry around your entire library with you, but so far that hasn't been enough to overcome the disadvantages inherent in reading for extended periods of time from a small electronic device.
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What the hell is with these top-* lists?
It is dangerous to be right when the government is wrong.
Every year, I see these lists and I wonder, do most people really spend that much on a single Christmas gift? I'm sorry, but I'm not buying anyone a $2500 self-tuning electric guitar (CBS list), or a new $2299 Apple iMac (MSNBC list) or even a $400 iPhone this holiday season. I swear these lists must be created by retailers or someone trying to convince you that you have to go all out and spend all your savings every Christmas, just so your friends and family will love you.
At least some of these lists are surprisingly decent - the Dallas and Detroit ones are actually pretty reasonable - accessories for your friends and family that already bought their gadgets. Now those make good gift items.
I don't know, but instead of playing Rock Band, maybe people could learn to play real instruments.
Get off my lawn.
With that list of reqs/specs I'd just go with the original paperback:
1. Low puchase cost
2. Best in class - by far - battery life
3. Best in class - by far - display resolution
4. Lightweight
- It took western civilisation 2000 years to ensure popular literacy, and now we work with icon driven GUI's. Go figure.
1. Buy gadget
2. Replace batteries
3. Watch it break down
4. Attempt to fix
5. ???
6. Profit (for the person who sold it)
7. Massive unrecycled waste (your gift to planet earth)
Good ideas: plants, books, tools, Slashdot membership, backrubs, fruit, nuts, candy wrapped in paper.
This holiday is about loving your family, go be with them, instead of working extra hours to buy them plastic crap you won't even remember in two years!
technical writing / development
Did you go to college? Heaving around all those textbooks SUCKED, especially when I had to walk to campus! This is the one great usage I can see for e-books, or at least PDF releases of texts, but I doubt the printing industry is going to give up on leeching off of college kids.
I swear to God...I swear to God! That is NOT how you treat your human!