Redbox: Vending Obligations?

I've had a lot of fun with various Redbox units around town. (For those of you unfamiliar with it, it's a vending machine typically outside of a store with high-traffic, like a Walmart or grocery store. You pay $1 to rent a DVD for a night, then a dollar every night until you return it.)

Okay, so typically my Redbox has 9-15 pages of 15 DVDs per page... so usually 100+ titles.

The Redbox unit doesn't know who I am when I walk up to it, so it can't make me a recommendation. It just shows the DVDs in whatever ordered it's instructed to show.

However, once I return a DVD, and if I press buttons right after, there's a pretty good chance that the person touching the screen (in this case me) is the one who rented the DVD.

Now, the box can't make assumptions whether I liked it or not. It'd be really awesome if it gave me a 5-star rating system when I returned the title. For example, when I am ready to return it, I press "return DVD" then it asks "How would you rank this rental?" then once the DVD is returned, it records it to my profile.

But, for the sake of what's happening now, it has my rentals "linked" in its system. So, it could, if it chooses, display DVDs it thinks I may like at the HEAD of the pages, and not randomly.

Now, this is my moral question. If the system could know which DVD I would like most, should it put it on page 1, 2, or 3? I typically look at the first 3-5 pages of listings (30-50 titles).

If it put a DVD up that I might like, but in no hurry to watch, it could make $2-$3 on the rental (taking 2-3 days to return) instead of the $1 it would make it I wanted to watch it ASAP (because I'd return it the next day).

Would the device be obligated to make the proper recommendation? And who judges proper?

Just some thoughts.

Missing from Windows 7?

I installed Windows 7 Ultimate on a Boot Camp partition on my Core 2 Duo Macbook Pro.  Okay, it's painless to install, it seems very, very stable.  The built-in Internet Explorer seems relatively safe and fully functional.  The Backup function, while not as simple as Mac OS X's Time Capsule, seems sufficient.

Then, I try to add the Stocks Gadget to my desktop.

Wait, what Stocks Gadget?  Apparently this feature of the beta was removed for the final release.

Microsoft, please add the Stocks Gadget to your additional Gadgets option by the time you release Windows 7 later this month!

Yeah, I know, it's still delayed quotes.  But better than nothing.

Bing and Other Cashback Programs

I saw the cashback programs from Bing (which is the rebranded Microsoft search engine) and decided to look into it a bit.

The Bing cashback program is relatively easy to sign up for.  You can use a standard Live ID (for example, Hotmail) or sign up for a fresh Live ID.  Then, you agree to the terms and give Microsoft your mailing address for your check (minimum reward value: $5).

Then, you use the Shopping section of the Bing.com Search Engine to see potential cashback partners.

Now, you'd have to be reasonable.  If the cashback on a product is 3% on a $100 buy, at at Bing cashback site, and $95 at another site, obviously you should consider the other site.  So it can be helpful to cross reference at a site like Google Products (if you have the spare time).

In reality, you need to take in consideration for shipping costs between sites, because there can be a significant difference from site to site.  If the shipping cost is going to eat your cashback, take that into consideration, too.

If you're opposed to Microsoft, you might consider MyPoints, which has a cashback-like feature (points towards Gift Cards instead of cash) but can also boost your point bonus with reading e-mails and filling out surveys.

Just some ideas to "save" a little money.

A New Android Phone from Samsung / Sprint

I've done significant research on iPhone programming over the past year--I have a shelf of pretty much every book put out on the subject.  I love my iPhone, the apps are great, but eventually one comes to accept that not everything will be using an iPhone--especially in the United States with it (currently) stuck on the AT&T network.

For those who are looking for something else, there are a whole bunch of phones coming out based on technology created by Google ( http://www.android.com/ ) that will be available on multiple wireless carriers, not just stuck on one network.  So if you are content with your current wireless company, you might easily be able to grab one of these phones and keep your (hopefully) great service.

Why is this Android stuff significant?  Because the app store is rather compatible between phones.  iPhone developers have one outlet:  Apple's App Store.  As a mobile developer, it can be useful to have more choices.  For example, the Samsung Moment, a phone coming from Sprint around November 1, has a relatively fast processor, and spots a physical keyboard (leaving more room on the screen for apps, great if your app requires text entry.)  On an iPhone, if you enter text, pretty much half of your screen is eaten by the virtual keyboard.

The other thing that is potentially useful about Sprint's new phone is that the plan including text can start around $70 a month, and you look into $90-$100 a month for a text/data plan for the iPhone.

So, consider the iPhone with serious competition now (not just the Moment, but all Android-based phones in general).  iPhone developers--you might want to pick up the Android SDK for fun, brush up on your Java and have a little fun.

I'd enjoy playing some games on my iPhone against some Android users.

Moved to Blogger

Well, sorry to those of you who were following my blog with few updates.

I've moved to a Blogger site so updates should be much more frequent!