Where am I going? Random observations

I am on a flight and on a new journey.... More importantly I can't design a flower garden or paint a picture.  Where am I headed?

Some random observations :

I am much more interested every morning in LinkedIn than Facebook.  Represents more friends and interest in where they are going.  Targeted communities will lead social and we will join them as we did clubs and fraternities in the old days. 

The more ill placed ads on Facebook the less interested I become and more concerned about their profiling me.  We need Europe to rise again to focus on privacy issues that the US fails to be concerned about.   These personalized ads are an invasion of privacy, but the us culture gave in to worrying about this as google rose years ago. 

Lenovo is proving innovative in the PC and tablet space.  The new Thinkpad Helix is exciting to me...  Yoga 11s is a good budget alternative and the Horizon looks like fun. Will the next retail space be Lenovo stores. You can't really buy the technology you want locally except for Apple.   Pick a PC or laptop you want to buy and only place to find it is online. 

Best Buy creating brand mini-stores staffed by the vendor sounds smart ?  Ask JCPenney... Dilute a stores identity at your own peril.  For physical stores to beat online they need the right identity, product assortment, availability and service.  They also need to seamlessly blend the experience across mobile, web, and physical store.     Ceding space to vendors will cause the dilution of brand identity and store identity.   The only place I saw this as smart was Macy's in Manhattan where the store is already an iconic destination.

Stores who block off aisles dedicated to online fulfillment appear to me to have not thought this out clearly.  Makes me think they aren't sure what business they are in or the purpose of their physical presence.   Lets be clear, Amazon has the service and support, but its operation is not that profitable.  The genius is to resale their infrastructure for cloud computing getting others to basically pay for their computing infrastructure is brilliant, but there is plenty of room for traditional retailers to regain their leadership.  I would expect  in ten years, if not sooner, amazon will have select physical showrooms.

Sears shows prices at other online outlets on their website. I find that an interesting choice. 

Netflix splitting between DVD delivery and online access two years ago... That was attacked looks pretty smart today.   They are going to be the HBO of the Internet and I don't even own a DVD player any more. 

Delta appears to have no more video screens at the seats of domestic flights.  Why do they need them with wifi available? Think that is a wise choice.   Delta in Fort Laudedale seems like the busiest airline again, and more so then when they were the dominant airline out of a much smaller Fort Lauderdale airport. 

Another interesting choice, I enjoy orbitz. For business travel makes ut easy to manage travel receipts.  That said, called Delta to change a ticket booked on Orbitz and they charged me $50 orbitz fee.  Supposed to have called orbitz?  

Has anyone found a low priced ticket on Southwest ?  Turning into the most expensive option unless you can plan way ahead.   



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