Shoestring Theory

Dan Ariely explains why your life needs fewer options. Keeping too many options open could actually hurt you. Maintaining options in life can sap time, money and resources, explained Dr. Dan Ariely of MIT in a New York Times interview. Areily and economist Jiwoong Shin tested students at MIT with a simple computer game involving […]

Let’s play a game! What’s under the keyboard? (Note, not the actual keyboard in question.) Governments really shouldn’t use laptops. They just seem to lose, misplace or let the dang thangs get stolen a little too easily. In another privacy embarrassment for the British government, an encrypted CD with “highly confidential” government data was found […]

Wired’s got an interesting piece up on the nature of business models that rely on a “Free” product. Think things like flickr, YouTube, Jonathan Coulton, Facebook, etc, though the opportunities range far beyond that. It’s not groundbreaking, but strikes me as more of an introduction to an in-depth conversation. Which is convenient, as Chris Anderson […]

Photo from bunchofpants on flickr thanks to a Creative Commons license. I got my eyes checked today after not having seen an optometrist for four or five years. I had the full battery of tests run, including the one where the doc dilates your eyes to stare into your brain. It pretty much forced me […]

More stats from PowerSellers Unite. Put a fork in it, for it is done. Statistics are again from PowerSellers Unite. You can visit them to see the current volume versus the same time on the previous day at their site anytime. Total listings increased 203,254 over the same time yesterday, or a 1.49 percent increase. […]

More stats from PowerSellers Unite. Barring any shocking (or even interesting) news about this year’s eBay boycott, this should be the next to last post dealing with the numbers. As always, statistics are from PowerSellers Unite. You can visit them to see the current volume versus the same time on the previous day at their […]

Let’s cover some background before we get to the funny auction. There were a ton of news stories this week about Paul Mawhinney putting his legendary music collection up for sale on eBay for three million dollars. From the Pittsburg Business Times: After 46 years of collecting and 36 years of running Record-Rama, Mr. Mawhinney’s […]

More stats from PowerSellers Unite. eBay listings increased again today, putting them equal to (or even slightly above) where they were earlier this month. Statistics are again from PowerSellers Unite. You can visit them to see the current volume versus the same time on the previous day at their site anytime. Total listings increased 204,069 […]

Mobuzz ran a bit on Thursday dealing with the eBay changes and the Scientology brouhaha. You can find a widescreen, higher quality vid at mobuzz.tv.

More stats from PowerSellers Unite. eBay listings increased today for the first time since the boycott started. As a commenter mentioned yesterday, the big drop was likely caused by the list fee sale from the previous day. Statistics are again from PowerSellers Unite. You can visit them to see the current volume versus the same […]