Nice gain yesterday. Our stocks — the ones on the right — are doing fine. With the exception of gold, which has declined. Give it a little more time.
Anakarko a takeover target? Marvin Schwartz is one of the best money managers on Wall Street. I have friends who have money with him. They speak about him as though he walked on water. He recently did an impressive interview with CNBC. For the main interview, click here. For the follow-on web interview, click here. He seriously likes Anadarko Petroleum (APC).
My BIG accomplishment. I got my dictionary onto Apple’s App Store. That means you can now buy a copy — all 26,147 terms defined and now all searchable in under a second.
I’m selling it at $19.99 (about $5 less than Amazon sells the print version.) I get 70%. Apple keeps 30%. It delivers and collects the money from customers. It’s a bargain at 30%.I’ve been writing the dictionary for over 25 years. I’ve always hesitated putting out an electronic version because I could never figure out how to stop everyone and their uncle from copying it and giving it to their friends — like the kids do with music and movies. Apple has tight copyright and copying control. I’m comfortable with them. They don’t do any marketing and promotion. That’s my job.
I used an American firm to do the software programming — Zco Corporation in Hudson, NH. It cost around $20,000. It should have cost less. But I didn’t define the app as well as I should have.
What’s neat, however, is that anyone can define an app — games, search engines, etc. And Zco will do the programming for you and deal with Apple.
Apple charged me $99 to become an Apple Developer.
OH to be a failed CEO. Eric Schmidt accomplished basically nothing as Google’s CEO. Not a single new business under his watch — despite the mega-riches. Search is still Google’s business. Despite his failure, he’s getting an “equity award” of $100 million in stock and stock options, vested over the next four years. Personally, I think the money belongs to the shareholders. But what do I know? Corporations are run for their management, not for their shareholders. “Gee whiz, Harry, you’ve just figured that out?”
Hard drive prices plummet. You cannot believe the prices on large hard drives. Newegg is having a sale. You cannot afford not to have several as backups. Click here.
Tablets compared.I checked out tablets at CES. My conclusion: For now, there is only one: the iPad. Apple has sold over 7.5 million iPads. What’s amazing to me is how many of my aggressively non-technical friends have bought an iPad. A friend, who’s rich and successful beyond my wildest expectations, only loved his BlackBerry. Now he loves his iPad — “It boots fast. I can do emails. I can surf the web. And the CNBC app is phenomenal. Have you seen it?” He raved on and on about the CNBC app…” It’s good and pretty. I love reading the Economist on my iPad. My wife wants to take it away from me and use it for emails and to read books on her quick trip to Australia this week.
The key to using the iPad is to learn how to lock its screen orientation. Hit the Home button twice quickly. Scroll to the very left. You’ll see a circular icon. Touch it. The screen will lock and stay horizontal or vertical. To get back to normal, touch the Home button once. You can also make free phone calls on your iPad using Skype. Download the app here. You’ll need a headset and a microphone.
The Circus Part 1.
The circus owner needs a lion tamer. He puts an ad in the newspaper.
A candidate appears. “What do I do,” he asks.
The owner: “Hold the chair, the lion will obey.”
“And if it doesn’t?”
“You have a whip. Crack it.”
“And if that doesn’t work?”
“You have a revolver. Shoot it into the air.”
“And if that doesn’t work?”
“Well, then you will throw shit at the lion.”
“Where do I get that from?”
“Trust me on that one. You’ll have plenty.”
The Circus. Part 2.
The circus owner needs a new act. He puts an ad in the newspaper.
A candidate appears. “I get shot out a cannon. I land with one foot on a high wire. Then I do three somersaults and land on my head.”
The owner, “This is fantastic. The act of all acts. I’ll pay you $50 a performance. But let me see you do it.”
The candidate gets shot out a cannon, lands with one leg on the high-wire, does a triple somersault and lands on his head.
The circus owner is flabbergasted. He’s never seen an act like this. “Right, you’re hired.”
Candidate, “That will cost you $250 per performance.”
Circus owner, “I thought we agreed on $50?”
Candidate: “Yes, but that was before I tried it.”
Harry Newton who loves deductive reasoning. Finally, he figured out one ThnkPad pad had developed some weird hardware problems. It wasn’t the software. It went back to Lenovo yesterday. They’re really good about customer service.
Obama has his State of the Union message this evening at 9:00 PM. The Australian Open plays semi-final matches. If the speech is boring, you know what I’ll be watching. A better idea: have two TV sets. Listen to him. Watch the tennis. A perfect combination.
Good work on the telecom dictionary app.
Hi Harry,
Eric Schmidt a bad CEO?! Since the IPO in 2004, the stock has jumped from $85 to $611. 619% over 6 years? A leader who can lead his company to annualized returns of 39% through a tough economy is far from “a failure” ; in my book. As far as new products, Google Docs, Google Chrome, iGoogle, Google Maps, Google Checkout, the entire Android operating system… The list goes on. You can disagree with the size of his equity award, but calling him a “failure” takes it too far.
“Listen to Obama. Watch the tennis. A perfect combination.”…..I think I'd rather listen to the tennis and watch Obama.
ironic that you mentioned how to lock the screen orientation this morning as i just discovered on my commute today that the button on the right side above the volume control no longer locks the screen. it used to when i first bought my ipad but they must have changed its function when they upgraded the software. now that button turns the volume on and off. thanks for the tip!