TechConsumer News is a feature we started out of a hobby of tracking the latest happenings within the consumer related technology sphere. The goal is to provide a concise, compiled overview of the most intriguing stories from the last few days. Feel free to give [...]]]>

TechConsumer News is a feature we started out of a hobby of tracking the latest happenings within the consumer related technology sphere. The goal is to provide a concise, compiled overview of the most intriguing stories from the last few days. Feel free to give us feedback or send us tips. If you like what you find, you can subscribe via email or RSS.

Here’s the latest in TechConsumer news:

Nintendo announced plans to ship a new exercise product called Wii Fit on May 19 (in the U.S., already out in Japan). It comes with a weight-and-motion sensing device called the Wii Balance Board and will sell for less than $100. It will measure your shifting weight and walk you through exercise routines.

According to Reggie Fils-Aime, president of Nintendo’s U.S. division, “Wii Fit is all about breaking the definition of videogaming, about something that keeps you and your family fit and engaged.” Nintendo has already sold 1.4 million copies of Wii Fit in Japan in just the past few months.

Amazon.com has followed other retailers and announced a preference for Blu-ray hardware. “The high-definition landscape is rapidly changing, and consumers are looking for guidance on how to make the best high-definition buying decisions,” said Peter Faricy, vice president of movies and music at Amazon.com. He continues:

“Our customers have clearly voiced their support for the Blu-ray format. Blu-ray titles have increased from just over half of our high-definition sales to over three-quarters of our high-definition sales since early January. In order to best serve our customers, Amazon is recommending Blu-ray as the preferred digital format and will continue to carry the ‘Earth’s Largest Selection’ of Blu-ray products.” Also, for those with plenty of spare time, Wired explains the rather lengthly process of converting HD DVDs to Blu-ray.

Some top technology companies, including Intel, Microsoft, Dell, and Advanced Micro Devices, decided to form the PC Gaming Alliance, a group that plans to promote the PC as a gaming platform. Other PCGA members include Acer, Epic, Nvidia, and Razer USA. According to a press release, the alliance plans to “accelerate innovation, improve the gaming experience for consumers and serve as a collective source of market information and expertise on PC gaming.” But some are not very convinced that it will amount to much.

Starting within the next few weeks, Dell computers (notebooks and desktops) will be for sale in more than 900 Best Buy locations in the U.S. After this move, Dell’s products will be available in almost 10,000 stores worldwide. This seems ironic considering Dell pioneered the low cost, online, skip-the-middleman [...]]]>

Starting within the next few weeks, Dell computers (notebooks and desktops) will be for sale in more than 900 Best Buy locations in the U.S. After this move, Dell’s products will be available in almost 10,000 stores worldwide. This seems ironic considering Dell pioneered the low cost, online, skip-the-middleman model. But the company lost the “world’s largest computer maker” trophy to HP, and the retail distribution channel is one area where HP shines.

This news follows after Dell has already announced similar deals with Staples and Wal-Mart. The company is hoping to become more consumer-friendly, as the business market has slowed in comparison. And there are apparently too many consumers that like the “try before you buy” model in retail stores. Right now, Dell gets only 15% of its sales from the consumer market with most of its sales coming from the business-to-business market.

So would you buy a Dell in a Best Buy?

*Update* Here are some PR quotes from each company:

Michael Tatelman, vice president of sales and marketing for Dell’s global consumer business: “Seeing the latest fashion colors of our Inspiron and XPS notebooks or previewing the ultimate gaming experience on a high-performance system can be an important part of how people shop… In the next few weeks, people looking to upgrade to a Dell notebook or desktop in the U.S. can visit their local Best Buy to check out and purchase our award-winning line of products.”

Dave Morrish, senior vice president for Best Buy’s mobility business unit: “Dell is clearly one of the most popular and successful PC companies and their addition to our retail and online selection gives Best Buy customers unprecedented choice when buying a computer.”

Related Links:   Dell Desktops     Dell Laptops

Late last week Michael Dell sent out a company-wide internal memo outlining how Dell will make a comeback. It looks like it turned out to be a great PR stunt whether intentional or not, as Reuters quoted from the memo extensively and the Wall Street Journal referred to it as reasoning [...]]]>

Late last week Michael Dell sent out a company-wide internal memo outlining how Dell will make a comeback. It looks like it turned out to be a great PR stunt whether intentional or not, as Reuters quoted from the memo extensively and the Wall Street Journal referred to it as reasoning for the stock to be up today.

During the last two years, Dell has had an SEC investigation, unexciting profits, a costly battery recall, a volatile share price, and the death of its MP3 player. But Michael Dell is back and ready to make some serious changes. Rather than go over the details myself, you can draw your own conclusions. Here’s a copy of the memo Michael Dell sent out to employees April 25:

To: Dell Employees Worldwide

From: Michael & the Executive Leadership Team

Dell Confidential — For Internal Use Only

One Dell, One Focus — Simplifying IT for Our Customers

We met as a complete Executive Leadership Team for most of last week to discuss Dell’s future. We left the week with a great deal of confidence about our plans for the next generation of Dell customers. Throughout our history we have worked as a team — as One Dell — and we have made quality PCs affordable. Now Dell plans to make information technology affordable for millions of customers around the world. We will do this by simplifying IT where others perpetuate complexity and innovating beyond hardware into solutions. This is one of the most exciting periods in our history but it requires all of us to stand together as One Dell to make profound changes and take well thought-out risks.

Here are some of the steps we will take to get there:

• Fix our Core Business to be competitive. The Direct Model has been a revolution, but is not a religion. We will continue to improve our business model, and go beyond it, to give our customers what they need. We will simplify our organization to make it easier to hear customers and respond to them. We’ve already streamlined our executive leadership structure. We need to streamline our management structure to speed decisions and remove bureaucracy. We’re making improvements in pricing, product development and fulfillment, and customer experience. We reorganized the product group to more effectively listen to our customers and develop end-to-end customer solutions. We are now revisiting our entire design process to improve our speed-to-market and focus on what customers truly value. Our new Global Operations organization, led by Mike Cannon, is working to take our supply chain and manufacturing to the next level of efficiency and quality. This group is also partnering with the regions and the product group to pursue new manufacturing and distribution models to address the unique needs of our customers in all markets. More broadly, we plan to eliminate overlaps in our organization and activities to enable us to deliver even more value to our customers. We also need to improve sales productivity. These won’t be merely exercises in cost-cutting. We will re-invest those resources in the customer solutions that will build Dell for the future.

• Re-ignite Growth in our Core Business to reach more customers. We are taking some concrete steps to get growth back into our core business. We released the EC280 in March for first-time computer users in China. We will open a new factory in Brazil in May and a new factory in India in July to be closer to those huge customer bases. In June, we’ll launch our new Inspiron models with personalized color options and improved mobile broadband. We will launch products and services for small and medium business customers later this summer. And our new Dell Data Center Solutions Division is addressing the unique needs of hyper-scale data centers for customers whose business relies on enterprise computing solutions. We plan to take our improved cost structure to acquire new customers and sell existing customers more products and services. We are accelerating down the path to be a truly global company giving customers around the world the best products, the easiest solutions and most choices.

• Build For the Long term to provide more customer solutions. Ron Garriques’ Global Consumer team is re-inventing how we address the evolving needs of our consumers around the world and the unique needs of the next billion consumers in the large and emerging markets of Brazil, Russia, India and China (BRIC). With strong share position in markets such as Japan, the U.K. and Canada, now we are going to make a mark in the rest of the world. Ron and team are also tackling how Dell’s consumer business should evolve in the long term in mature markets. Stay tuned for more here.

We are also embarking on a bold, long term initiative to radically simplify IT for our commercial customers. Simply put, the philosophy comes down to a set of core beliefs:

• Information Technology shouldn’t be as complex as it is.

• You should spend less on maintaining I/T and more on innovation.

• Every IT project should not require an army of consultants.

• Computing should have minimal environmental impact.

• Superior information drives efficiency in your IT environment.

We are already taking steps to fulfill this vision, but we have a long way to go. For those of us who have worked for a while in this industry, we know our competitors drive complexity and needless cost into customers’ environments. These so-called "service divisions" create a never-ending cycle of activity with unclear return on investment. We intend to break this cycle. We will build different kinds of services and offer key technologies that will help customers escape this complexity trap and unlock the true potential of technology. And, as we re-invent Dell to deliver on this promise for our customers, we will rely on Mark Jarvis, our new chief marketing officer, to ensure we properly position our new systems and solutions capabilities in the global marketplace.

We won’t hesitate to use our company’s assets to build or buy the capabilities and technologies we need to deliver on our initiatives. Our transformation will take time to accomplish. We need your help to identify how we can become more efficient and effective for our customers across all areas of our business. We want you to take action with your team and bring your ideas forward. On June 20, we’ll launch the internal version of IdeaStorm called "Inside IdeaStorm" for employees so that you can tell us where you think we have opportunities to improve as a company and how we can streamline our work to eliminate low value activities. We will listen and we will respond.

This is a defining moment in our history and in our relationships with our customers. Just as we re-invented the way consumers and organizations buy hardware, we are going to re-invent the way the world gets access to IT. We are excited about what we will achieve for our customers as we make information technology more affordable for them and what that will enable them to do.

The future looks great for Dell and we are up to the challenges that we’ll face on our journey — challenges that will test, teach and ultimately strengthen us as a company and as a team — as One Dell.

Thank you for transforming Dell with the customer in mind every day. Be sure to let us know your thoughts on this on One Dell Way.

Related Articles:

Dell Releases $335 PC for China, India, & Brazil

Dell Ex-CEO Gets $5 Million Cash for Screwing It Up While HP Profits Soar

Just How Digg-Like Are They? Chart Comparing New Sites by Yahoo, Microsoft & Dell

Microsoft software will sell for just $3 in some parts of the world in
an attempt to reach the five out of six people worldwide still not using computers. The software giant has a goal of bringing computing to a further one billion people by 2015 (doubling the current number of computer [...]]]>

Microsoft software will sell for just $3 in some parts of the world in
an attempt to reach the five out of six people worldwide still not using computers. The software giant has a goal of bringing computing to a further one billion people by 2015 (doubling the current number of computer users). Bill Gates made the announcement during a speech in Beijing:

"All human beings deserve a chance to achieve their full potential. Bringing the benefits of
technology to the next 5 billion people will require new products that
meet the needs of underserved communities; creative, new business
approaches that make technology more relevant, accessible and
affordable; and close collaboration between local governments,
educational institutions and community organizations."

Here’s how it will work: Microsoft will provide the $3 Student Innovation Suite to governments that agree to purchase PCs directly for students to use in their schoolwork and at home. This new suite of software will start shipping in the second half of this year and includes Windows XP Starter Edition, Office Home and Student 2007, Windows Live Mail Desktop and many other educational products.

Minimum eligibility for governments is that they pay for at least half the cost of the computer, though the software can also be used on refurbished computers. Microsoft explains that refurbished computers can be purchased for as little as $50.

So now the developing world has the $53 Microsoft computer vs. the OLPC $100 laptop in the works. Whichever becomes more viable, it’s only good news for those 5 billion people without computers…

Related Articles:

Unintended Consequences of Technology and Economic Development

$100 Laptop Now Becomes $130 Laptop

With an estimated 500 million pounds of electronics collecting dust in California’s closets, garages and attics, finding ways to reuse those metals, plastics and chemicals is critical.  That’s where John Shegerian’s company, Electronic Recyclers, comes in.  The Futures Channel takes viewers inside the largest electronic recycling plant in California in its new [...]]]>

With an estimated 500 million pounds of electronics collecting dust in California’s closets, garages and attics, finding ways to reuse those metals, plastics and chemicals is critical.  That’s where John Shegerian’s company, Electronic Recyclers, comes in.  The Futures Channel takes viewers inside the largest electronic recycling plant in California in its new online micro-documentary, “Recycling Computers.”

An industry born out of the technological revolution, recycling electronic waste is one more part of the surging green wave aimed at leaving our planet in better shape than when we found it.

The largest facility in California, Electronic Recyclers can break down millions of pounds of electronic waste every month.  Everything from computer monitors to cell phones to hard drives comes through their doors to be crushed, shredded and melted down. The Futures Channel releases its latest online documentary, “Recycling Computers,” on Monday, April 16. The video takes students inside the recycling plant to see the staggering amount of electronics they handle on a daily basis.

"No one ever thought about it, originally, when they invented these things, where they were going to go when they came to their end of life,” says John Shegerian, CEO and co-founder of Electronic Recyclers.

As Shegerian explains in the movie, it is estimated that in California alone 500 million pounds of electronics sit collecting dust in warehouses and attics and garages, which could be recycled. Only two percent of the 100 million discarded cell phones in this country each year are recycled appropriately, he says. 

Being able to recycle the materials used in electronics and keeping e-waste out of landfills is central to Electronic Recyclers’ work. “Everything that comes through the front door leaves as a plastic, glass or metal, to be re-used again," Shegerian explains.  Metals, like gold in computer chips, are thrown into chemical baths and then melted down to be used again in other products.

In addition to publishing educational videos on its website, The Futures Channel provides lessons and activities so students can immediately apply the math and science concepts they have seen in the videos.

“As I watched this [video], I was struck with the complexity of the components of the computers and of the apparent need to recycle these prevalent items in our lives,” says educator Roberta Haren. “The 5th graders I teach will be able to take real world knowledge of electronics that they have and be able to immediately connect to the video.”  Haren describes in detail how she would use the video in her classroom.  Her complete review is available on The Futures Channel’s website.

The video also provides students with a good example of  an entrepreneur, John Shegerian, who has combined his business savvy with his passion to help safeguard the planet.  "We are all part of this earth," he notes in the video, “and we all have to be involved to leave a better environment than we inherited."   

Watch the movie:

http://www.thefutureschannel.com/dockets/hands-on_math/recycling_computers/