Category Archives: Technology

How Amazon Needs to Get Social

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The news came out yesterday that Google search will soon be including results from its Google Plus network. This is pretty huge if you think about it. It means that when I search for a book, for example, I’ll be presented with something a friend of mine said about that book 3 months ago, or maybe even yesterday. Google has already done a great job making the search results relevant to me, but this is another huge step in the right direction towards really relevant searches.

It got me thinking, though, about how Amazon needs to incorporate a social element to the online shopping experience. Consider Amazon reviews–they’re the best thing in the world, right? More often than not, a decision on whether to buy one product over another comes down to the reviews.

But not all the reviews are accurate. The sheer volume of reviews helps to mitigate this problem, but the problem is still there. Like the guy who gives a product 1 star because he had a bad shipping experience–something that has absolutely nothing to do with the product itself.

Imagine if you could build trust circles, or trust groups within Amazon–a group of people whose opinion you trust around a certain topic. Like a group of people whose opinion you trust about books, or technology, or art. Maybe this list of friends gets pulled from Facebook, or maybe it comes from Google+. Or maybe Amazon builds their own social network, allowing people to connect with other friends on Amazon (and easily share books via the Kindle).

Now imagine you’re looking at a product page, and see that the product has an average rating of 3.5 stars from all users. Not bad. But then you can tweak the 5-star rating to only include those reviews by people in one of your trusted circles or groups. Now the average goes up to 4 stars, and the reviews you are reading are by people you trust. Assuming you’ve chosen your circles or groups wisely, you can be confident that the reviews are more relevant to your tastes, likes and dislikes.

The Amazon rating system could be so much more if they could bring a social element to it. Right now, shopping on Amazon feels like I’m in my own little world, but I think the future of online shopping will be a very social experience.

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Trevor Lewis liked this post

Kindle Touch Review

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I’ve had my Kindle Touch for a little over a week now, and absolutely love it.

First of all, I prefer it to reading on my Samsung Galaxy Tab, mostly because of the e-ink screen. I spend all day staring at a computer screen at work, so the last thing I want to do when I come home and read is stare at another glowing screen. The e-ink is refreshing and doesn’t stimulate my eyes right before I go to bed like my tablet does. For me, the best thing about it is the screen.

I’ve found the navigation to be fairly intuitive. A few minutes playing around and I had the hang of it. In the course of my reading, I’ve also found a few swiping gesture shortcuts to navigate around (try swiping from top to bottom, bottom to top, and right to left while reading).

The other nice thing about it is the long battery life. I haven’t had it long enough to test the 2-month battery life claim, but I don’t doubt it at all. After using it pretty consistently for the last few days, the battery meter reads just under full. I’ve made sure to turn off the wireless when I’m not using it. In contrast, consistent use of my tablet requires charging at least every other day.

Also, it’s nice to have a device dedicated to reading. For someone like me who likes to multitask, the tablet offers plenty of distractions and makes it hard to get through a chapter without some sort of notification getting in the way. Ditching the distractions makes for a great reading experience.

I was really excited when I learned that Utah libraries now support ebook rentals through OverDrive. However, the excitement quickly died down when I logged in and saw that the waiting list for popular books like The Help is 100+ people. I’m not getting that book anytime soon. Unless public libraries purchase and make more copies available, I doubt it’ll be useful in the long run (unless you’re looking for really obscure books).

My excitement returned when I learned about Amazon’s Kindle Owners’ Lending Library, a way to check out books from Amazon (up to one book a month) with no due date if you have Amazon Prime ($40 for students after the free trial). Not every book is available as part of this program, but it’s got a pretty decent selection which I imagine will expand over time.

My first rental from the lending library has been The Hunger Games. The catch with these rentals is that they’re only available on an actual Kindle device–the book doesn’t show up in the Kindle app on my tablet, or in the web-based reader. Since you can rent up to one book a month, it’ll be easy to keep my 2012 resolution of reading one book per month, without needing to actually buy any books.

What’s been your experience with the Kindle? Are you sitting on the fence, wondering whether you should get one? Have any more tips and tricks to using the Touch? If I’ve convinced you, you can get yours at Amazon right now.

Podcasts in Google Music

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I still think it’s only a matter of time before Google Music adds podcast subscriptions natively. But until that happens, I’ve found a solution to get podcasts into your Google Music account that uses iTunes as the podcast manager.

With Google Music, you can download the Music Manager, a small application that acts as the link between your computer and Google Music. With Music Manager, you can upload your current library (you specify the location) or download the music you’ve purchased through Google (someday I expect the ability to also download music you’ve uploaded). But iTunes podcasts aren’t included in that library upload by default.

Under the Advanced tab in Music Manager is a checkbox to ‘Include podcasts in uploads’. Check that box and now you’ve got your podcasts available in the cloud, accessible from the web and the Google Music app on your Android phone. If you leave both iTunes and Music Manager running in the background, new podcasts will be downloaded and uploaded without any supervision.

Here are a few of my favorite podcasts:

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