Tyson Kirksey » Technology

It’s a Bird, It’s Superman…no, it’s a Plane!

Tyson — Tue, 30 Mar 2010 17:14:06 +0000

My wonderful wife ran across something so interesting yesterday while using Google Maps. She was just perusing our neighborhood from above and look what appears almost immediately over our house! Apparently the moment when the satellite snapped the picture, there was a commercial airliner flying north immediately above our house. I’m guessing the speed and material of the aircraft are what makes that cool prism effect.

Anyways…just wanted to share. What are the chances, right?

Google Has a Better Idea for your Computer

Tyson — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 21:28:59 +0000

Google’s long awaited operated system, Chrome OS, was open-sourced today at a big to-do at Google’s HQ in Mountain View. Here’s a video of what Google thinks is a better idea for your computer.

My First Real Firefox Extension

Tyson — Sat, 18 Apr 2009 15:29:34 +0000

(This post may not make any sense to some of you…)

I’ve spent the last few weeks building a Firefox add-on to simplify the process of tagging links with Google Analytics tracking variables before sharing on Twitter. It’s called Snip-n-Tag, because…well…it shortens URLs and tags them. How creative am I, huh? See it at the Mozilla site here: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/11492

Anyways…in 3 days it’s been installed over 100 times, so I feel pretty good about that. It’s a simple extension, but I think it solves a real problem fairly eloquently. For you folks that use Twitter to drive traffic to your website, check it out and give me your feedback. You can leave comments on the snip-n-tag page of this site at http://www.tysonkirksey.com/snip-n-tag.

As I mentioned in the title, this was my first real firefox extension, starting from scratch and learning XUL and all that. I’ve built a couple of Greasemonkey scripts for Google Analytics which have been converted to extensions, but nothing like this yet.

The Cadillac Escalade Hybrid

Tyson — Mon, 05 Jan 2009 00:47:29 +0000

Yesterday I was driving through East Texas and I saw for the first time a Cadillac Escalade Hybrid. Shwanky, I know. But I got to thinking – I wonder what the math on that guy is. So I looked it up…here we go:

The standard 2009 Escalade MSRP pricing starts at $60,985, while the hybrid version starts at $70,685, a difference of $9,700. This is the premium you pay for the hybrid engine. Now, I’ll ignore the slightly less powerful motor on the hybrid version, as I suspect with over 300 horsepower there is still sufficient strength to do whatever you need.

OK, so let’s figure out the break-even analysis on that $9,700 premium. GM claims the hybrid gets 50% better fuel economy in the city, and 20% better on the highway. For city driving, that brings the MPG up from 12 to 18. The average driver covers just over 1,000 miles per month, so I’ll use 1,200. That’s 67 gallons of fuel versus 100 gallons required for the standard gasoline engine, as savings of 33 gallons. At our current bargain-basement petroleum costs, that’s a savings of about $50 a month. If gasoline remains at this price (ha, I know), it’s going to take about 16 years to break even and start saving money with the hybrid.

Now let’s say oil prices begin to rebound as everyone expects they will, and they rise again to a $3 average. Of course that means it will only take 8 years to reach break-even point and start seeing green. Much more reasonable, don’t you think? Now obviously if you drive twice as much as the average driver and put 25,000 miles a year on your hybrid, you can look forward to break-even point just as that odometer rolls over the 100,000 mile mark.

Now let’s not forget the best-case scenario for hyrbrid owners. If gasoline skyrockets to a $5 average, it’s just going to take the average driver a little less than 5 years to reach fruitfulness. But keep in mind, this assumes 100% city driving, and no highway travel. So I consider this the ultimate best case scenario.

Maybe this kind of math is why GM is looking for a bailout about now, what do you think?

Clever Marketing from EA Sports and Tiger Woods

Tyson — Fri, 22 Aug 2008 14:14:46 +0000

Steve Rubel over at Micro Persuasion had a great post this week regarding EA Sports responding to a video gamer on Youtube.

Levinator25 posted this video on YouTube poking fun at an apparent glitch in Tiger Woods ’08:

EA Sports responded with a video of their own…

I’m Putting This on my Permanent Xmas List

Tyson — Fri, 13 Jun 2008 03:16:07 +0000

I really dislike mowing, but it’s one of those package deals with homeownership I guess. Anyways, I was flipping through Popular Mechanics this week and saw something for the first time. A roomba for the yard!

My Experience with Live Search Cashback

Tyson — Mon, 26 May 2008 15:36:41 +0000

Much has been written about Microsoft’s bribery search engine – Live Search Cashback. I like a deal as much as anyone, but this almost seems ridiculous. Anyways…I’m shopping for a couple of unique items for my car stereo in order to hook up my iPod, and here’s my experience:

1) I typed in the product name I’m looking for “FMMod01″, into the box at the top of this page. Here are the results. Looks like there are some options at a decent price, hopefully.

2) After clicking on Compare Prices, I see the list of merchants. Oh, Crutchfield! Fantastic…love ordering from them, even if it costs a little more. And look at that discount! 50% cashback…score!

3) At this point I’m getting excited, so I click Go To Store and see this:

OK, what!? It went from 50% cashback savings to a whopping 0.0% cashback savings!? I decide to enter an email address, hoping that the savings will switch back as quickly as before, but the next page shows this:

Well that really bites! Two thumbs down for live search cashback – I’ll just stick with Google and evreward.com.

Apple + Fitness = More Profits for Steve Jobs

Tyson — Mon, 31 Mar 2008 14:44:19 +0000

I just recently learned about the Nike+iPod system, which is very cool. But this, this is a great idea.

Music + Fitness = More Profits for Steve Jobs

Tyson — Thu, 27 Mar 2008 21:03:35 +0000

I have just recently learned about the Nike+iPod exercise software, which is cool. But this, this is a great idea.

Apple and Free Music

Tyson — Wed, 19 Mar 2008 18:44:34 +0000

Lots of news has been going around today about Apple in talks with the music labels to offer all-inclusive iPods – hardware that comes with a buffet of music at no extra charge.

Alternatively, Apple is considering offering an iTunes subscription service that would give users unlimited access to music for the life of their device.

For a $100 premium fee, customers can pay to have unlimited access to the complete iTunes library for the lifetime of their device, whether it be an iPhone or iPod. Or for a $7-8 monthly fee customers could have the same unlimited access, though at this time it looks as if the subscription service will only be offered to iPhone customers.

I assume this would be similar to Yahoo’s old Music Unlimited program that I subscribed to at one point – offering tracks with DRM so as soon as you stop your subscription the downloaded music becomes unusable. That service was $7.99 a month, I believe.

If the music really does last only as long as the device lasts, I’m thinking it’s a good day to own this company.