An audience of two

Friday November 02, 2007

Bumbo Seats and Dumbo Parents.
A company has recalled 1 million child seats because of a few retarded parents who placed their kids in seats on top of tables. Apparently the parents did not possess the common sense of a goldfish and this warning label wasn't clear enough:

WARNING — Never use on a raised surface. Never use as a car seat or bath seat. Designed for floor level use only. Never leave your baby unattended as the seat is not designed to be totally restrictive and may not prevent release of your baby in the event of vigorous movement.

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The High Def Format wars continue
Interesting events today in the battle between BluRay and HD-DVD. WalMart had a "secret sale" at 8AM with Toshiba's HD-A2 player being sold for under $100 and discs for under $15. Each store reportedly had on average 25-50 units, which in most cases sold out in minutes - multiply that by the 750 stores thatvreputedly offered it and that's a lot of players. Toshiba also has a mail-in offer going on until the end of february, where you can get 5 free HD-DVD titles with the purchase of a player. 5 discs and a player for under $100 is a pretty good deal, even if most of the titles on offer aren't that exciting. Best Buy also had the same player for sale at a similar price online but is also sold out.

This represents a significant boost for the HD-DVD camp. The BluRay faction has been claiming that their players are outselling HD-DVD players, but that's counting Playstation and computer drives - if you only count standalones then HD-DVD is way ahead. And while I know some people who used their old PS2 as a DVD player, frankly it was a huge PITA. Most people prefer to keep their home theatre and games systems seperate.

What's interesting though is the timing of this deal. With Thanksgiving just 4 weeks away is WalMart making a pre-emptive strike on shoppers' attention in the hope of luring them away from competitors? Their web site does say that there will be more of these "secret sales". Or is this the first sign that Black Friday is moving to the beginning of November?

Unfortunately I missed my chance to grab one of these units. Hopefully I'll get another opportunity soon. This has effectively set a new price mark for next-gen players and surely other manufacturers will have to follow suit. After all, as with commodities like phones, razors and printers the real money is in the media, not in the initial sale.

Update: Circuit City still has them for $129. Hmmm...

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