Michael Braun's Blog

What will it mean when Apple can no longer count on the iPod to generate ever-increasing revenue for the company? To answer that question, you must look at it for different groups of people. For investors, it may mean reason for concern, as the iPod is one of Apple’s best selling products. If Apple can’t keep selling more quarter after quarter, then they will need to find other ways to increase profits. But for consumers and for Apple, this is not a reason for concern. Consumers still have a desire to own music-playing devices and the iPod is one of the best options. And Apple is still making a profit on the sale of iPods, meaning it would be illogical to scrap the product entirely. Someone should point this out to the critics wondering if the iPod line is getting old.

How much more can Apple really do with the tried and true mp3 player? There’s always changes to its form. This year, Apple shrunk the Nano and gave it touch screen controls. They made the Touch thinner and added two cameras. And they brought back the old design of the Shuffle, adding buttons again (thank goodness). And they can make changes to functions as well. Against Steve Jobs’ claims that no one listens to the radio anymore, iPods gained radio reception (FM anyway) last year (or the year before?). The Nano gained a camera last year, then lost it this year and gained a touch screen. The Touch added cameras and FaceTime video chat.

But these new forms and functions don’t really change what the iPod is. It’s still primarily a device used to play music, though the Touch comes closest to a pocket computer. And slowing sales are actually an indication of market saturation rather than declining interest. Consumers, in general, aren’t interested in updating their music players every year or two. And new features unrelated to music may not be enough to drive new sales. Further, redesigns focused around getting smaller don’t drive sales when the initial product was already plenty small. These factors all combine to give Apple a tough time selling the iPod as a continual source of increasing profits.

That’s not to say, however, that iPods are getting tired or boring. True, smart phones are getting better at music (the iPhone is already an iPod, and Android has some good music management apps), and smart phones are getting more popular. But for large segments of the market, the iPod is still a desirable product. Slowing iPod sales may be a concern for investors but us ordinary consumers have no reason to worry. The iPod isn’t going anywhere, any time soon.

Yesterday, Apple upgraded its iPod line, including a substantial update to the popular iPod Touch. The Touch now features two cameras (forward- and rear-facing) and a retina display, just like its more powerful cousin the iPhone. This change puts video chat capability in the hands of millions of potential customers through Apple’s FaceTime protocol. And considering how popular the Touch is with young people, tweens and teens, as a music player, gaming device, and social connectivity tool, it will likely be a first internet device for many young people. With wireless internet now ubiquitous, the Touch is basically a small computer.

But there’s trouble with new communication technology, especially once it propagates to younger people. Tweens and teens set the standard for usage extremes. Think of instant messaging with a dozen windows open at once, thousands of text messages sent every month, phone bills a mile long, and hours logged on social networking websites. And along with these extremes come the negative sides of these communication technologies: cyber-bullying, hate-speech, hurtful false online profiles, “sexting” and its associated negative consequences. What is it about youth that brings out these negative effects?

How long will it take before some tween or teens uses FaceTime for something inappropriate? My guess is it will be something sexual, reported on by the mainstream media as a “parental caution” but really because its titillating for the editors and advertisers. Perhaps a young woman or young man exposes herself or himself to what she or he thinks is one other person but is really a roomful. Or perhaps the video is recorded and posted online or emailed around. Or it could just be something done between two infatuated youths, only to be caught by parents. It won’t be long now, mark my words.

Until we crack the puzzle about what it is with young people that causes them to push these new technologies to extremes, all we can do is offer advice for parents looking to protect their children. Make sure your family computer is in a centralized location with easy monitoring. Set limits on screen time. Keep portable internet devices away from children (you can use parental controls to allow only certain apps on an iPod Touch). Keep laptops out of bedrooms. And, if you do just one thing, talk to your children about the risks inherent in misuse of these technologies. The more your children know, the more they can avoid negative situations before something really bad happens.

What has this world come to? UW’s classes this semester start tomorrow, Thursday, Sept. 2. It’s blowing my mind, especially considering that Monday is Labor Day, which means no classes. And since I have no classes on Friday, it’s a four day weekend (sort of). Bright and early tomorrow morning, I’ll go to my first and only class on the statistical concept of regression. It uses the free and open-source statistics program R, which means A) I don’t have to buy some expensive software or hope to recreate demos in class back on a lab computer, B) I can do the examples right with the professor in class, and C) I have to learn some crazy scripts as R lacks a real GUI (graphical user interface). Oh well, it will be good to learn.

The rest of my day tomorrow will be spent wrapping up the designs of two posters for the annual Institute on Aging’s Colloquium, basically a public outreach event designed to share with the public research relevant to older adults. I’ve got my own research to present as well as research with another professor, and I’m using InDesign to make both posters. If InDesign wasn’t so darn expensive, I’d probably buy it as it is one very fine product with an extremely intuitive interface. Rather than buy it, though, I’m depending on Adobe’s generous 30 day trial (full featured!). My own poster is designed to look like a Facebook profile “wall” with messages from various people (actually the individual predictive factors from my research).

As much as I would have liked the few days before school starts to be relaxing, I have been pleasantly busy meeting all kinds of new people. Last year, my specific area (comm. science) in my department (comm. arts) was pretty small; we had three professors and nine graduate students. This year, we’ve really ballooned – five professors and eleven graduate students! And the best part is that everyone gets along, making us a formidable bunch. I’m looking forward to planning many social events as the semester gets started.

Speaking of fun social events, UW-Volleyball season kicks off at home on Friday! Lauren and I will be there wearing red and ready to cheer. This year’s team looks pretty talented, and we’re looking forward to a winning season (unlike last year’s disappointing finish). Lauren will no longer be a student, as she finished her master’s degree in the spring, but luckily she’s starting a new job next week so the $5 charge (as opposed to $2 for students) won’t be too much of a burden.

For everyone starting class, have fun! For everyone else, enjoy a totally unusual Thursday.

NPR’s Morning Edition had an interesting story this morning talking about one university’s attempts to get students to go to class. Northern Arizona University is going to use RFID or some similar technology to automatically check students in when they arrive in a lecture hall. This information can then be used by professors to reward students for attendance. But in the grand scheme of educational goals, this system may be undermining the fundamental purpose of the university. Here’s how.

First, let’s separate out the two key factors at play in the higher education classrooms at Northern Arizona University. The first factor is learning; obviously NAU wants students to learn when they come to class. The second factor is attendance, which NAU has identified as a priority. There is obviously some covariance among these two factors. You can imagine a two by two matrix related to the material and the class: learned/not-learned crossed with attended/didn’t-attend. NAU wants to eliminate the didn’t-attend row in an effort to decrease the number of students in the not-learned column.

It’s a worthy goal, but it falls short of what the goal of the university should be: getting students to learn the material evidenced by performance on evaluation tools. In simpler language, students who learn should pass the test; students who don’t learn should fail. Nowhere in that construction do we find rewards for a student who did not learn the material. But NAU has just created some by awarding points for “just showing up.” NAU has taken the covariance observed and attributed causality to it.

The true cause of passing a test, of course, is learning the material (removing any variance caused by cheating or random variation like guessing successfully); passing is not caused by showing up to class. For instructors who don’t recognize this, the punishment for low attendance should be placed on their shoulders not on the students’. If the instructor, for example, uses tests produced by the textbook company, giving students who read carefully and learn visually no reason to attend class, then that instructor has earned his low attendance rates. If an instructor is a poor lecturer (and anyone who has ever been to college has had this experience), then that instructor is causing his low attendance. If students learn the material, then it does not matter how they learn it because the learning is the only outcome that matters.

The counterargument to this position is presented well by NAU. In the NPR story, they point out that each institute of learning has a vested interest in retaining students. Students who do not fail classes are students who are allowed to keep taking classes. Yet I know of no evidence that suggests mandatory attendance reduces dropout rates. Research (e.g., Marburger’s 2006 “Does Mandatory Attendance Improve Student Performance?”) does indeed support the impact of mandatory attendance on test performance, but this should come as no surprise to anyone! Of course being taught the material results in learning the material. But we don’t yet know how this might fit into a broader picture of overall student satisfaction with and desire to continue college education. It is most definitely possible for a student to attend every lecture and still fail the course. NAU’s argument may be valid, but more research is needed in this area.

In the end, my gravest concern with rewarding attendance is that it systematically disfavors students who cannot attend class as frequently as other students yet make up for their lack of attendance with intense studying and office hour visits. Rewarding a student who shows up and reads the newspaper during lecture makes no sense if we also punish a student who could not come to class because of a sick child. In the end, the college classroom is not about rewards or punishments; it is about testing the amount of learning completed by the student. Points given for just showing up undermine this goal. Students earn their grades by learning the material not by filling the seats.

With existing home sales at their lowest level in 10 years, including an especially steep 27% decline from June to July, many pundits are arguing that home ownership is no longer a source of wealth for American families. Gone are the days that buying a home meant long-term economic stability. In many ways, they are right, but that doesn’t mean buying a home is a bad investment, you just have to do it right.

Here’s the problems we’re seeing in the housing market. First, those markets where prices rose the fastest are also places where prices fell stupendously. Places like Florida, Las Vegas, California, and Arizona saw incredible rises in home prices. And builders kept producing more homes and high-rises, especially in the western states where federal and state money made habitation possible in places that were dry desert previously. The housing market has most decidedly bust in these places. So lesson 1: big gains mean big busts; avoid markets driven by irrational exuberance.

Second, the housing market has always functioned best in the long term. An oft-quoted statistic is that the average length of home ownership is 7 years. In this particular economic time, when faced with the greatest recession since the Great Depression, it’s no wonder people who bought homes just a few years ago aren’t able to make a profit. And with new lending tools, including monstrosities like “no money down” mortgages, there is no possible way these buyers have made progress in paying down their principle. They have a few years of interest-only payments to make before the amount they owe goes down. But for someone who bought their home 20, 30, 40, or 50 years ago, they will still come out well ahead in almost all cases. My grandparents bought their house in a tony neighborhood here in Madison 50 years ago. When they sell, they will make 20 times what they first paid. Lesson 2: in tough economic times, don’t expect to make a profit from short-term home ownership.

Third, home prices have taken bigger hits in areas harder hit by recession. It should come as little surprise that the housing market is affected by the forces of supply and demand. In an area like Detroit where there are few good paying jobs to be had, there isn’t much demand for new houses. This lack of demand, combined with a glut of homes for sale, naturally drives prices lower. This is a hard thing to swallow for people who have been living in an industrial area; things have changed rapidly these last few decades. But there have always been signs that economic tough times are coming. With each round of layoffs and each factory moved overseas, it wasn’t hard to see trouble on the horizon. Lesson 3: when bad signs arise, get out while you still can.

Fourth, in an ideal world, your mortgage payment should make up one third or less of your income (same goes for your rent). This should give enough monetary wiggle room to put money in other places. Any smart investor knows not to put all her money in one place and the same rule holds true for anyone seeking a return on their home. For those hoping to sell their home for a handsome profit, they should have enough economic flexibility to wait a few years to sell and enough investments that their home wasn’t the only thing they were banking on. Lesson 4: owning a home is no excuse for a lack of savings.

Here’s what I want to know: during the boom times, especially 2004-2006, there was a lot of talk about the American way of life not being sustainable. Remember when the US savings rate dropped into negative territory? For each dollar earned, Americans were spending even more. Clearly, that wasn’t working. Now there’s nothing but talk about why the economy isn’t back up to steam. The fact is that the economic boom times under President Bush came from reckless consumer spending. The last thing we need now is to begin those habits again. The American way of life is NOT sustainable and a major home price correction is just the first step in getting us back to living in line with our means.

Amos and Steph recently pointed out a bit of a logical fallacy to Lauren and me. They noted that they have several friends who advocate healthy, sustainable living while also advocating for the legalization and consumption of marijuana. Amos and Steph noted that marijuana is an easily cultivated crop in Mexico and such purchases may be fueling violence there. I have no doubt that this is frequently the case. But hitting even closer to home and relating even more to issues of a healthy planet are the local ways marijuana is cultivated.

Pot growers, in an attempt to evade law enforcement, have taken to cultivating their crop in the middle of large, forested areas. And it just so happens that these areas are frequently national forests or national parks. Take, for example, this recent bust in the Chequamegon-Nicolet National Forest right here in Wisconsin. Says the Associated Press, the growers “transform[ed] part of a national forest in northeastern Wisconsin into their own private pot plantations [and] left behind irrigation pits, clear-cutting of trees and bags of fertilizer.” The ring operating this site has had 12 total sites raided in the area. And this style of operation is linked to Mexican drug cartels, though this specific site hasn’t yet been linked. These marijuana growers, no matter how much their clients believe in sustainable growing practices, are interested in making a profit, not in helping the earth.

This is not to say that all marijuana sold in the United States is grown in clear-cut, chemically ruined parts of national forests. Certainly, for those people advocating pro-marijuana stances, there are sources of pot produced in small batches in hidden green houses and the like. Or perhaps the marijuana comes from California, where it can be legally grown with the right set of licenses. Not all pot is grown at the cost of the environment and our national treasures.

But to advocate a pro-marijuana position requires recognition of the responsibilities associated with illegal drug consumption. A curious young person, interested in trying marijuana, may be pushed further toward the drug by pro-pot propaganda, which downplays its health consequences (as less than tobacco) while talking up a natural experience. This young person has few options when it comes time to purchase, resulting in marijuana more likely to be grown to make a profit, perhaps in a national forest and perhaps by a drug cartel. Unless the advocacy of marijuana use comes with a strong condemnation of such cartels and growing practices, such advocacy is deeply irresponsible.

The internet (or, at least the obscure, Apple-focused technology websites that I visit) is abuzz over what Apple might announce at their next big event, scheduled for September 1. Judging by the invitations to the event (featuring a guitar with an Apple-shaped sound hole), it will focus on music. That fits with Apple’s usual schedule of announcing new and updated iPods in September. Accompanying these rumors have been a wide variety of evidence from various websites and suppliers. Based on pictures of cases being designed for the iPod touch, it seems likely that the touch will receive one camera, probably two, making it the first non-iPhone device to support FaceTime, Apple’s video calling platform. Also making the rounds has been pictures of a supposedly Apple-branded small touchscreen.

This screen measures 1.7 inches diagonally, making it pretty small. The screen on my third-generation iPod nano (the fat one) is around 2 inches diagonally. Speculation has suggested that this screen will either go into the new iPod nano or into a new or completely re-imagined product like the iPod shuffle. It would certainly be incredible to see Steve Jobs reverse his position on a screen on the shuffle. You may recall that when the shuffle first came out, Apple was criticized for not adding a screen to it. Two redesigns later, the shuffle has gotten progressively smaller, losing all buttons on the device in Apple’s latest iteration. To add a touchscreen would be a large change.

If the screen is not destined for the shuffle, where else could it be used? Surely it wouldn’t end up as part of a redesigned nano! After all, Apple only recently added video capability to the nano, including a video camera announced just a year ago. To move from a 2.2 to a 1.7 inch screen would seem to be a big degradation in consumer perceptions of product quality. Indeed, the nano seems like the product least likely to receive an update this year, other than an upgraded camera and some new colors.

Other than into the nano or the shuffle, I don’t know where else this little screen could end up. Could Apple be inventing some brand new product (maybe a touch-based Apple remote control)? Or intending it as an addition to an existing product (perhaps a small touch screen for a redesigned AppleTV)? If Apple shows off the new screen at their event, then we don’t have long to wait. But if they don’t, then I look forward to increased speculation about just what Apple might be planning.

Once again, the Daily Show hosted by Jon Stewart, has squandered a situation ripe with humor in favor of a clumsy storyline and little understanding of satire or intelligent humor in general. If interested, watch the clip here. Essentially, the bit entails reporter Aasif Mandvi interviewing a woman, Laurie Cardoza-Moore, who opposes a mosque proposed in Tennessee. Needless to say, Ms. Cardoza-Moore is a complete wacko. After she rails against Muslims because they don’t eat pork, Mr. Mandvi says, “You know I’m Muslim, right?” She responds, completely deadpan, “well, nobody’s perfect.”

With such a great subject for a story, how could the Daily Show get it wrong? For half the story, they don’t. Ms. Cardoza-Moore is the perfect subject for the story; she is completely delusional and reports that her knowledge of Islam comes from Google. But, unsurprisingly, the Daily Show screws up big for the rest of the story. Mr. Mandvi eggs on Ms. Cardoza-Moore by playing the role of a secret terrorist, including pretending to call someone when Ms. Cardoza-Moore says there are terrorist camps in the United States (“she knows about the camps, you idiot!,” he whisper-shouts into his phone); but he does not relinquish this character when interviewing the spokesperson for the Muslim community center located in a nearby community. And instead of trying to bait that woman into castigating him for pretending to be a terrorist, he pretends to mishear the woman when she says that she’s a mom. “So you’re the imam here?,” he asks; his misunderstanding is then intercut with brief clips of the Three Stooges. From laughter to stone-faced silence and back to laughter was my reaction to the story.

Not that the Daily Show has been so great recently. I’ve tried to document this occasionally, comparing the Daily Show to the Colbert Report, criticizing Jon Stewart’s conservative streak, and the Daily Show’s frequent racism. There’s nothing so terrible about the most recent story, other than the fact that it shows very clearly that the Daily Show lacks good editors and fails to understand what it is that makes their show funny.

To understand how this report should have gone, we first have to look at what type of news reporting the bit is satirizing. It’s the classic reporter against corporation or government, “man of the people” kind of reporting. I’m not sure who first popularized this type of story, but I recall watching John Stossel do it repeatedly on news magazine show 20/20. In this type of story, the reporter takes on an everyman approach to uncovering the injustices of the world. The reporter is cast as the hero and a large bureaucratic body usually serves as the antagonist (though the story could also be done focused on an individual trying to make a difference with the reporter as an advocate; or as a group of people or even an individual as the antagonist). The story usually culminates in an interview with the antagonist in which the antagonist says very incriminating things; ideally, there would be a followup interview of the reporter by the show’s hosts in which the reporter reveals that justice has been served. This is the basic formula that the Daily Show’s segment was meant to parody.

You can see the potential for humor in this type of story. For example, the reporter could pretend to be fighting for support of someone who has a very backwards position. In this way, the humor comes from mocking the protagonist. But the key to this humor is casting the right reporter for the story. We wouldn’t want to see Christine Amanpour doing a report on inaccurate grocery store scales; she would seem out of place. Instead, the best reporter is one that the audience can identify with. In this way, the Daily Show got the story spectacularly wrong. The best way to use Mr. Mandvi is to have him use his own religious upbringing to mock the antagonist; some parts of the story do this very well. But Mr. Mandvi is not convincing as someone interviewing the spokesperson for the local Muslim community center. To allow the spokesperson to contradict claims of widespread terrorism within the Muslim community, she needs a foil who is willing to repeat the claims of the antagonist verbatim and with a straight-face. Mr. Mandvi cannot reasonably sympathize with the antagonist nor can he antagonize the spokesperson and thus, the story fails for half its content.

It’s not shocking to see the Daily Show get it wrong AGAIN. But it is still disappointing. The Daily Show is the show that, supposedly, young people watch and listen to. I’m not trying to make the Tucker Carlson argument that Mr. Stewart should take his responsibilities more seriously. There are obvious challenges to putting on a comedy show that is also supposed to change the world. But for Mr. Stewart to fail so spectacularly at both the comedy and the change part is unforgivable. I don’t care how popular the Daily Show is, it still has a responsibility to get at least the comedy part right in the stories it puts out.

I’m considering a new project that looks at self-regulation strategies for managing use of social networking websites. Basically, my question is how do users keep themselves from experiencing negative results from using social networking websites excessively. Part of this project would aim to document specifically what people do on social networking websites and try to understand the frequency of those tasks. Here’s the list that I have assembled so far.

1. Update profile information (change biographical information, favorite music, movies, etc.)
2. Change profile picture
3. Post a message that all social contacts can see (a “status update,” a “tweet,” etc.)
4. Post a public message to another user (write on someone’s “wall,” “tweet” with an @username, etc.)
5. Send a private message
6. Engage in real-time chat
7. Post pictures
8. Create a social event and invite contacts (create a Facebook “event”)
9. Join a group
10. Indicate support for a person, cause, company, or organization (“like” a page, “follow” a celebrity, etc.)
11. Make new social connections with people you know (“friend” someone or accept a “friend request,” “follow” someone, gain a new “follower,” etc.)
12. Make new social connections with strangers
13. Spend time looking at your profile
14. Spend time looking at someone else’s profile
15. Post a message related to the message of another user (post a comment on someone’s “status update,” “tweet” in reply to another user, etc.)
16. Post a message that relates to your current location (“check in” at a restaurant, use Facebook places, “tweet” with your location, etc.)

The options for frequency are 1-Never, 2-Less than half of the time, 3-About half the time, 4-More than half the time, 5-Almost every time (that the user logs onto the website). There is also the option to indicate that the participant’s favorite social networking website doesn’t offer the feature.

So, what am I missing? What other things might people do on a social networking website? Comment or email your suggestions!

Earlier this week, Facebook unveiled a new feature called Places. Designed to mimic features already offered by social networking sites like FourSquare and GoWalla, Facebook Places allows users to post location-specific status updates. For example, you can post a status update when visiting a restaurant that will broadcast your location out to all your friends. This type of feature has been widely recognized as something lacking from Facebook. But mark my words, this feature is more about capturing more data about Facebook users than it is about offering a better user experience.

The main reason this is a battle about data and not about features has to do with the feature’s potential for profit generation. It’s easy to understand how a company could monetize location based services. In fact, users of these services are basically holding a sign that says, “market to me!” It allows businesses to get data on what types of customers are visiting their businesses, especially if they are willing to pay for that data. It allows consumers to receive specific special offers, even directly from the business itself. For example, you can imagine a cafe offering $.50 a cup of coffee if the user “checks in” before purchase. And the real-time nature of the feature means businesses can get a minute-by-minute account of their customer makeup.

But to do all that, the feature must be widely used and thus an instant advantage of Facebook over other such services. As Facebook becomes the ubiquitous social networking site (for now, anyway), this feature is just another way for Facebook to gather data about you. Facebook can roll out ads based on where users are in addition to what they like, all because users give that information to Facebook.

This is just one step further into Facebook’s eventual plans to offer advertising on third-party websites, a feature I have argued is just around the corner, especially if Facebook ever plans on going public. And like most of Facebook’s changes, it has nothing to do with offering a better user experience and everything to do with getting rich. Privacy groups are already angry about the new feature, and who can blame them. It’s another auto-opt-in change, that allows users to tag other friends’ location without their permission unless they specifically turn off that feature. I’m so glad I don’t have to worry about these changes anymore.

On Thursday, Chang Ma, a vice president at consumer electronics company LG, told the Wall Street Journal that his company’s upcoming tablet, running popular Android OS, will be better for consumers than the iPad. Specifically, he said that the iPad is a device for content consumption, whereas LG’s forthcoming tablet will be better for content creation. The real question is how will LG’s tablet be better for consumers?

To answer that question, we have to ask the ultimate marketing question, what do consumers want? Presumably, if I actually could answer that question, I might already be working for a marketing company. But I think we can look at two different types of tablets and see a lesson that LG should be mindful of. After all, in many ways, we’ve already seen the “consumption versus creation” battle play out, in struggles between tablets running Windows and the iPad. And we already know that the victor was, hands down, Apple’s iPad.

It’s possible, then, to consider the reasons why the iPad succeeded where other tablets have failed by looking at the iPad’s lack of features. The iPad does not offer any standard ports (it has just one, used to sync and charge), it has no cameras (yet), and it can’t run multiple applications at once (until this fall), nor can it display more than one application at a time. The iPad is a seriously limited device. And I use mine for a couple of hours each day (or more).

Whether or not consumers believe that they can or cannot create content on the iPad doesn’t much matter if consumers like the iPad and don’t feel excessively limited by it (and having used the iPad for everything from drawing with SketchBook Pro to brainstorming with Popplet, I must disagree with Mr. Ma’s claims).

LG should be especially careful if their attempts to create a product focused on creation end up sacrificing key competitive features. The iPad’s best features are often its least touted. For example, battery life on the device is stellar and should be talked about more. I charge my iPad once a week, and don’t worry about having enough power until the charge drops below 10%. The iPad is also the ultimate in pick-up-and-play technology. As innumerable web videos have shown, anyone can figure out how to use the iPad; its design is nearly perfectly intuitive. I can hand my iPad to anyone and let them use it without having to explain anything to them. This makes the device perfect for any coffee or conference table in the world and helps to explain the iPad’s success in a wide variety of markets.

If LG’s product can’t compete in areas like these and if they explain away the lack of intuitive design or poor battery life by saying their device is about “creation,” it won’t matter much because LG will fail in the tablet market. For every computer user who desperately wanted to be able to draw on their screen at any time, there have been tablets available for years. The iPad’s success comes from consumers who never gave a tablet much thought until they tried the iPad. These consumers don’t care about “creation” on a tablet. They just care about something fun, cheap, and easy to use. LG’s got a some big claims to live up to, especially in wallets of consumers, where claims of “better” are actually tested.

Earlier this week, Pink Floyd’s label EMI withdrew the band’s albums for sale on digital music stores like Apple’s iTunes and Amazon. All this over a complaint by Pink Floyd that allowing per track music sales of their music was undermining the artistic integrity of their work. As a fervent supporter of the album as the greatest artistic genre created in the 20th century (yes, greater than the motion picture!), I have no qualms with that argument. I do not buy piecemeal tracks and find it disheartening when other people do, especially on albums that are more than the sum of their parts. But Pink Floyd is missing the larger economic picture by removing their albums from sale on digital music stores.

Let’s face it, not everyone is interested in buying albums by Pink Floyd. Personally, I find their music irritating and boring, aside from a few singles. This is the case with most bands who have had a successful career and released many albums. Record labels understand this and thus produce and release greatest hits albums. These albums allow a casual listener to pick up the singles she likes without having to purchase the band’s entire catalog. Digital music sales take this one step further, allowing listeners to make their own greatest hits collection, buying just the individual songs they like.

This does undermine the artistic integrity of the band’s work. After all, the band chose each song for their albums carefully and ordered them in a particular way. We don’t care to see the Mona Lisa rearranged like some sort of puzzle, so why should we want an album to be split into pieces? The answer is economics, and Pink Floyd should start being a little less selfish.

First, per track sales should increase the number of people purchasing Pink Floyd’s music. If Pink Floyd has created a compelling product (an album), then real fans should want to buy the album in its entirety. Indeed, for bands without hit singles, I imagine that their albums sales compete very well with per track sales. Thus Pink Floyd should feel confident that real fans will buy the entire album. For those casual listeners, however, an “all or nothing” model does not maximize Pink Floyd’s earnings. After all, though some casual fans may buy the entire album, many will pass if they can’t get the single they want. And without getting that single, many listeners will fail to become fans and will not come back to purchase more. The purchase of a single is just one step closer to purchasing the whole album.

With that singles money, Pink Floyd should really feel grateful. If they hadn’t been able to produce hit singles and sell lots of albums, then they wouldn’t have stayed signed to their label. For most bands, especially ambitious bands like Pink Floyd, money from the label is what allows them to keep producing records. If single says help produce more money for the label, it means Pink Floyd can keep making music.

And what about bands besides Pink Floyd? Earnings from Pink Floyd’s success means labels are free to take risks on other, new bands that can’t be expected to sell as well. Thus Pink Floyd, by allowing sales of their albums track-by-track, helps fledgling bands get their big break. Not that these bands would fail otherwise (and many will fail to sell even with a label’s help and money), but someone took a chance on Pink Floyd and Pink Floyd should return the favor. Indeed, as Iranian bands use Pink Floyd’s music to fit against political oppression, there’s no better time for Pink Floyd to use their monetary wealth, including money generated from sales of singles, and their power for social good. Singles sales can only help further that noble goal.

The New York Times has come full circle, from reporting that today’s young people are listless, narcissistic losers to finally embracing more of a lifespan perspective on development in their magazine for this weekend. Basically, the lifespan perspective says that observations of college grads delaying adulthood can be explained by a new phase of development called “emerging adulthood.” I’ve read a persuasive argument for this new stage written by Dr. Jeff Arnett at Clark University, in case you are interested in learning more. The opposing viewpoint says that our culture today has corrupted young people and turned them into a bunch of narcissists. This argument has been put forth (though not well supported) by Dr. Jean Twenge at San Diego State University. News media usually picks one side or the other or plays the two sides as a great debate raging to try to explain if and why young people are different today when compared to other young people of the past.

But what if both perspectives are wrong? What if there aren’t real major differences in young people today compared to young people of the past, thus striking down the narcissism argument? And what if there isn’t a life stage of emerging adulthood? Indeed, is it possible that the entire phase of “adulthood” is a fabrication? It seems like these questions are worth considering. Here’s why.

First, let’s consider the entire concept of a phase of development. The thinking behind such a perspective says that variation within people of a certain age (say, five and six year olds) is smaller than variation between people of similar ages (three and four year olds compared to five and six year olds). Thus, it is acceptable to group people together by ages and claim that there are phases of development.

Further, because we know that the body and brain undergo certain physical changes and develop new ways of thinking that can be explained above and beyond simple education, it is valuable to do this kind of grouping. For example, we know that children have a period of time in which is it very easy for them to learn new languages. After a certain age, this ability declines supremely. Thus, having two stages of development centered around this ability makes sense.

But what happens to variability within age groups as we age? Consider infants. By and large, there is very little variation in the ability of newborns. All newborns can do basically the same things – suck, cry, et cetera. It’s hard for even the most wide-eyed parents to marvel at the abilities of their 2-week-old. As people age, this variability increases. Anyone who has spent time around a group of kids in the same grade can tell you there are sometimes worlds of difference within that group. Some kids seem smart as a whip; others can’t even compete against a horse. And while most everyone will get caught up in areas like basic math and reading though the process of education, there are still exceptional differences as these kids head toward their teenage years. Fast forward to late in life and we see very dramatic variation. Take 80 year olds for example. Some are leading vast investment empires (like Warren Buffett) and some are comatose. There is no comparison between these two types of people, even though they are the same age.

So is there a certain period of time after which a “life stage” perspective is no longer useful? Can there really be a life stage of 70-90 year olds? First, is there less variation within the group than there is between this group and others? There would have to be some vast differences between groups to overcome the variation within. Second, is defining this stage valuable? 20 years is a huge amount of time, especially when compared to the rapid changes occurring in children, which necessitates that a child’s early life stages are relatively short. At the end of life, it seems that having a life stage based in years is not especially valuable.

But does that mean that the end of life is not more similar for people facing it? Wouldn’t we say that an 80 year old suffering from cancer is probably having a more similar experience to a 50 year old going through the same thing, compared to an 80 year old running marathons? The end of life would seem to offer a reasonable stage in which we would expect to see more similarities than differences. Indeed, in the developmental literature, there is widespread consensus that the end of life is a meaningful time, especially when considering how close individuals feel they are to the end of their life (regardless of how much longer they will actually live). This gives us a new option when looking to find fitting ways to categorize people.

This new option also gives us good guidance for how to consider the lives of college grads. I argue that there is widespread variability in today’s youth and that this accounts for the difficulty in categorizing the nation’s youth. For any recent college graduate, consider your classmates. Some have probably gone off to get married. Others have found full time careers. Still more may have gone on for more schooling, or gotten a job to bide their time, or decided to travel before “settling down,” or have moved back in with their parents, or become a parent unexpectedly, or any number of other options. There is a lot of variation, and these options are all in recent college grads that I know. I’m certain there is even more variation when you consider everyone aged 22.

The reasons that there is so much variation in this group of people is less important than recognizing that there is such variation. Specifically, this recognition renders moot arguments for cultural forces creating a bunch of narcissists. (I’ll offer no apologies for this to Dr. Twenge.) The fact is that the only cultural forces worth recognizing are those that can explain increased variability. Neither a lifespan perspective nor the “everybody gets a trophy disaster” folks can explain why there is such variability.

This returns us then to the original question about the value of a life stage associated with this time. With so much variability and so many difference choices being made, I argue that the entire concept of a life stage of emerging adulthood is misconstrued. Indeed, I call into question the concept of “adulthood” itself! Adulthood may be constructed from a set of experiences, but it should not be based on specific developmental or age-based perspectives. You are an adult when you feel like how you think being an adult feels. Thus for all people getting married or starting a family, we could categorize them together. There is likely less variation within this group than between this group and others, regardless of age. But there is little value in grouping by age alone after puberty.

For the record, I feel like I am an adult. But I am certain there are plenty of other 26 year olds (perhaps living at home with no job, as is one of my former roommates) who don’t feel that way at all. Such vast variability makes categorization overly reductive and often downright impossible. For those scholars struggling to do so regardless of the challenges, it may be best to consider another route entirely.

Once again, Beloit College has released their annual “mindset list,” a collection of items purported to act “as a reminder to faculty to be aware of dated references” that “quickly became a catalog of the rapidly changing worldview of each new generation.” In reality, it falls far, far short of that goal. Indeed, even its own purpose is incorrect. A new generation of students does not enter college each year. Generations are generally 15-20 years apart, and certainly each new set of college students cannot represent a new cultural generation. Suffice it to say, I think the list is stupid.

Though I felt I presented sound criticism of the Mindset list in a blog post I wrote last year, I realized I didn’t lay out an argument against the list, other than to say it doesn’t live up to its purpose. Indeed, commenter “Lone Rngr” (not a real name?) took me to task on this point, and rightly so. From the comment, “why are you so bitter about the mindset list? sure [sic] one can debate how useful or relevant some items are but the concept is sound in my view.” My response to this comment not sufficing, let me lay out specifically the damage I think it caused by this list.

First, the list is twee and not serious, yet garners widespread news coverage. Aside from the publicity purposes this serves for Beloit College, it is worth recognizing that the list has no real value. Many of the items treat pop culture as deterministic of personality and suggest that not being born during a time equates with a lack of knowledge of that time. For those who buy into the list, this leads to ignorance about other generations. Imagine reading the list and believing that this generation “never recognized that pointing to their wrists was a request for the time of day.” Every 18 year old must seem to be a totally foreign person, devoid of cultural references and hardly even American. If the reader believes this and thinks it’s cute, then he is likely to treat the generation in a less serious matter. It’s certainly not a good way for anyone to begin a conversation.

Second, the list is only twee AT BEST; at worst, it’s reductive and even potentially dangerous. The list presents the group of incoming freshmen as one united body, rather than as a collection of unique individuals (or at least individual types). Further, this body is presented as having no awareness of history. To reduce an entire group of people to their pop cultural exposures is entirely unhelpful for anyone trying to promote intergenerational understanding. Indeed, I argue that such lists actually create intergenerational fear, as older people are lead to believe total falsehoods about younger people. “46. Nirvana is on the classic oldies station. 55. Rock bands have always played at presidential inaugural parties. 56. They may have assumed that parents’ complaints about Black Monday had to do with punk rockers from L.A., not Wall Street. 58. Beethoven has always been a dog. 65. They first met Michelangelo when he was just a computer virus.” – What crass, ignorant boobs these kids must be! So much so that they are to be feared, at least for their lack of intelligence.

In reality, few reading the list will be tricked into such reductive thinking, and some of the items may actually be helpful. For a professor whose examples talk about the Cold War, such struggles have been out of the cultural consciousness for young people for at least a decade now. Time to update those lectures! But even without these widespread effects on all readers, the list falls so short from its purpose and reduces young people in such a dramatic way that it isn’t helping, and may indeed be hurting, intergenerational relations. And that’s where my objections come from. The list is promoting ignorance rather than enlightenment, and I’m sick and tired of it.

There was a time in which Apple could be counted on to deliver new, innovating electronics. Maybe they weren’t the first into the market, but they were the best at delivering comprehensive hardware/software integration. The iPod, for example, wasn’t the first portable digital music player; but it was the first that came with easy-to-use software that promised to digitize your CD collection with minimal pain and hassle. Similarly, the iPad wasn’t the first portable internet device, but it was the first with access to an extensive application store. But something happened to Apple between the launch of the first iPod in 2001 and the release of the iPad nine years later: Apple is still delivering innovative products but at a much lower cost. The original iPod was priced at $400; you can get an iPad for just $100 more.

Part of this price change is the overall cost of the associated parts; obviously things like flash memory are much cheaper today than they ever have been before. But Apple is now winning in price and innovation, especially when compared to other innovative products. Specifically, I’m thinking of Toshiba’s new Libretto portable computer. It’s an innovative device featuring two touch screens hinged together like a book. It resembles, in form, Microsoft’s Courier tablet, a project that was recently canceled. Overall, I love the look and idea behind the Libretto. It’s very innovative and exciting, definitely more so than the iPad. But what I don’t love is the price. The Libretto starts at $1100.

Let me repeat that price: $1100. You can buy a notebook from Apple for less. You can get two iPads for less. You can probably buy four or five netbooks running Windows 7 for less. There’s an obvious cost associated with innovation, namely that Toshiba can’t bank on selling enough to bring the component parts down enough in cost. But Toshiba has also all but guaranteed that they won’t sell many Librettos because of the price. It’s an intriguing product, but even without reading a review of it, I will bet it won’t be successful. The price is simply too high.

So is this the price of innovation these days? No. It’s the price of bad software. The Libretto runs Windows 7, which is the best choice that Toshiba can make; no doubt the computer would cost even more if Toshiba had invested in developing a new operating system for the device. But it means that Toshiba has no committed followers who will flock to the device based on trust. The opposite is true for Apple. Apple can innovate and try new products with the knowledge that hundreds of thousands (if not millions) of people will snatch up whatever new product they release. Thus Apple can plan to produce a few million iPads, enough that the cost can be lowered overall. Because Toshiba has not been able to generate such legions of devoted fans, they must price their products much higher. And because those higher prices mean lower sales, innovation doesn’t get into the hands of very many people.

I’m not sure I have a lesson to offer in this comparison of Apple’s versus Toshiba’s pricing. But it is interesting to note how wildly things have changed for Apple in just a few years. When I started marketing work for Apple as a campus representative in the fall of 2004, the biggest hurdle I perceived in pitching Apple was price. Indeed, we reps were told specific arguments we could offer to help overcome the idea that Macs were too expensive. (The most ridiculous was to suggest that people take out additional student loans.) Today, Apple’s sales are higher than ever and many of their new products are priced to be affordable, especially the iPad. It’s the power of trust, the power of devoted fans, and even, silly as it sounds, the power of love. Apple’s got it; Toshiba can only wish.