Random Thursday

Say, did you notice that I posted not once but twice yesterday? Pretty impressive, huh? Could this be a sign of things to come? Nah, probably not.

• Scientists think they’ve discovered the opening to a vast system of tunnels on the moon. Oh, great. Another way for illegal aliens to cross the border onto earth.
• Wonder how the annual performance review of the secretary featured in this article is going to go? [Via Neatorama]“Ms. Henry, you cost our company $1.26 billion. On the other hand, you do make a mean cup of coffee, and your filing technique is impeccable.”
• I’ve heard of “kick-butt” competitions, but here’s one where you probably get points for kicking your own.  
• How many cell phones have you gone through in your lifetime? I’m guessing that my wife and I have had at least a dozen between us, and perhaps more. And we always have trouble deciding what to do with the old ones. We’ll try to remember to check in on this page (it provides instructions for erasing cell phone data) before our next upgrade and disposal.
• Speaking of cell phones, Motorola’s new Droid smartphone will be released into the wild next week and it’s already generating a buzz (you have surely noticed the “iDon’t” TV ads contrasting the iPhone’s alleged weaknesses with the Droid’s features). The announcement that Google will provide turn-by-turn navigation capabilities for the Droid is also a big deal, although there’s speculation that the same feature will eventually find its way onto the iPhone. In any event, as a completely satisfied iPhone user, I’m still happy that some competition is being introduced and I hope the Droid is as competent as its maker claims. Apple’s had a pretty easy ride thus far in this business line, if you don’t count the massive unhappiness over its exclusive arrangement with AT&T, and having a strong alternative to the iPhone will surely stimulate the creative juices of the Cupertino folks.
• Finally, here’s a fascinating real world socioeconomic experiment. To celebrate the first anniversary of the wildly popular game World of Goo, the developers (2D Boy) offered a special deal: download the game from their website and pay whatever you want for the software that normally sells for $20.They ran this promotion for 13 days and provide some statistics on their website related to the 85,250 copies of the game that were sold during that period.Some of the more interesting observations:
  • Linux users ponied up the most per game, followed by Mac users; Windows users were the stingiest.
  • In a breakdown by country where there were at least 100 purchases, US customers were in the bottom one-third in terms of price paid (averaging $1.83 per download). Switzerland was at the top of the list with an average price of $5.37.
  • In an informal survey of purchasers in which they explained their reasons for setting whatever price they paid, 22.7% said they paid as much as they could afford, and 22.1% said they liked the “name your price” model and wanted to support it. Only 5.4% said they paid what they felt the game was worth to them.