As many readers already know, Circuit City has been wiped from the face of the retail planet. Doomed by poor management and an inability to compete in the marketplace any longer.In 2007 it would seem that Circuit City decided customers only care about price when it comes to consumer electronics, and Circuit City shed their highest paid employees to reduce their costs. Best Buy, believing instead that consumers valued good advice in making their buying decision, quickly snapped up many of those laid off from Circuit City.On the pricing front, my favorite ‘no wonder they went out of business’ story is this:My step-brother picked up a digital camera in the Circuit City liquidation sale at more than 20% off and he was feeling good until he found out that Wal-Mart’s regular price was $4 cheaper. Circuit City may you rest in peace.Now let’s examine other reasons why knowledge is profit … Continue reading →

I came across an article on Windows Live the other day highlighting a couple of potential distruptive innovations in the gaming industry that I thought I would share with you.The first is OnLive, based in Silicon Valley, which simply put is Video Games On Demand. No downloading, no physical media, just click and play. All you have to do is plug in a sleek mini-console (about as a big as a pack of cigarettes), or load a 1mb plug-in into your PC browser. The company was founded by noted technology entrepreneur Steve Perlman (WebTV, QuickTime). OnLive spent seven years in stealth development before officially unveiling at GDC 2009 for a Winter 2009 Launch – check out the video (53 min):Zeebo Inc. is the second company attempting to challenge the gaming industry leaders with disruptive innovation. Zeebo Inc.’s “video game console for the next billion” is aimed at countries like India, … Continue reading →

If you haven’t seen this video highlighting the work that Trent Reznor of Nine Inch Nails and team have done in the wake of decreasing music sales and increasing piracy, you certainly should: Nine Inch Nails makes their body of work available on their web site for free and then offers people several different ways of purchasing a part of the music and a part of the experience (including limited edition items). It all boils down to two key concepts: Connect with fans (CTF) Give people a reason to buy (RTB) So, what are you doing to connect to the fans of your products and services? Are you giving your customers enough of a reason to buy? @innovate

I came across a video on BNet on the future of ink. Electronic ink (aka electronic paper) is the display technology powering the Amazon Kindle and pretty much every other serious digital book reader out there. The technology is also being tested with store signage in Wal-Mart and was used to power a multimedia panel on the cover of Esquire. If you’re not already familiar with the technology, or if you’d like to see more, watch the video below:The key question in my mind is not what has the technology been used for so far, but what other imaginitive uses can people come up with that will improve the quality of our lives?What do you think?@innovate

I came across an article in Fast Company on a wireless technology standard that I think most people (especially non-techies) have probably never heard of – ZigBee. ZigBee is a wireless technology that uses significantly less power than WiFi and as a result is ideal for monitoring applications. The application detailed in the Fast Company article was a remote healthcare monitoring solution called AT&T Telehealth, but the technology is also touted for energy management and efficiency, home automation, building automation, and industry automation. If you are interested in learning more about ZigBee, they have lots of educational information on their web site. What other uses can you imagine for this technology? @innovate

To celebrate the twenty year anniversary of the Internet, here is a video of Tim Berners-Lee talking about the birth of the Internet and where things may go from here. For his next project, he’s building a web for open, linked data that could do for numbers what the Web did for words, pictures, and video – to unlock our data and reframe the way we use it together. Check it out: What do you think the future of the web holds? (please add a comment) @innovate