:-))

Trust, but Verify before you Buy

Another wonderful article from Clark Howard that applies to everything:

See what marketers know about you

By Clark Howard

ClarkHoward.com

Marketing organizations that have been super secretive are now facing scrutiny in the aftermath of continuing revelations about government spying.

One called Acxiom that I've talked about in the past reportedly has massive documentation on who you are, what activities you like, what cars you own, what your mortgage is, what kind of ailments you have, etc.
This data can be continually crunched and packaged for sale thanks to the miracle of parallel computing technology. But now for the first time, you can get a peek at what's in your Acxiom file.

Just go to AboutTheData.com and you can answer a series of questions to fully verify that you are who you say you are. Then you can see the info they have on you that they believe is fact -- but may actually be fiction.

Out of a sample group of 4 people on my show staff, two were able to see their records and two weren't. The two of us who couldn't probably couldn't because we've frozen our credit.

My executive producer Christa was able to see her file. It contained incorrect info including the wrong age of her kids, the wrong number of children, and the wrong income. My associate producer Joel's file was even more radically wrong. It listed him as a blue collar craftsman who completed high school, but had no college education. Joel is, in fact, a graduate of Kennesaw State University and not a craftsman -- unless you count drinking craft beer as a qualifier!

So these data brokers are out marketing what they claim is a precisely fine-tuned dossier they have on you. And in many cases it's kerflooey! "All the inaccurate data, all the time." How's that for an advertising slogan, Acxiom?!

Fortunately, you have the option to go to AboutTheData.com and opt out so they can stop compiling data on you!

One caveat, though: There's been a lot of widespread suspicion that the opt out form may be a backdoor kind of way for Acxiom to collect further data on you. The company denies it, but that hasn't quelled the skeptics. Use your own best discretion before taking the leap.

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Quote worth repeating again:

"It ain't what you don't know that gets you into trouble. It's what you know that just ain't so."  Mark Twain

Professional, "highly trained" (whatever that means) Stock analysts are a great example, especially when they appear on CNBC or Bloomberg TV :-))

Go Netflix Go!

Much more interesting investor call then having to listen to a bunch of analysts asking questions as though they are trying to sound smarter than each other :-)

Netflix 2nd quarter conference call

Here comes Yahoo!

Yahoo Weather App:   Forecast for Yahoo:  Bright and Sunny

 Yahoo 2013 Q2 earnings video

Buyer Beware

(the author of the following article, Clark Howard is top notch)

By Clark Howard

Should you pay more when you're shopping online simply because of the browser you're using? Some popular online retailers think so!
The New York Times  reports shoppers are getting widely different prices based on whether they use Chrome, Firefox, Internet Explorer, or Safari. Here are just two examples:

• For the same Samsung TV on NewEgg.com, a Chrome user was offered a price of $997. Meanwhile, the price was $1,399 when using Firefox or Internet Explorer.
• Another Samsung television model at Walmart.com was offered for $199 on Firefox and $168 on Chrome and Internet Explorer.

Meanwhile, Mac users could be paying a higher rate for hotel rooms on Orbitz.

According to The Wall Street Journal, Orbitz has been experimenting with a 30% premium on Mac users when they search for select hotel rooms versus PC users. That effectively works out to be around $20 to $30 more than a PC user.

When asked for explanation, Orbitz basically stated that Mac users make more money and are interested in fancier hotels. (There were no happy campers in the Apple world based on those comments!)

The best way for you to stay one step ahead of online retailers who are manipulating price is to use technology to fight back.

If you want an easy way to see if a quoted price is a deal or not, you can compare prices on websites like Decide.com or ShopoBot.com, or use a browser bookmarklet such as Hukkster.

Another alternative would be to install a browser plug-in like Invisible Hand that automatically pops up an alert while you're shopping if a better price is available on another website.

Finally, Amazon customers can typically get a better deal if they put something in their cart and then abandon it before the final purchase. That usually signals to Amazon that you're willling to walk away and triggers a lower price the next time you put it in your cart to checkout. Give it a try!

So many know it all's

"It ain't what you don't know that gets you into trouble. It's what you know that just ain't so."  Mark Twain