Real Estate, The Economy, and News: March 2018

Friday, March 30, 2018

TV Networks Looking to Cut Commercials in Exchange for Higher Viewership

People who watch television today, especially Millennials, have discovered that with improving technology come opportunities to make the viewing experience more enjoyable. It is a generally accepted fact that very few people actually enjoy commercials of any kind. Sure, some SuperBowl commercials stand out, but in general, commercials tend to be repetitive and boring, and simply get in the way of the TV program trying to be watched. According to Stephen Battaglio's L.A. Times article, more and more television customers are finding ways to avoid commercials in their daily viewing.

Streaming services like Netflix give consumers an alternative to normally scheduled broadcast television. They can watch all the TV shows and movies they want (albeit within a limited library of titles) without any commercial breaks for around $10 per month. TV ratings are continuously declining because even though television has the earliest airing time for many sought-after shows, if a viewer is willing to wait an extra day, they can watch the same episode without the annoying commercials and advertisements.

When digital recording devices became popular within the last decade, primetime shows had to change their strategy to engage the viewers who would simply watch later and fast-forward through any commercials. When remote controls were first invented, TV channels stopped having commercials in between different shows because they found that viewers were more likely to change channels during that transition. Especially as younger viewers adapt to new technology, networks will have to adjust accordingly if they don't want to lose an entire demographic for the foreseeable future.

In response to the changing viewership, networks are working on cutting down the amount of ad time to meet the expectations of their viewers. Many viewers want to see fewer ads, and if that doesn't happen, they'll just turn to alternatives like streaming. Some channels have up to 18 minutes of commercials per hour of television. Some have stated that they're looking to cut ad time by up to 50%. Others are working on other strategies, such as airing two long ads, one at the beginning and one at the end of a TV show, without a commercial break in the middle. Their hope is that viewers will be more attentive to ads if there are fewer of them. If those networks can convince advertisers that the reduction in clutter will improve their brand, then they may just be able to bring in the same amount of ad revenue even with less air time commited to commercials.

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Friday, March 23, 2018

Liquidation Sales Could Offer Great Discounts for Savvy Shoppers

Several retail chains over the past few months have had to start shutting down some of their less-profitable stores and liquidating their merchandise. One of the more notable examples, Toys R Us, was in the news recently about having to close down all of its over 700 locations. Many economists blame the surge in store closures on the success of online retailers like Amazon. When a shopper can get the same product for the same price (or cheaper) without ever having to leave the house, why would they ever shop at a brick-and-mortar store? Compounded with the decreased number of customers is the fact that traditional retailers have inherently higher costs (rent, electricity, more employees, etc).

Well, according to an article by the Associated Press of the L.A. Times, if they play their cards right, a retailer's loss could be the savvy shopper's gain. A shopper has to be careful, though; liquidation sales aren't always a good deal. You have to compare prices and check online deals if you want to make sure you're not being tricked by the "CLOSING" sign in big letters. Liquidators are aiming to make as much money as possible from the merchandise before they completely go out of business. Therefore, it makes sense that the liquidation prices would be at some equilibrium: high enough that the store can make money, but low enough that they can entice shoppers to buy the merchandise.

One of the tricks that retailers use to make the deal seem better is to focus on the percentage discount, rather than the final price of the product. Often, they will raise the prices, then mark a discount on it, so that it seems like it's significantly cheaper than usual when, in fact, the amount of money saved is pretty minor. The way to avoid such tricks is to compare the final discounted price with the price of the product at other stores or online. It's only a good deal if the overall price is low, not necessarily if there's a large percentage discount.

Additionally, shoppers should be aware that there's a happy medium in getting the best deal on the greatest selection of products in a liquidation sale. The sales tend to start at a 20% discount and prices go down over time until all of the merchandise is gone. If a shopper waits long enough, they can save the most money. On the other hand, if they shop earlier, they have a greater selection of products to choose from. There's a sweet spot in the middle where the discounts are relatively high AND the selection is relatively expansive. Shoppers looking to find the best deals (especially on clothes and toys, because those tend to be more discounted than electronics) should try to find that sweet spot.

If you have a gift card for a store that's closing down, use it immediately! Even if you know the chain is being bought out by another retailer, use the gift card, because the store credit may not be honored by the new owners. Once in a while, gift card holders can get a settlement after the retailer's bankruptcy, but that requires filing claims, something that many customers forget to do until after the deadline. Finally, even though liquidation sales can have great deals, shoppers should be careful that the items they're buying are of good quality and not defective. Often, sales during a liquidation are final, and the stores don't allow returns, so be careful when shopping and only make purchases when the merchandise seems to be in good condition.

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Friday, March 16, 2018

Alternatives to GPS Expected to be Less Susceptible to Spoofing or Jamming Attacks

The Global Positioning System, or GPS, as it's more widely referred to, was first developed by the US in the 1970s, and has been used ever since as the main method of determining location, speed, and even time. It relies on a set of 30 satellites in orbit, as well as their respective stations on the surface of the Earth. while the system has worked well for several decades, it is not completely immune to sabotage, and if any of the satellites or stations were to fail or be destroyed, the entire system could be compromised. To address this, says Samantha Masunaga, in her L.A. Times article, there are many companies working on guidance technologies that don't rely on those satellites, thereby assuring accurate and reliable location reporting.

GPS systems are susceptible to attacks from a few different methods. The more common method is the use of a GPS jammer, which prevents a GPS receiver from getting a signal, essentially making the receiver useless. In that situation, the attack can be problematic, in that the user no longer has control over their GPS system. However, the attack that poses far more concern is known as "GPS spoofing." GPS spoofing is a method by which a hacker feeds the GPS receiver a false signal, and causes the navigation change very slowly. Because the change is so subtle, the system doesn't detect it as an issue, so no alarms sound. A hacker could send the user into a dangerous situation, or simply somewhere other than where they wanted to go, and the system would be none the wiser until it was too late.

One company, called Satelles, has their own set of location signals being beamed from a separate set of satellites. When there are multiple sources performing the same function in some industries, some might call that redundant and think it a waste of resources. However, with something as fragile and important to things like national security as a positioning system, it's better to have multiple redundancies. If one of the systems becomes vulnerable to hacking, another one can fill in and take its place. Alternatively, one of the branches of the US military, called DARPA, is working on an advanced navigation system (ANS) that relies on signals from local radio towers, cell towers, and TV towers. Those signals can then be triangulated by the ANS receiver to provide information about the receiver's precise location.

Others have looked into the option of using image recognition on vehicles to determine location based on the geography or landmarks of the surroundings. One company, Iridium, has a set of 66 satellites that were originally designed for satellite phones, but have since been re-purposed for location services, which are at higher quality due to the closer proximity to the Earth's surface. No matter which technology ends up becoming the dominant replacement for current GPS systems, it seems greatly beneficial that they are trying to go in a safer, more secure direction. Anything that is resistant to spoofing, jamming, and other sorts of attacks will be great for commercial and military applications, and may one day lead to a completely different default global positioning protocol.

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Friday, March 9, 2018

Robocallers Use Out-of-State Loopholes to Evade Strict California Regulations

Robocalls, even from a company or political platform that you feel connected to, can be annoying at the best of times. Recently, there was a controversial legal battle centering around freedom of speech, the conclusion of which was that the state of Montana technically has the legal right to pass a law banning robocalls, even those of a political nature. At the very least, this decision could help Montanans to crack down and have specific rules regarding such calls, in an attempt to reduce the number, if not do away with them altogether. Interestingly enough, discovers David Lazarus in his L.A. Times article, California has some pretty strict laws regarding robocallers. It just so happens that nobody follows them.

Politicians in California have found loopholes to get around the laws regarding robocallers. According to the California Public Utilities Code, every robocall within California is required to begin with a live person and the name, phone number, and address of the organization making the call. Then, the live operator has to ask permission and get consent before playing the pre-recorded message. Only if every single one of those criteria is met is the robocall legally permissible. Of course, because most people are so accustomed to illegal robocalls, a call meeting those criteria tends to resemble telemarketing more than robocalling, which, of course, has its own set of negative responses.

Californian homes get constant robocalls from the beginning of election season all the way to election day. The way that most get away with the robocalls without technically breaking state law is by designing the calls to originate outside of the state. If the robocall is coming from a computer server in another state, technically it doesn't require a live operator or affirmative consent or really any other regulations before playing the message. Of course, even though this strategy avoids breaking state laws, it may be breaking federal laws, although that doesn't stop much. According to federal law, robocallers can't call cell phones (again, something that still happens all too often), but the federal policy has no restriction on robocalls to landlines. Even though many people have given up their landlines over the years, there are still several million throughout the country that can be targeted.

As you can see, there are restrictions on when and how a political representative can place robocalls. However, those regulations can be easily side-stepped. There is a potential solution, though. Because the callers can avoid state regulations by making the calls from another state, this can be prevented by passing a regulation that prohibits political robocalls from being placed out of state. If the political groups have to place their calls from in state, they will be forced to follow the state regulations, which would reduce annoyance and frustration among many recipients. Of course, this would severely limit the scope of a political group's reach, but at least they would be able to better target voters interested in their specific platform.

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Friday, March 2, 2018

Tech Companies Aim to Develop Ecosystems of Interconnected Devices

Many new technological innovations revolve around the category of "smart devices." These inventions, which tend to be for the home, but can also be used in businesses, aim to integrate all of the user's devices, for a seamless connection and a simpler interface. For example, over the past year or so, several of the largest tech companies (Amazon, Apple, Google, etc) have come out with their own devices powered by artificial intelligence (Alexa, Cortana, Siri, etc). More than that, though, says Tracey Lien in her L.A. Times article, those big tech firms are making a concentrated effort to integrate all kinds of other technologies into their digital assistants, in order to better draw in potential new users.

For example, Amazon approached a company called "August," which focuses on remotely-controlled locking systems, a few years ago to see if August would be willing to allow integration of their service into Amazon's Echo device. The CEO of August agreed, figuring that the partnership with Amazon could only be a good thing, and now a user of the Echo can lock or unlock their doors simply by speaking and instructing Alexa (Amazon's artificial intelligence) to do so. Using voice recognition to control other devices in a home is a highly-sought-after capability among consumers, which is why devices like the Echo have become so popular.

From August to security camera-designer Ring and so many others, there are over 30,000 different ways by which Alexa interacts with third-party devices and applications. With many, the combination of third-party accessibility is the selling point. Let's say you're expecting your friend to come by to pick something up, but you're bed-ridden, or you just don't feel like getting up to answer the door. Ring would tell you who is at the door, then you could use that information to decide whether to let August unlock the door so they can just walk in. The combination of devices makes many things that much easier and more efficient, saving users time.

The purpose of companies like Amazon is to make their devices so useful that they can bring in more and more customers. Then, much like Apple has done continuously over the years, they create an ecosystem of their devices, where each device is useful on its own, but they blend so seamlessly that having all of the devices is the ideal choice. Through various online shopping services, such as Amazon Prime or Google Express, there may even come a day in the near future when users can control everything about their home, including the purchase and receipt of deliveries, remotely. Already, Wi-Fi enabled thermostats and smart electronics are poking out into the marketplace. Who knows what's next?

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