When you buy a consumer electronics product from, say, a Best Buy chain store, you are not just the customer of the retailer, but of the manufacturer whose product you purchased. If your Mac fails, you will generally call Apple, or visit the Genius Bar at an Apple Store, if one is nearby (yes, I […]

You just know that there will be a new version of the iPad this year, and barring some unforeseen corporate disaster at Apple, that expectation will come true. The same can be said about an iPhone 5, although how each of these products will be actually labeled is open to question. Beyond those simple certainties, […]

With CES in action this week in Las Vegas, as usual, you can bet that Apple’s absence will be felt more than ever. Apple doesn’t do the trade show circuit; they even stopped attending the Macworld Expo, emphasizing their own specially targeted media events, and the ability to reach customers via a growing retail chain […]

As most regular readers know, I’m not enamored of Consumer Reports and the way the magazine handles personal technology. Their efforts to simplify and generalize possibly complex information ends up helping nobody. While they no doubt accurately represent reader surveys about product and service reliability, the actual reviews are tragically flawed. I’m also concerned why […]