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05 Apr 2010 10:37

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Tech: iPad hype: Analysts don’t learn their lesson about overhyping

  • 700k number of iPads some random analyst said Apple sold this weekend
  • 300k number of iPads Apple said they sold this weekend, which is still pretty good
  • 5M number of iPads new analysts are suggesting Apple will sell this year; gah, hype! source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

03 Jan 2010 19:39

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Culture: Could Avatar make a Titanic-type run? Let’s compare numbers.

  • Avatar is looking good in its third weekend, dipping just 9% from last week. Not bad for a movie that had a relatively modest launch for a blockbuster. The secret to its success? The same as “Titanic” – staying power. But even if James Cameron’s latest can’t keep up, his trump card might be an even bigger deal.
  • Titanic’s track record:
  • $1.8 billion total lifetime run – in 1998 money (holy crap)
  • $200 million budget for what was expected to be a huge bomb
  • $600 million in domestic grosses – in 1998 money! Holy crap!
  • $28.6M Titanic’s first-weekend box office take – decent, not spectacular
  • $35.5M Titanic’s second-weekend take – it went up by an astonishing 23.8%
  • $36M Titanic’s biggest week, which didn’t come until week six, by the way source
  • How Avatar’s catching up:
  • $1 billion worldwide already – in just three weeks!
  • $280 million the most likely budget for “Avatar”; totals have varied as widely as $250 million and $500 million
  • $150 million has been spent on marketing the movie alone, which Fox is taking on the cost of
  • $77M Avatar’s first-weekend box office take; it was hurt by snow
  • $75M Avatar’s second-weekend take – down only 1.8%
  • $352M Avatar’s domestic gross after a $68 million third weekend source
  • The 3D wildcard:
  • $3-5 the markup the 3D adds to ticket prices source
  • Big investment Cameron’s film took years to build because of the fact that the technology had to come first, both for filming and in the theater. Cameron paid to build the technology himself along with a bunch of investors.
  • Residual effect Fortunately for Cameron, he can sell the cameras to other filmmakers. “Journey to the Center of the Earth 3D” has already used it. Steven Spielberg and Peter Jackson’s “The Adventures of Tintin” soon will.
  • Cash for conversions Even better for studios, the technology is relatively easy to build into older films. For $30 million, a popular hit like, say, “Titanic,” can have a brand new life in 3D. It’s like a money machine for Hollywood. source
  • Will it beat “Titanic”?
  • Before inflation, probably. After, it depends. It’s probably not likely that the movie will hold up sixteen straight weeks at No. 1 like Titanic, but it’ll have a good shot of holding on tight thanks to the fact that it’s going to be in IMAX (where it’s made $66 million already) for months. But at the very least, it’s looking like it has more staying power than “The Dark Knight,” the biggest hit of the naughts. Well, before “Avatar.”
Posted by Ernie Smith • 2 Comments • Permalink

01 Jan 2010 12:00

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Tech: Word on the street: Apple super-bullish on selling tablets

  • 10 million tablets in the first year, an ex-Google exec sez source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

29 Dec 2009 21:17

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U.S.: Albert Gonzalez: Meet the guy who stole lots of credit card numbers

  • See this guy over here? You hate him. This guy is named Albert Gonzalez, and he’s responsible for stealing 130 million credit card numbers, along with two Russian hackers who probably look like video game characters. If you’ve ever shopped at 7-Eleven, there’s a good chance your card was stolen by this guy. He pleaded guilty today. So remember. Hate him. You. source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

20 Dec 2009 10:46

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U.S.: So, how much snow did the East Coast get, anyway, guys?

  • 24″ of snow fell in Bethesda, Maryland, within earshot of D.C.
  • 16″ of snow fell in the National Mall, within the city limits of D.C.
  • 23.2″ of snow fell in Philly, a road trip away from D.C. source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

10 Dec 2009 10:49

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Biz: As the world turns: New jobless claims volatile yet again

  • 474,000 jobless claims this week, after a week when it seemed we’d finally turned a corner
  • +17,000the increase from last week’s promising low; not awful, but not exactly great either source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

17 Oct 2009 11:17

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U.S.: Your kids probably shouldn’t skip out on that swine flu vaccine

  • 86 children under 18 have died of swine flu since the outbreak first hit
  • eleven of those kids died in the last week; many of those kids were healthy source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink
 

21 Sep 2009 21:53

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Tech: The scale of World of Warcraft is beyond massive

  • 5.5 million lines of code for the game, which is 1.3 petabytes in size (a petrabyte is a BILLION megabytes)
  • 4.4 billion in-game rewards have been handed out the game’s 12 million subscribers/shut-ins source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 4 Comments • Permalink

18 Aug 2009 10:06

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Biz: Home building numbers dip in July, but not without silver lining

  • -1% the decline in housing starts in July, which was much lower than expected
  • +1.7% the increase in starts of single family homes, the hardest-hit part of the market source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

18 Aug 2009 09:59

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Biz, Tech: How did the credit-card hackers do it? It was easy, actually.

  • A little malware here, a proxy server there … Albert Gonzalez and his Russian conspirators weren’t screwing around when they hacked the Gibson of a number of corporations, most notably 7-Eleven, and stole millions of credit card numbers. By targeting potential victims, learning the companies’ point of sale systems, and launching SQL-injection attacks to install malware, they were able to steal 130 million credit card numbers. They exploited bad security using crude methods for positive gain. source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink
 
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