January 2013 Archive • Page 5 of 5 •

Best of 2012: Most Useful Business Gadget of 2012

Arthur Goldstuck (@art2gee) picks devices that can save your social, business and career life.

What defines a great gadget? Arguably, it can be captured in a single word: desire. The high end of smartphone, tablet and laptop ranges depend heavily on this basic concept for their market share.

But then there are the rest of the gadgets, as well as the rest of the market, where both consumer and business users are looking not only for the best value for money, but also the highest utility.

One way to sum it up is: can this gadget save your life? And here we’re talking about social life, business survival and career success.

The lousy record of “hyper-targeting”

by Bob Hoffman (@adcontrarian) In the past I’ve written a couple of posts (here and here) about the lousy record of “hyper-targeting.” My bottom line on this has been…

“As we have developed the ability to target people more and more precisely on the web, click-through rates of these hyper-targeted ads have dropped dramatically.”

The question is, why? If you believe conventional advertising wisdom, being able to target people based on individual behaviors, attitudes, and demographics ought to make advertising substantially more effective. And yet no one’s smarter than the facts. It hasn’t made online ads more effective. So what’s going on?

Best of 2012: Tablet of the Year

Arthur Goldstuck (@art2gee) picks the best tablet computers of 2012.

The best tablet on the market is not always the best value for money on the market.

While most major technology manufacturers make tablets, not all are able to bring them to market at prices that makes sense. As a result, no-name brands compete alongside the biggest names in the business. They can’t match the quality of the big guys, but their prices are often unbeatable.

The choice for the best tablets of the year takes both of these factors into account.

The tablet ranking is divided into 10” devices or thereabouts, those with screens smaller than 9”, and then the overall choice of Tablet of the Year.