AJ3U Technology Blog

When I think of Internet Radio, I think of existing radio stations that are now streaming their existing broadcast over the Internet. This is great for people that like a particular terrestrial radio station, but can’t pick it up in a certain location, like at work. After having an iPod and Sirius Satellite Radio for while, that type of “old” radio just isn’t for me.

I heard about Pandora and thought it was more of the same old thing, but I thought I would give it a try. Wow, this is not your father’s Internet radio! Pandora asked me to enter a song or artist I liked. After a few seconds, it created an Internet radio channel, just for me. And to my surprise, it played song after song that were exactly what I liked. I had typed in “Van Halen”, and the playlist filled with Van Halen songs, as well and Guns N Roses, Boston, Ozzy, Scorpions, etc. Amazing! Plus, as songs play, you can give a thumbs up or down to let it further refine what you want to hear.

Genius. I’ll be checking this out more often.

I’ve been trying to find a Wii Fit for a while now.  Every time I stop by Best Buy or Target or wherever, they are always out of stock.  A few days ago, I checked on Amazon only to find they too were out of stock.  However, I noticed Amazon had a link that read, “Send me a text message when this item is available”.  What the heck – I entered my phone number.  Yesterday, I received a text message at 2:30PM from Amazon letting me know that a few Wii Fit’s were going to be available starting at 3PM.  Better than that, the message said, “reply with ‘buyfit’ to purchase one”.  So I did.  About 30 seconds later, I received another text message with the total plus shipping and it asked for another reply message for final confirmation.  I replied.  It worked!  It used the credit card I have associated with one click checkout and processed the order.

Simple, effective, time saving.  This is an awesome feature!