Holiday Lights Display

As the holidays fast approach, millions of us are pulling decorations out of the attic, grabbing extension cords and untangling the lights. Last weekend I set up the tree, put lights outside, and put candle lights in each of my windows. It certainly looked nice and festive, but I quickly dreaded having to plug and unplug each set of lights every day.

Fortunately, I had a solution! Using X10 automation modules, my windows computer and about 30 minutes of effort, my lights now turn on and off automatically every day!  This post details the steps I took to accomplish this, and provides some resources so you can set up a similar solution yourself.

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According to reports from Gartner, Juniper Research and others, smartphone sales are growing at a fantastic rate. Sales of smartphones have increased 47% over the previous year, and some estimates suggest that smartphones will make up 80% of the  mobile phone market in 5 years. Smartphones are defined as mobile phones with advanced capabilities – this sales trend has clearly been led by the iPhone and its internet connectivity.

If these analysts are correct, in a few years, 4 out of 5 people will be using the internet on their phones. What does this mean for you? Well, there will be a significant change in users’ internet usage behavior.
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Most website owners now realize that, in order for their site to remain popular and successful, it needs to evolve. Exactly how it should evolve, however, isn’t always easy to determine. Should you blog or tweet or implement some other buzzword you’ve heard lately?  Should you do what your competitors have already done?  Although these changes and ideas certainly have merit, by focusing just on these approaches you will  constantly be playing catchup.

Instead, I suggest thinking about your customers first and how you can use the internet and technology to make their lives easier.  Sure, a blog or twitter stream lets your customers hear from you more readily, and this communication has tremendous value.  However, this added communication doesn’t necessarily make you any less dispensable to the customer. Rather, to become truly indispensable, you need to offer them new services and features that they come to depend on.

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