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Friday, February 25, 2005
Awards, Rebates and Other Useless IncentivesRecently I bought a D-Link DSM-320 MediaLounge, and I couldn't have been much more disappointed. It simply didn't do whait it claimed (play video) correctly (in sync), and when I wrote in to their support with a very detailed, friendly question, I got zero response. Not in 72 hours, not in 1000 hours, not ever. It is a known issue and there is no solid date for a fix.So how did I end up with a piece of equipment that was worthless to me? For one thing, I do tend to buy anything I see that's being cleared out. But in this case, I had seen the awards this thing had won, and it really looked to be exactly what I needed. It won the AEA "Most Innovative Product Technology for Consumer and SOHO Markets", and the CES 2005 "Innovations Honoree Award". It looked like a no brainer for $150 or whatever it was. Well, it was a no-brainer. Those awards are meaningless, as they often are. I recently purchased ClickTracks Professional, a logfile analyzer that has won any number of awards, and it simply can't analyze a logfile as big as mine. Until it's updated, it's 5000 flushed dollars. Another thing I need to watch out for is the mail-in rebate. There's a reason they are getting so popular with merchants: they are a good deal for them. Most people don't send them in, but even those that do religiously help the store out by cutting off the UPCs from their boxes, so the store can guarantee many fewer returns. Had I been less lazy I'd still have that garbage MediaLounge playing out of sync video in here. So in general, don't be swayed by awards on boxes and rebate signs on shelves, you'll end up with piles of good intentions and terrible products. Just like me.
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Gadgetize: Awards, Rebates and Other Useless Incentives