Just a word of caution, VMWare is reporting a problem between their
"Fusion" product and the recently released Mac OS X 10.5.7 Update,
specifically for Macintosh systems with ATI graphics chips.
http://blogs.vmware.com/teamfusion/2009/05/a-message-to-mac-users-with-atib…
Apple and VMWare are working together to correct the problem.
Regards,
Doug
-------------
Doug Hamilton, BA, MA, APP
Senior Computer Consultant
Computers-on-Campus; Univ. of Manitoba
204-474-6196 (Ph.)
204-474-7556 (Fax)
http://www.umanitoba.ca/bookstore/
...from:
http://bpr.hpordercenter.com/hbpr/ - HP
http://www.cpsc.gov/cpscpub/prerel/prhtml09/09221.html - U.S. Consumer
Product Safety Commission
NEWS from CPSC
U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission
Office of Information and Public Affairs Washington, DC 20207
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
May 14, 2009
Release # 09-221 Firm’s Recall Hotline: (800) 889-2031
CPSC Recall Hotline: (800) 638-2772
CPSC Media Contact: (301) 504-7908
HP Recalls Notebook Computer Batteries Due to Fire Hazard
WASHINGTON, D.C. - The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission, in
cooperation with the firm named below, today announced a voluntary
recall of the following consumer product. Consumers should stop using
recalled products immediately unless otherwise instructed.
Name of Product: Lithium-Ion batteries used in Hewlett-Packard and
Compaq notebook computers
Units: About 70,000
Importer: Hewlett-Packard Co., of Palo Alto, Calif.
Hazard: The recalled lithium-ion batteries can overheat, posing a fire
and burn hazard to consumers.
Incidents/Injuries: The firm and CPSC are aware of two reports of
batteries that overheated and ruptured, resulting in flames/fire that
caused minor property damage. No injuries have been reported.
Description: The recalled lithium-ion rechargeable batteries are used
with various HP and Compaq notebook computers. Models that can contain
a recalled battery include:
HP Pavilion Compaq Presario HP HP Compaq
dv2000
dv2500
dv2700
dv6000
dv6500 dv6700
dv9000
dv9500
dv9700
A900
C700
F700
V3000
V3500 V3700
V6000
V6500
V6700
G6000
G7000 6720s
The notebook model is located at the top of the service label on the
bottom of the notebook. Batteries that can be subject to the recall
will have one of the following bar code labels (^ in the code can be
any letter or number):
62940^^AXV^^^^ 65033^^B7U^^^^
65033^^B7V^^^^
65033^^BGU^^^^ 65035^^B7U^^^^
65035^^B7V^^^^
65035^^BGU^^^^
65035^^BGV^^^^ 67059^^V8U^^^^
67059^^V8V^^^^
Sold at: Computer and electronics stores nationwide, hp.com and
hpshopping.com from August 2007 through March 2008 for between $500
and $3000. The battery packs were also sold separately for between
$100 and $160.
Manufactured in: China
Remedy: Consumers should immediately remove the recalled battery from
their notebook computer and contact HP to determine if their battery
is included in the recall and to request a free replacement battery.
After removing the recalled battery from their notebook computer,
consumers may use the AC adapter to power the computer until a
replacement battery arrives. Consumers should only use batteries
obtained from HP or an authorized reseller.
Consumer Contact: For additional information, visit the HP Battery
Replacement Program Web site at http://www.hp.com/support/BatteryReplacement
or call (800) 889-2031 between 7 a.m. and 7 p.m. CT Monday through
Friday.
Media Contact: Sheila Watson at (281) 514-6552 or sheila.watson(a)hp.com
Photos of recalled batteries
CPSC is still interested in receiving incident or injury reports that
are either directly related to this product recall or involve a
different hazard with the same product. Please tell us about it by
visiting https://www.cpsc.gov/cgibin/incident.aspx
---
Send the link for this page to a friend! The U.S. Consumer Product
Safety Commission is charged with protecting the public from
unreasonable risks of serious injury or death from thousands of types
of consumer products under the agency's jurisdiction. The CPSC is
committed to protecting consumers and families from products that pose
a fire, electrical, chemical, or mechanical hazard. The CPSC's work to
ensure the safety of consumer products - such as toys, cribs, power
tools, cigarette lighters, and household chemicals - contributed
significantly to the decline in the rate of deaths and injuries
associated with consumer products over the past 30 years.
To report a dangerous product or a product-related injury, call CPSC's
Hotline at (800) 638-2772 or CPSC's teletypewriter at (800) 638-8270.
To join a CPSC e-mail subscription list, please go to https://www.cpsc.gov/cpsclist.aspx
. Consumers can obtain recall and general safety information by
logging on to CPSC's Web site at www.cpsc.gov.
...to put an item into the "shopping cart" to get the price? Here's
the coming wrinkle: they'll spam you until you purchase.
[NOTE: the "track you" software is free to online retailers: http://www.seewhy.com/atfree
]
...from:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/17/business/17digi.html?th&emc=th
Just Browsing? A Web Store May Follow You Out the Door
By RANDALL STROSS
Published: May 16, 2009
IF you try on a sweater in a department store dressing room, but
choose not to buy it, a persistent sales clerk won’t pursue you into
the street yelling, “Hey, are you sure?” Nor will you receive a call
at your home the next day to check again if you want to complete the
purchase.
But in the online world, visitors to Web stores who touch the goods
but leave without buying may be subjected instantaneously to
“remarketing,” in the form of nagging e-mail messages or phone calls.
A new Web service, called Abandonment Tracker Pro, is in beta testing
and scheduled for formal release next month. Developed by SeeWhy in
Andover, Mass., the service will alert a subscribing Web store when a
visitor places an item in a shopping cart or begins an application and
does not complete the final step.
What distinguishes Abandonment Tracker Pro from other services is its
enabling of remarketing “in real time,” SeeWhy says.
The idea that a visitor isn’t entitled to leave an online store empty-
handed without being pestered sounds distasteful enough. But having
that contact start immediately seems a new form of marketing brazenness.
Abandonment Tracker’s remarketing depends upon knowing the e-mail
address of the wayward prospect; knowing the phone number will make
follow-up phone calls possible, too. (And if you’ve signed in, a store
would be able to find you with the e-mail address you provided when
you registered.)
Charles Nicholls, SeeWhy’s founder, says he advises Web sites to have
visitors “put their e-mail address in at the first step,” to increase
the likelihood that it will be captured.
When asked about possibly alienating prospective customers with
overzealous remarketing, Mr. Nicholls said: “Tone and manner are
important. The message should be something like, ‘Oops, was there a
problem? Can we help?,’ versus an out-and-out hard sell, which will
just wind everyone up.”
Technically, as soon as an address is typed into a box on a Web page,
it can be dispatched to a store’s server without even waiting for the
visitor to hit the “submit” button. Widely used Web scripting
technology makes it easy to send to a remote server every letter
pressed on the keyboard. Google, for example, uses this technology for
a good purpose: when one begins typing in a search term, each letter
is zipped to the server, which, without perceptible delay, returns
suggestions that begin with the same sequence of letters.
The same technology, set off with each press of a key, could be used
for other purposes, however, like recording the e-mail address at a
site one visits for the first time and then leaves without formally
submitting the information.
Asked whether Abandonment Tracker Pro uses that technique, Mr.
Nicholls said the basic version did not. “We can write a script that
will capture the e-mail address immediately,” he added, if the client
paid a separate charge.
I asked John Squire, chief strategy officer of Coremetrics, a Web
analytics and marketing firm about the idea of capturing e-mail
addresses while they were typed. Mr. Squire expressed revulsion at the
suggestion that a Web site would collect a visitor’s information
without the press of a “submit” button.
He was not even comfortable with remarketing in real time. “There’s a
Big Brother factor that retailers are going to have to look at,” he
said. Better to wait one or two days, as his clients typically do, he
added.
Mr. Nicholls says online vendors make a mistake by waiting even a
single day, as remarketing immediately produces a follow-up sale three
times as often as remarketing a day later.
Coremetrics’ clients report that their best remarketing results have
been obtained not by sending annoying follow-up e-mail messages, but
by using special ad networks to display to the customer on other Web
sites ads that are related to whatever the customer left in the
shopping cart, Mr. Squire said. “They’re seeing great returns on
investment and they’re not seeing a backlash from the ads,” he reported.
Abandonment Tracker Pro addresses a longstanding fear of lost business
represented by the supposedly grave problem of “shopping cart
abandonment.” “Up to 70 percent of shopping carts, registrations,
quotes and online forms are abandoned before they’re complete,” SeeWhy
said in a recent press release.
SeeWhy relies on Coremetrics’s data to substantiate the problem, but
Mr. Squire of Coremetrics dismisses shopping cart abandonment as a
meaningless metric. He said there were many reasons that customers
might not complete a purchase. And the rate of cart abandonment rose
substantially from 2005 to 2008, he said, a reflection of intensified
comparative shopping that visitors carry on with many sites
simultaneously.
KEVIN HILLSTROM, president of MineThatData, a consulting firm, also
looks askance at worries about shopping cart abandonment. “Today,
people are shopping at six sites at once, dropping items into carts at
each one and reading reviews,” he said.
Instantaneous e-mail remarketing might appear to produce an increase
in sales, which are easily measured, he said, but “you can’t see the
negative effects on customers who are irritated and will never come
back again.”
Online stores should emulate the self-restraint of retailers in
physical stores. When a visitor leaves without buying, don’t give
chase down the street.
Randall Stross is an author based in Silicon Valley and a professor of
business at San Jose State University. E-mail: stross(a)nytimes.com.
