The Deal Me In Report

OfficeMax drops mail-in rebates!

2006-07-09T13:41:00.000-07:00

OfficeMax is dropping mail-in rebates. Sweet!

No more Amazon / Toys R Us partnership.

2006-07-09T13:38:00.000-07:00

Good news and bad news. Amazon and Toys R Us have split up. What does that mean to you? Well, Toys R Us had some great sales on games and toys, and I haven't seen them yet on Toys R Us's website.

The upside, however, is that Amazon now has their own toys / games section, and that, unlike TRU, you won't get hit with tax, and you can use Amazon Prime and Super Saver Shipping.

I'm going to go ahead and say this is overall a positive.

Amazon and Disney are having a spat.

2006-04-14T21:43:00.000-07:00

So, I've heard it through the grapevine (actually, Buy.com told me) that Amazon and Disney are having a little bit of a tiff right now. Apparently they're having a disagreement over "back-end funding" and in retaliation, Amazon has raised the prices on all their Disney titles to full retail.

I love watching stuff like this.

Google, Earthlink win San Francisco free wireless contract.

2006-04-06T13:57:00.000-07:00

Good news for SF cheapskates:

A six-week panel review of bids for San Francisco's ambitious plan to provide city-wide, free WiFi access concluded yesterday, and we have a winner. It's the Google-EarthLink coalition, reportedly by a nose over MetroFi (the current WiFi provider to the cities of Sunnyvale, Cupertino, and Santa Clara). The winning bid calls for about 1,500 Tropos Networks transmitters to be installed in light poles across San Francisco, with a stated goal of achieving 90 percent coverage by the end of this year. EarthLink and Google will share the cost of hardware and installation equally, and EarthLink will essentially run the network.

EarthLink is expected to charge about US$20 a month for ad-free connections running at around 1Mbps, while Google essentially pays Earthlink for network access, then gives 300Kbps hookups away for free but with that tangy ad flava added. We wrote about a Google patent that should allow exactly that kind of monetization of free wireless networking not two weeks ago, and it looks like they found an opportunity to implement it in a hurry.

http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20060406-6540.html

Saving money is not always about being a cheapskate.

2006-04-01T19:22:00.000-08:00

When I tell somebody what sort of website I run, I get one of a couple reactions:

"Oh, cool, can you find me a good deal on (insert random obscure object here)?"
"Haha I may as well call you Scrooge from now on."

Number one, although occasionally frustrating, isn't what bothers me. The second response is irritating, as it completely misses the point of what I try to do. Finding deals isn't about saving a few pennies so you can hoard them in a big vault. Finding good deals is about enriching your life by seemingly coming up with extra money out of nowhere.

Let's say you need a new computer. You price one up at Dell, and it's going to run you $1199. If you end up saving $300 on that computer because of a nice coupon that Dell is running, that's $300 more that you can use to enjoy life. Take your sweetheart on a road trip. Take your parents out to dinner. Buy a dachshund.

Frugality isn't about saving money just for the sake of saving. It's about spending a little bit of time researching in exchange for an increase in the quality of your life. We don't have a lot of time here - enjoy it while you can. There's something to be said about saving up, but remember that it's all worthless unless you enjoy yourself along the way.

Gratis charged in "biggest deliberate breach of internet privacy ever"

2006-03-23T11:39:00.000-08:00

You know them as the "free ipod" people. They always seemed shady... here's proof.

New York's attorney general sued an internet company Thursday over the selling of e-mail addresses in what authorities say may be the biggest deliberate breach of internet privacy ever.

Attorney General Eliot Spitzer accused Gratis Internet of selling personal information obtained from millions of consumers despite a promise of confidentiality.

The consumers thought they were simply registering to see a website offering free iPod music players or DVD movies and video games, Spitzer spokesman Brad Maione said. On sign-up pages, Gratis promised it "does not ... sell/rent e-mails."

Instead of confidentiality, Spitzer said, Gratis sold access to their e-mail information to three independent e-mail marketers, and hundreds of millions of e-mail solicitations followed.

Gratis, based in Washington, D.C., did not immediately respond to requests for comment Thursday. But in a statement after Spitzer's related lawsuit of March 12, a Gratis spokesmen said the company wasn't involved in any inappropriate practices.

In that case, Datran Media of New York City, a leading e-mail marketer, was accused of using unauthorized personal data "mined" by other firms from about 6 million e-mail addresses nationwide. Datran agreed to reform its practices under a $1.1 million settlement.

"Unless checked now, companies that collect and sell information on consumers will continue to find ways to erode the basic standards that protect privacy in the internet age," Spitzer said.

Spitzer's "data mining" investigation began last year amid reports of companies compiling and selling marketing lists.

Gratis owns and operates websites that offer free merchandise for registering their e-mail addresses. The state fraud lawsuit accuses its owners, Peter Martin and Robert Jewell, of privacy violations in 2004 and 2005.

Spitzer claims Gratis wrongfully shared as many as 7 million "user records," creating the largest deliberate breach of a privacy policy discovered by U.S. law enforcement. He said the company's promises to consumers included: "We will never give out, sell or lend your name or information to anyone," and "We will never lend, sell or give out for any reason your e-mail address or personal information."

http://www.wired.com/news/politics/0,70482-0.html?tw=rss.index

Thanks, isnoop.