IT Insights Blog

Most of your who are a) reading these words, and b) live somewhere in Earth's northern hemisphere, have doubtless begun to take notice of the annual shift in the weather that occurs over the final two months of the year. Furnaces have been tuned up, clothing that provides additional warmth is out of the closet and circulating in the regular lineup, and stockpiles of such cold-weather essentials as Kleenex tissues, hot chocolate, and ice scrapers have been replenished.

Saving money is a beautiful thing. Almost everyone who buys things on a regular basis would choose to save money if they could. Suppose that you are driving down the street with your gas indicator on E. You see two service stations ahead, one on either side of the road. On the left, gas is $2.99/gallon, while on the right the price is $2.44/gallon. Assuming all other variables are equal, do you turn right or left? Let's face it: Most of you turned right as soon as you saw "$2.44."

Outdoor recreation store REI has an old holiday sales slogan: "Your loved one can never have too much gear." As anyone could attest who has ever been a serious hiker, climber, skier, and so forth, that's a marketing department that really knows the quirks of its core customer. Whatever your preferred activity is, you never really look around at your stash of accessories and think, "You know what? I don't actually need more than I already have."

Sometimes in professional sports there's a moment so exciting that it transcends mere fandom. And in the information age, you don't even need to be there to appreciate the drama and the chills. Such a moment was bequeathed to us all at the end of yesterday's game between the New England Patriots and Miami Dolphins. Here at the IT Insights Blog, we don't really even follow the NFL (except for on Super Bowl Sunday), and we still got chills watching it this morning.

We've all heard the story about Kyle MacDonald, the Canadian blogger who started out with a single red paper clip and made a lot of trades, some wacky and others less so, right on up to the point at which he became the proud owner of a ... house! Imagine that. Actually, you don't even have to imagine it. Kyle's story is so famous that there are accounts of it everywhere. You can read about it (naturally) in Kyle's book, One Red Paperclip, or watch his TEDx Talk. Behold: