Technology Advances that Ain’t

Photo Courtesy of Freshwater2006

Technology Rules

I know that as an active Blogger and a participant in Web 2.0 that technology is the center of the Universe.

I love great places to find things to do on the web, and agentgenius has been a source of some of those great places. Like Vicki Moore’s recent blog about DocStoc or when Vicki introduce me to Makeuseof in another blog or the blog about free real estate sites written by Nick Bostic, or some many other great, useful applications that have been shared here.

As a long time gadget freak I need to have every piece of technology, from my Ipod to the distributed sound system at my house I need it bad! My cars both have built in GPS and yet I own a Garmin Nuvi 660 for use in rentals. My wife and I each have PC laptops, and we’re currently thinking about adding Macbooks. I use four different desktops for my personal use, and at one time carried two phones AND a palm pilot.

I Have a lot of History

I am ready to advance the technology I use as rapidly as it comes out. My first computer was a Commodore Vic 20, which I upgraded to a Commodore 64 in my first real estate office . My first mobile phone needed a satchel, my first smartphone was the size of a paperback book, and my first digital camera used a floppy disk for storage. My first videos of houses were taken 20 years ago, and I run to the Trade shows at every meeting I attend to see what new and inventive and what the rest of the world thinks we should own or be using. And some of it is just plain disappointing.

So What is Silly Technology?

I don’t think that a solar powered light on a sign is a significant marketing advance. In my market area we have street lights in most areas, and in those truly rural areas, the only thing you would be able to see would be the sign, since the house would be shrouded in the dark.

Talking houses are another piece of technology that leaves me cold, though they have been around long enough that somebody likes the concept. I think that if the buyer has gotten close enough to read the sign directing them to whatever the frequency is, and they are going to make a call, I want them to call me! If the exterior of the house has them interested I would rather not give them the opportunity to rule it our because of the description my sign provides them with. It is a basic rule of advertising that consumers make calls for information so that they can eliminate properties not so they can see even more properties.

I feel the same way about large displays of photos in a broker’s window where the consumer presses a button to hear property information. What the heck happened that we think that people prefer speaking to a recording instead of a person. And when did we decide we woud rather buy a machine to do that for us?

Recently at the NAR Mid-Year meetings I saw a piece of technology that was touted as the latest greatest technology. This company provided an agent with buyer information if the consumer dialed a specific code to get property information. Of course to get the number to dial, the consumer had to be sitting in front of the property looking at the sale sign. In 1988, I was an investor in a company that had a similar product. The consumer called a phone number dialed a code and was provided with information about the house. Of course the new technology provides the agent with the caller ID information, but they need to be in front of the house first. And what got them there? A sign, or maybe a website, but it had nothing to do with their cell phone

While there are great technologies available for us to move forward with, sometimes the technological advances are just plain silly. I guess that’s why they say that you can always tell pioneers – they’re the ones with arrows in their backs.

So how about it? Have you run into silly technology? Tell me about it.