As if it is not bad enough that they have a pretty annoying and unusable multi-step, multi-page ticket sales process, recently they are starting to give out some borderline non-sense captcha validation images. How many people would just say “forget it” and leave? Well not many, since TM is an undocumented Monopoly for ticket sales in my opinion. Pretty bad user experience overall. I would love if they at least put the reCaptcha page on the same page as the ticket search form to cut down page loads. Better yet, make the whole process an ajax based system so you never have to leave the order page. It sucks to go through a blinding reCaptcha page and then get the dreaded “You’re Screwed” all sold out page. Just tell me right upfront: “Hey Don’t bother, no seats are available mr!” and don’t waste my time. I mean I have to pay an inflated ticket price + order processing fees + convenience fees + delivery fees. Can we at least get a convenient to use website?

I went ahead and did a 2 minute reshuffling of the order form for TicketMaster and this is what I came up with. Just put all forms on one page and got rid of the clutter. Progress bar and search results would appear on the same page.

I noticed also that there are now TicketMaster hosted auctions and scalping services on site. Wonder how far they have to push the envelope before regulators are forced to step in.

arguments itself returns an object that looks like an array (but not really an array) of the arguments passed to the function.

Prior to JavaScript 1.4 the Function object also had a similar arguments property, which is now deprecated.

However the Function object comes with a few other useful properties that we can still use to get argument related data.

function callTaker(a,b,c,d,e){
  // arguments properties
  console.log(arguments);
  console.log(arguments.length);
  console.log(arguments.callee);
  console.log(arguments[1]);
  // Function properties
 console.log(callTaker.length);
  console.log(callTaker.caller);
  console.log(arguments.callee.caller);
  console.log(arguments.callee.caller.caller);
  console.log(callTaker.name);
  console.log(callTaker.constructor);
}
 
function callMaker(){
  callTaker("foo","bar",this,document);
}
 
function init(){
  callMaker();
}

For demonstration purposes, you can run the init function above and view the logs in FireBug.

arguments object and its properties

arguments returns ["foo", "bar", Window, Document]

arguments.length returns 4

Note: even though our function has a signature with 5 arguments, length returns only 4 here. This is because the caller sent us only 4 arguments. See below for how we can use Function’s length property to find the number of expected arguments.

arguments.callee returns callTaker(a, b, c, d, e)

Note: callee shows us the signature of the currently executing function and is useful when trying to make recursive calls to a function within its own body.

arguments[1] returns bar

Note: arguments can also be set for functions in an array like format. For example you can set the second argument like this: arguments[1] = 'moo';

Function object and its argument related properties

callTaker.length returns 5

Note: This is the expected number of arguments.

callTaker.caller is the same as arguments.callee.caller and returns callMaker()

Note: we can go up the stack trace and get the caller of the caller etc. For example we can find the function that called callMaker using arguments.callee.caller.caller which returns init().

callTaker.name returns callTaker

callTaker.constructor returns Function()

Note: Since we have not modified the basic behavior, we see the built in function that creates an object’s prototype for our function, which is the Function object.

Basic Usage Sample

var dataArray = ["One", "Two", "Three", "Four"];
 
var lister = function createList(list) {
 if(arguments.length == 3){
  var result = "<" + arguments[1] + ">";
  for (var i = 0; i < arguments[2].length; i++){
   result += "<li>" + arguments[2][i] + "</li>";
  }
  result += "</" + arguments[1] + "l>";
  document.getElementById(arguments[0]).innerHTML = result;
 }
}
 
function makeList(){
 lister("list_HTML","ul",dataArray);
}

Run the sample

References:
JavaScript Stack Trace
Function
arguments

Let’s take a look at the basics:

70/30 -

• Developer gets:
  • Hosting
  • Credit Card Processing
  • Access to millions of iPhone and iPod touch customers
  • 70% of what they sell online.
  • Paid out monthly
  • The SDK, Tools and Documentation
• Apple gets:
  • Subscription fees of $99 or $299
  • A vast Inventory of Apps
  • 30% of the sales
  • Full Control over what apps are listed in its App Store
  • plus…

What else?

Well if you have an iPod touch, and not iPhone, You need to pay a “nominal” fee to upgrade your device to be able to get the App Store on it.

So why does Apple want to restrict its App sales to the App Store you ask? The reason given is that it is a security risk. People who sign up for a developer account are supposedly safer since Apple has their personal information on file such as credit card numbers and phone and such. So if someone does write some malicious app that gets into 2 million iPhones and causes world hunger, we can all point to the right person and demand justice.

It might be unreasonable to conclude that if Apple is the single point of inspection, that no viruses will get through to its Store. Sure they will do a good job of inspecting all the stuff that comes in, but something somewhere will go wrong. And that is bound to happen.

Up until now Mac software has been distributed and sold by developers themselves. Not many Mac owners complain of a virus infection however. How is it that with a mobile device this changes?

One thing is for certain, Lots and Lots of money will be made on this by both Apple and top notch Cocoa programmers. Another side effect will be new coders coming to Cocoa Apple land and getting a taste of things in Cupertino. Xcode and other iPhone SDK development tools are Mac only tools, which could potentially boost Mac hardware sales as well. Oh and did I mention you need Leopard?

Finally, new apps mean new iPhone and iPod touch customers who up until now have not bothered switching to the land of apps and Apple. And more people hitting up the iTunes store looking for apps means more eyeballs that will most likely browse around the isles for other stuff like movie rentals and music downloads.

So we all are part of a major shift in technology usage and Apple is in the middle of it all as it builds its digital goods empire. This is probably the biggest shift we’ve seen since the personal computer was commercialized.

It makes perfect business sense, and seems like a winning business model for developers and Apple. I leave it up to you to determine how efficient and beneficial it is for consumers. My only question is then why did Apple wait over 9 months to release the SDK, and is waiting another 3 months to release it to the public? And what will Google Gears, Microsoft and Nokia do if anything to steal some of Steve’s spotlight?

A last thought: What happens if I buy an app for my iPhone and want to put it on my iPod touch? Will I have to pay for it again?

Clicking on Video Units the first time will take you to a page where you are shown a video presentation on Video Units. here is the video:

So how do you actually make money with Video Units? The FAQ section of Video Units talks about this. When you place a video unit on your website, you’ll earn revenue from two types of ad formats: companion ads, which sit above your video content within the player and can be either text or image-based, and text overlay ads, which appear in the bottom 20% of the video content area. Ads on video units can be paid on either a cost-per-click or cost-per-thousand impression basis.

So companion ads are like banner ads and text overlay ads are like AdWords ads.

The setup page walks you through creating the code to place on your site and is quite simple to use. You just pick a color theme, the size of the video ad unit and you can also filter the content to be shown in your player. You can also save the player by giving it a name and description.

Video units come in 3 different sizes:

• 400 x 415
• 500 x 510
• 780 x 560

You can pick from 9 preset color schemes:

Click on Generate Code, Copy the code, and Paste it into your site. Below is a sample video unit which I’ve created for testing out the service.

Some of the advantages of Video Units over regular ads are:

You will now deliver content to your site as opposed to ads. You can also make the content relevant by choosing from categories you wish to have shown. The ads in videos are not obtrusive and you make money from them. You are actually enhancing the user experience and helping to attract and retain users.

From what is available on the promo page it looks like you the ads will not be in the same area as the movie, but they appear as part of the YouTube player and outside of the video content to ensure a smooth user experience. Here is a sample screenshot of how the new YouTube video Ad Units will look like. You will also be able to customize the color scheme of the flash player to fit your blog or portals look and feel.

The content of the ads will be relevant to the video itself, something that AdSense has already perfected down to a science. Let’s hope that publishers will have the option to choose specific videos to be shown, or at least choose from a narrow range of topics.

This is a win-win deal for all the parties and great for you publishers, since it will allow you to not only improve your content by adding the YouTube content to your site, but also give you a new source of income.  Checking my Google AdSense account, I am not seeing any information on these video ads yet. There is a mention of a “button” on the YouTube promo page, but the button is not there! Hopefully we will hear more from Google soon.

• Simple wireless downloading and sharing
• Hi-defenition LCD screen
• Open and Simple audio & video encodings
• Preloaded video cards, SD & Flash to be available
• Microsoft software compatibility
• X-Box compatibility
• FM Radio (I think this is a big one for some people)
• Advanced Chips
• Advanced audio quality

but some other things I would like to know first are:

• Battery life (will it die faster with the LCD?)
• Weight (is it a rock?)
• Reliability (how often does it crash?)

Many people including myself are already iPod owners and will probably not invest in another expensive device for some time. Zune Marketplace (the iTunes competition) is to be released tomorrow, so I will have to wait and see how the MS software competes with iTunes, because quite frankly I love what iTunes can do for me and think it will be tough to make a better product. From what I can see you have to buy Microsoft Points. I can see how they are trying to save money by consolidating credit card processing charges. Depending on the user interface this might also be a cumbersome workflow. Overall, Zune is good for the competition and good for consumers, wheter Microsoft wins or loses.

It will be sometime before you can find your next concert ticket on Google Base and purchase it from Google. Completion of Google Wallet will help.

It remained to be seen how eBay, which owns a stake in craigslist, will react to the potential for Google to become a competitor. >>

• Penalty on early withdrawal of savings
• Failing to add the amount of reinvested funds (e.g., dividends) to your cost when computing gain or loss on the sale of mutual funds
• Business gifts to a maximum of $25 per recipient
• Mortgage prepayment penalties
• Points or origination fees on a mortgage to purchase a residence
• Accounting fees for tax preparation
• Depreciation on home computers to the extent used for business or investments