This is not another article about how technology is turning us into zombies or interrupting our dinners. I will, however, point out a potential trap that those of us with strong interests in technology can fall into: The everlasting “search for the best.”

Let’s do a quick inventory. How many tabs do you typically open when reading product reviews for a new purchase? How many apps do you have for your phone, tablet, or computer that perform the same basic function? How many times have switched which product you use for a given task in the last year? How much time do you spend researching products that you don’t need to buy or replace? How do you feel when you find out about a new product that could potentially replace one that you currently use? Just think about those things for a moment or two.

The more straightforward version of those questions is this: How much time, money, and stress do you spend on keeping your finger on the pulse of technology and making sure that you have the best? Is it worth it? Unless you are, say a product reviewer whose job it is to make recommendations to readers or an an organization, you probably do not need to put much energy into that sort of knowledge, but if you could be considered a gadget geek, a technology enthusiast, or another generally nerdy type, you probably put in more energy than you need to.

The technology you use in your everyday life should be working for you, not you for the technology. So I’m going to share a few things that I try to think about when I find myself stuck in a search for the best.

What problem am I trying to solve?
I’ll use smartphones as an example here because that tends to be my weakness. I constantly have an eye turned toward the latest smartphone news. I’ve tried switching hardware, switching platforms and switching carriers multiple times, always convinced that I might find something I like better, something faster, something less expensive. Because I focus on finding something better, it’s easy to convince myself that I’m solving an actual problem that I have (which is that my smartphone experience could be better). But if I stop to think about it, I can rarely pin down a serious problem with my current setup that needs solving. There are lots of features and apps and speed improvements out there, but if they don’t solve a serious, tangible problem, why should I concern myself?

What are my requirements?
Write down the features you need and mark the ones that aren’t acceptable or available in your current setup. Are you really missing out? Are the features you’re missing worth the trade-offs of upgrading or buying new technology? That fancy new quad-core processor sure makes for a fast smartphone, but how much will you benefit from it if you really just use your phone to check email and surf the web?

Is the problem I’m trying to solve worth this much effort?
The time you spend researching and reading and weighing options needs to be taken into account. Is it worth spending a week to learn a new productivity system or to research the best french press? Will that new planner save you that much more time than just writing your to-do list on a note card? And, by the way, is all this research on the Getting Things Done system just a way to put off that paperwork you’re supposed to be doing? Will an $80 french press make your coffee taste that much better than the $20 model at the grocery store? Do you care that much?

What is driving me to have or know about the best and the latest?
This question gets at a sneaky way of justifying the “search for the best” to yourself. When my job has involved managing technology – and especially now that I write about it, I found it easy to justify a general interest is knowing all there is to know about (and trying out) the latest and the greatest. The thing is, it was never important to my job that I have the latest smartphone or a 10-bay RAID device. The time I spent researching technologies that I had no need of could have been spent learning a useful skill or otherwise improving things at my job. Even if you’re, say, an aspiring tech blogger, you’d probably be better served by practicing your writing than by knowing everything about all the new gadgets and, if I’m honest, reading tech reviews is easy and entertaining even though it can sometimes feel like work.

Concluding thoughts
The point of all of this is that, while sometimes useful and fun, constantly researching and evaluating tech can become a time sink and a source of stress. It can also become a habit that you cease to think about. As with anything that takes a good amount of your time and energy, it is a good idea to take a step back occasionally and let yourself become aware of your thoughts and motivations and of the results you’re getting. Sometimes the quest for improvement itself can be detrimental to the thing you’re trying to improve. So take a step back, take a break, and observe. Perhaps the best technology is the technology you already have and have decided to settle on.

10 years ago was the first time that I began thinking about the possibility of using your phone in the payment process. As technology has improved and adoption along with it you can clearly see that many places in the world are quickly looking to mobile payment to be the standard.

There a numerous environmental, political, and infrastructure reasons why mobile payment is taking off. With 45.5 millions Africans using mobile payments in 2011 and trending towards over 100 million in 2016, there is no wonder so many companies are jumping into the space.

On another note, this is my first infographic. I would love some feedback as I am going to try and make more.

Freeloader Solar Charger

This little guy is little more than a battery pack with a solar panel. You can charge the battery before you go out (in case it ends up being really overcast,) or even while your out, and a variety of different USB attachments will let you charge just about any device that exists, from the iPhone to Nokia, Tom Tom, Kindle, etc.

ViewRanger

ViewRanger is a handy mobile app that maps, tracks, and aids in navigation by using your phone’s GPS. It works with iOS, Android, or Symbian smartphones and gives you access to a 1:25,000 Ordance Survey map. This one is great for hikers, mountain bikers, geocachers, or campers.

Suunto Ambit

This is an amazing watch from the Finnish company Suunto, and is they’re most advanced watch to date. It’s a total trailnerd gadget: compass, altimeter, speedometer, heart rate monitor, GPS, this thing can even give you the weather. This is great for runners, mountaineers and people who are very concerned with the amount of information that can be gleaned from their wristwatch.

Mammut Barryvox Transceiver

Off trail and cross country skiing can be dangerous, especially if you like the serene beauty of avalanche country. The Barryvox is a great little gadget that you hope you’ll never need, as it’s designed to help rescuers find you in the event of a catastrophe or other accident that renders you in trouble. Every second can count in an emergency, and the Barryvox lets you track multiple people. Plus it’s got a 200 hour battery life and a 5 year guarantee.

My second favorite place in the world to see a game!

I love sports. Pretty much all sports. I love to play sports, and I love to watch sports. When it comes to the watching, I especially love baseball. Nothing says summer like a baseball game. I have such great memories of going to baseball games with my dad during the summer. I grew up in Houston, Texas, and watched the Colt .45s play at Colt Stadium. I loved getting those giant bags of peanuts and cheering on our team!

On Monday, my son and I are going to Coors Field to see the Rockies play the Astros. It’s especially fun for my son when a Colorado teams play Houston teams, because it’s pretty much a win-win as we get to have a fun rivalry between us. My son will pull for the Rockies, but I have always had a special place in my heart for Nolan Ryan and thus I am pulling for the Astros. Pulling for the Astros is of course only acceptable when my Cubs are not involved. Perhaps I am polytheist? Or maybe that isn’t what you call someone who worships both Nolan Ryan and Andrea Dawson. It doesn’t matter, it all makes sense to me!

If the weather holds up tomorrow, we’re planning to head out to Berkeley Lake to fish. Maybe we’ll actually get lucky and nab a channel cat! We’ve got our chicken livers all ready to go from last night’s delicious dinner (thanks, Bruce!).

Memorial Day 2011 was awesome!

We’ll probably take our own ball and gloves along with us to the lake for some catching practice. As a busy, working dad, I always try to make the time with my son strictly “our time”—just the two of us, with no phones, no computers, and no clients. I try to make as many of these father-son days outdoors. It’s so important to disconnect from the hyperconnected world sometimes (as much as I love connecting!).

In a place like Denver, there are tons of outdoor options for families. We’re also thinking about hitting up the Downtown Denver Arts Festival. It looks like a pretty cool, kid-friendly place. I hope your Memorial Day weekends are as fun-filled as ours promises to be!

Graduates who find themselves underemployed can market themselves by engaging in some continuing education leading towards a Masters degree. Many online education students use the flexibility of non-traditional course schedules to fit schoolwork around a professional pursuit, like an internship.

Drew Shemchuk is one such non-traditional student. A University of Washington newsletter recounts his experiences balancing studies towards a Certificate in Construction Management with his work managing a construction company specializing in disaster relief. “I knew I didn’t have the option of doing something in person because of work,” Shemchuk said. “If there’s a hurricane in Florida, I’m on a plane going to Florida the next day. I can’t really pick and choose where I’m going to go.”

The best way to ensure that you can find paying work while pursuing online learning is to keep an eye open for internships or part-time work within your field of study. The accreditation of your degree program helps you qualify for financial aid that can prevent you from having to take just any job. Finding even seasonal or part-time employment with a business in your industry will have the added effect of building your resume.

Online courses help students earn a certificate or degree while holding down a job, and this has resulted in a jump in older students enrolling in accredited Master’s degree programs online. A Huffington Post article from April 2012 cites U.S. Department of Education statistics that report 5 million American college students are older than 30 years of age. This represents 25% of all American college students. At this age, many students are thinking about caring for a family or owning a home. Even with financial aid, these attendees must find a separate income stream to make everything work.

“You can make more money on average if you go to college, but it’s not true for everyone,” said Richard Freeman, a Harvard economist. “If you’re not sure what you’re going to be doing, it probably bodes well to take some job, if you can get one, and get a sense first of what you want from college.” Many young college students see a degree as the first step on a path towards a career, but the growing perception of later education as a tool to further a career is causing us to rethink our traditional view of the student. A paying job in your field can be leveraged into a better career just as well as the online degree you’re working towards.

I’m still not over this.

But life goes on, right? … right?! It has to. Game two was a disaster, but I’m willing to chalk that up to shellshock and emotional turmoil on the team. Now it’s time to buckle down. That bench mob we’ve been talking about all year, they have to show up. I need to hear Stacey King shout “WWWWATSON!” and a little bit of “Korver with the HOT SAUCE!“

I like to save room on this site for things of more tangible importance, but Chicago sports are a bit of a soft spot for me. On a more serious note, there is a great parallel here for businesses that take a hit to a major property. Derrick Rose comprises 30% of the Bulls’ cap space. He is the prototypical star, the flagship product, the top client. If a 30% chunk of your business disappeared overnight, how would you handle it? Speaking for myself, I hope it would be a better showing than Tuesday night’s game.

So it’s crunch time. There is no replacing Derrick Rose. Trying to replace your number one product overnight would be ridiculous. So what do you do? You batten down the hatches, and you find ways to improve every other aspect of your business. For you that might mean upselling services to smaller clients or finding ways to improve the quality and distribution of your smaller products. For the Bulls, it means it’s time for the Bench Mob to start earning that name: hard-nosed transition defense, crashing the boards, taking high-percentage shots, making the extra pass, getting open down low, and shutting down the team that, a week ago, was basically playing with the goal of not getting embarrassed.

Although nearly everyone uses the internet in the modern age, not everyone uses it in the same way. Some people simply check their e-mail and browse the news; others enjoy high-quality online gaming, video streaming, and other services. It’s important to diagnose your needs based on what you use the internet for and incorporate that information into your decision-making about internet service deals. If you’re someone who just uses e-mail and Facebook, you probably don’t need the fastest service available, for example.

One way to save a lot of money on internet is by looking into bundle deals. Oftentimes, service providers will offer package deals that group phone or cable television services with the internet, if not both. They are offered at discounted rates to attract a wide range of customers and meet the household needs of people all over the country. If you already have phone service or cable television, you could be eligible for a package deal with that service provider that includes powerful internet service. Getting away from dial-up and DSL is a desire felt by many, so this is a significant opportunity.

You can stand to benefit a great deal from bundle packages—just be sure to assess the reliability and reputation of the service provider before agreeing to a contract.

The fact is, many businesses today depend on the internet—often a lot more than they think. If you use the internet as a field for advertisement and campaigning, an outage or system failure could potentially result in substantial losses. Similarly, if you store your information in an online database, you could find yourself unable to access it at vital times, causing a complete halt in productivity. This could lead to serious problems for your business if you don’t have the insurance you need to secure your success. This is especially important for businesses whose online services include sales—any problems with internet connection could result in devastating losses. A specialized form of umbrella insurance, such as cyber or cloud insurance could protect your assets and ensure that your business will remain strong through eventual and inevitable ups and downs in the digital world.

If you’re an insurance provider, you should also consider adding this service for your clients. Many new businesses today are completely centralized around the internet and will need a specific kind of insurance setup in order to continue with confidence

The government finds it absolutely necessary to popularize fuel efficient vehicles due to the negative impact that “gas guzzlers” have on the environment. It’s also a good product to market because as gas prices rise, customers will want to consider the effectiveness of purchasing a more fuel efficient vehicle from the get-go to save on driving expenses over time.

The tax rebates aren’t the only benefits to this scenario, though. With the Fuel Smart Auto Loan, customers can receive discounted interest rates on their car loans on their purchase of vehicles with a highway mileage of at least 30 miles per gallon. This system is in place to further push customers into buying more environmentally friendly cars. The government is investing in the world’s future by offering customers a reason to lower their carbon footprint.

Considering an eco-friendly car has benefits for everyone involved. You make a cost efficient decision that has a positive impact on the environment and you help to popularize new vehicles that handle driving in a smarter and more responsible manner.