POST-MORTEM

animbear just gave me a great idea.

We were chatting online about new gadgets (as per usual), and discussing some of the past few digital cameras I've had. He remarked that I really "give my equipment a workout" -- which is very true. While I don't mistreat my gear, I *do* expect it to perform under real-world situations and use. I'm not one of those people who freaks out when their digital camera gets a scratch on it, or their laptop gets a dent -- those are marks of character, battle scars, and I should hope that the gear can stand up to such simple ups and downs of everyday life.

He then remarked that I should do "end of the line" reviews -- like "post-mortems" for gear when it's at or near the end of its usable life-cycle for me. How the gear fared over its lifetime, not just out of the box. Not just a first impression, but a review of how I learned to really love (or hate) a gadget, and how I learned to get the most out of it (or how it actually changed my habits to fit its quirks). It could show patterns that emerge from certain manufacturers, or much-ballyhooed functions that you never use.

What a great freaking idea, I thought. It's done all the time for cars and certain products (Consumer Reports is a good example), but rarely have I seen it done for personal electronics -- mobile phones, PDAs, digital cameras, camcorders, MP3 players, etc. -- because it seems so often that those products are sold mainly on the merit of new features and improvements.

I think from now on, when I get a new gadget, if it's replacing something else, the old one will get a full post-mortem here in my journal.

Does anyone know of any other review sites that do this?

SEOUL & SEA

Next week's business trip to Korea just got a little more interesting. My boss graciously decided since I'm going to be halfway around the world already, that he also wanted me to do a research trip to a very important theme park that I unforunately haven't seen yet.

I finally get to visit Tokyo DisneySea.

For the uninitiated, Tokyo DisneySea (or "TDS", as it's known amongst us nerds) is sort of the holy grail of theme parks. It is considered, without much debate from anyone, the single best example of immersive, environmental entertainment design on the planet -- and the most expensive park ever, with total costs estimated at 4-5 billion US. The picture shown on the right is just the beginning -- literally every inch of the park is dripping in lavish theming and fine detail, bringing to life a central theme showcasing the "myths, legends and lore" of the world's oceans.

Although us fanboys have known about TDS since it opened next to Tokyo Disneyland in 2001 (and drooled over it on countless internet sites ever since), your average Joe here in the states probably doesn't really know much about it -- because the same year, Disney opened the much lower-quality, much criticized California Adventure park in the US, and discouraged the press here from giving TDS much coverage (especially any qualitative comparisons), for fear of bad press here at home (which they got anyway).

I'll be arriving in Tokyo on Friday afternoon the 11th, seeing the parks on Friday night and all day Saturday, and departing on Sunday afternoon. I'll be traveling with a co-worker (our delightful Design Manager, Mary) and we'll both be staying at the Sheraton Grande Tokyo Bay.

While I'm certainly going to take my fair share of photos (and HD video with my new Canon TX-1), there are more than enough photos on the internet to show you just what kind of a marvel this place really is. For a random sampling, there's always a Flickr search -- but if you want to waste a half hour drooling over your keyboard, here's a really great structured photo tour of the entire park, through its seven themed "ports of call".

Needless to say, this is h-u-g-e for me. I'm. Very. Excited.