I am turning 40 this year, but for years people have been telling me I act a bit like an “old man.” I will not necessarily disagree with them in some regards, but I am very much a kid at heart when it comes to my tech toys. Over the last several years, writing reviews for the Gadget Corner has exposed me to a wide array of technology. Whenever a new FedEx or UPS package arrives in my office, I tear into it with reckless abandon to see what new technological marvel I have received. As a self-described tech geek, the annual International Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas is like Christmas, New Year’s Eve and the Super Bowl all wrapped into one three-day tech smorgasbord. Every other year I make the trek to Sin City, along with a few hundred thousand others, to see what the tech world has to offer. Now that I have returned to Chicago after six days and five nights in Vegas, I can take some time to reflect on CES:

• CES Unveil Fail: The highlight of CES has traditionally been the Unveil held before the start of the convention. This is where the show gathers the top innovators in a single location for the press to get a sneak peek. In years past, it seems to me that there were maybe a few dozen exhibitors included in the Unveil. This year, there seemed to be 100 or more. CES did a real disservice to the exhibitors, because there was not enough room to talk to exhibitors, let alone muscle your way into the buffet line for the all-you-can-eat shrimp!
• Drones, Wearables and Robots, Oh My!: I was disappointed this year because I never had a “wow!” moment. Don’t get me wrong, I saw many interesting things at CES. However, there was nothing I would rate as game-changing or extraordinary. Drones were creating a lot of buzz this year, but that isn’t something I am overly interested in. There were also a lot of wearable devices, but I see those as quickly becoming a commodity product. Lastly, automation was huge this year. Toshiba’s ChihiraAico talking humanoid robot was by far the creepiest thing at CES, but I walked away from CES 2015 with a feeling that there was no new product I was truly excited to review.
• Six days and five nights in Vegas is three days and two nights too many: In my lifetime I have probably spent over 70 days and nights in Vegas, all of which have been for conferences or conventions. I am not a gambler and you can only stare at the fountains in front of the Bellagio for so long. If you have never been to Las Vegas before, it is worth going once. You really cannot appreciate what a spectacle it is unless you experience it firsthand. If you do go, however, a long weekend is about the perfect amount of time!

Quicken Premiere

Last month, Hareesh Jayanthi offered us a thoughtful review of Quicken 2015 Premier for Windows. As editor of CI, I am always happy to see articles generate a response from readers, but I think we were all surprised by the overwhelmingly negative feedback about the article. Quicken is one of the more polarizing personal finance products on the market. In the market segment, there really is nothing else like it. As such, it seems that Intuit is satisfied with resting on its laurels. The result is a buggy program that could be so much more. Hareesh, I thought, did a good job of highlighting the higher-level functionality of the program and offered what could only be described as a lukewarm opinion on the software. Many readers voiced their disappointment in Hareesh’s article, but I think the comments were misdirected. Hareesh achieved what he set out to do: discuss the functionality of the program. Many of the comments directed at the article appeared to come from frustration with the program itself. Just because we cover a piece of software, a website or an app, does not mean we put our stamp of approval on it. We covered Quicken 2015 Premier because it was an update to a widely used piece of personal finance software. In addition, many readers suggested that we ask an AAII member to review software. On the surface, this sounds like a good idea, but knowing the ulterior motives of an outside reviewer is sometimes hard to discern. We pride ourselves on offering unbiased opinions and will continue to do so. This has been a learning experience for Hareesh and the staff at CI, and we will let this guide us moving forward. As always, keep those comments coming!

Point & Figure Charting

When I started working at AAII nearly 18 years ago, the first regular column I wrote was on technical analysis for the AAII Journal. My first trip to Vegas was to attend an annual technical analysis conference, and it was there that I came to appreciate the merits of charting and technical indicators, even while remaining an avowed fundamental investor. It was at one of these conferences that I heard Tom Dorsey discuss point & figure charting. These funny looking charts made up of Xs and Os and that ignore the passage of time have become my go-to chart for looking at trends as well as support and resistance levels. In this month’s Feature, I provide an overview of point & figure charting, and I hope you find them as fascinating and useful as I do.

Withdrawal Calculator

One of the biggest worries of soon-to-be-retirees is whether or not they are going to have enough money to enjoy an active and comfortable retirement. For this month’s Spreadsheet Corner, Jaclyn McClellan has created a withdrawal calculator that allows you to estimate whether your retirement nest egg will be large enough to see you through your golden years. The spreadsheet is robust enough to allow you to dictate your expected rate of return during retirement, the expected inflation rate, how many years you expect to live after retiring, and even whether you want to have a remainder to pass along after you are gone.