Panasonic FS4 ships for $100

While we can certainly complain about the prices of the advanced and high-end digital cameras and DSLRs, it's hard to complain about how things have developed at the entry-level. Perhaps the extra pressure from camera-phones and webcams combined with the intense competition and economies of scale (and other factors) contributed to the availability of feature-packed options at the $100 price-point.

When you compare to five years ago, you can get a lot more for a lot less at $100, inflation-adjusted.

Okay, enough blah-blah, the purpose of this post is a $100 camera deal with free shipping, which is the daily deal at J&R World: the Panasonic FS4. There is a limit of one camera per customer.

If you are a camera-addict, yet the name still sounds strange and unfamiliar, it is because Panasonic sneaked it in without telling many people about it. We accidentally run into it at the Panasonic website in late August.

It is intended to be an affordable but featured-packed LiIon-based P&S digicam. It has the evil battery-lock, but the evil gives around 400 shots per charge.