Given the opportunity to immortalize one's love in a pithy engraveable slogan, almost everyone seems compelled to maudlin cliche. The calligraphic curlicues of "Forever yours" or "Eternal love" are etched into the bands of millions of lovers who — if not for the paucity of imaginative romance in the whole romance industry — might find a truer and less predictable expression of their love in almost anything at all, from an imprint of a co-mingled genetic sequence to the words "Fine ass bitch." Just about anything is more romantic than the rote repetition of cliche. On the other hand,...
"I have now reigned about 50 years in victory or peace, beloved by my subjects, dreaded by my enemies, and respected by my allies. Riches and honors, power and pleasure, have waited on my call, nor does any earthly blessing appear to have been wanting to my felicity. In this situation, I have diligently numbered the days of pure and genuine happiness which have fallen to my lot. They amount to fourteen." Abd Er-Rahman III of Spain (960 C.E.)The old cliche that you can't buy happiness may be true, but new findings show it looks like you can at...
Miss The Middleman, ABC Family's show about an upstanding superhero and his apprentice Wendy? Me too. That's why I dug up this clip of Middleman actor Matt Keeslar explaining just what's wrong with The Lady And The Tramp, and by extension all stories about bad boys who "change." True, this scene from The Last Days Of Disco isn't exactly scifi, and neither is Tramp. But the bad-boy-who-changes thing is a scifi cliche, and it's just too awesome to hear Keeslar deconstruct it. [IMDB]...
Miss The Middleman, ABC Family's show about an upstanding superhero and his apprentice Wendy? Me too. That's why I dug up this clip of Middleman actor Matt Keeslar explaining just what's wrong with The Lady And The Tramp, and by extension all stories about bad boys who "change." True, this scene from The Last Days Of Disco isn't exactly scifi, and neither is Tramp. But the bad-boy-who-changes thing is a scifi cliche, and it's just too awesome to hear Keeslar deconstruct it. [IMDB]...
Description: My second time to Vegas, I went for a soccer tournament and made it a priority to take one evening to myself and walk the strip with my camera. I took a few cliche’ shots of the Bellagio and of other typical Vegas stuff, but when I saw this scene, that little voice inside my head started shouting at me. Location: The Las Vegas Strip, Las Vegas Date Taken: May 16, 2008 Camera: Canon 20D Exposure: 2 seconds Aperture: f/11 Focal Length: 21mm ISO: 100...
Where is that friend of mine? Who else likes to go there? Where is that place on the map? It's simple, useful questions like this that location based social network Shizzow aims to answer and the service just opened up today to users outside of beta location Portland, Oregon to now include users anywhere in California. There are lots of location based social networks available, but this one is refreshingly simple. Is that enough to effectively differentiate Shizzow? It's going to have to be, because there's not much else about the service that's unique. Most features are easily reproduced, however,...
In the HuffPo (sure, we can call it that, why not?), aging rocker Neil Young (heck, what's a tired journalistic cliche between friends?) offers up a vision for How To Save A Major Automobile Company. The big three must reduce models to basics. a truck, an SUV, a large family sedan, an economy sedan, and a sports car. Use existing tooling. Keep building these models to keep the workforce employed but build them without engines and transmissions. These new vehicles, called Transition Rollers, are ready for a re-power. No new tooling is required at this stage. The adapters are...
In what is probably a clear challenge to VOIP services such as Skype, Google has now introduced video and voice functionality to their Google Talk gadget inside Gmail. However, some of you will NOT see it yet as Gmail is doing their usual and rolling it out slowly to users. So some of you will have it and some of you won’t. So if you don’t have it yet, don’t despair. You will see it eventually! This new feature is a really big deal because along with also being able to put Google gadgets in the Gmail sidebar, this...
Yes, it is perhaps the oldest cliche in politics to say that everything is riding on turnout. But take a look at the data for Georgia and Missouri in the latest TIME/CNN poll. In both states, McCain holds a narrow lead among "likely" voters (those who traditionally vote), but Obama leads among registered (the kind of result you get if turnout is huge). ...
With all the information Microsoft is releasing at its launchtastic Professional Developers Conference in Los Angeles this week, CEO Steve Ballmer sent out a honking long missive to customers who have opted into the software giant’s “Executive Email” program (who knew?). Along with the Azure–finally, a lovely and apt brand name from Microsoft–cloud services offering, it also outlines the inevitable and unavoidable path for the company, which has long struggled in getting its digital strategy right. That includes cloudy browser versions of Word, Excel, PowerPoint and other of its powerhouse software products. Of course, as with any Microsoft (MSFT)...
I just got back from the Obama rally at Civic Center Park here in Denver. The Denver Post estimates the turnout was 100,000 people, which is really just astounding considering the total size of the city is about 550,000 people. Here's a shot that gives you a sense of the crowd - and let me just remind you, it's not a short distance between City Hall, where the speech was, to the steps of the state capitol: Here's an up close photo from the speech: Most Americans have seen Obama speak, and millions at this point have been to his...
Over the last few weeks I’ve been using tr.im to quickly shorten URLs that I post to Twitter. It that provides all kinds of great statistics on the shortened URLs that you create, including the number of visitors, visitor country locations and referring websites. You can create custom urls, private urls and the ability to post directly to Twitter. Oh and it makes the shortest URLs possible, since tr.im itself is only 4 characters. Big shout out to @dlprager for turning me on to tr.im. Related PostsTweetburner, Helping You Shorten, Post and Track URL’s on TwitterSuper-Con San Jose Comic...
You won’t likely see this 30-second consumer-generated video in the Superbowl, but I decided to enter the contest anyway. I named this entry “winning commercial” for Google’s spiders not for you. It’s really a loser. If I was smart, I’d focus on nailing another poorly promoted contest, instead of tossing my hat into this crowded ring. Feel free to watch this video 9 times so that it makes it to the “most viewed” gallery. Kudos to the agency for giving each entry a unique URL instead of the typical bloated flash website that has no way to direct link into...
Greg Neichin and Adam Erlebacher were in an East Coast grad school looking for ways to help advertisers and their agencies make the transition to the Internet when they stumbled upon an idea: what about creating an online market for placing products in movies and TV shows? Say, an EBay-type auction site, where brands and agencies bid for the chance to have their cars, cellphones and power tools in the center of the frame? But they soon discovered that one cliche about Hollywood -- "it's all about relationships" -- is grounded in truth, at least where product placement is...
