Windows Haters Unite

I must admit, my first exposure to computers was on two different macs. But, for all intents and purposes, I am a very well-versed Windows user. I love how Apple has influenced different trends including product design. However, my cheap soul just can't justify the expensive entry price into a Mac machine. At least not yet. But, for anyone who knows what a computer is, and has ever used a Windows machine for longer than an email break at the Public Library, then you'll enjoy this gif. CLICK HERE to see the animation.

Worldwide Obesity

I found this interesting graphic that shows obesity levels in the top 27 "fattest" countries. Of course, we (the USA) are at the forefront. I'm actually surprised to not see more South American countries in this list. The obesity trend in the US is quite alarming. Every time I travel outside of the country, I'm always amazed upon my return how "fat" Americans are. I'm also amazed at how large the portions are at restaurants.

(source and drawing by: www.wellingtongrey.net)

iTunes Killer??

Amazon recently released their mp3 service. The catch? There are none. In fact, it's almost better than the iTunes store in most ways. Why? Well, because it DRM (digital rights management) free. I know, I know, iTunes offers DRM free songs to. Albeit, their DRM free prices are 50%+ higher than Amazon's. And, any mp3 you download from Amazon is fully compatible with iTunes and your iPod. Basically, Amazon mp3 offers you more songs for the same money.

Will Amazon's service kill iTunes? No. I'd be willing to bet a lot of money it won't. But, it gives all you frugalites out there a way to be smart and enjoy your music for less.

Mobile Phone Deals

I'm a sucker for good deals. I mean, really good deals. I get a kick out of talking to others and they say, "I'm buying a new laptop, but I'm getting one through my dad, he gets great deals". Or, "I'm buying it through a friend, they get a company discount". I'm sure we've all heard this. Then, you ask details about the purchase, the specs, and you find out they paid more than had they walked in to their local Best Buy or CompUSA. With a laptop, it's one thing.

Now, fast forward to mobile phones. It is absolutely stupid to pay much for a mobile phone these days. You can even get a the newest Blackberry Curve 8320 for TMobilefor free right now via Amazon. Now, we bargain shoppers know Amazon.com is not always the best place when it comes to price. But, when it comes to mobile phones, I have yet to find a source that is anywhere near as consistent as Amazon when it comes to deals.

I'm going to list a couple pros and cons about using Amazon for mobile phones.

PROS:

-It's Amazon, not some flaky fly by night.
-You know the rebate is legit
-Shipping is reliable in relatively fast order
-You probably already have an account with Amazon
-Amazon always has steals when it comes to cell phones. It's a pretty good bet that if the phone is Free, or they pay you after rebates, on Amazon, then there's no way you'll find a better deal elsewhere. This makes it simple, check out the phone on Amazon. If it's free or less than free, no reason to shop elsewhere, you've found the best deal.

CONS:
-Make sure you comply with the rebate terms. Well worth reading the fine print. Note that amazon has really cleaned up the fine print on their phone rebates. It doesn't take more than a couple minutes to read all the print.
-You have to wait for the phone to be shipped
-Defects/problems with the phone have to be handled via the service provider. You can't just walk in to the "store" where you bought the phone.
-Sometimes they don't offer all the phones that other resellers do.

I'm sure there are other Cons and Pros. But, over the years as friends have come to me for deals, when it comes to mobile phones, Amazonhas always come out on top as the best deal. Hopefully this helps!!

It's Definitely been awhile!!

Well, it's been a long while since I've posted to this blog. I'll admit, it's hard to keep motivated. Tell you what, start clicking on my Google AdSense ads, and I'll instantly become motivated. How does that sound?? [does it always have to be about money]

So, in contemplating what to do with my blog, I realized I should start writing again to improve my communication and writing skills. After all, I did minor in English in school. And, I chose English because I liked the tools of writing and persuasion. So, for my first post in over a year, I've chosen to update all with some great websites I've found, perused, and visit.

Here are some:

FURNITURE
Ikea Hacker Blog - Here's a cool blog that features DIY twists on existing Ikea furniture. I love the design language of a lot of stuff at Ikea. However, i struggle with the apparent poor quality of their products. I must admit, i don't own anything from Ikea (other than the less-than-stellar shrimp, egg, bread, lettuce leaf concoction I ate last time I visited their store). But, I've helped friends move who own some of their furniture. Every intimate, as in the side of the dresser is smeared against my face as I attempt to heft it up some stairs, interaction I've had with Ikea furniture (e.g. Dressers, Shelves, Tables, Beds) has revealed poor, particle board quality. Sub-par faux wood prints, and furniture failure under nominal moving loads. Alas, their design language still rawks!

BluDot Furniture - Wicked cool, tres moderne furniture. This company was started by Charlie Lazor, also known for his flatpak prefab home. Bludot features some really cool furniture with, at times, beautiful lines. I'm not overly keen on contemporary stuff that loses functionality. But, I think a lot of stuff on bludot manages to balance functionality with minimal design intrusion. Good design is something that blends and doesn't stick out. In some ways, though, BluDot looks like a premium Ikea. Hopefully the price is indicative of quality. Something not found too often in Ikea stuff.

ARCHITECTURE
Flatpak House [see also Dwell by Empyrean] - The whole prefab architecture movement is awesome!! Too bad it's still very expensive. Another really cool prefab home, that is much more affordable, is the Rocio Romero LV and LVL home. The biggest drawback of this, though, is the price. You'll easily pay $150/sq. ft. with these homes. Arguably, you're getting real, modern architecture design for that price. But, it's still not cheap. A few homeowners may find it less expensive. There was one family, though, that built a Rocio Romero LVL home for under $100k. And, the home looks quite nice. I haven't looked into this, and if anyone knows, please update me, but it looks like they sanded the Plywood floor and finished it for the flooring. Which raises a good Eco question: IF you're building a home and trying to be sustainable in the process, why put down flooring on TOP of the wood plywood? As you can see here, the plywood can be finished quite nicely. How sustainable are you really??

Some other PreFab Highlights:
WeeHouse -small, almost rinky-dink type homes. Ready to live in a shoe box?? But, combine a few together, and you've got a comfortable pad.
Eds Shed -prefab home in London. Very, very modern design. I like the wood. But, it has such few windows, i wonder how much natural light comes in. This is one thing I like about the Rocio Romero design, there's gobs of natural light. I like the idea of positioning your home such that when you wake up from the Sun washing over you in the morning.
Napa Prefab - LV home extremely nicely finished.
Move Modern - great resource for modern, contemporary designs, features, for sale, etc. Includes prefabs.
Royal Homes, CANADA - More prefab, modern coolness
Euro Prefab the LoftCube - here's a very expensive (given it's 420sqft size) prefab in europe. They just finished building their first proto overlooking the skyline of Berlin.

SHOES/FASHION
Since I'm in process of launching a footwear brand, see placeholder website, I guess that makes me somewhat in the fashion, trend, consumer goods coolness side of things. So, i present to you a list of blogs focusing on such things.

Sartorialist I love the layout of this blog. Super simple, very few words, but pictures that really capture the essence of the blog, which is to showcase real life people, wearing real-life fashion. As he says, "I always felt that there was a disconnect between what I was selling in the showroom and what I was seeing real people (really cool people) wearing in real life". Hence, the Sartorialist.
Freshness Mag - The sneaker craze continues.
Shoebum - more outdoor oriented blogger.
CoolHunting - more sneakers from the hunter himself, Josh Rubin's Coolhunting

BUSINESS BLOGS

I love business and have to keep up on the latest. As a start-up entrepreneur, I wear a lot of hats. Since my education was in Finance and English, I needed to learn about branding, marketing, etc. So, I frequent these blogs:

Brand Autopsy - This is a great blog with continual mini-case studies.
AlarmClock -fairly comprehensive blog on dealflow, usually in the tech area. It seems like if it's hot in Silicon Valley, AlarmClock covers it. If it's not hot in the Valley, good luck.
AdAge- I subscribe to their newsletters which are always highlighting various Ad/Marketing campaigns, their effectiveness, opinion letters, etc.
Springwise-Another newsletter I subscribe to. Absolutely awesome newsletter for those that love to come up with business ideas. Chock full of new ideas, this newsletter features new, innovative business concepts that are launched worldwide.

Hopefully this is a good primer for learning and linking.

Match your Toyota Car with a. . .Toyota Home?!?

That's right, Toyota makes prefabricated homes. They're on track to manufacture 5,000 homes this year growing to 7,000 homes in the next couple years. Not bad, considering the average price is $227,000. Do the basic math, and that's a $1.1 billion business!! Not bad! The article, found in the Detroit News, states that a typical home can be assembled by cranes and a roof placed on top in less than 6 hours!! Not too shabby. Just if I could start importing these bad boys.

Check out these images courtesy of The Seattle Times article:

Seth Godin, Creative Funding

Check out this post from Seth Godin, suggesting a creative, and good, way to fund a new project within a business. It's not totally clear how this funding solution would work in a true start-up that has yet to produce anything (other than the funding received would be exclusively for the original product, and not spinoffs therefrom). Traditional VC or angel terms can be, as Connect magazine warned, stifling to management attaining true greatness with the organization. As such, funding the project, instead of giving up the whole company may make sense.

Check it out: Seth Godin's Blog

BYU Business students win at the Utah Entrepreneur Challenge

Well, here's another article regarding our big, 1st place finish at the Utah Entrepreneur Challenge. Get ready for "Mountain Life Comfort".

Link to article: BYU students win at UEC

WE WON!! WE WON!!

First, we were announced as finalists in the Utah Entrepreneur Challenge, or UEC. Then, we prepared our pitch, presented to the judges approximately two weeks ago. And, what happens?!?

First, we arrived, rather belatedly, to the Awards Banquet which was held on Thursday, April 27. And, when I say belatedly, I mean 40 minutes late. You know, my mom purchased this book for me titled "Never Be Late Again" and, you'd think after having read half of the book, I would begin to implement some of the techniques and principles from it. The only reason I haven't completed the book is because I figured I would be better off stopping where I was and trying to implement some of the techniques, rather than read the whole thing, with some unreasonable hope that I'd actually remember everything I'd read. But, I digress. . .

So, we show up at the banquet/mixer, and begin chatting with the big shots. We're talking the movers and shakers of Utah. The investment community of Utah is growing, and maturing into a much better environment to raise capital. So, we're networking the floor, trying to become further acquainted with all the folk. Dinner is served, which was very underwhelming. Nothing like cold Beef and tasteless mushroom sauce drizzled over the top. We were hoping our Advisor, John Knab of Phonex Broadband, who has rendered incredible support and feedback thus far, was going to make it. But, alas, he had family duties to attend to.

So, we're sitting at the table, getting progressively more nervous as they prolonged the announcement of the winners by recognizing all the sponsors, supporters of the program, etc. At last, 35 minutes after the planned announcement, they bust out the top three winners. And, the third place winner was Precision Surveying Solutions. A great company with a very promising technology for surveyors. The second place winner, Five Star Painting, a franchising concept. And. . . . .

At this point, I was nervous but, as a team, we were confident as we felt our presentation was solid. And the Grand Prize winner of the 2006 UEC Challenge is. . . Core Footwear^TM!!

Needless to say, we were pretty excited with this result. Not only does this award validate the direction we are headed, but we feel it's a reflection of the solid team we have assembled. Keep posted, as we continue to develop Core Footwear^TM and bring our patent-pending technology to market. Soon, you will be able to learn more at CoreFootwear.com.

We just want to thank all our mentors, advisors, and those who have rendered incredible support in helping us get this far. We would like to especially thank John Knab for his amazing insight and feedback. Truly, without him, we would not have gotten this far.

Amazon.com: JL421 Badonkadonk Land Cruiser/Tank: Everything Else

Are you ready for your personal tank?!? Get it now at Amazon.com. Do people really buy this stuff? Come on, it has a 6 hp Tecumseh engine, claiming 40 mph top speed, with up to 5 passengers. Yeah right!!!

.:Design for Africa:.

I just stumbled upon this project, and find it incredibly inspiring. Design for Africa is a project by two recent Design graduates, one from Germany, the other from Sweden, who are on a quest to leverage design principles to improve the lives of impoverished people. After almost 2 years of preparation and fundraising, they are finally on their way. Their goal is to meet with local communities, villages, governments, etc, to identify ways where design can improve the lives of the people. Traditionally, design is expensive, and therefore inaccessible, to poorer people. But, Design For Africa has a goal to find ways to solve problems with cost effective solutions. It will be interesting to see what they come up with; but, check out the site, and read their Diary.

CouchSurfing - The world is smaller than you think!

Are you ready to get your travel on?? Check out Couchsurfing.com. This is one of the coolest websites of which I'm a member. Basically, it's a networking site for all you frugal travellers that love to meat new people in new places. You go on couch surfing, and you can find other people that have a spare couch, floor, room, bed, or otherwise virtually anywhere around the world. So, say you are travelling to New York and want to stay somewhere. Well, go to couchsurfing.com, do a search, and find someone with a spare couch. Then, you get to crash at their place and get to know some locals in the whole process. I've already hosted a few different people and have had a positive experience. So, check it out:

CouchSurfing - The world is smaller than you think!

State of the Union Address 2006, the Best Yet!!

This is perhaps the best parody on Bush yet!! As the good man says himself, "For those of you who say we don't need the patriot act, I say, I have to question your patronism". Or, better yet, Bush lets us know that he "won't put all his eggs in one biscuit."

OK, these are just a couple teasers, so do yourself a favor and click on the link to view the video for yourself. I don't want to spoil it for you.

Come on, click the link.

Why? "Because our children must be literized".



WARNING: Do not watch this video with food, fluid, or anything else in your mouth, unless you want to shower your computer screen with masticated food.

The REDNECK ROLLERCOASTER is Hilarious!!

I can't explain it, but you need to watch this. I couldn't help but laugh like a litte kid. I wish I had this when was a kid. Then again, if I had it, I probably wouldn't be alive today to write this.







Click here: REDNECK ROLLERCOASTER

Those Russkies

This guy is the Russian Jackie Chan!!! Fo, real!



Click this link to watch the vid: RUSSIAN CLIMBING

Watch out, it's a TREEEEEEEE!!!

This is funny. But, kinda reminds me of my crazy escapades, including the time I rolled my old Subaru Legacy Wagon in the beautiful National Forests of Colorado. Watch, and laugh: Truck Crash - Google Video

CAR DESTRUCTION - PT CRUISER

Want to see a crazy nut!? This guy is outta control. For one reason or another, he's pissed off at the world. So much so, that he runs over to a car at a stop light and starts destroying it. Pretty out of control. Check it out: YouTube - CAR DESTRUCTION - PT CRUISER

BuriedCar.com

Wanna get a 1957 Plymouth Belvedere Coupe, virtually brand new, never seen the light of day since 1957? If so, go to BuriedCar.com to learn more. Tulsa Oklahoma buried a car back in 1957 in a Time Capsule, along with other memorabilia, pictures, etc. But, one thing they buried with the car is a 5 gallons of gas. Now, this car was buried in a concrete time capsule. It will be unearthed in 2007. So, it's been officially marinating in the fumes of gas for 48 years, and will continue for two more before being released. As much as I'd like the car, could the paint, let alone everything else on the car, have held up to those fumes???




As a note, the reason they buried fuel was in case the internal combustion engine was no longer existant in 2007, the day to exhume the car.

Win the Boston Marathon in Spira Shoes, get $1 Million

Spira Footwear, a company in Texas, is offering $1 million to the person that can win the upcoming Boston Marathon in their shoes. Why? Well, first, because they are a small company and this is a great marketing gimmick to garner eyeballs to their website, technology, and product offering. But, another reason is to persuade the sanctioning Track & Field Governing Body to relinquish an "antiquated" rule stating that springs in shoes are not allowed in competition. Spira Footwear was launched by two brothers about 5 years ago. Their technology consists of literally a metal spring in the heel and forefoot. No, these aren't those funky Z-Coils you may have seen. These springs are a lot lower profile. It's pretty cool technology. And, in independent tests, their shoes have produced impressive results. The results were so good that they claim that, at times, the springs may return over 90% of energy.

Compared to a few years ago, their product design has come a long way. Their original design was for a walking shoe, and it was horrendously ugly. Granted, most walking shoes are very geezer like. I hope this company does well, as I'm in the process, myself, of developing a footwear technology. And, on that note, look for an upcoming blog that will track my progress through the patent, sourcing, production, and marketing of the technology.

Your Luxury Airline has arrived - ENTER "Eos Airlines"

Talk about uber-luxury! It doesn't get much better than this. Approximately 48 total passengers on one Boeing 747. That's not too many people, for those of you who have never flown the Jumbo Jet. In fact, that's virtually no one on a plane this size. I'm very interested to see how EOS Airlines does. They already have 3 Jets in service and only one route of service. London (Stansted) to New York (JFK). And they already have three Jets in service!! Considering they Launched in mid-October, this either signifies that their concept works, or they are very, very well funded (well, they are probably well funded regardless. After all, they are in a capital intensive industry). The airline industry, as you well know, is fraught with, sorry for the pun, turbulence. With the bankruptcies of Delta, United, etc, I think it has become obvious that the airline industry is evolving. Southwest and, arguably, JetBlue have shown that the low-cost route can be successful, assuming good management and execution. And, with the proliferance of the Travelocity's and Orbitz's of the internet, most consumers have shown that low-cost works. But low-cost isn't the only place to compete.

Yet, no one has focused on the higher-end-only segment. Sure, Virgin has reclining seats, Singapore Airlines too; however, as far as I know, next to fractional jet ownership, EOS is the only airline to be so exclusively high-end. And, for a price of $2,500 from New York to London, only the high-end will fly this airline. So, for 4x more money than a standard coach fare, you can fly to London, sleep on the way there, and eat world-class cuisine before you land.

Let's look at the numbers real quick. Given a flight from JFK to London is roughly 8 hours, EOS is realizing $15,000 in Revenue/hour, or $120,000 for the whole flight (assuming all the seats sell). Compare that to a standard 747, with 212 passengers. Let's assume the average sales price for the flight on a standard 747 is $500 for the same route. That's only $106,000 in revenue for the same flight. Assuming both flights are full of passengers, EOS stands to make 13% higher Revenues on the same flight that any major carrier makes. All this, with less cost for baggage handling, cabin cleaning, etc. In the ultra-competitive landscape of the airline industry, 13% explains why EOS appears to be so well funded. It's a no brainer for investors.

You know, disruptive technology, and/or innovation arguably drives and creates new industries. It's funny how the large carriers failed to innovate. Instead, they responded to innovations that start-ups proved to be successful. Hence, Delta's Song, United's Ted, etc. But, the big boys, with these offshoot "low-cost" carriers, are only responding to, and replicating, what Southwest had been doing for years. Yet, they failed to trump other start-ups in other aspects. Such as EOS Airlines and the Uber-luxury market.

I don't know, but this EOS stuff smells like Disruption.
Eos Airlines - Home Page