Why would Apple apply for a United States patent for technology that would force users of its operating systems including iPods and iPhones to watch and or listen to compulsory advertising?

According to this article from the Telegraph.co.uk Apple’s patent application describes this technology as “enforcement routine” software, and the rumors are flying that this software would force users to watch or listen to advertisements which they would be unable to skip past.

Steve Jobs name is actually listed on the patent application, so the company must be taking this idea seriously.

How would this software be used?  I’m guessing that Apple could start offering music, or videos, or other things we all clamor for at no charge only after we watch an advertisement.  Or perhaps they’ll start giving away iPods and iPhones for free in exchange for making ads mandatory for those users.

Social Media is about consumer empowerment.  It’s about seeking information, not being forced to see or hear anything the consumer doesn’t want to see.  The companies that don’t understand that won’t be here tomorrow.

Steve Jobs and Apple really understand the marketplace, and over the last decade have done a great job of exploiting business opportunities by offering amazing products that people didn’t even know they needed.  They have created not only a successful business but as Seth Godin would point out, a Tribe.  Not just customers, but devoted fans.  Zealots even who can’t wait to buy the next “whatever”.

So here’s my take on the patent.  I think Apple has applied for a patent for this technology to make sure that this technology is used responsibly and its use doesn’t go rogue (sorry, the word just fit!).  I also think that by offering “free” ad driven services with compulsory advertising, they will drive even more traffic to a “paid” subscription model that would be ad free.

Consumers will have a choice.  Free with compulsory ads, or a subscription and no ads.

Have it your way!

Seems to work for Burger King!

What do you think??  I’d appreciate your comments.

This video kind of sums up what the patent would do to your computing experience.

An apple a day keeps the doctor away,
And someone can be the apple of your eye.
One bad apple don’t spoil a whole bunch,
Unless it’s the apple in your American apple pie.
Apple isn’t only a computer,
Nor just the name of Gwenyth Paltrow’s daughter.
An apple isn’t only for your teacher,
Or simply scraps for piggy fodder.
An apple isn’t all that evil,
Unless it is from Snow White’s witch.
While many men may curse Adam,
For taking an apple from Eve, that b***h.
But we mustn’t see only crab apples,
Nor the apples of shrunken head dolls,
But rather embrace the apple,
And the tree from which it falls.
The apple is more than Delicious,
And Granny would tell you so,
For McIntosh, Fuji and Braeburn,
Are just part of the list, you know.
Here come Jonathan, Pippin and Gravenstein,
Nicola, Baldwin and Rome,
Adams Pearmain and Ambrosia,
Pink Lady and Ginger Gold.
And these apples adorn the Gala,
Even Rambo makes a Cameo…
James Grieve takes on the Empire,
As Ben Davis bites Taliaferro.
But Liberty will always stand,
Like a Honey Crisp Northern Spy,
And Pink Pearls and Paula Reds,
Will make Jazz apples shy.
But no matter how you like d’em apples,
Don’t forget what they are truly for.
Apples are here for your health,
And so you can remember your ‘core.’
So take a bite out of life,
Enjoy it along the way.
And there will be much more of life to come,
If you eat your ‘apple a day…’

© 2009 Queena Verbosity 100% Real Words
Media Monster Communications, Inc.
Stacey Kumagai
http://www.100percentrealwords.blogspot.com
http://hubpages.com/profile/mediamonster
http://www.braingasm.com

I went to the Annise Parker web page today to see if she had moved ideologically to the left in her campaign for Mayor now that she has released a poll saying she has a 13 point lead on Gene Locke in the Mayoral runoff election.

I thought that maybe being ahead in the polls would free her up to speak a little more truth than she has so far in the campaign.

Ms. Parker’s campaign has been touting Ms. Parker, a Democrat, as a so-called “fiscal conservative.”

It is obnoxious and disheartening that a Democrat is making this claim in a majority Democratic city.

If I want a so-called fiscal conservative, I’ll vote for a Republican.  Given the absence of a Republican in the runoff in our majority-Democratic City of Houston, maybe what folks in Houston want is a government that helps people and that has a place in people’s lives.

While visiting Ms. Parker’s web home, I checked out the list of supporters her campaign team has complied.

Below is the link to that list. (You’ll have to cut and paste it–Sorry. I’ve got this new Apple computer and it is giving me fits. I can’t get links inserted into the blog that you don’t have to cut and paste. I’m sure I’ll figure it all out with time. Maybe.)

http://www.anniseparker.com/supporters/

My blog is on the list!

I have indeed endorsed Ms. Parker. It is correct to put my blog on this list.

Though if you read the post, it was not a fully flattering endorsement.

http://texasliberal.wordpress.com/2009/10/28/with-hestiancy-im-voting-for-annise-parker-for-mayor-of-houston/

Nor is this more recent post 100% supportive of Ms. Parker–

http://texasliberal.wordpress.com/2009/11/15/gene-locke-willing-to-tell-bigger-lies-than-annise-parker-to-win-right-wing-voters/

The comment beneath the 11/15 post is one of my fellow Houston progressive bloggers suggesting that I was smoking weed while writing the post.

Ha!–Nope. Maybe just drinking some carrot juice.

I give the Parker people credit for putting my blog on the list of supporters.

Maybe they are thick-skinned—That is a good trait to have.

Maybe —To paraphrase the 1964 Barry Goldwater campaign—in their hearts they know I’m right.

Maybe it is a small joke on me. You can’t click though to my blog from the Parker site. So as far as anybody knows, I’m 100% on-board.

I hope it is to some extent a joke at my expense.

Better than playing a joke on others, is a joke at one’s own expense.

All the world is a stage.

I just hope that Ms. Parker recalls I was a supporter even before the first round of voting two weeks ago.

I’m looking for an appointment as city alligator commissioner. I’m hoping the city will give me a boat to cruise up and down the bayous and a net to catch the gators.

Among the more distressing aspects of your new system is the tendency for application and system messages to get buried behind other windows. In the Speech > Text to Speech system preference you can set the machine to “announce when alerts are displayed” and “announce when an application requires your attention”. Do so.

While there, select a voice which you like but is also discernible. I like Alex slowed a bit.

You might wish to do the same to the preferences in iChat.

Pay as little attention as you can to the Apple-fan community. Some technically inclined Mac guys exist but you will find them through Google when you need them.

The Apple solution for external drives is no better than the other names you know, but double the price.

In every Print dialog you can make PDFs. While these are good for forwarding to people and posting, they are good enough to forward via internet to copy shops. This is why I don’t have a printer. Just across the street I get whatever I want for a nickel each page. Seven cents for 60# paper. Your mileage may vary. They do color, too.

Still seeking additional tips, criticism or addenda.

The Universe is conspiring to prevent me from sleeping, and I’m getting on with it.

Hardware:

The Tip. The tip no one will share with you. The dark, dirty secret of the Mac underground: Lose the sloppy, crappy, awkward mouse. They’re terrible. The $3 mouse you can get at Fry’s, or your regional equivalent, is dramatically more usable. I have a $8 five-button mouse from the blatantly named Discount Electronics with a prominent Dell logo. All five buttons work seamlessly with OS X. The center button brings up the dashboard. The leftmost button is F9. The rightmost button is some kind of auto-scroll mode the name of which I can’t be bothered to look up right now. As you may know the right click is the command+click.

You do not need special, magical Mac accessories anymore. Firewire is not overrated, but most people won’t be able to tell the difference. This may not apply to you. If you need a USB hub, get a USB hub. You don’t need the mystical iHub for $50.

If you don’t have one now, get one. Get a big, fat external drive and store upon it everything intend to keep. Everything. This means you. Should anything happen to your Mac and you take it in for service, to the unfortunately named Genius Bar or to anyone else, your machine shall be returned to you completely wiped with only the OS installed. Not just disk problems, literally anything.

In about two weeks the keyboard will stop working. Although technically covered by warranty, being removed from its packaging counts as abuse. Yes, the replacement from Apple Store runs a mere $60, but is no more durable. Get a real keyboard. Ideally, dig up the keyboard to the PC you just retired and use that. There are good Mac keyboards, but they start in the triple digits.

If you have access to old, old Mac parts, say at a computer crap store, get the old white-keys keyboard that shipped with the lamp-like iMac. That was the last quality keyboard Apple ever shipped. It’s top-rack dishwasher safe. I’m pretty sure it doesn’t have certain keys you will never use, but you’ll deal.

I don’t think any Macs ship today with under 4GB. That’s a minimum. Kudos to Apple for nsfwing finally shipping machines with proper minimum RAM without punitive upgrade charges. The objective of packing your Mac with memory right off the bat is that you’ll never have to bother with it again.

The speakers on the iMac are fine. If you’re doing any serious listening and you don’t want to hear it in Kahn-Hazeltine AM stereo, external speakers should be somberly considered. Get this from someone who deals with audiophiles or musicians as opposed to computer guys. Since my iMac has replaced my television, stereo, world-band radio … and probably some other stuff … a low-grade, “studio-quality” M-Audio system replaced the internal speakers. Read reviews and listen to as many systems as can be managed. This is very subjective.

Software:

Pocket-camcorder and most phone video is not read in its native form by OS X, and especially not by iMovie which may no longer ship with your machine. To rectify this, you need some additional software. This is what I do, and I do not propose this as the perfect absolute solution.

Flip4Mac WMV player is a collection of codecs which do not ship with OS X natively. This is an install-it-and-forget-it solution.

http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windowsmedia/player/wmcomponents.mspx

You also want Perian, which has all many of the codecs neither OS X or WMV Player provides.

http://perian.org/

Squared 5, MPEG Streamclip. It ain’t pretty, but it sure works. It can take any video your Mac can read and turn it into anything else your Mac can read. For example, the MPEG files generated by your digital device to the DV files accepted by most editing programs. You can do crude edits and some image manipulation in MPEG Streamclip as well.

http://www.squared5.com/svideo/mpeg-streamclip-mac.html

I leave it to you to find where the videos are in your device. No handy-dandy OEM downloaders and encrapeners are available. Pro tip: Convert video to a larger size then convert within iMovie to the original size. I don’t understand why that keeps the image sharp, but it does.

Need a UTC clock on your desktop? This is a simple solution and the only game in town:

http://www.northernsoftworks.com/utcclock.html

Preview does not suck as much as you think it does, you just have to get used to it.

Safari does suck as much as you think it does. Go back to Firefox. The OS insists upon Safari being there, even if it doesn’t do anything. Don’t delete it, just let it stew in its own juices.

iChat does AIM, ICQ and Jabber. Fire up those old accounts or gmail, or whatever Jabbers you may have. This is also a set-it-and-forget-it solution. You can only audio or video conference over AIM.

Front Row is all but useless unless you organize your media Apple’s way with religious devotion.

uTorrent, just in case you have to do that. Encrypt, encrypt!

VLC and Mplayer OS X will humbly play videos without the overhead of QuickTime Player.

OpenOffice.org has a native OS-X version.

Making tea at your desk? Mac in the kitchen? Get cuppa

Unix/Linux disks to read? ExtFSManager

Want to know what’s going on under the hood? Bjango’s iStat Menus. Sits right on the menu.

audio manipulation? Audacity

independent feed reader? Vienna

Install X11, and most of the Open Source world becomes available to you. Not Photoshop, Gimp.

Odds and ends:

At first, that closing a window does not kill the application feels like an annoyance. When you get accustomed to the idea, it can be very handy. You can close your IM, Mail, music player and so forth while they keep running and you work in other windows.

When iMovie generates output it uses every CPU cycle it can find. Deal.

Remember, you may move the dock (taskbar) to any edge of the screen you wish. My dock is to the left. It may also be set to autohide. Handy and adds screen real estate.

You have to be in an Admin able or master account to update the OS. If you are not, the machine will download the same files over and over and never update until the master tells it to do so. This is a very common complaint among Mac users, but they shall not act to address the problem. Never run the Admin account (I don’t think you can anymore, at least not in the GUI), but make certain you have a master account for daily use.

Set the desktop image to change hourly or every 30 minutes. Get a bundle of interesting images from one of those desktop-image sites, like the set of 110 images called “oil and water” which I use, and all but eliminate burn in. Yes, it still happens. I could show you a white upright LCD iMac with burn in, if I could get you a security pass for the plant. Of course, if you have plenty of photos in iPhoto you can just use that.

Accounts: Admin comes with the OS. You have a daily use account, and if someone in your house dislikes your screen resolution, or should have limited access to the Mac for some reason, make for them an account of their own. Remember to log out from the system as you depart, or set the screen saver to log you out, if you have multiple user accounts. Again, your daily-use account can, should, and is expected to be a master account.

Take the time to work through every single System Preferences setting and make certain the settings are either what you expect or what you want. Yes, all of them.

System Preferences > Hardware > Displays > Color: When the Mac is at its home location, with the most typical lighting, do the “Calibrate …” exercise. The difference can be dramatic. While you’re in the neighborhood, turn down the screen brightness to below 50%.

Explore the Radio category on iTunes. I leave it to you whether you wish to compromise your music collection there.

To those who find this missive, I am entertaining additional points and criticism.

Some of my local readers may have not seen this spat between Engadget and Miami New Times. Tim Elfrink of the New Times wrote a piece on the two brothers of Psystar, the company that makes Mac clones out of PC parts for half the price of a legit Apple laptop/desktop. Young second-gen Cuban immigrants from hardscrabble upbringings defy stereotypes by dressing well and take on an established American corporation by creating grey-market shadow products. It’s like BrandsMart but sexier because Apple is involved. Almost sounds like a made for TV movie on Univision, Telemundo or Spike TV. Well there is a lot some nerd rage out on the interwebs with some of the details.

From the Engadget article.

[...]there’s a quote here from Psystar founder Rudy Pedraza that simply leaps off the page:

Rudy scoffs at the idea he borrowed from the Hackintosh scene. “The first thing you have to do is unlearn everything you’ve read online about how to make this work,” Rudy says, “because it’s all wrong.”

Really? Because we think there’s a very large, very active hacking community out there that would disagree with you, Rudy.

• “Robert cracked the code behind Apple Computer’s elegant operating system, OS X.” Yeah.
• “Psystar legally buys the software…” That’s not in question, really. The issue is what happens after Psystar buys OS X, when it modifies and redistributes it. You know, the specific thing Apple’s suing about.
• “[Apple] filed a 35-page lawsuit in California claiming Psystar was selling “unauthorized” versions of OS X.” Why is unauthorized in quotes? That’s exactly what Apple claims.
• “As with Microsoft, which lost a multimillion-dollar antitrust decision in Europe in 2004, Apple is protecting an illegal monopoly, Psystar claims.” Psystar has already lost this part of its case in California, and in the new Florida case Psystar only claims Apple has a monopoly on “premium personal computers,” which pretty much invalidates the pricing argument and has driven the company to sell more expensive machines.
• “Robert says he found his own way around Apple’s built-in security devices. The breakthrough meant that, among other things, the cheap machines were virtually immune to viruses and hackers.” This is simply not true. OS X is vulnerable to hackers in its shipping form, and hacking EFI doesn’t change that.
• “Psystar pays full price – $29 – for each copy of OS that it installs on its computers.” $29 is the Snow Leopard upgrade price. The full price is $169 with iLife and iWork.
• “What’s more, Apple holds that consumers who purchase an operating system don’t actually own the software…It’s a dubious-sounding arrangement that courts, at least so far, have upheld.” It’s not dubious to the courts, who’ve been upholding EULAs for over a decade across the country. (And striking some down, to be fair.)
• “Pretty much anyone with basic computer knowledge can make a cloned Mac for just the cost of a full tank of gas in an SUV.” Actually, anyone can do this for free, without having to pay Psystar.

Now, don’t get us wrong — the personal story of Robert and Rudy Pedraza laid out in the article is moving stuff, but when the chips are down, we’re picking the hacker and enthusiast community over a couple guys trying to make a buck selling unlicensed software, and that Hackintosh quote struck us as impossibly arrogant and extremely foolish. The OSx86 community is already wary of Psystar, and we’re guessing no one’s going to rush forward the next time these jokers need some help.

Hi Edwin –

Yes, Endgadget did such a good job of calling out our “errors” that they spelled my name wrong until I called them out on it. (Looks like the’ve fixed it now).

As for the other “errors” — I see 7 complaints about characterizations in the story and no complaints about factual errors. (Way to bust us for putting “unauthorized” in quotes. That’s because it’s “quoted” straight from the Apple lawsuit.)

There is only one charge about a supposed factual mistake: that Snow Leopard’s update runs at $29 but the whole package sells for $169 with the whole iLife package.

I’m not certain which version Psystar purchases, nor do I claim to know in the story — I was simply providing readers some context on what Apple charges for Snow Leopard updates at the Apple Store.

Tim

Comment by Tim Elfrink from Miami on Nov 11th, 2009, 18:55 pm

Well, Nilay didn’t take too kindly to his article being accused of shoddy writing either.

My reply is that it’s pretty ballsy to take on a copyright lawyer who’s been covering Psystar and its associated litigation since day one by bitching about a typo and trying to re-cast my criticisms of his piece as taking issue with his “characterizations” of the facts.

His entire piece is centered around a single, provably false “characterization”: that Robert and Rudy Pedraza developed the EFI hack that enables Mac OS X to run on non-Apple hardware without any reliance on the hackintosh community. That’s a joke, and he clearly didn’t do the required research before writing his piece.

As for the rest, Psystar’s antitrust claims *have* been thrown out, so a comparison to Microsoft is ridiculous and misleading, there’s simply no way the EFI hack renders any machine “virtually immune to hackers and viruses,” the Snow Leopard price is simply wrong, calling EULA law “dubious” is even more misleading as it’s been so well-tested, and anyone *can* make a hackintosh for free.

Psystar tells a good story, and it’s clear that Tim bought it without question. It’s just too bad so much of it is based on lies and mistruths.

I don’t know about you guys, but I am with Nilay and Engadget on this. They have far more experience and the actual facts on their side. Yes Engadget had a typo with Tim’s name, but that’s really a secondary and minor issue. But at least one of the issues in the original Engadget list could be easily fixed with a little more detail. Let’s do some comparisons.

“Robert cracked the code behind Apple Computer’s elegant operating system, OS X.”

That’s too vague for me. Let’s try again.

“Robert cracked the code behind Apple Computer’s elegant operating system, OS X that prevented the OS from running on non-Apple hardware.”

“Robert cracked the code behind Apple Computer’s elegant operating system, OS X. But some in the Hackintosh community claim they stole the code from open source projects.”

Depending on what you want to believe, either of those may work and I’m sure a ton of other people can re-write it better ways. As for the others on the list, I believe the New Times did fail to get the facts on this. Granted this isn’t a quick and easy subject but with time and some research, this would not have been a problem. Sadly, time is valuable for any newspaper. Time and money that seemingly no paper has to spare. I just hope this doesn’t burn the Miami New Times from writing about more tech articles. I really enjoyed the majority of the article and wish for them to write more stories about technology.

Update:

I originally wrote this story on Wednesday of last week and something new has happened in the Psystar vs. Apple case. On Saturday this update was posted:

Yet another bad day for Psystar. After both Apple and the shady hackintosh company filed for summary judgements, the rulings are out, and Psystar is looking pretty screwed.

All of Psystar’s motions for summary judgment were denied, while all of Apple’s were granted. That means that Apple got exactly what they wanted, while Psystar got exactly what they didn’t want.

Don’t worry, there will be a trial. The court still needs to determine (*deep breath*):

Apple’s allegations of breach of contract; induced breach of contract, trademark infringement; trademark dilution; trade dress infringement; and state unfair competition under California Business and Professions Code § 17200; and common law unfair competition.

Phew! So yeah, at this point it’s looking less like a trial to determine Psystar’s legitimacy, more like a trial to decide how much they owe Apple.

Now, I’m no lawyer, but from where I’m standing this case is looking pretty grim for Psystar. I’ll leave it to you legal eagles to explain exactly what all this means in the comments, because all I know is that it can’t be good. [Gizmodo via Groklaw via 9 to 5 Mac, image via walknboston]

So there you have it.

Forgive me as I gush about the cleverness.  It’s sickening, I know, but they’ve done it again. Another excellent use of cyber front page by Apple.

We started the 2009 Rally Agile Success Tour (AST) Series in March in Denver, CO; we just concluded it in London, UK. In between the AST “train” stopped at:

• Atlanta, GA
• Boston, MA
• Chicago, IL
• Los Angeles, CA
• New York, NY
• Santa Clara, CA
• Seattle, WA
• Washington, DC

All in all we hosted about 1,000 participants in these cities. More than 40 panelists shared Agile experiences with their local colleagues. Some 200 meetings were held with various participants in conjunction with the events. Obviously, I cannot write here about the level of business generated by the success tour, but none of my Rally colleagues complained so far…

The breadth and depth of topics that were covered is mind-boggling. Here are a few of the most intriguing ones:

• Agile Business Service Management
• Agile contracts
• Agile Governance
• Beautiful software
• Lean
• Sausage Syndrome
• Software capitalization
• Use of emulation in Agile projects
• Virtuous Cycle of Agile
• Why Agile is natural for Business Intelligence

The success tour proved successful to a degree that actually perplexed me for quite some time. I had certainly expected a strong series of events from the outset and could point out to various things we were doing right along the way. Yet, the very simple ‘secret sauce’ that made the event series so remarkable eluded me until I collected my thoughts for writing this post:

The Agile Success Tour proved phenomenally successful because the Rally team is so much like the customers and prospects that participate in the events, license the Rally software and work hand-in-hand with Rally coaches.

A few words of explanation for what might seem on the surface like a somewhat banal statement. The various members of the Rally team – sales reps, coaches, technical account managers, marketing professionals and execs – resonated with participants in the events due to exceptionally high level of congruence in values, thinking and practices. If Ryan were the CTO of eBay he would probably have licensed Rally software; Jean would have re-architected the flow of eBay processes; Zach would have integrated the ALM tools eBay uses. As for Lauren, she would have single-handedly created a world-wide marketing events organization for eBay.

The power of being like your own customers is magnetic. Digital Equipment Corporation was immensely successful selling minicomputers to engineers like their own engineers in the 60’s and 70’s. Sun Microsystems rode the early Internet wave as their product designers were carbon copy of the folks who roamed the World Wide Web. Apple triumphed with the iPod because just about every Apple employee would have murdered for such a cool device. Nothing beats the intuitive understanding that comes with designing, marketing and selling the kind of product you will buy, play with and use yourself.

After the Santa Clara event, Forrester’s Tom Grant told me the following about Rally:

What a smart company – everyone gets it!

Though a slightly different perspective than mine, Tom had actually identified the outcome of the company-customer congruence I am highlighting in this post. Everyone at Rally gets it due to natural identification with his/her customers. Contexts and experiences of customers are exceptionally well understood and often replicated in Rally’s Boulder, CO headquarters and its various branch offices.

Fundamentally, the success of the success tour reflects the affinity between Rally and its clientele.

http://www.crayonroom.com/moody.php

Video posted to YouTube by seancollier.

On January 24 Apple Computer will introduce Macintosh and you’ll see why 1984 won’t be like ‘1984′.”

Hey, even back then, no dull, uninspired and uninspiring “Launch Parties” (see previous post) for Apple.

will not be available, ever, in the Czech Republic.

Talk to any of the the folks distributing/selling Apple equipment here (Kinetik, iStyle). That’s what I’m being told, and they say that reason is because it is only going to official Apple stores, and since there are officially none in the CR there will officially be no mac mini servers sold here. Officially.

I am officially “livid”.

I’m usually not a big fan of video games. I mean, I play them – when I have time…if I have time…when I USED to have time. But the standard 3D graphics have gotten stale to me. There’s something about the ’shininess’, the surreal amount of texture detail, the hang-up on recreating reality (Look how real it looks!  Who cares? Have you ever looked at a  Van Eyck? He had hyper-surrealism/hyperrealism down in the 15th century. )

And I am not a fan of Flash as a development platform, an animation tool or whatever Adobe wants to sell it as this week. I do some work in Flash. But I rarely find it the ideal tool for anything other than hyperactive, marketing driven websites where the first thing you do is turn off the music, turn off the animation and try and find an HTML version where you can at least bookmark specific links… ANYWAY, the following post deals with a video game that’s done in Flash. So much for my cranky dislikes.

I saw this game on the Apple download page and decided to look into it and it’s really quite a cool game. The free demo works on OSX. The game play is pretty inspired. It’s not HALO – thank goodness – the body count isn’t the defining accomplishment but it’s fun to interact with, inspiring to look at and I wasted some time with it and it felt good!

The company is from the Czech Republic (Is it still called a Republic?) . Their website is here and they have some fun point-and-shoot type games (look under FLASH GAMES at the top of the page). They all feature inspired art direction, intriguing character design and innovative interaction with the scenes. Wonderful, fanciful illustrated worlds that feature a great deal of humanity in the art. They give me a real sense of seeing things from another human beings perspective. And that, for me, is usually a defining factor in what makes Art. Show me something about how you perceive the world. It doesn’t have to LOOK like the ‘real’ world. In fact,  don’t let the real world interfere if you have a strong enough vision. That’s why this work feels special to me. 99% of video games out there have no interest in presenting a point of view that resonates beyond what we precieve as ‘reality’. Even the most ridiculous, outlandish constructs in video games are rendered with the upmost care to make sure they look JUST LIKE WHAT WE SEE all the time.

This company has been doing work for quite some time and once again I am behind the times. Nothing new in discovering that. But it’s new to me and I really enjoyed it.

“…What do Apple Computer, Hershey Chocolate, Mary Kay Cosmetics, and the Ford Motor Company have in common?  They all started out as home-based businesses.  Over half  of all U.S. businesses are based out of an owner’s home….” [see quote origin here]   According to the Direct Selling Association, in 2007 direct selling independent contractors were responsible for $30.8 billion in sales by 15 million people in the United States; and $114 billion and 62.7 million people worldwide.  That is a lot of home business activity.

Participating in this incredible home-based commerce landscape, with not one, but two home-based businesses is Susan Degnan…marketing and direct selling maven [ sdegnan1@nycap.rr.com ].  I like that word, maven.  It means someone who is experienced and knowledgeable in something.  And Susan is an experienced and knowledgeable direct seller and home-based business owner.  Susan graciously agreed to one of my interview blog posts.

Susan Degnan

Q:  I love to talk to people about the benefits of having a home-based business.  Susan, you have told me that you have a home-based business…what do you like about working from your home?

Susan: I love being able to work my business around my life. The freedom to do what I want, when I want to do it, without having the burden of having to be at a 9-5 job. I love my family and want to enjoy my life to the fullest. I want to produce a lifestyle for myself that allows me to not have to worry about money. I believe that a home-based business is the key to achieving that goal.

Q:  What would you consider to be the challenges of working from home?

Susan: Probably the challenge I face the most is motivating myself each day to work on my business. There is no boss and no deadlines.  Also, I really love being with my family and enjoy puttering in my house, so these things sometimes gets in the way of working my business.

Q:  Have you found the internet to be of value to you in your home business?  In what way(s)?

Susan: I am working with one of my team members on developing our website for nutrition and coaching.  Although I am a firm believer that talking to people is the key to success, I trust his judgment that this is a valuable venue.  I also believe that the internet attracts many people who do most of their business on-line.  My company is currently in 7 countries and within 10 years will be the largest health and wellness company in the world, so working the internet is a must!

Q:  You have two distinctly different enterprises that keep you busy as a business woman.  One is work you do in the publishing industry.  What challenges you there?

Susan: I am the Marketing Manager with my company and help new and seasoned authors market their books. Although this specific industry is fairly new to me, I am a people person and have been working in management in one venue or another most of my life.  The publishing industry keeps you on your toes, always learning.  I am challenging myself each day to become a better writer and that is somewhat stressful, because I have had insecurities about my abilities in that area.

Q:  You told me previously that you began a direct selling business.  Why do you think the direct selling industry is exploding as it is across the globe?

Susan: I believe that the time has come in our country where people now understand that corporate America is no longer a safe bet for employment. Working for someone else creates a false sense of security and leaves you living paycheck-to-paycheck.  If you want to secure your financial future, a home-based business that produces residual income is key!

Also, I have been very fortunate, because my business deals with health, wellness and weight loss.  I love helping people with their health and simultaneously have an opportunity to participate in a million dollar a day industry. Doing what you love while creating a secure financial future for your family is the best!

Q:  What are your particular joys in working in the direct selling industry?

Susan: That’s an easy answer. I want to roam freely through each day and participate in my life completely.  Financial worry is such a burden and residual income is the answer!  Additionally, people help me to grow spiritually and I want to offer something to each and every person I meet.  I know that each day I have an opportunity to contribute to the world I live in.

Q:  What advice would you give to a young person, say directly out of college, who might want to “be their own boss?”

Susan: Investigate a business prior to jumping in. A home-based business with a residual income is the way to go, but many businesses fail in the first few years. The five criteria that must all rank a #10 are: The owners of the company must be proven experts in their field. The products must be consumable, emotional is a home run. Timing is everything. Training must be superb and the comp plan must be a binary. Old MLM comp plans are too hard to work.

Thank you Susan!

Some helpful information about small business and direct selling can be found:

• Direct Selling Association: http://dsa.org
• Direct Selling 411: http://www.directselling411.com
• Small Business Administration (United States): http://www.sba.gov
• Great resource for home-based business (United States): http://www.business.gov/start/home-based/
• An interesting and helpful site for small business information in the United Kingdom: http://www.smallbusiness.co.uk

When it comes to using social networking sites, recent demographic surveys show that adults are starting to dominate sites like Twitter and Facebook. According to Forrester Research’s data, participation by people aged 36-54 jumped by 60 percent in the last year. Meanwhile, The New York Times reported that only 11 percent of Twitter users are aged 12-17.

While the numbers are interesting, what jumps out at some Baby Boomers (traditionally considered to be those born between 1946 and 1964) is that it’s considered breaking news that they’re interested in new computer technologies and tools—and even more shocking, that they’re able to understand them and use them.

It’s not a shock if you consider that word processors were a fixture in many offices in the 1970s, when thousands of Boomers were already in the workforce. Consider also that Apple Computer’s first computer hit the stores in the summer of 1976, and its famous “1984” TV commercial to announce the Macintosh computer debuted during the 1984 Super Bowl. By then, thousands more Baby Boomers were seasoned professionals who used computers at work every day. Many had jobs in the information technology field and were instrumental in developing technologies that we take for granted today.

To be fair to today’s younger set, we have to acknowledge that every generation considers its parents’ and grandparents’ generation to be out of touch. Even to the point of dismissing technological pioneers like Thomas Edison and Albert Einstein. You know who I mean—those old guys who, yeah, I guess were kind of ahead of their time.

Jeff Goldblum

 

 

Jeffrey Lynn “Jeff” Goldblum (born October 22, 1952) is an American actor. Currently, he stars as Detective Zach Nichols on the USA Network’s crime drama series Law & Order: Criminal Intent.

In 1974, Goldblum appeared in Death Wish as Freak # 1. Later in his career, as “Lacey Party Guest” in Annie Hall (1977), Goldblum is seen saying into the telephone at a Hollywood party, “I forgot my mantra.” Goldblum has had leading roles in films such as The Fly, Independence Day, The Lost World (1997), Earth Girls Are Easy and The Tall Guy. Goldblum’s strong supporting roles include those in Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1978), The Big Chill (1983), Into the Night (1985), Jurassic Park (1993), and he also had strong supporting roles in The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou (2004) and the cult films The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the Eighth Dimension (1984) and Igby Goes Down (2002).

For several years, Goldblum was the voice for most U.S. Apple commercials, including advertisements for the iMac and iBook. He also voices some U.S. Toyota commercials as well as Procter & Gamble’s facial cream line. He has recently appeared on Irish TV in commercials for the National Lottery.

Goldblum taught acting at Playhouse West in North Hollywood with Robert Carnegie. It was with several actors from this acting company that he improvised and directed the live action short film Little Surprises, which was nominated for an Academy Award in 1996.

Goldblum got the role of Adam in the upcoming film Adam Resurrected, a film adaptation of the Yoram Kaniuk novel. Jeff is a German entertainer who becomes the ringleader to a group of Holocaust survivors in an asylum after World War II.

In September 2006, it was announced that Goldblum was one of the founding members of a new theater company in New York called The Fire Dept. According to press materials, “The Fire Dept is made up of established and emerging writers, directors, actors and designers who have come together to create and produce work that cannot be replicated inside a television box or on a movie screen…The work of The Fire Dept combines the rigor and structure of great narrative storytelling with the vitality of formal experimentation to immerse audiences in a total experience that leaves them awake, alive and transformed.” The company will devote energy into developing new live theater works as well as interpreting old favorites.

His guest appearance was on Sesame Street in 1990 as Bob’s long-lost brother Minneapolis (parody of Indiana Jones) where Big Bird’s friend Snuffleupagus had “the golden cabbage of Snuffertiti” hidden in his cave. He has also appeared on Tom Goes to the Mayor, The Colbert Report, and Tim and Eric Awesome Show Great Job!.

Goldblum replaced Chris Noth as a Senior Detective on Law & Order: Criminal Intent. In the series, Goldblum plays the role of Detective Zach Nichols.

Trivia:

Is the voice behind the iMac/iBook commercials for Apple Computer.

Engaged to Laura Dern. [1995-1997]

In a jazz band called “The Mildred Snitzer Orchestra” with actor Peter Weller, they perform at local clubs in Los Angeles. They were also in a band together in the movie The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension (1984).

Studied acting at New York City’s prestigious Neighborhood Playhouse under the guidance of legendary acting coach, Sanford Meisner.

Was engaged to Catherine Wreford, a 23 year old dancer from Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada.

Appears alongside ex-wife Geena Davis in three films, back to back: Transylvania 6-5000 (1985); The Fly (1986) and Earth Girls Are Easy (1988).

While filming Earth Girls Are Easy (1988), he and co-stars Damon Wayans and Jim Carrey took approximately two hours to be suited up as the aliens.

Along with Jim Carrey and Damon Wayans, his voice was dubbed for certain scenes in Earth Girls Are Easy (1988).

After playing the victim of an alien invasion in the remake of Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956), he appears in two films in which he fights aliens: The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension (1984) and Independence Day (1996). Also one where he plays an alien: Earth Girls Are Easy (1988).

He can wiggle his ears one at a time. He demonstated this talent on “Late Night with Conan O’Brien” (1993).

Has worked twice with three of the writers of Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981): the film’s director, Steven Spielberg, directed him in Jurassic Park (1993) and The Lost World: Jurassic Park (1997); the screenwriter, Lawrence Kasdan, directed him in The Big Chill (1983) and Silverado (1985). Philip Kaufman, whose idea it was for Indy to pursue the Ark of the Covenant, directed him in Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1978) and The Right Stuff (1983).

Appears in two remakes of cult science fiction/horror films: Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1978) and The Fly (1986).

Member of jury at the Cannes Film Festival in 1999.

Born on the same day as actor Christopher Lloyd.

Father was a doctor and mother a radio broadcaster. Has two older brothers, Rick and Lee, and a sister Pamela. Older brother Rick (by four years) died of kidney failure while traveling in Morocco at age 23. Lee is a realtor and Pamela an artist.

Almost got the part of ‘Dr. David Blume’ in Blue Sunshine (1976), but lost the part to Robert Walden because the director thought he had better chemistry with leading actor Zalman King.

Appeared opposite his then-girlfriend Geena Davis in The Fly (1986), and future girlfriend Laura Dern in Jurassic Park (1993). In both films, each actress’s character remarks that “Something went wrong.”.

In three films, Jeff Goldblum plays characters that have some sort of vomit-related sickness. In The Right Stuff (1983) he plays a NASA promoter who gets seasick. In The Fly (1986), Seth Brundle gets motion sickness which is why he invents teleporting. And in Independence Day (1996), David Levinson gets airsick. It’s unknown if Goldblum actually suffers from any of these.

Sorry, but I’m real happy with this news because I’m writing this with Apple iMac…..

I have been a Apple computer user since 1992 and swear by them…

My start up story is this…..one day my wife and I opened a business and  I had to some stuff down on paper…well I sat down a began typying on my typewriter……after correcting something ever sentence I grew easperated!….this was not gonna work!……so I went out and decide to get a computer…everybody had PC’s but to tell you the truth I was completely dumbfounded about operating a computer…A Drive, B Drive…what the……?…..but a budy of mine had a old Apple Classic…..yea…9 inch, black and white screen. That was ok, but that wasn’t gonna be enough…so out I went to look a better Apple model….and low and behold I found it….a ‘pizza box’…a Macintosh LCII…….bought the thing, and took it home ……took it out of the box,  connected everything and started using the thing in 20 minutes…..I BS you not!…..

So I’ve been with Apple for the last 17 years…..and I’m happy when they are happy, cause it just works…and I don’t care anything about the drives….( I guess nobody else did aftter a while, because they are gone!)

I just typed ”Famous Wrong Predictions” into google…

“Drill for oil? You mean drill into the ground to try and find oil? You’re crazy.”  Opponents to Edwin L Drakes plan to drill for oil in 1849.
 
“We don’t like their sound, and guitar music is on the way out.” Decca Recording Co. rejecting the Beatles in 1962.
 
“I’m just glad it’ll be Clark Gable who’s falling on his face not Gary Cooper.”  Gary Cooper on his decision not to take the leading role in “Gone With The Wind.”
 
“Who the hell wants to hear actors talk?”  H.M. Warner on having talking in movies? Warner Brothers, 1927.
 
“So we went to Atari and said, ‘Hey, we’ve got this amazing thing, even built with some of your parts, and what do you think about funding us? Or we’ll give it to you. We just want to do it. Pay our salary, we’ll come work for you.’ And they said, ‘No.’ So then we went to Hewlett-Packard, and they said, ‘Hey, we don’t need you. You haven’t got through college yet.’”  Apple Computer Inc. founder Steve Jobs on attempts to get Atari and HP interested in his and Steve Wozniak’s personal computer.
 
“You’d better learn secretarial skills or else get married.” – Modelling agency, rejecting Marilyn Monroe in 1944.
 
“Everything that can be invented has been invented.” Charles H. Duell, Commissioner, U.S. Office of Patents, 1899.

 Does anybody actually know anything?

I hate to give up without a fight.  When something breaks, I do my best to fix it before giving up on it for good.  I also hate losing, especially when losing means having to pay Apple for a new iPod.

So when my beloved ipod mini, constant companion for the past four years and occasional gag post prop, died a couple of weeks ago, I didn’t mourn the loss and start to shop around for a brand new replacement.  I looked at it as an opportunity to tear the thing apart and try to make it work again.  A quick look at a few sites and I learned how I could build myself a new – and much bigger -  ipod mini for under 50 bucks.

I know the mini is old, that a brand new 16GB Nano that has a colour screen and shoots video isn’t expensive, but so what?  I don’t need a colour screen to read text, music videos have always bored me to hell, and you don’t need to shoot video with an iPod.  Who thought that one up, anyway?

Besides, if you’re used to handling the mini, you’ll find the wafer-thin Nano much too light, its feel too flimsy.

Another great thing about the mini – besides its substantial heft, smooth hand feel and functional simplicity – is how easily it can be taken apart.

Using only the two screwdrivers – one to pry the ends off and the other to remove two tiny screws holding the guts to the outer frame – I had everything apart within five minutes.

I would go into lavish detail about how to do all that, including why you also need a hair dryer for the job, but that would simply be repeating what is already available on this easy-to-follow how-to video.

I could have replaced the old hard drive with a 32GB card, but since I only need it for music and podcasts, the huge size and extra expense would go to waste.

So I swapped the old 4GB hard drive for a 16GB compact flash, and threw in a new battery at the same time.

After formatting the new flash card and charging the battery, iTunes at first wouldn’t load onto it, but after a bit of iTunes tweaking and reformatting, it finally worked.

Sorry, Apple shareholders.  Your company’s bottom line won’t get much help from me.

Mit der kostenlosen Version Version 2.1 erscheint heute der Open-Source Enpacker The Unarchiver. Dieser kann die Archivformate Zip, Tar, Gzip, Bzip2, 7-Zip, Rar, LhA, StuffIt, BinHex, MacBinary, Xar, RPM, Cab, SEA und LZX dekomprimieren. Neu hinzugekommen sind die Formate Rar-, Zip- und 7-Zip.