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Gear Review: North Face VaporWick Shirts - Ruckus Crew Neck Mens T

2009-04-12T22:07:00.003-04:00

Dicks Sporting Goods is having their winter clearance and I was able to pick up two North Face vaporwich T's at clearance prices of $15 for a short-sleeve and $20 for a long-sleeve.

I've always been trained since my early years in the boyscouts to wear poly undergarments but I never did because it usually cost more than basic cotton stuff and my parents didn't get the message.

The North-Face VaporWick shirts are made from 100% Polyester, woven specially designed to wick moisture away from the body. The material is also UPF 30 UV resistant.

The shirts are soft, and fit well. They are somewhat athletically fitted, but realistically you can tailor the fit to however you want based on sizing. For example, I got the Tshirt in Large, and it fits the same as my many other T's, and I got a medium sized Full-sleeve and it fits slim, like many "under-armor" shirts you see in the commercials. The Fabric stretches well and is quite soft so its easy to wear underneath layers. The biggest benefit I think I'll see is when I sleep in a tent this season and will hopefully wake up and not be damp from my own sweat. The colors are good, the collors and details are comfortable and neither shirt has "tags" on it, on the inside collar. Like most brands these days, Northface has realized that tagless shirts are cheaper to make and mor comfortable to wear. Great for everyone. I recommend hurrying to your closest Dicks Sporting Goods Store and browsing their clearance racks for great deals like these shirts. They won't last long and are quite a bargain right now.

I'm back! No, I didn't really go anywhere.

2009-04-12T11:32:00.003-04:00

So I want to blog again. Who cares if no one reads my posts yet? I'll just have to create more valuable content.

Some of the most-read posts/ things I've ever done were product reviews. I've had a concept in my mind for a great "product reviews" website for a while.. but since I don't have the resources to pull it off, I'll just start small. Expect to see me writing product reviews very often going forward, including more website and movie reviews as well as a variety of other things reflecting my hobbies.

HULU: Streaming television shows straight to your desktop. Television Network Supported too! Its Great!

2008-03-23T13:35:00.001-04:00

Those who know me well, know that I love video on demand; especially when its free! That's why I'm so excited about my new discovery (which I'm sure someone else discovered a long time ago). Check out Hulu.com!

Hulu has tons of free video content featuring a lot of television programming from the 90's through today. Some of my favorite shows are on there from both NBC and FOX, and other television networks such as FuelTV, BRAVO, G4, FX, SciFi, IGN, and many others. HULU features 10 to 15 second adverts before each program, and sometimes breaks shows up with a 2nd advert in the middle, but its pretty unobtrusive since its only one commercial at a time, not an entire set. Check out the link below for a list of the programs they currently offer (most feature entire seasons worth of shows).

I'm in the middle of Season 2 of NEWSRADIO right now. The video quality is acceptable, even when full-screened on my 22" display. Sound quality is very good as well, and the flash based video player is virtually error free, though slower computers might have slightly lower frame rates. I also encounter almost no buffering/ stuttering of video once programs start, (using cable/broadband access).

Check the site out. I bet you'll find at least one program you'd like to watch. Here's hoping that Hulu can stay on-line, and that the current level of advertising generates enough revenue to support the bandwidth/ programming costs. In my estimation, there's probably not enough money per advert to make it profitable yet...and as a user, I'd rather they don't start playing longer commercials or sets of commercials before each show (fingers crossed).

hulu COMPLETE SHOW LISTING.

Selling on eBay: Still a big pain in the butt?

2008-03-22T12:00:00.001-04:00

I've sold quite some product on EBay over the last few years, -- but honestly --as a somewhat regular user, in the back of my mind the only "impression" I have of the site is that its been an overall bad experience.

Its not because the experience of communicating with customers, shipping product, or paying the high fee's has worn me out (as you would expect). The problem is that the site's user-experience/ GUI for selling an individual product on eBay has been so muddled. The last time I used EBay, I swear it felt like I had to fill in a million fields about the product I wanted to sell, write my own description for the product (even though there were 50 other auctions available for the same product), and navigate through 5 pages before I had my item posted. It literally took me 2 days to post my last auction.

I realize I may be totally exaggerating the details (# of fields/ pages), but that's genuinely the impression I have of eBay after selling over 100 items on the site over the last several years. Its really kind of sad that I'm paying for such a poor (and time consuming) experience... I want something better! (I'm thinking I'll try CraigsList first. Its free so it can't hurt.)

I have lots of stuff to sell, but eBay doesn't really make it any easier to sell my stuff..they just are the marketplace for it. I still have to pack everything and bring it with me..the photos..the descriptions..everything! I know that there are plenty of happy "powersellers" out there who love eBay..but they are not using the handicapped tools that eBay equips the average user with. Most of them are paying monthly fees to 3rd party service providers who are providing them with powerful, easy to use tools that make selling on eBay more profitable and simpler.

eBay, are you listening?

I don't want to start an eBay business.. I just want to sell my mp3 player and some other miscellaneous items. Why the hell is it so hard?

In eBay's defense, I haven't used eBay to sell product in over 6 months, and they might have made some recent improvements (crossing my fingers)

I'm off now to eBay, where I'm going to post a couple items for sale. Hopefully a more pleasing experience than I remember.

Projekt Revolution - August 18 2007 - Linkin Park

2007-08-19T12:34:00.000-04:00

I could die a happy man today. I saw Linkin Park live last night at Darien Lake Performing Arts Center (Darien Center, NY). I'm a die-hard Linkin Park fan. Though I don't buy the merchandise, I've got the albums, and their music carried me through college until today. I haven't been a huge fan of concerts before, but I can see now why some people talk for years about their great concert experience. Theres nothing like seeing your favorite band of all time perform, and rocking out with them.

I am a lucky bastard. I got fifth row seats --near center -- for me and 3 friends, and we didn't have to pay a dime (one of the few perks of my job). On top of that, Taking Back Sunday, My Chemical Romance, and Linkin Park all sounded amazing (better than my Dave Matthews Band experience). My Chemical Romance killed the mood for some concert goers though with a very long set, and a lot of yelling at the crowd/ cursing. Linkin Park sounded pretty amazing, damn close to the album recordings..which I didn't think was possible considering their complex sound. The build up to their performance was spot on, and I really felt like I was in the presence of greatness when the curtains pulled back. I didn't think I'd be one to get taken in by the concert experience, but like I said, if you have the chance to see your favorite band of all time perform...take it, and get good seats. You will not regret it. See video above and photos below.

Anywhere.fm featured on TechCrunch.com!

2007-08-04T20:47:00.000-04:00

Its official, Anywhere.fm went into Public Beta last week and they've now been featured on TechCrunch.com. TechCrunch's post about the site is here.

I've been using Anywhere.fm since I was invited to the Private Beta test, and I've got to say that the developers are doing a whole lot in very little time. It seems like every time I log in they've changed something or added a new feature.

The site is a marvel. It allows me to upload my music library to their servers (30GB's!), and then access my library from any web browser (broadband necessary). In addition they've already rolled out "Friend Radio", which allows me to listen to my friend's music, as radio-stations. For example, my brother is a user, and he's created a playlist of his favorite rock music. I can actually browse to his profile, and hit play on his playlist, and it starts playing for me. Its a great way to discover new music. One of the newer features that they'll be tweaking heavily is something called "music compatibility". With that, you can tell how much of your library/ musical tastes is matched to another user. That way you know that they've got similar tastes, and might even be able to turn you on to some other music you might like. Soon you'll even be able to message people with similar tastes and talk about your favorite artists!.

I use the site everyday at work, and it works like a charm. Its simple, unbelievably fast at streaming my music, and has a great user interface. Give it a look: Anywhere.fm

Movie Review: Man of the Year

2007-07-17T21:07:00.000-04:00

A story about a botched election should be exciting, and powerful, especially when we've seen what it can do to our country before. I saw Man of the Year last week. I'll let the cat out of the bag right now... its not one of Robin Williams best movies. And its not because of him, but because of the director. Written and directed by Barry Levinson (Envy, Analyze That, Wag the Dog).. the story and eventually the film fail to take advantage of the fantastic plot in many ways.

Maybe I wasn't in the right mood during the movie, but I wish the movie had played up more of the drama, as well as Robin William's (Tom Dobbs, Comedian) tone of excitement and refreshing take on politics. In that way, the movie really failed to capitalize on its terrific cast and storyline. Being an obsessive fan of "The West Wing" myself I've seen the best written political drama there is (many many times), and I found myself re-directing the scenes in my head during the second half of the movie. I've never done this before, but it was quickly turning into an amateur film project toward the middle.

Not capitalizing on the drama of being chased, or the unsettling nature of a botched election, or the sad stepping aside of a would be hero, the movie simply felt under-done. Thats why I give the movie a 3 out of 5. See it if you're interested because the plot is good, but don't worry about it if you weren't interested already.

Sorry for the harsh review Barry, but I wanted more from such a brilliant story, especially in these times of highly charged elections.

Restaurant Review: Moti Mahal in Amherst, NY (Buffalo)

2007-07-14T20:21:00.000-04:00

Moti Mahal
3547 Sheridan Dr
Amherst, NY 14226
(716) 837-3038

I visited Moti Mahal tonight for a quick dinner by myself. I was craving Indian food and couldn't wait until my next visit from Jeff (my restaurant buddy) to go get some. Cheap has become my word of the month and its actually the main reason I have been avoiding Indian restaurants so much lately. The words "cheap" and "Indian Restaurant" don't mix... This annoys the hell out of me because most Indian Restaurants don't offer the atmosphere that you'd expect a $20.00 meal to be served in. I've always had issues with Indian Restaurants because of this. Theres very few Indian establishments offering an equal combination of a good atmosphere/ fine surroundings /good food in both Rochester and Buffalo. And I know they exist in other cities (NYC, Seattle WA, New Jersey and so on..I've been there, I know they exist). So why not Buffalo? In my opinion the nicest Indian Restaurant in Buffalo is Tandoori on Transit, and second best is probably Taste of India in Amherst, since their remodeling and addition. These restaurants offer what I consider to be good surroundings/ service/ food. However there are so many others that are simply lacking...yet have menu prices similar to their nicer cousins.

So why did I visit Moti-Mahal tonight? Because I have driven past it so many times, and after Googling it for reviews, and visiting Bill Rapaports Buffalo Restaurant guide, figured it would be a good cheap, and fast meal with "home cooked" style food. The restaurant only hit on 1 and a half of my 3 requirements though. The restaurant is small, which is totally acceptable. When I walked in, there were only 2 other people eating and one waiter running the entire front end of the restaurant. That too is fine, though somewhat concerning.

My measure of an Indian Restaurants food is based on the quality of its Chicken Makhani (Butter Chicken), Naan, and Rice. I'm not daring enough to try much else when I visit a new Indian restaurant for the first time. The service overall was acceptable, however my major complaint is that the waiter wasn't serving water with ice, which I'm accustomed to (and I think everybody is accustomed to). Instead the water was served straight from the tap, and not a very cold one at that.

Food wise, My Chicken Tikka Stuffed Naan came out looking delicious, and not too crispy as I sometimes fear it will be. However the chicken had no flavor. From the look of it..the chicken was mostly seasoned with red food coloring and not much else. The Chicken Makhani looked the part, though I asked for Medium and it was served mild. "Note to self: Always ask for hot". Lastly the rice was great, and exactly as my mother makes when I'm home. Another thing that I was surprised about was that no yogurt was served with my meal. No achaar either (indian pickle). I figured if this place was called authentic, and served in a very homely atmosphere that they would at least offer these extras. Not so.

Atmosphere: I knew going in, not to expect very much of the atmosphere (there is none). The walls are strangely painted a light green, the trim white/ beige, the plates were plain white (cheap), there was Indian music playing from 2 tvs that were playing bollywood music scenes from a "random songs" DVD, the kind you can find in any Indian Bazaar. Personally I think the entire place should be re-painted, new Plasma TV's hung, new speakers put in, as well as new lighting. From the looks of it, the owners had purposely left out many bulbs from each of the light fixtures because they were too bright otherwise. This really made the place look cheap in my opinion.

Overall, I dont think I'll be going back to Moti-Mahal anytime soon. I'll move on to another new Indian Restaurant in the hopes of finding a jewel (hopefully). For Chicken Makhani (portion comparable to other Indian restaurants in the area), a Chicken Tikka Naan and a bowl of Basmati Rice (Which I finished completely in my second helping) I paid $ 16.20, leaving the remainder of my $20.00 for tip. For $20.00, I was pretty much robbed. I could have gotten a lot more food from any other restaurant and enjoyed it more.

My recommendation: Dont visit Moti Mahal-- even though people have said its cheap, their regular menu items are just as expensive as everywhere else, though I'm guessing their lunch buffet probably looks like a better deal. I'd probably avoid their 10.95 dinner buffet and visit the nearby Taste of India instead.

Transformers: Best Movie of the Year? Decade?

2007-07-13T00:32:00.000-04:00

I just got back from seeing Transformers.....

unbelievable.

Now I understand why one of the bloggers that I read recently said he'd like to find a way to teach technology using the movie... It is by far going to be hailed as one of the best movies of the year..and for me its potentially one of the best movies I've seen in the last 5 years.

Yes, the movie is good at that level and I don't think I'm over doing it. The best part is that most people dont know the story as told in the movie...so its just one big surprise, the way it should be.

If you have any interest in this movie, please go see it, you will thank me afterwards. If you have no interest in this movie, please go see it with an open mind... you will thank me afterwards.

Thanks all, have a good night...

Threadless T-Shirts: Sun Lion

2007-01-13T22:32:00.000-05:00

Yeah, I know. "Long time no post." I've been busy enough with work, and moving.. and a small vacation. I'm not back, per se... just found something to post. Threadless.com is a site I just found that I think more people might want to know about. I'm into originality. I'm the kind of guy who gets tweaked when I see high schoolers wearing Abercrombie and Fitch because its the hot brand..(or Holister or some of those other uber-expensive young people's clothiers). I'd rather that my clothing first of all, be functional, and secondly express me and what I'm into. Thats why I've been a huge fan of Zazzle.com, and designed and made some of my own t-shirts to wear around. Thats also why I posted the above link to a t-shirt I just found on Threadless.com. Threadless seems like a concept similar to Zazzle, in that people can post their own designs online...but Threadless only produces those t-shirts which have been rated highest by their army of regular customers and site visitors. Threadless designs seem to all be vector-art designs..which are pretty hip and cool..(easy to print as well) and all of them are pretty original. With the great number of designs they've got..you can be sure you'll be one of the few..and maybe even the only person with that design. Now thats cool. I highlighted one that I found and liked at the top. Take a look at some others as well. They're not too expensive.

Sandisk Sansa E260 MP3 Player - Video Review

2006-07-09T00:53:00.000-04:00

I bought the SanDisk Sansa E260 Mp3 player about 1 month ago and had read several reviews about the unit before I purchased it. I also had the chance to see and use it at my local Best Buy. In case you don't have the opportunity to do the same before you purchase yours, I've created this --novice-- video review of the player. Its my first attempt, and if I give it another shot I promise to improve on the presentation and video quality.

Please feel free to email me with questions, or leave questions in the comments of this post, and I'll respond asap.

If you would like additional reviews of the Sansa E200 line of players I would recommend visiting:

Side note: I just went back and counted my "umms and uhhss.." and counted 104! Thats absolutely horrible and not up to my incredibly high standards for presentations. Practice Practice Practice folks. I'll definitely not allow that on video again, sorry!

Superman Returns to Theaters!

2006-07-07T02:07:00.000-04:00

Its 2am, so lets cut to the chase. This evening I saw Superman Returns at my local IMAX theater. I was able to buy tickets early (the show I originally went for was sold out), left, and then came back to see the movie at the 10:45pm showing.

And what a show. The movie was very good, and truly stunning to watch in IMAX 3D. According to the theater's special introduction soundtrack, Superman Returns is the first live action film to have been put through the IMAX 3D conversion process. As I had read that the film would be made available in IMAX 3D several weeks ago, I knew I was interested in seeing it. Aside from the many documentaries I have seen in various museum based IMAX's across the country, this would be my first "Feature Length Film" viewed in an IMAX theater.

As the opening credits rolled, it became very clear that we --the audience, were about to embark on an epic journey through space --too earth-- to visit the story of Superman's return to Metropolis. The massive screen size, and clear picture certainly helped portray the vastness of space as various far away planets and stars spun by.

Although the opening credits rolled in 2D, 3D scenes have been distributed throughout the movie in the IMAX 3D release. My understanding is that director Brian Singer, was allowed to make a total of 28 minutes of film into IMAX 3D. This meant that he had to select scenes with depths of field that would take special advantage of IMAX's new conversion technology, and those that would also truly enhance the audiences enjoyment of the film.

I think Mr. Singer got it right. Some scenes in 3D literally had me dodging to my right to avoid getting hit by debris. That kind of immersion is something even the most visionary of filmmakers only has wet dreams about. While some scenes didnt seem to benefit at all from the enhancements, it was very clear when the right scene came along, that the meteor, or Superman, or Lex Luther's boat were in fact popping out and moving in a new dimension. This gives the scenes a much more deep, and real feeling than you are accustomed too. At one point early in the movie, I actually saw a gentleman reach out and try to touch one of the characters that was floating in front of the screen.

Although 3D is exciting, Superman Returns wasn't only a great film because of the new theater experience afforded by IMAX 3D. It was a great film because it got the right balance of action, story and drama. It is the delicate mixing of those three things that makes for such terrific summer blockbusters as ID4, Braveheart, Lord of the Rings, Gladiator, Batman Begins and so on... Superman Returns gets it right in that sense, and some scenes are absolutely mesmorizing. Brandon Routh does an exceptional job of speaking his lines with the same degree of innocence and sense of duty as did Christopher Reeves, and Kevin Spacey as Lex Luther is just plain perfect.

Some scenes had me holding my breath, and ready to break a sweat. To me, thats what movies should be able to do. And therefore I am excited to say that Superman Returns is definitely worth seeing in IMAX 3D if possible (just costs $5 more, make sure you get a good seat). And if not possible, go and see it in your local theater. Just be prepared for the return of a long forgotten hero, and a few hours of old fashion movie watching (2 hrs 37min Runtime!).

9/10 when seen in a good seat in IMAX 3D. Probably an 8 out of ten in regular theaters/ DVD.

As a side note, I suggest you get to the theater early, as there are several 3D trailers that are shown before the movie that really show off the characteristics of IMAX 3D, and also it could be hard to find a good seat, even now, after 2 weeks in theaters.
I think that if more movies come out on IMAX 3D, we'll see a lot more people heading back to the movies in order to get an experience that they just cant get at home. I'm a home theater buff, so I really enjoy myself when watching a DVD at home. However, this experience was plainly the most immersive I have had in years (ever?), and was worth all 11.50 of my hard earned dollars. (It doesn't hurt that I was a superman fan before the movie).

Google drops spreadsheet A-bomb on Microsoft

2006-06-06T18:57:00.000-04:00

This is no April fools joke people, Google has just pulled out the big guns in its war against Microsoft.

Google has talked for years about a vision of a world where all of our most necessary computer applications will be web friendly. At the core of this idea is the notion that our basic, and necessary software could be run on the internet, rather than our computer. The beauty of this idea is that our files would be instantly attainable from any PC, we could open, edit, and save them all from within our universal browser, and the software will be instantly updated every time there was an improvement, or just a simple tweak.

Although Microsoft would never state so publically, this idyllic vision is threatening to its way of thinking, and business model. Microsoft's presence today is largly based on its history of developing "the world's software". The company's public image, is based mostly on it's designing strong, feature rich productivity software (at a hefty price ~$600 for the entire Microsoft Office Suite).

Because Google never introduced a web product that particularly threatened any of Microsofts PC based applications, the software giant has largly avoided discussing the matter and has many times simply dismissed Google's efforts as incomplete and amatuerish.

Until today.

Today Google announced a beta release* of Google Spreadsheets, a basic spreadsheet tool, hosted online by Google. Google claims that Google Spreadsheets is the perfect way to share spreadsheets... emphasizing that you no longer have to send your spreadsheet to your group by email, and then save their revisions as a new file. Google will instead will simply allow you to share your web based spreadsheets with other Google users, who will be able to edit the spreadsheet and save it in real-time. Within seconds you can log-in, and see the same spreadsheet with its updates, running through your browser. You will even be able to edit the files simultaneously (try doing that in Microsoft Excel!?)

So today was G-day. The day Google charged onto the beaches of the Microsoft main-land. We should expect to see a lot of retaliation from Microsoft in the coming months, as they try to fight back the Google attack with newly announced features in their Microsoft Office product line. We may even see new Microsoft announcements regarding their web-strategy, in order to show they have a plan to take on Google on their turf -- the net.

*Google Spreadsheets is currently in a limited test beta phase, and is only open to a small number of users during this phase of testing. I don't have an account with access, so if someone wants to share screenshots and reviews, I'd like to see/ hear them.

"Unboxing" (see also: undressing, opening, first time..)

2006-05-27T12:09:00.000-04:00

Vicarious thrills from opening new gear. Share in the Unboxing Ceremony!

I found this nice site, authored by Josh Bancroft, an "Intel Geek Blogger". Josh's idea is a simple one. Share the thrill of unboxing your new techno gadget with the rest of the world through photos and descriptions about the experience.

How is a site like this at all important? Up until a few years ago, it really wasn't. But technology has become a much more personal, and user-interface driven industry since the year 2000. Today, packaging and design play an increasingly important role in product features and most manufacturers have adopted the mantra, for example:

Apple iPod hardware is widely considered the best designed hardware ever, and its packaging has won several design awards
Sony's marketing positions their products as part of a designer lifestyle, hence the name of their online store: SONYSTYLE.com
Seagate's new hard-drive packaging for high capacity drives (I just bought one, and the packaging was a surprise)
Dell's XPS product lines are designed specifically around the idea of providing a "somehow improved user experience" according to Dell.

So with package design being such an important part of product design and having become one of the major features of a product, it is important that we document these great, innovative user experiences.

And why a crazy site/ blog about all this? Because unboxing is quite simply one of the most exciting parts of buying new technology. So exciting, that Unboxing.com recently had 6000 site visits in a 24 hour period.

Visit unboxing.com to get your peep on.

photo courtesy of Jonas Lönborg

Simpsons talk High Definition.

2006-05-21T19:40:00.000-04:00

Tonight's episode of The Simpson's is all about Homer wanting a 50" High Definition Plasma TV. The show's writer's focus on Lenny getting a new HDTV, and subsequently, Homer wants to replace his own with a new HDTV!

HDTV needs this kind of mainstream attention in order to be introduced to virtually all tv viewers. Personally I am glad, and kind of excited whenever HDTV comes up in coversation, so you can imagine my glee about Lenny getting a new HDTV! By the way, I'm happy to say that Homer got a new Plasma HDTV for his bedroom at the end of the show.

Guess-The-Google, Web Game!

2006-05-19T22:43:00.000-04:00

Hey... do you have a couple minutes to kill? Want to waste some time anyway? Check out a new game I just found: Guess-The-Google. The game will bring up a series of 10 (or is it 20) images from the google search, for a particular keyword. You have to guess what the keyword is, based on the grid of images. Surprisingly, I didn't think it was as tough as it sounds. If you beat a score of 216, you got me beat!

Guess-The-Google

Movie: XXX: State of the Union - Review

2006-05-19T22:41:00.000-04:00

NSA Agent August Gibbons, fresh off the success of his last renegade recruitment, once again finds himself in need of an outsider. Gibbons and his new agent Darius Stone, now code-named "XXX," must track down a military splinter group that is conspiring to overthrow the U.S. Government.

Genres: Action/Adventure
Running Time: 1 hr. 41 min.
Release Date: April 29th, 2005 (wide).
MPAA Rating: PG-13 for sequences of intense action violance and some language.
Distributor: Columbia Pictures

Just watched XXX: State of the Union on DVD, starring Ice Cube as the new Triple X. Willem Defoe stars as the antagonist Secretary of Defense, and does a decent job with the poor writing. Samuel Jackson is again brought in to play the head of the NSA.

Overall the movie is decent so long as you do not expect a quality film, and don't mind the Sci-Fi genre. The acting is unfortunately worse than Vin-Deisel's portrayal in the orignal. Ice Cube plays the new XXX with attitutude, but acts it out in a thuggish manner. It feels as though he is ill prepared for the role: my one example would be his poor physical appearance. I would have expected for an actor to bulk up, or trim down for a role as an ex-navy seal, however his overall appearance as a hero is just average.

Luckily for this film, there were no rediculous sports stunts, just some plain rediculous stunts. They don't come off quite as cheezy as the first film, and some are executed better than the first. There is however a cartoonish use of CG animation in the second half of the film. That is where the Sci-Fi/ Fantasy comment would come into play.

If you were a fan of the previous James Bond Film" Die another Day, you should be just fine with this film.
If you hate movies with rap soundtracks, this film is definitely not for you.

Overall I would say it is not as bad as the original seemed to me, however the poor writing and simultaneously poor acting take it quite low. This movie holds value only as a exciting, over the top action flick, with less than average execution. A DVD rental - Maybe (If your in the mood), A Ticket Price movie - no.

Movies: The Village - review

2006-05-19T22:38:00.000-04:00

Set in rural Pennsylvania in 1897, this is the story of the small village of Covington (population 60) surrounded by a woods inhabited by a race of "mythical creatures," and the romance that blossoms between Kitty (Greer), the daughter of the town's leader (Hurt), and Lucius (Phoenix), a young man who questions the policy of keeping Covington's citizens completely confined to the village.

Genres: Drama, Romance, Science Fiction/Fantasy and Thriller
Running Time: 1 hr. 48 min.
Release Date: July 30th, 2004 (wide).
MPAA Rating: PG-13 for a scene of violence and frightening situations.
Distributor: Touchstone Pictures

I watched M. Knight Shyamalan's - The Village, this Friday. What a fantastic film. It captures you with peoples desires, a bit of innocence, fear, and love. The story is fantastic, the acting is unbelievably good, and the character of IVY is both strong and cute. The film shifts plots very well halfway through the movie, and sounds (sound effects) once again play a major role in this film, just as they did in Signs. Probably the nicest surprise comes at the beginning of the film as the opening credits role. The ensemble cast is extraordinarily well put together, so much so that you fear they might compete with each other. Thankfully the cast co-exists gracefully on screen.

I will not spoil the film for anyone who still has to see it, and I suggest that you do not listen if someone tries to spoil it for you. The movie captures you early on with the mythical beasts surrounding the village, and then continues to hold you, as you watch the characters display a variety of emotions through their ordeals, and eventually are releived of see a happy ending.

I was enthralled throughout the whole film, so much so that I watched every additional feature on the DVD. Although this is a DVD which I will probably not own (story is given away; therefore not as exciting the second time), I hope to remember the story and the awesome qualities of the film for a long time to come.

As it displays many of the same qualities as SIGNS, the director's previous film; I will say that if you enjoyed signs (which I did) you will probably like this film. If you disliked Signs, you probably will not.

I dont give grades to movies, but this would be an A in my book.

This post was originally written for and posted on my Modblog blog. Since that was recently taken down, I wanted to repost it.

Movies: Four Brothers - Review

2006-05-19T22:33:00.000-04:00

Four adopted brothers come together to bury the woman who raised them. At the funeral, the brothers discover that their mother may have been murdered and they want revenge.

Genres: Drama and Crime/Gangster
Running Time: 1 hr. 49 min.
Release Date: August 12th, 2005 (wide).
MPAA Rating: R for strong violence, pervasive language and some sexual content..
Distributor: Paramount Pictures

I saw Four Brothers last week. I wanted to post quickly regarding the film. I thought it was pretty good. Originally attracted to the film through it's trailer (showing people who value Family and Diversity), I hoped it would at least live up to those ideals during the actual film.

As it turns out, it did. It is by no means a sappy film, however it does display the qualities of brotherhood and valuing family above all else. Each of the roles is well acted, and the film obviously succeeds in doing what it was intended. The story is well told, production and direction are executed with good results. Each brother's character has his place in the family, and his own attitude. Overall each role is well acted, with a good performance by Benjamin Andre, (half of rap duo Outkast).

One annoying thing about this film was the amount of violence. As each of the four brothers are misfit's, the story allows some leighway in showing violent scenes. Although I believe it was a bit much for my taste, I would certainly not go so far as to call it excessive. A certain amount is needed to portray the story... After all.

I think the film was a good one, and one worth seeing for anyone who is interested in it as a result of the trailer. It is slightly more violent than I would hap liked, but the acting and direction are both good.

If you liked black-hawk down, you may like this film. (somewhat violent but heroic)
If you disliked Mystic-River, this film may not be for you. (some minor gang violence, portrayal of Detroit city living, revenge).

Film gets a good B in my book

This post was originally written in August 2005 for my Modblog blog. That blog was recently shut down and has been reposted here.

Halo 3: Announcement / Teaser

2006-05-18T00:23:00.000-04:00

I won't often post about video games, but this one is kind of important. Although Halo 3 has potential for becoming the Xbox 360's next killer app, its not the game I wanted to talk about. So far the game is early in its development, and all we know is that it will not be released until some time in 2007.

So with very little information, why post?

Because of the announcement trailer. I just saw the announcement trailer that the Xbox/ Bungie team showed at E3, and it is Brief yet Epic. The 2 Minute 25 Second trailer leaves you with a complete feeling of wonderment, which is something I haven't felt about a movie or game trailer in since long as I can remember. Even if you're not a fan of the Halo series of games I encourage you to take a look at this short trailer. The experience is cinematic, and for some (fans), breathtaking. Its just awesome to see cinematography like this.

There are both small and large .WMV versions, and also QuickTime available from the bungie.net site, I've linked the .WMV's.

Small .wmv file

Large .wmv file.

Note: A great thing about these vids is that the big one is available in its full HD glory, and was actually rendered using the Xbox 360 engine... meaning... something very close to what we see here could end up in the game itself. That's something Playstation 3 can't say about any of it's teaser/ announcement videos.

Perpendicular Recording will blow your mind....Dude.

2006-05-04T22:16:00.000-04:00

I can't help but resist thinking about where storage capacities are about to start going. To the moon I tell you --to the moon.

Last week Seagate took the covers off their latest hard disk drives based on Perpendicular Recording technology. Perpendicular recording is a way of writing data to a disk (versus longitudinal), so that a storage medium can store more data in the same amount of space. How do they do that?

Here's an analogy: Longitudinal recording is like taking a ton of toothpicks, and then laying them end to end, until they circumference the entire Earth. Lets say for this example, that it would take 1 Billion toothpicks. Now, instead of laying the toothpicks end to end around the Earth, Perpendicular Recording actually stands each toothpick on its end so that it only takes up a fraction of the width that it would, when laying on its side. This way, maybe it would take 20 toothpicks to make up the same length as one toothpick on its side. That means multiplied out, we could now use 20 Billion toothpicks to circumfrence the entire globe. Perpendicular Recording is just like that!! It's this sort of perpendicular arrangement of each bit of data on the recording medium (hard disk in this example) that allows drives to reach capacities many times higher than those of today's hard disk drives.

Until literally 2 weeks ago....the maximum capacity of any single 3.5-inch hard drive on the market (like the one in your computer) was 500 Gigabytes (GB). And the truth is, many manufacturers were having trouble making a higher capacity hard drive. All the larger 1 Terabyte (TB) hard drives on the market today are actually just two separate 500GB hard drives slapped together and screwed into a metal case (and then called a 1TB hard drive). This is because of a variety of issues that limit the capacities and access speeds achievable by todays traditional drive technologies. The most important theoretical limit to higher capacities today, is the problem of the Superparamagnetic effect (big science term). Essentially the problem is that using longitudinal recording, we have found that bits can only be packed to a certain density on the magnetic disc platter. If they're packed too tightly, the bits start to break, and the data is lost. In addition to the magnetic problems, there are other physical difficulties in improving on todays drives. For example, disk platters (the magnetic disks inside a hard drive that literally spin around inside), have already reached their maximum size, density, and rotational speed (as high as 15,000 revolutions per minute on some high end drives). If manufacturers pushed them to spin any faster, the platters would litterally crash into each other the moment they were subjected to any sort of shock or vibration. To give you an example of the type of speed we're talking about: If the round platter were actually a wheel spinning on the ground; it would be traveling at 156.108 miles per hour. Very Fast.

Anyway, back to the point of capacities..Seagate's new 750GB 3.5inch hard drive is now the highest capacity (and best performing) retail hard drive on the market today. Thats right! In addition to being the highest capacity drive, it is also one of the fastest drives on the market today because of perpendicular recording. Because there is so much more data per square inch of recording media, the heads (read needles) that read the data don't have to move as far forward, to read the next bit of data in the sequence. This results in dramatically faster access to your data, whether it be your videos, photos, music, or text.

Perpendicular storage is going to change the world we live in. I am certain of it. According to this white paper from Seagate, "[using perpendicular recording,] a 3.5-inch disc drive could store two terabytes of information, a 2.5-inch drive in a laptop could hold 500GB and a
1-inch drive, such as those in MP3 players, could store as much as 50GB of data."

Considering that todays 3.5 inch drives are 500GB, and today's laptop drives are 120GB, and today's MP3 players are maxed at just 8GB....you can see why I am so excited. With the introduction of these new higher capacity drives, its been proven that perpendicular recording is going to be a practical solution to higher storage capacities. Its a pretty exciting thing...

I personally cant wait to get my hands on a 500GB Ipod Video.

For more info, definitely watch this fun flash animation, called "Get Perpendicular"
For more information on perpendicular recording, see this white paper, and the other resources at Seagate.com
Also visit: Hitachi's introduction to perpendicular recording
And see the Wikipidia article on Perpendicular Recording

P.S. sorry this read like a commercial, theres just a lot to explain.

X-Men 3 opens in theaters May 26 '06

2006-05-04T00:08:00.000-04:00

I recently watched the original Xmen movie (and plan on watching the second), in anticipation of this summer's upcoming release of X-Men [III]: The Last Stand. Although I'm not a comic nerd, I do appreciate a few superheroes (Superman, Batman, Wolverine). Of the X-men series, Wolverine is my favorite character, and the above self-portrait is my homage to the character.

ABC web streaming goes live

2006-05-01T10:12:00.000-04:00

Anticipation has built over the last month for the broadcasting event of the year. ABC has launched its online broadcasting network, and the site has gone live with todays most popular programs available for streaming for free, online. Mike Davidson (an awesome designer whose blog I recommend you read), has posted a review with his first thoughts on the new system thats been put in place.

Today's launch hopefully marks the beginning of a revolution, with more and more major network programming going online. Cartoon Network US has a site going live in on July 17, 2006 which will stream a large number of their shows, and NBC has started streaming all their news programs, with plans to also stream the extremely popular "Today Show" morning show, already in the works. Rumors are that Fox may is also working on a streaming site for their primetime programs.

Read Mike's brief review

Visit the ABC program streaming site

Video Effects on the Logitech Orbit Camera/ Web Cam

2006-04-29T23:52:00.000-04:00

Have you heard about the latest Logitech Web Cam? Its called the Logitech QuickCam Orbit MP, and it looks like a blast! The camera is Logitech's high end (i.e. retail price $129.99) model, and features some pretty cool technologies including the ability to follow the user around as they move --not literally, but by rotating on its axis for pan and tilt motions. It also has the ability to do some "simple motion capture" as demonstrated on this cool little video. The software for the video-effects is included for free by Logitech.

After watching the video, I am now certain that I want one.

See the Video

Review: Logitech Harmony 880 Universal Remote

2006-04-12T23:02:00.000-04:00

So! I got the Harmony 880 yesterday. Widely considered one of the best universal remotes available for home users; I wanted to share my initial thoughts on this little remote.

Premise
After roughly 24 hours of initial testing & configuring I can honestly say it's an impressive remote. I've had my share of experiences with bad universal remotes. In my (few) years I have configured a variety of universal remotes. All of those have required either having pre-programmed remote codes, and being able to find them -or- utilizing the "learning" capabilities of the remotes to teach them various functions of my already existing equipment. Smarter remotes can be programmed to follow macros in order to do a group of tasks at once-like turning on the tv, dvd player, and home theater receiver all at the same time. Of all my techie experiences, programming remotes has been the least pleasant, and the least satisfying. In a complex system the task is arduous at best, and simply impossible for some, but a true techie master will not quit until he has mastered every command and function with his remote.

Easy Configuration process
This is where the Logitech Harmony 880 comes in. It is simple to program, and thanks to it's absolutely incredible list of devices, actions, and functions, it can truly replace all of the remotes in your system, and in some cases- do a better job than your original remote. The remote is programmed by visiting the Harmony Remote website, configuring the remote, and then uploading the configuration to your remote through USB. The online programming wizard is customizable for novice, medium, and expert users. For basic systems, the remote will be a breeze to program and for expert users with complex systems it may be time consuming, but it will never be dissatisfying or overly difficult.

Basic Operations
Programming the remote on my first day with it was a long task, but thats only because of the detailed configurations I wanted. The remote easily found the complete code set for my Sony TV, Xbox 360 System, and Sony Upconverting DVD Player. When I say "complete", I mean it too... I can even enter and manipulate menus on all the systems (an impossibility for some remotes). As said before, these basic electronics were easy to find and configure on the remote, however I do have 2 devices I consider slightly more specialized.

The Proverbial "Wrench in the works"
The more specialized devices in my system are the Creative Soundblaster Extigy external sound card for my PC, and my Aiwa 5 disc CD changer. Ok, well maybe the Aiwa isn't specialized but it wasn't in Harmony's unbelievably large database of pre-programmed devices (at least that I could find). As a result the Aiwa CD player isn't operated by my remote, but that will be easily fixed once I find the Aiwa's original remote (and "teach" the Harmony a lesson.) The Creative Soundblaster Extigy was a surprise actually, because it is actually listed in Harmony's website under "Computer Device". All the functions are there, including PC surround sound settings, mute, and media player control functions.

A True Test
The PC setup is by far the most complicated of the macro setups in my remote. When I want to use my PC for watching a downloaded episode of The West Wing... I simply press the custom "Use PC" activity I designed on my remote, and voila!, My TV powers on and switches to the S-Video input (my PC Video Card), the Sound Blaster Sound Card switches on with Optical out into my receiver, and my Technics receiver turns on, with the correct input selected. From there I can control the picture settings on the TV (colors/ aspect ratios), the media player controls (pause, play, stop, next, previous) of Windows Media Player 10 on the PC, and adjust the volume on my surround sound receiver. All this without reaching for another remote, or my mouse!

Conclusion
This is it people! Thanks to the Logitech Harmony 880 Remote, I have mastered my home theater... I have stared death in the face and spit on him! Wielding my Harmony as a knight wields his broadsword... a samurai his katana... a viking his axe, I have defeated this monstrosity of a home theater and wrapped it in a rechargeable, ergonomic, and customizable leash of submission.

Overall rating: 9 out of 10 Stars.
(The truth is I would never pay retail ($249) for this remote, so dont run out and get it just because I said so. I paid under a hundred dollars for the remote, including coupons and a rebate, I recommend you try and do the same..but at least don't pay more than 150 for it. It's just a remote control after all.)

Product Review: SONY 30" Hi-Scan® FD Trinitron® WEGA® TV

2006-01-31T19:13:00.000-05:00

This past December I purchased a new television for my new apartment in the Buffalo area. After taking many factors into consideration, and changing my mind about the features I was looking for, I eventually ended up with a 30" Sony WEGA HDReady TV.

These days, searching for an HDTV should involve looking both locally at brick-and-mortar stores for the physical aspects of the displays, and online for the most competitive pricing.

From the onset I had envisioned getting a 30-32 inch LCD panel. My desire for something sleek and impressive was overwhelming, and LCD TV's give that effect today. Unfortunately they are fairly expensive for large displays (27"+).

However, features such as static pixels, and a natural ability to be used as a computer monitor still drew me in. I still wanted to consider an LCD display... I would just have to look for the cheapest ones.

A search for low price LCD TV's today yeilds such names as Olevia (a new manufacturer), Westinghouse (think lightbulbs), and Mitsubishi (think cars). None of them give you a comforting feeling of confidence when compared with names such as JVC, Sharp, and Sony. (Sharp for a long time has not been included with such names as Toshiba, Sony, and Panasonic; But the company has literally led the way for amazing LCD displays, and their LCDTV's are now considered among the best in consumer electronics for image quality.)

After eventually ruling out getting an LCD Display (There is no good quality 30 inch display available for under $1000.00), I decided on a SONY KV-30HS420, as pictured above. After 4+ months of use, I can attest that the TV is fantastic for what it is.

Features: To be honest, the TV isn't heavy on features. Mostly it serves as an excellent quality traditional TV/ superior monitor. This HD Capable TV does not feature an HD Tuner, and I don't mind, because I wouldn't have gotten over-the-air reception anyway, seeing as I live in the basement level of my apartment complex. All menu's are above average in terms of ease of navigation. The feature I use most often on the display is actually the zoom features on the TV. Currently I regularly watch an Xbox 360, 1080i upconverting HDMI DVD player, standard definition antenna broadcasts, and s-video output from my ATI video card equiped PC. Between all these sources, it is often necessary to vary the aspect ratios/ zooms of the display, and I've noticed that the Sony provides one very useful feature; it's called "Wide Zoom", and it is fantastic at stretching out a 4:3 image to an approximate 16:9 image. Instead of grabbing the image and stretching everything out (making everything and everyone look fat), the tv applies a geometric algorithm of what Sony describes as 5 lenses, to the image. As a result, the people and places you are watching, dont appear stretched out at all, and very little of the original image is cut off. It really is a remarkable feature, and I was recently surprised to learn that it isn't offered on all of Sony's 16:9 displays. It really takes the worry out of watching 4:3 programming with "bars" on the sides, as I can fill up the entire screen, and never feel like the picture is skewed, or awkwardly stretched.

Quality: The Image quality is excellent, blacks can be truly black, and build quality of the remote, and external case of the monitor are fantastic. Colors are appropriately saturated, and lines on the monitor are absolutely crisp. Although I havent watched HD TV programming, I do have HD signals running out of the upconverting DVD player, and also the Xbox 360. Both provide unbelievably clear images on the screen.

The Stand: Stands are always an issue with flat screen TV's, thats why I wanted to make mention of the stand. As a former home theater professional, I knew before getting this TV that I would definitely be needing a new stand, as my previous 10 year old 27" stand would not be able to take the incredible weight of all the glass used in SONY's Trinitron/ Flat screen monitors (details below).

On top of that, I now had to accomodate a Widescreen TV. That meant that a traditional 32" TV stand for a 4:3 monitor, might not work for my 30" widescreen TV. If you purchase a 32" stand, and expect it to fit your 30" widescreen TV, think again. I purchased a new 36" television stand, to accomodate my new 30" widescreen TV, and its a perfect fit. Actually it looks fantastic with the TV on it, as the dimensions of the TV, and those of the stand are very close in shape and size. So remember to think deliberately about your choice of TV stands, otherwise you could be dissapointed with the results.

Weight: Another factor I want to mention in TV selection is the weight of the Television. CRT Tubes TV's are the heaviest type of Television, followed by Rear projection TV's, then Plasma, then LCD displays. This Sony weighs approximately 165 lbs! You can see why I wanted to mention it. Luckily I'm a young, strapping lad with plenty of friends. If I wasn't, I would have definitely looked more closely at a different display technology.

Remote: I've liked Sony's remotes for quite a while actually. They are large, typically easy to read, and ergonomic. Their styling typically reflects the styling of the unit they control (unlike some other manufacturer's who contract their remote's design to third-party manufacturers). All buttons are easy to reach, and none are too-small to easily operate. Sony's television remotes today all feature the ability control a separate cable box and dvd/ vcr. I can attest that this remote does an excellent job of controlling my new Sony DVP-NS70H DVD player (most major functions except Menu button).

HDMI: A quick note about HDMI. This television has one HDMI port, which I am using with my upconverting DVD player. Although HDMI is a fairly new technology, I can already see that it will be the new standard in AV connections. Its ability to transfer fully digital video and audio signals in one cable (up to 1080p easily, and 5.1 digital audio standard) and the simplicity of the connectors (like a USB cable) are sure to usher in a new era of simple, high quality connections among components.

So there you have it, my brief review of the Sony KV-30HS420. An excellent quality HDTV Monitor, with exceptional display properties. I want to wrap up this review by mentioning that I am not a Sony follower. In fact in my past work as an AV sales associate, I used to be anti-Sony because of the above average pricing (for similar quality/features) versus other manufacturers. The reason I ended up with this Sony display is actually based on that point. I got a terrific deal on the monitor from Sony direct at Sonystyle.com. If it were'nt for the great price I got by negotiating with them over the phone, I most likely would have ended up with a similar quality (lesser priced) Panasonic TV.

So thats it! If you have any questions, please feel free to write them in the comments, I would be happy to answer them as updates to this post.

Fun Stuff: Bouncing the Tennis Ball from Optus

2006-01-31T19:04:00.000-05:00

I was recently forwarded this simple flash game, and while it didn't keep me entertained for hours. It was good for a few minutes of fun at least.

The first time I played I was able to get 36 bounces. When I came back to it a second time I scored 76 bounces. Think you can do better? Give it a shot, and click the link.

First post in Months

2006-01-31T18:50:00.000-05:00

Hello again world. How are you? I'm just dandy.

It's been several months since my last post and for that I apologize. Alot has happened: I quit my previous job as a Sales Person for an AV equipment rental company in Rochester. I found another job in Buffalo, and have moved to the area and begun work. I've already been at my new job for a couple months and definitely enjoy working for a large organization with lots of resources after working for a company with only 8 employees (including myself).

DashingMan.com is actually on hiatus right now. I'm taking time off from running the business, and will be considering its future. The business has done well in attracting customers, and I intend for the time-being to fulfill all the monthly subscription orders that I can. To those customers whose orders were canceled recently, I apologize for the inconvenience. DashingMan has run low on several major products and as I am considering what to do next, I determined I would hold off investing in new inventory.

Anyway, this post hopefully marks my long awaited return to the web. In my coming posts I hope to discuss my new electronics products including a Sony HDTV, and the Xbox 360. In addition I'll probably comment on some of the things I'm learning from my new job in Marketing/ Sales at a world class organization (no names yet).

Paypal goes down...hardcore, then comes up for air.

2005-11-15T23:35:00.000-05:00

Just noticed that PayPal.com went down tonight, with a complete and utter crash. Visiting PayPal.com tonight at around 11:20pm Eastern(do not know exact begin time), you would have found a page describing error 500: server error.

The site seems to have come back tonight at 11:37pm Eastern. Lets watch on in the next day or so and see if PayPal tells us whether this was the result of an inbound attack, server updates, or simply can't be accounted for.

Ipods could be target of new viruses.

2005-09-20T21:09:00.000-04:00

You know; I had an odd thought just now. After keeping a constant watch on recent updates with Apple and the iPod brand, I have noticed something interesting. Ipods could be susceptible to viruses. Yes, Viruses.

One commonly repeated theory regarding why viruses are more prevelant on PC platform computers than that of Apple is a simple one: There are many more PCs in the world than Apple computers, therefore to do the most damage a virus creator is best off designing his virus for a PC.

Well that makes sense doesnt it?

Now if you apply the same rule to mp3 players... you reach the subject of this post. There are many more iPods than any other make of mp3 player. A recent report by research firm Canalys maintains that nearly 70 % of all hard-disk mp3 players are an iPod product.

Now imagine the chaos. A young iPodder with an iPod Mini...or an even more unfortunate owner of a new 60gb iPod photo logs onto the internet one day. He's got his iPod in its dock and is eagerly searching for an interesting podcast or two. He finds something that sounds intersting and goes for the kill.

Unbeknownst to our young iPodder, he is quickly downloading a new virus that has been disguised to look like a podcast. But this file is instead a virus designed to attack the contents of his iPod the moment it is played.

Our hero removes his iPod from the dock and heads off for a jog with his iPod, with the hopes of listening to his newly downloaded podcast files. Instead, this iPod owner is listening to static. And soon finds that his iPod is locked in play mode with the hard-disk drive grossly gnawing away at itself like a dog whose just lost his leg in a heinous car accident.

Yes ladies and gentlemen, its possible. Imagine the absolute horror of finding your ipod has become infected with a virus and knowing there is no way to clean it without sending it back to Apple to have it wiped clean and reprogrammed. You would lose all of your music, probably have to format your computer (and lose even more music), and then live with the fear for the rest of your life, of having it happen all over again.

Its a possibility which I suggest you watch out for, and just one of the reasons I advocate not buying an iPod, but instead looking for one of the superior products produced by today's PC/ hardware manufacturers.

After all, it seems that these pc products are less likely to catch a virus than your (Apple) iPod...

The MacMini's long lost brother

2005-06-04T00:46:00.000-04:00

Today, Aopen technologies revealed their version of the MacMini, dubbed the PCMini by those who saw it. Its a remarkable likeness, and is actually 1 millimeter shorter than the Mac Mini. I'm pretty impressed. Complete story at Macworld.com

TAG makes its move with Carmen Electra

2005-05-12T22:29:00.000-04:00

Carmen Electra is a pretty chick. A dream date with the actress was recently auctioned off on eBay.com. Thats right, Carmen Electra.... Dream Date.... auction. Who wouldn't go for that? Well it appears the Gillette company is once again showing their mastery of demographics and target markets. The auction, found here, was a campaign stunt by TAG body spray (Axe competitor), by the Gillette Company. All profits went to the National Prostate Cancer Coalition, to the benefit of men everywhere.

Why do I say it was good marketing? Because Tag "gets" its target market, and has payed attention to their desires. I openly admit however, this isn't that hard since their market is mostly young men between the ages of 15 and 20 (or somewhere around there). But there are some other clues as to their doing a good job on this one... Afterall, they successfully posed it as a charity event, probably got the lovely Carmen to join along on the cheap, for charity, successfully staged the event on the internet (a rapid communication medium, perfectly suited to the youth lifestyle), and got their name out with every single page view. Plus some press coverage, such as this article your reading now. Good job Gillette (TAG).

So what did the auction end at? A whopping $407,500.00 Looking at Mrs. Novaro (Electra) I think its obvious this wasn't an act of charity, but rather a fairly well spent pile of money.

I wonder what 15-20 year old had $400K to blow on eBay? A sham bid maybe? We'll see.

Infinity Tries All-Podcasting Radio Format

2005-04-30T22:41:00.000-04:00

Broadcast radio has been suffering from a downward trend in the past few years. The popularity of digital music, a growing population of fanatically loyal satellite radio listeners, and an increase in the amount of radio advertising is forcing a re-evalutation in the industry. In an article released today by AP writer, Seth Sutel, Seth describes Infinity Broadcasting's newest attempt to counteract these trends with an experimental "retrofit" of one of its lagging stations in San Francisco, CA. On May 16, KYCY-AM will convert from a talk-radio format to an experimental format... broadcasting PodCasts.

According to the article, Infinity Broadcasting is planning on airing listener submitted pod-casts. Although it doesn't name any pod-cast streams in particular, I believe they will probably also venture into podcasts from other internet sources. I am happy to see podcasts being embraced in this way, but it certainly raises a couple of issues.

One issue that I immediately see becoming a problem is that the radio station has no plans to pay for the podcasts which it airs. This is gonna be a problem; probably very quickly. I'm not too concerned about those listeners who freely submit their podcasts for broadcast by the station, but rather, am worried about the chance that that the station may play podcasts which were never intended for submission. After all, not everyone is willing to license their work to be broadcast freely, for the benefit of a money-making radio station (controlled by the number two broadcasting company in the nation). Infinity, (KYCY-AM) had better be careful they don't mistakenly air a podcast to which they weren't licensed.

Another issue, "If you don't plan on paying people for their pod-casts, How do you expect to get quality programming?" I just don't see how those pod-casters who develop great programs are going to allow their content to be aired absolutely free of charge. Basic economics will come into play, and the the station may find that the content it receives is less than premium, and although free, it may not best serve their audience. I can see how the station can benefit from this experiment, in that it no longer requires paying for the programming, but still allows them to air advertising... However, Im not sure that people who develop popular podcast content, are going to allow a media barron such as Infinity Broadcasting, to benefit from their work. Especially with the incredible profit margins that radio stations currently enjoy.

In Summary
I have a feeling the station will be able to make this work, but I can see podcasts doing much better on Public Broadcast Radio. I think that a system like PBS can better guarantee that my content won't unfairly benefit a company such as Infinity Broadcasting. I certainly hope to hear more about this issue as the station moves forward with its plans.

Whats your opinion?

Truly awesome advertising

2005-04-25T21:57:00.000-04:00

As a long time subscriber to Maxim, Stuff, Blender, and FHM magazines, I have witnessed a dramatic shift in the capabilities of magazine advertising. Ads have left the 2 dimensional space of paper, and reached a 4th dimension that was for a long time simply unreachable; and found only in the dreams of idealist ad executives. These changes are based on new found creativity, a greater understanding of New Media, and a truly revolutionary increase in advertising budgets. I'm not talking about pop-up books, but about interactivity, and how it has reached unbelievable levels. A couple of recent examples (that I can remember) are listed below:

1) The Stickers Advertisement, from Mini-Cooper USA. This advert -which ran in several magazines- contained a full page of of decals. The stickers were for mini-cooper enthusiasts to place on their Mini's, for everytime they raced another sports-car and won (kind of like when the Red-Barron would mark his airplane each time he shot down an enemy). In addition it had several lettering decals for car-owners to use in detailing their cars with their names, or some other message. That was a tremendously successfull campaign, as I remember it today. I even used the lettering on my own car. Though I wasnt a Mini owner, I still appreciated the gesture.

This ad campaign was a stroke of genius for Mini. On the budget side, the stickers would have been only slightly more to print (compared to other possible textiles), yet produced a whole new level of interactivity for the reader.

2) The Jeep Sponge: "Grows right before your eyes". Remember those "incredible growing dinosaurs" that used to come in little plastic pills for you to drop in a bucket of water. Anyway, it used to be a popular and cheap kids toy in the early 90's. Jeep harnessed the power of those toys in order to emphasize the new length of the 2005 Jeep Wrangler (usually described as too small for extra passengers). In the recent magazine ad campaign, Jeep stamped the same sponge material into little Jeep Wranglers, and sealed them up on the page of the advert. Readers were greeted with a quick blurb about the newly lengthened Jeep Wrangler, and told to play with their new toy. Like an 8 year old I ripped that wrangler right out of my magazine and ran to the bathroom sink. And what do you know, it did get bigger!

So there you have it folks, another effective advertisement that worked, and emphasized its message pretty darn clearly. Though, as I said before, it was probably much more expensive than a color ad would have cost. After all, its the same kind of toy people used to pay for just a few years ago.

Share your Ideas with a Blog [Director's Cut]

2005-04-12T23:35:00.000-04:00

Blogging isn’t rocket science; that’s why it’s growing at an astronomical rate. Since the beginning of the web, people have been sharing ideas more easily, but with blogs the communicative properties of the web have been harnessed for us mere mortal’s. Truly the idea of a personal webpage has come to the masses.

Sharing ideas is a piece of cake with blogging, especially so with some of the tools I found for this month’s review. With them you can write down your thoughts and post photos to your cubbyhole on the World Wide Web. As with every web industry these days, some of the tools you have to pay for, and others are free. Below I’ll cover a few of the best FREE tools available for new bloggers.

Blogger
One of the easiest blogging services around today is Blogger (www.blogger.com) by Google. Through Blogger you can create a free user account, pick a sub-domain for your blog, (e.g. sinkroutine.blogspot.com) and then pick a title for the page. From there it’s incredibly easy to begin posting to your blog using a WYSIWYG editor or straight html. Blogger features a good number of standard templates with an excellent variety of colors. Each one is very well “polished” and is something most people would be proud of displaying. For those eager to customize their blog, Blogger.com allows advanced manipulation of content through tags and CSS style sheets. Once your blog is online Blogger makes it easy to start sharing your ideas with the world by allowing you to make yourself public for other users to find. Public blogs are searchable through the various blogging indexes, and Blogger.com blogs can even be found on Google.com if you search hard enough. Blogger’s big downfall is this same public availability. “Un-public” blogs are not locked down by user (their just not indexed), so if someone randomly stumbles across your blog they will be able to read it. Overall Blogger.com is a very user-friendly blog host, which covers all the basics of blogging.

Movable Type
Movable type is a product of Six Apart (www.sixapart.com/movabletype), a company looking to master the art of blogging, in more ways than one. Movable type is a blog tool which can be downloaded by advanced users in order to setup a blog on a user’s own host, rather than using a free (and often times, ad-based) blog host. Movable Type is the leader in custom-developed blogs which accomplish exactly what a user wants, with more features than can be listed in most articles. Movable type is available to individual users; and a limited version (1 author/ 3 blogs limit) is available for free, so long as you don’t expect any sort of customer service for the product. Movable Type is a product worth looking at if you know what Perl scripts are and aren’t scared of installing something on a web server.

Flickr
Flickr (www.Flickr.com) started as a community to efficiently share your photos with the rest of the world, in addition to your own circle of friends. Through Flickr you can post your photos, organize them, comment on them, and allow comments from others. Plus their still in beta which means they haven’t “gotten all corporate” yet. Their service currently allows you to share your 100 most recent photos or you can pay a service fee to share an unlimited number of photos if you wish. The reason Flickr is discussed here is because it’s become a popular way of posting photos to your blog. Their tools work with a majority of blog hosts, and even if you’re not quite ready to start blogging, it’s a fantastic place to start sharing your photos with others, and enjoy a community truly built for idea/ photo sharing.

LiveJournal
LiveJournal (www.LiveJournal.com) is another popular product of Six Apart. As the name describes, it’s aptly suited for bloggers who wish to post journal entries to the web. The LiveJournal community of users is truly built around interacting with people on a personal level; allowing users to post lists of their favorite things and share them for other users to find. It promotes friendship development, and in addition to Blogger.com’s standard feature set, has the added ability to lock-down your blog like Area 51. For each post, an author can decide who in the LiveJournal (and general web) community can see that post, and private pages will not be found without user approval. LiveJournal is originally based on an open-source project, and now offers low-cost premium options for paying users. It might not be open-source ideology; however it does cost money to serve 6 million user’s blogs.

Blogging is ready for the masses, and whether you wish to share your plans for world domination, or simply break up the monotony of the web with the sound of your voice, a good place to start is the services mentioned above.

Sean Rekhi is webmaster for DashingMan.com, and also authors a business and technology blog at www.SinkRoutine.Blogspot.com.

What is Open-Source Marketing?

2005-03-06T18:36:00.000-05:00

What is open-source marketing? That was my question when I found this manifesto at ChangeThis. Aptly titled, yet vague, I was expecting the manifesto to discuss which marketing techniques can help fuel the development and distribution of open-source projects such as Firefox, the Mozilla browser that has taken over almost 30% of IE's market share, and managed to build a cult of followers for its grass-roots marketing campaign.

Alas, I was wrong. Open-source marketing, as described by author James Cherkoff, is kind of like viral-marketing, and encompasses most of the promotional side of marketing.

What is it really though? As I see it, its the change we're seeing from marketing (promotion mostly) taking a "broadcast" message, and instead igniting a fire in its users. It's saying that we can no longer exert even a minimal amount of control of our message and our consumers, but instead can woo them using the values of the Open-Source movement. It's saying that instead of pushing our message on people, marketeers should build upon peoples own interests in the products/ ideas/ messages that we want to push.

One of my own examples of what Cherkoff is getting at is: Collegehumor.com, a "college co-ed" site that practically sells itself to its customer base of college-age men and women who are trying to avoid the everyday boredom of classes, and feed their habits of procrastination. College-humor does little to advertise in the mainstream web hangouts of this crowd, but instead relies on people sharing the site with their friends, and through posts on other various sub-culture sites, bent on the same purpose.

Overall I find Open-Source Marketing, as described by Cherkoff to be a valid argument on where marketing is heading (and where some campaigns are at now). Although not all his examples are right on point, there are some very relative, and recent ones that bring the idea to crystaline clarity.

Blogging is communication, and why Amazon.com should read mine.

2005-03-04T13:31:00.000-05:00

I wanted to say quickly how much I love the communication of blogging. As a FastCompany reader I have started to leave comments on their blog. Today I was happy to find a response to my comment posted just minutes after I had posted it myself. The interaction of the web is phenomenal for sharing information and I think having my ideas validated and responded to makes my day.

Below is what I said at FCNow, let me know your thoughts here, or at the FCNow blog.

Has anyone noticed that Amazon has changed its free shipping policy? Although its still a benchmark feature of their shopping experience, they recently (I dont know when) changed the option so that now, even if the item is in stock and ready to ship, they say they will wait 3 days before shipping the item (in addition to its "availability" time) using "free super-saver ground shipping". This is a departure from this option's original value, when Amazon would ship the item when it said it was available (24-36-72 Hours). Its a frustrating change for the customer, and one Amazon hopes will prompt customers to opt for the higher priced shipping options. I for one think its a mistake by Amazon, as 2 weeks ago it took 11 days for me to receive 2 in-stock items from their store.

Barnes and Noble however is reaching in to capture the market of customers who noticed. At Barnes and Noble.com they are guarantee-ing that orders which include free shipping will be delivered within 3 days of leaving B&N. When it comes to getting free shipping on books and media, now whose the leader? An excellent power-play by Barnes & Noble, a not so brilliant strategic move by Amazon.

A perfect example of bad news writing.

2005-03-03T19:30:00.000-05:00

US News Article | Reuters.com

I'm sorry, but how do some people get paid to write news articles for Reuters? Reuters (I think the worlds largest news organization) is pretty much letting anyone write for their organization these days. In this article about Gillette's new men's razor the author has succeeded in contributing nothing substantiative, yet released the article anyway.

His title grabs the attention of the reader about a possible new product from Gillette, the makers of the Mach3 and the M3Power series of razors, but his article discloses nothing about the product. The single substantive point of the article is to announce that a new wet razor product is in the works from Gillette, as announced by the company's senior vice-president for strategy and business development. The article goes on to not discuss a release date, to not discuss the name of the product, and to not discuss the new advancements Gillette has acheived. It does however serve as a quintessential example of bad journalism.

Why do I feel so strongly about this? It's because anyone could have told you there was a new product in the works, and they would have been right. They are Gillette. At any moment in time throughout the company's history they have always been developing the next great shaving system for either men or women. It's the company's sole reason for existence. The only thing this writer has acheived is to offer the Gillette company (one of my favorite companies by the way) another piece of absolutely free and useless media [while getting paid to do it].

My only conclusion is that the author should be taking kick-backs from Gillette for writing about them and offering such great publicity. Gillette is quite possibly the second greatest marketing company (product innovator) in the history of the world. It is the company's job to make new wet shaving products, it is the author's job to be a journalist. In this case only one has succeeded in doing their job.

Whats your opinion? Do you agree or disagree with my view?

Gillette "Hair Raising Scheme" Called Into Question Again.

2005-03-03T08:38:00.000-05:00

War over Gillette's hair-raising claims

The FairFaxDigital (Sydney Australia Publication) reported last week that the Gillette Company has once again had trouble with a product introduction due to a judge's injunction. Gillette has been barred from using any statements that "micro-pulses raise the hair of the beard off a man's face" in order to cut more closely.

For those of you who don't remember, I covered this issue 1 Month ago when the exact same thing happened to Gillette in its German launch of its advertising campaign. At that time I questioned whether it was a fluke of luck for the attacking Energizer Holdings Company (owner of competitor; Schick), as they attempted to dismantle Gillette's advertising campaign and had randomly gotten lucky. Now it appears that we may see a trend growing, as Energizer has successfully stopped Gillette from using the "micro-pulses" tag-line in any of its Australian advertising.

This could turn out to be very interesting as we see if Energizer is willing to persue the same lawsuit in the U.S.... Gillette's largest and most profitable market for the M3Power razor. For more information, follow this link to the FairFax article.

I love this Ad concept: 3M Safety Glass

2005-02-28T21:25:00.000-05:00

3m Safety Glass Advertisement

I just had to blog this. I'm a very regular fastcompany reader and this evening I was reading up when I caught this ad, as they had blogged about it on the FcNow blog.

Apparantly 3M (the innovation giant) has designed a safety glass so strong that they want the public to see how much they believe in it. Therefore they have created street advertisements, that resemble "lockboxes" full of "money" (suspected play money). This is definitely one of the most attention grabbing ad concepts you will find in the city. Even if its not real.

Why Overstock.com Auctions deserves your attention.

2005-02-16T23:08:00.000-05:00

Overstock.com Auctions vs. eBay - Price Comparisons
I was browsing Overstock.com tonight... in response to a couple articles I have read recently. They've gotten some press regarding their online auction environment gaining market penetration against the EBay behemoth. Although its not a huge share, I was glad to learn of their success in the market and even more happy to find this page on their site, with a side by side comparison of the two products. Overstock has drawn up a table of the auction products they offer and their prices versus eBay.

I suggest you take a look.
Why am I pro-Overstock? Its all eBay's fault. As a fan of selling lower cost products using the auction model, I eventually stopped all of my eBay auctioneering because of the ridiculous margins that eBay asked for when selling my low revenue products. It got to the point where I stopped selling there and started my own fixed price site, and what do you know? It's been cheaper ever since. The truth is I support competition in the market, and therefore I am in support of Overstock Auctions. After all; when there is competition the consumer always wins.

Brandchannel announces Readers Choice Awards for 2004

2005-02-15T17:26:00.000-05:00

BrandChannel, the online site of Interbrand consultancy has released their list of the top most influential brands of 2004 today. Among the leaders are all the ones you would expect, and obviously have interacted with on a daily basis in some way, shape, or form.

The leader? Apple. Obviously the brand had a meteoric year in 2004, and I can't argue against that. In fact I too am inflicted with the apple bug, though I don't need an Ipod, I am certainly curious about the new MacMini computer, a sub-$500 computer, a first for Apple. Is being number 1 great? I imagine yes, since it means you have had results in the market; but are people forgetting that there could be negative associations?...being on the list of most influential brands means that you have taken over people's lives. It means that you in effect, are so popular that you are everywhere...ubiquitous. The brandchannel article goes so far as to describe the apple ipod brand in this way so there must be some weight to the argument.

The problem with being so popular, is that people eventually despise you and will want to rebel. The reason I know is that I am one of those people who thinks that the original ipod was an achievement in mp3 player technology, but as time has gone on the ipod minis and the new shuffle are simply an attempt to play off the power of the brand. Now, when anyone say's their getting a new ipod product I actually argue against it, citing that the new products offer less value than their parents, and that competitors with less brand power have gone out of their way to develop better products to compete, but are getting blocked out by the giant sequoia that is Apple. For example, for the same price as the ipod minis available today, there is a 5gb player with 20 hours of battery life which is smaller, and will play more kinds of media. This new product featurewise crushes the ipod mini, but has gotten less attention. This is a common problem with popular brands... but my knowledge of this has turned me into a iPod rebel, everyone else has swallowed the apple pill, but some of us...the rebels of the ipod wars; will rise up to educate the masses, and defeat the slavemaster: Apple computers Inc.

You should definitely check out the list. For marketers its the creme de la creme, and an opportunity to see how brands have played out globally, versus in our own minds.

Penn State Blog: Week 1 -- Is it Homework?

2005-02-14T02:21:00.000-05:00

Week 1

It seems that a Penn State University Economics professor is asking his/her students to write blog articles as a homework assignment for class. Weird? Well from what I gather from the blog address: psu1234.blogspot.com, the content of the articles (basic economic principals as they relate to college student's daily lives), and the profile (there is none), it seems that a professor at PSU may be trying to peak students interests through a collaborative blog.

Its not a bad idea if you think about it; each student gets to contribute their ideas on the classroom material, relating the material to their daily lives however they wish. On top of that, students put thought into their peices so they are well enough written to be published online.
The result is a very richly written blog, full of ideas, each article precisely on-topic, but contributed from a wide variety of authors. A truly grand example of the use of blogging.

A trend? I think so
College students write billions of essays/ articles/ shorts every year and for many, it is at their peak writing ability, so why not share? I am sure we are going to see many more creative, insightful, on-point blogs such as this one written very soon.

Jayloden.com - AIM Virus Removal

2005-02-14T00:33:00.000-05:00

Jayloden.com - AIM Virus Removal

AIM Virus's suck. Tonight I got a call from a friend with a computer virus that made their AIM act up and put up "random" away messages. Her away message would automatically come up with a link for others to click on, (e.g. "my photos from the beach"), that would send the virus to the next persons computer. It had other symptoms too, such as re-setting internet explorer's security settings, and not allowing windows Task Manager to open when the user hit CTRL+ALT+DEL.

So what'd I do? I began searching the web; having not encountered the problem before I hoped for an easy solution.

And what do you know, I got one. A guy by the name of Jay Loden (I'm assuming, after all its http://www.jayloden.com) has apparantly had the problem multiple times and taken it upon himself to make a fix for a large variety of AIM viruses and spyware issues. His tool, what he calls AIMFIX, helped us out BIGtime. It is simple, well updated, and extremely effective. It's so effective I'm writing about it here so that other inflicted users can easily find his work. My message to Jay: Keep up the good work.. Once again, for a quick fix to the AIM virus described above, try visiting JayLoden.com, and use AIMFIX.

Energizer Holdings Annual Meeting; Webcast 1-25-05

2005-01-21T02:57:00.000-05:00

Energizer Holdings Company (the owners of Schick) have announced an online webcast of their annual shareholders meeting. They'll obviously be discussing the past year's successes, attempting to downplay their failures, and talking about the great future ahead of them. What else would you expect from a meeting of this kind? The reason I'll be watching is to see what changes (if any) they will announce in branding strategy/ new products, or at least whether we can expect anything new in the next quarter. After all, they need to say something to please their shareholders/ stakeholders. The webcast can be found at http://www.energizer.com, on Tuesday Jan 25th, 2005 at 2:30pm CST.

We learned about the webcast through a press release found here at biz.yahoo.com

Shaving does not cause you hair to grow in thicker!

2005-01-18T21:38:00.000-05:00

My mother and father held me off from shaving until it was too late. I was a hairy dude in middle-school. Shaving with hair clippers to keep the hairs short because my father had not yet taught me to shave, was a nuisance beyond belief.

Why were they keeping me from shaving? Because they believed that the earlier I shaved, the heavier my beard would grow in. Were they right? Nope.

In fact, the concept of your beard growing in thicker after you start shaving is an old-wife's tail thats outlived its welcome: Contrary to popular believe, shaving does not change the texture, color or rate of the hair growth.

Think theres some truth to the idea still? If you feel that your's, or your son's beard grew in only after beginning shaving; consider this explanation.

Before shaving regularly, many young adults will let their "beards" grow out naturally, with soft tapered edges. The hairs are long, pliable, and matte close to the skin the way a grown beard would. Grown beards are soft because of their length, and the natural taper of the hairs when felt by your hand.

After shaving, the beard has been cut down to the depth of the skin, and what you feel in the next day or week of growth is the stubble of the beard, cut with a sharp blade, therefore leaving a sharp edge rather than a naturally tapered one. From then on while the beard grows it will always feel sharper and more coarse than before you began your shaving routine.

As for the thicker hairs, and greater density of hairs after you begin shaving theres an explanation for that also. Young males begin shaving before they have reached their peak in puberty. Many have what we referr to as "peach-fuzz" which is the introductory growth of soft hairs on a young man's face. It is important to recognize that this soft growth is only the beginning of a boy's maturity and as he ages another year his beard will fully mature, including a thickening of the hairs and an increase in the density of his beard.

So there you have it, a well thought out, easy to explain answer to whether shaving actually promotes hair growth on your face. As for me... Luckily all the fake-shaving came to an end one day as I told my mom that I felt rediculous shaving with clippers, and that I wanted to be clean shaven. My father was out of town on a business trip at the time and could not be there to teach me, so my mother did what she could: She handed me one of her Pink Gillette, Single Bladed razors, and my dads can of shave foam.

Today I'm one of the most vocal experts on mens shaving, and an owner of a men's grooming store... so I guess it didn't screw me up too much. Heh.

Gillette finally announces a powered razor for women

2004-12-21T01:14:00.000-05:00

Gillette hopes to create a buzz with vibrating women's razor

MOOOooommmmm!, Lisa keeps taking my m3 powerrrrr!!!

Although I'll have more time to cover this article in detail later, I wanted everyone to know that Gillette has finally announced a vibrator for women based on the Gillette M3 Power. The Venus Vibrance will be a new razor system based partly on the successful design of the M3 power. It should be noted that many women have found the men's M3 power to be a great product already... so its no surprise that Gillette had plans to introduce another gender specific product.

Gillette loses 1 battle in the war of the worlds

2004-12-20T23:18:00.000-05:00

Energizer Holdings, Inc. Announces Successful Advertising Challenge in German Court

Apparantly Gillettes getting a whoopin in Germany. Schick, owned by the Energizer holdings company brought a lawsuit against Gillette and its new M3 Power shaving system, claiming that Gillettes advertising campaign and packaging materials are directly misleading consumers in that country. Which part of the advertsing, you ask? The IMPORTANT PART. Get this, Energizer submitted evidence to the court suggesting that there is no proof that "micro-pulses" stimulate and raise the hair off your body during the shaving process.

Wait a second, haven't I heard that in the advertising here in the states too? Uh oh. Well I honestly tried the m3 power blades without the m3 power razor recently, I instead used the Mach3 Turbo handle and received a similar, though less pleasurable shave. Since that time I have been suggesting that the most significant enhancements in the new system have been in the blades and their coating. Gillette must however, push the marketing of the entire system, since they wish to enhance sales of their Duracell line of batteries.

Back to the news... Is it true? Well the judge in Germany has ruled that Gillette must abide by an injunction, requiring they suspend all advertising that makes the claim regarding "micro-pulses" and their effect on the hairs of our skin. Gillette was allowed to show some evidence supporting their claim, but it appears to not have been enough. Is this something we will be seeing in other countries soon? Is Gillette pulling our legs? In some ways I don't really care. Thats because its a better shave. Period. Gillette improved upon their Mach3 line of products and I'm the type of guy who wants to trade up when given the opportunity. Thus I'm happy, and wouldn't be using the product if I weren't. (I know I'm not alone.) We'll wait to hear more on the case, and I'll try and keep everyone updated as news comes in.

[note: the link is a PRESS RELEASE by the Energizer Holdings Company (Schick owners). It should be obvious that Energizer may try to blow out of proportion the significance of this issue, to benefit themselves]

Wet Shave or Dry (Electric Razor)?

2004-11-26T14:07:00.000-05:00

I'm feeling in the mood for tradition today, the day after Thanksgiving holiday here in the U.S. Therefore I am posting this article on whether to Wet Shave, or use an Electric Razor (often called "Dry shave").

Wet Shave or Dry (Electric Razor)?

The truth is that most guys shave the way their fathers shaved. My father used a SensorExcell (Gillette) for a long time while I was a kid. Although my father never really taught me to shave, he influenced me to wet shave also. I have many friends who's fathers used electric razors and they have used them ever since they started. In the battle between Wet versus Dry the lines are becoming more blurry with the introduction of waterproof electric shavers and other new technology. In reality both shaving systems have their pros and cons.

Wet Shave:

Guaranteed a close, professional looking shave
May be cheaper if you dont opt for the best blades available
Extremely refreshing when done right
Blades serve to remove dead skin and make you look rejuvinated
- Can cut yourself
- Need a sink and mirror (or shower and mirror)
- Can take longer than a dry shave
- The best blades are expensive
- Not so easy to clean up all those hairs stuck to the sink

Dry Shave (Electric Razor):

Shave anywhere you want, car, bathroom, office
Shave without a big mess, little clean up
Less chance of shaving bumps (but high chance of irritation)
Impossible to cut yourself because the blades are well protected
- Dry shave isn't quite as close
- Possibility of razor burn from poor razor/ electric blades
- Need to recharge the bastard, or feed him batteries
- Not nearly as rejuvinating an experience as wet shave

Which system is right for you really isn't for us to say. Your preference is what matters. Just know this, if you want to try a different system you should give the new method some time. You and your hair need time to get acquainted to a new shaving system. If you shave on a daily basis you should try and shave with that system for at least 2 weeks, we recommend 20 days. Your hair grows a certain way once you start shaving and it needs time to adjust, so don't make your decision too quickly, or you will find that your not as satisfied as you expect/ could be.

My personal preference? I've always wanted to try an expensive rotary razor, however my trusted weapon of choice in this battle is the M3 power razor from Gillette (VERY WET).

The End of the Earth

2004-11-24T02:22:00.000-05:00

The End of the Earth

So, now that The Sunday Sink Routine is up I decided to take a look around and see if anyone else has had the idea to topic shaving on their bloggs. Who knows, maybe I'm not the only guy in the world who thinks shaving is important enough to dedicate 5 articles in one 24 hour period to. Well, it turns out I am... kind of. This guy, (he goes by adam) made me laugh pretty hard with his November 1 post on shaving with a pink razor. Need we say more? Take a look at his site. Its really too bad he doesn't have a place to contact him or leave comments. I'd like to let him know I'm about to send a thousand people his way.

A lost shaving tips site

2004-11-23T21:42:00.000-05:00

Try this site on for size. Its ranked high on yahoo, so it must be good! Right? Actually we are posting the DashingMan.com shaving tips page here on Sink Routine because this page recently lost its spot on the search engines. After a site redesign in early November, it appears that this usefull shaving advice page has gotten lost, and we wanted to help it get found again. This page, created by DashingMan.com, can be found at shavingtips.info, shavingadvice.info, and howtoshave.info (Yes, they are all the same).

Review: Gillette M3 Power Razor

2004-11-23T17:08:00.000-05:00

Athough its been a while since the launch of the Gillette M3 Power Razor system (Product Website), I thought it would be a good idea to cover a review of this product for this christmas season. Many people have thought of this product as a great "stocking stuffer" for a son, husband, brother, uncle, pet goat... Whomever! And the great thing is you can now know what your getting into, thanks to The Sunday Sink Routine.

Price: A Gillette M3Power razor set [razor, two cartridges, one Duracell AAA battery] will retail for approximately $14.99. A Gillette M3Power 4-pack of refill cartridges will retail for approximately $10.99; an 8-pack will retail for approximately $20.99. As always, retail prices are the sole discretion of individual retailers.
Packaging/ Contents: The M3 Power razor comes in vacuum formed plastic packaging and includes 1 razor, 1 duracell battery to power the razor, and 2 new M3Power razor blades.
Product Features: (Manufacturers Description)
Our judgement: The M3 Power is a great product, and does shave better than Gillette's predecessor, the Mach3 Turbo. Based on many of the same patents as the Mach3, this razor's improved blade coating has made a noticeable difference in the comfort of the shave, though slightly less noticeable of an actual difference. There is significantly less "tugging" and pulling of the hairs which provides a smoother shave. The pulsing motion of the razor takes a little while to get used to, but once that original shock wears off you are very comfortable. The trick is to mix this new razor with other new products in your shaving routine. This way you will notice the most difference, and improve your skin at the same time. Overall, I honestly received a great shave, with an improvement over my typical Sunday Sink Routine.
Pro's: A great shave, probably the best you have had yet, unless you take as much time to shave as I do. A nice product, that most people who try will upgrade to. Plus if you don't like it you can continue to use the razor with your old mach3 blades. (It is backwards compatable)
Con's: Most expensive razor and blades, Not a gigantic improvement over Mach3 Turbo Quality, bright green color of razor-blade head.
Better Than: Gillette Mach3 Turbo, Mach3, Schick Quattro
Not Quite as Good as: Best so far.
Rating at time of writing: 10 of 10

Where to buy: Although the M3 Power is available nationwide (U.S.) and is slowly expanding to global markets, we feel that shopping online is probably the easiest (and cheapest) way to find the product. I recommend you try DashingMan.com for their M3 Power razor combo, or blades. Their combo is the cheapest you will find, and includes free shipping.

Ammendmant: I noticed something recently that I want to share. If a guy does not like the Mach3 style razors from Gillette --more often than not-- he will dislike the Gillette M3 Power razor when he makes a switch. The 2 products are related, and both incorporate the same flexible pivot point, which is a deciding factor on which razor to use for many men. So, I suggest that if you arn't currently a Mach3, or Mach3 Turbo fan, it may be a bigger adjustment for you than others.

Has anyone used ZIRH?

2004-11-23T14:35:00.000-05:00

You know, I recently had the opportunity to start selling ZIRH mens products, and I decided not to go the whole way. Instead of stocking this entire mens line of products, we have opted to create an affiliation with the Zirh.com website. A couple Zirh products are available in the shaving cream category right now, and I recommend them. But for even more selection, I would probably just visit Zirh.com directly. Personally, I would go with another, slightly lesser expensive product such as something from Muhle Pinsel or Musgo Real, but Zirh has a web only offer for the holiday season, giving you three travel size ZIRH premium men's skin care essentials Free with $50 purchase. (Not bad at all.) Since no other retailer is allowed to offer this special and no one I know of carries ALL the Zirh products. I suggest you stick with Zirh.com when looking for their products.

A shout out to my site!

2004-11-23T13:25:00.000-05:00

Yes, I live in the world of webmastering. The kind of world where a guy (or girl) believes his website is a living entity that needs care... and sometimes a little tough-love. I am starting this blog today this 23rd day of November 2004 in the hopes that I can share what I know and learn about shaving, and comment on whatever I please. I hope my ownership doesnt influence my blogging, but I also dont care too much if it does. If you read this blog, let me know, and remember that most everything on here will be an opinion, unless it sounds like fact. I happen to be nearing the "expert" level of shavers, and have kept ontop of the shaving industry for an entire year while developing an online grooming site for men. Im sure you will find it soon enough. So read some more, and take a look at the links... I'll try and post when theres something to report.