Category: product endorsements

testing Audible.com

On By Rick McIn Apple, books, music, product endorsements, travelLeave a comment

These days I would much rather have a book on my MP3 player than in my backpack. But getting the books I want is challenging. (MP3 books on tape available in the library are limited.)

I finally tried the big boy in audio books – Audible.com. So far I’ve been very impressed.

Sign-up was no more painful than with any other website. You get 2 free books to try it out. I quickly and easily found two of my top to-read-next books:

  • Shantaram: A Novel
  • Himalaya

    • Himalaya

    My computer asked if I wanted them in iTunes. Of course I did. The site knew I was on Mac and it caused no grief.

    Actually, two of the files did not download immediately. I called the 1-800 number and was greeted on first ring. They fixed my problem instantly. Great service!

    Audible.com content is encoded in their proprietary .AA format, but it worked with my Apple iPod so no complaints.

    The only downside of Audible.com I have to report (so far) is the price.

    <blockquote Membership plans can be purchased on a monthly ($22.95) or annual ($229.50) basis.

    Most people sign-on for the 2 books / month for US$23. For me, I still feel $11.50 / book is a bit high. (I wonder what percentage the author gets?)

    They do have some special promotions once you are a member.

    mainimage_bookstack.jpg

    Here’s another review:

    If you are a “money is no object” person, then I recommend sticking with the audiobooks section of the iTunes Music Store (iTMS). The selection is the same as Audible.com, but because the experience is completely contained within iTunes, it’s by far the easiest way to shop for, buy, and listen to audiobooks. The downside is that you’ll pay full retail, instead of being able to take advantage of subscriptions and sales common on Audible.com.

    The option which I believe best balances convenience and cost is Audible.com. Signing up for a premium subscription costs $22/month, and entitles you to two book “credits” per month.

    Aldoblog

    Now I have 11hrs of Michael Palin and 1.7 days !! of Shantaram to get me through my upcoming summer travels. (Loving Shantaram, so far!)

    Audible.com – Wikipedia

    I love Horseradish Mayo

    On By Rick McIn food, product endorsementsLeave a comment

    My favourite “glop” (something like Pad Thai, don’t ask) ingredient disappeared off the grocery shelf some years ago. That was Kraft Horseradish Mayonnaise.

    Happily, I’ve just been introduced to the President’s Choice version. Yum, yum! (My eyes are watering.)

    pi074016038373932b.jpg

    President’s Choice – PC Great Food – PC Horseradish Mayo

    best movie – Crash (1996 or 2005?)

    On By Rick McIn ethics, movies, product endorsements2 Comments

    In 2006, director David Cronenberg said he was upset with director Paul Haggis who had chosen the name Crash for his 2005 Academy Award winning film Crash, feeling “it was not only ethically wrong, but annoying as well”.

    I loved that Crash, and felt it deserved Best Picture in 2005. It was a very important look at racism.

    But Cronenberg’s 1996 film also called Crash was braver, more visionary and far, far more memorable.

    Unique. (The only movie close to as brilliant and shocking I’ve seen is City of God.)

    Did you see the original Crash?

    … a feature film about a group of people who take sexual pleasure from car accidents. Cronenberg has said that his agent at the time told him it would wreck his career, and begged him to direct The Juror instead.

    The film stars James Spader, Holly Hunter, Elias Koteas, Deborah Kara Unger and Rosanna Arquette.

    It was opened to mixed reactions from critics. Some praised the film for its daring outline and originality, others criticised it for its graphic sexuality mixed with violence.

    It was nominated for the Golden Palm at the Festival de Cannes, in the end it won the special prize for daring, audacity, and originality.

    crash.png

    Crash (1996 film) – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

    25 Sites We Can’t Live Without – TIME magazine

    On By Rick McIn books, movies, music, product endorsementsLeave a comment

    Amazon.com

    The uber-e-tailer that never forgets its bookstore roots.

    The new print-on-demand service means customers can now order out-of-print, backlist and large-print books from several big publishers.

    Soon it will start selling DRM-free MP3s     (meaning you can copy the songs for personal use and download them to any device) from EMI and other labels out of its new music store (iTunes already does).

    And, if the rumors are true — that Amazon is in talks to buy Netflix — before long it could own the market on movies, both digital downloads (through its Unbox service) and rent-by-mail.

    Amazon.com – 25 Sites We Can’t Live Without – TIME

    I just used Amazon for several purchases. Awesome, as usual.

    flickr new SLIDESHOW not intuitive

    On By Rick McIn photos, product complaints, product endorsementsLeave a comment

    Fans of flickr like myself like to blame the parent company Yahoo! when things go wrong.

    But I question this new innovation from the flickr team:

    We’ve launched an improved version of the Slideshow.

    Here’s the feature comparison:

    Old Version — sucks
    New Version – rules!

    You wanted bigger photos!
    You wanted to see titles descriptions!
    You wanted to see your photos on a black background!

    Flickr Blog : Announcing Slideshow 2007

    If you look at photos on flickr, here’s an important tip: During slideshow mode, if you hover your mouse over the centre of any photo, an “i” should appear. Click that and you will get a text overlay on the pictures during the slideshow.

    hover-click-i1.jpg

    Invisible-until-you-hover links on photos and videos are becoming quite popular. But it’s definitely not intuitive.

    Thanks George.

    music – Weird Al Yankovic getting screwed?

    On By Rick McIn economics, music, product complaints, product endorsementsLeave a comment

    Lets say you love Weird Al Yankovic and want to make sure he gets as much money as possible from your legal purchase of his music.

    How best to do that?

    From Weird Al’s website:

    Tim Sloane of Ijamsville, MD asks:

    Al, which of these purchasing methods should I use in order to make sure the most profit gets to you: Buying one of your albums on CD, or buying one of your albums on iTunes?

    Weird Al:

    I am extremely grateful for your support, no matter which format you choose to legally obtain my music in, so you should do whatever makes the most sense for you personally. But since you ASKED… I actually do get significantly more money from CD sales, as opposed to downloads.

    This is the one thing about my renegotiated record contract that never made much sense to me. It costs the label NOTHING for somebody to download an album (no manufacturing costs, shipping, or really any overhead of any kind) and yet the artist (me) winds up making less from it. Go figure.

    So, buy a CD if you want to put your cash in Weird Al’s pocket. Or, better, buy directly from his website.

    BUT … What percentage of your CD purchase does Al and his band actually bank?

    That’s a convoluted and confusing topic. I believe Al’s cut to be 15% or less of suggested retail on CDs.

    My complaint is the oligopoly of music companies that keep (possibly) 85% of the dollar I want to pay Al.

    To me it’s almost worth downloading illegally, ripping off Al (who deserves the money) in order to stiff Volcano (Sony BMG), who I hate. (Why I hate Sony BMG.)

    Obviously in future the artist needs to sell directly to the consumer, cutting out Sony BMG and that ilk as much as possible. Illegal downloads will hopefully speed that evolution.

    But if you, like Weird Al, want to continue shoveling money into Sony BMG — buy Al’s most recent great album — Straight Outta Lynwood — through Amazon and I’ll take a 4% cut, as well. (Out of Al’s percentage, I imagine.)

    Straight Outta Lynwood

    (via Weird Al and a Messed Up iTunes Deal » Another Blogger and the digital music blog)

    iPhone review – Engadget

    On By Rick McIn Apple, product complaints, product endorsementsLeave a comment

    Engadget is the #1 site for technical reviews. They posted a massively detailed review of the iPhone so far.

    Here’s the summary:

    It’s easy to see the device is extraordinarily simple to use for such a full-featured phone and media player.

    Apple makes creating the spartan, simplified UI look oh so easy — but we know it’s not, and the devil’s always in the details when it comes to portables. To date no one’s made a phone that does so much with so little, and despite the numerous foibles of the iPhone’s gesture-based touchscreen interface, the learning curve is surprisingly low.

    It’s totally clear that with the iPhone, Apple raised the bar not only for the cellphone, but for portable media players and multifunction convergence devices in general.

    But getting things done with the iPhone isn’t easy, and anyone looking for a productivity device will probably need to look on. Its browser falls pretty short of the “internet in your pocket” claims Apple’s made, and even though it’s still easily the most advanced mobile browser on the market, its constant crashing doesn’t exactly seal the deal.

    The iPhone’s Mail app — from its myriad missing features to its un-integrated POP mail experience to its obsolete method of accessing your Gmail — makes email on the iPhone a huge chore at best.

    For us, the most interesting thing about the iPhone is its genesis and position in the market. Apple somehow managed to convince one of the most conservative wireless carriers in the world, AT&T (then Cingular), not only to buy into its device sight-unseen, but to readjust its whole philosophy of how a device and carrier should work together (as evidenced by the radically modernized and personalized activation process).

    Only a few days after launch it’s easy to see June 29th as a watershed moment that crystalized the fact that consumers will pay more for a device that does more — and treats them like a human being, not a cellphone engineer. Imagine that.

    But is the iPhone worth the two year contract with the oft-maligned AT&T and its steep price of admission?

    Hopefully we gave you enough information about the iPhone’s every detail to make an informed decision — despite the iPhone’s many shortcomings, we suspect the answer for countless consumers will be a resounding yes.

    iPhone review, part 3: Apps and settings, camera, iTunes, wrap-up – Engadget

    My answer … WAIT.

    Lake Quinault Lodge, Washington State

    On By Rick McIn food, McCharles family, product endorsements, travel, traveloguesLeave a comment

    En route to Idaho, my parents and I were happy we scheduled dinner at the “Roosevelt Room”. The best meal we’ve had in a long, long time.

    Recommended.

    quinalt.jpg

    Ancient towering trees…sun splashed lawn…a tranquil lakeside setting

    Welcome to Washington State and the glorious Olympic Peninsula.

    Find your true retreat at historic Lake Quinault Lodge, a landmark on the shores of beautiful Lake Quinault. Listed on the National Register of Historic Places, the Lodge is the perfect place to leave the cares of the work-a-day world behind.

    Lake Quinault Lodge, Olympic National Forest, WA

    travellers love Gadling

    On By Rick McIn blogs, product endorsements, travelLeave a comment

    gadlinglogo1.gif

    Man, it makes my head spin just to think of all the things we’ve covered, the gazillions of articles we’ve read and written about, trips we’ve done, blogs we’ve reviewed, snarky thoughts we’ve had on everything from airlines to zippers. And all the amazing folks who have joined up to make gadling one of the best travel blogs out there.

    Gadling’s 10,000th Post – Gadling

    I see nonsense on the internet that blogging has “peaked”.

    What about the long tail? Cumulative wisdom?

    From the Gadling photo pool – the most beautiful city I’ve seen – Istanbul.

    392882889_cdd2dfb0b2.jpg
    Blue Mosque – flickr

    … OOPS.

    Gadling is long past 10,000 posts. I missed that milestone as I have so many others.

    advertising is dead to me

    On By Rick McIn Apple, dead to me, product endorsementsLeave a comment

    Do you hate advertising as much as I do?

    Unless you make an effort to avoid them, you’ll see 5000 ads / day.

    … billboards, sandwich boards, TV commercials, radio spots, posters, newspaper inserts, storefront promos, magazine ads, web banners, spam emails, product placements, infomercials, sponsorship logos, advertorials, and so on …

    adbusters

    Why are you wasting my time?

    Advertisers, I promise NOT to buy your product if you pester me.

    You might ask, “What about those ads on this blog, Rick?”

    … good question.

    Well, … the Google text ads are contextual. The least offensive and intrusive possible. And they are supposed to relate to topics on this page.

    google-ad.jpg

    Or you might ask, about those video ads you post on this site. “Rick, why are you shilling the Apple iPhone?

    I might say those are entertainments. Funny. Or interesting. They may or may not inspire you to purchase a product.

    The things I specifically recommend are listed under my product endorsement category.

    That’s the only kind of advertising I want to see. Specific advice from people who have some expertise in the area. Especially those I know personally.

    If you tip me to something I might be interested in buying, I should give you a small commission.

    workbuyconsume_article.jpg
    Adbusters