July 2007 Archives
Blackle is the tougher, punk rock version of Google. Heap Media claims the darker color saves energy and that they created it for environmental reasons. See. Barflies.net is helping save the planet.
In January 2007 a blog post titled Black Google Would Save 750 Megawatt-hours a Year proposed the theory that a black version of the Google search engine would save a fair bit of energy due to the popularity of the search engine. Since then there has been skepticism about the significance of the energy savings that can be achieved and the cost in terms of readability of black web pages.
I think they just want to show off how punk rock they are. Plus, black goes with everything.
I know that many people HATED the submarine ride back in the day (claustrophobia, boredom, cheesy broken mermaids!) but my sweetheart and I were able to get on the newest reincarnation of the Finding Nemo Submarine Voyage in less than 45 minutes on July 3rd and I am geeeeeeking out about it. We'd gone a week or two ago at 8am on a Sunday and were greeted with a 5.5-6hr line!
First, let me say that the storyline is choppy (Nemo's lost, look out for jellyfish!, found him, now he's at school, joy and fun, the end) and they added stuff that no one cared about (the volcano search?) but overall, it's super cute. The characters are also sadly animated and projected instead of being cheesy animatronic fish, which I think many who are used to Disney would argue is pretty awesome. My favorite elements: the anglerfish scene; the beautiful, undersea coral; the seagulls on a buoy who intermittently yell "Mine?" and flap their little wings; the captain who lets us know that new technology called "sonar hydrophones" (my new band name) lets us listen to the undersea creatures. The first few minutes are non-Nemo but once we hear about the technology, the fun begins! I'll spare you who have not yet enjoyed it with too much details here but suffice to say, I clapped like a 3-yr old most of the way through it.
Many people have asked if the ride is claustrophobic but I didn't feel that way though the Midwesterners who kept talking the whole 10+ minute ride didn't help me feel particularly comfy, but I digress!
You are loaded down a left or right spiral staircase and seated on a bench with twenty seats; you're back-to-back with the other twenty who fit on the other aisle. You get your own porthole, though if you are over 5'6" expect to crouch to see anything. You're then escorted off the sub with an instrumental rendition of "Beyond the Sea"...sigh.
All in all, it was magical and reminded me that Disney will never cease being a place where you can forget about work and school and cleaning the house, and whatever responsibilities you may have and just relax...that is, after you pay the steep Disney entrance toll ;)
I'm sort of addicted to this stuff. It's light, vanilla scent is just the thing on a hot day, or after a cool shower on a REALLY hot day, when fragrance is just too much. The spray has a nice feel, and it's not at all as "sparkly" as you might think (or even hope). The problem (if it is one), is that this is a product marketed for 7-year-olds! Or even younger.
According to Ad Age, “Girls have started using deodorant younger and younger,” said Dave Knox, assistant brand manager at P&G overseeing the body-spray launch. “If you don’t target the consumer in her formative years, you’re not going to be relevant through the rest of her life.”
This makes perfect sense, right? P&G figures that if you don't get 'em young, you won't get 'em at all. So, they've come up with Sparkle Body Spray, and an advertising strategy designed to capture youngsters where they live - online.
Supposedly, imc², an "interactive ad agency" (go ask Lauren what that is) has created a first for the Procter & Gamble brand - 'character' blogs wherein each "Sparkle Body Spray Girl" has her own posts on the website, written in a tone and language to match her unique personality. Rose is a romantic. Vanilla is a hip music lover. Tropical is a cheerleader. And Peach is into computers. (I'm Vanilla - go figure). Some folks (like those over at the Big Blog Company) are ecstatic. Others are less so, citing "fake blogs" and "fake people" as a sign of mass marketing manipulation that poor smelly 7-year-old girls won't be able to figure out.
In fact, the uproar was so loud that P&G has pulled the ad campaign. According the CBS News Marketplace, "Procter & Gamble has quashed its Secret Sparkle Body Spray ad campaign that targeted preteen girls with a deodorant body spray.
The move comes after the Children’s Advertising Review Unit complained that P&G was ignoring its guidelines for advertising to children. The CARU rules say that “products inappropriate for children should not be advertised to children. This is especially true for products labelled ‘Keep out of reach of children.’”
The offending deodorant spray line carried a ‘Keep out of reach of children’ label, but nonetheless P&G’s advertising for the product was directly aimed at preteen girls as young as seven."
Damn. Now you can't find the Sparkle Girl blogs, nor can you find them on the "immersive online advertising" on www.neopets.com, or at www.secret.com. And what totally fun stuff will Vanilla be doing this weekend? What about her iPod downloads? Now I'm worried that if I can't find the Sparkle Girls, I won't be able to find my Sparkle Body Spray. Maybe P&G will pull that too. And that will just stink.
Why don't you have an iPhone yet? No time to camp out, not available in your favorite color?
Peter Basch from LA2Day asks us to tell the truth, "We are too poor," but before you get despondent, consider his great pointers on how to reject the iPhone, including ways "to make the iPhone early adopter feel like a bit of a git."
Here then are a few positive answers that will leave you one-up:
"Tell you the truth, I'm kind of over it, now that it's available"
"Hope you’re keeping your old phone around, because you'll be sending your iPhone back for a new battery after your 1-year warranty has expired, but before your 2-year contract is up"
"Without GPS it's really kind of, you know, lame"
"I do a lot of calling from the car, and I need voice dialing or, at least, tactile feedback so I can keep my eyes on the road"
"It doesn't have a Bluetooth A2DP profile for listening to music with wireless headphones (note: this one is particularly effective, as nobody knows what it means)"
"Family plan costs $30 a month extra, not the $10 you expect - read the 5pt type in your AT&T contract"
"Thank god I don’t need to be writing emails all the time, and, if I did, a keyboarded phone, like a Blackberry, would be a lot better"
And then, of course, there's always my personal favorite - the truth - which is: Call me a Luddite but I really only want my phone to do one thing - call people!
