Got Blue-Footed Booby!
Thanks to the World Wildlife Fund, we’re now proud owners of a blue-footed booby doll.
Kinda cool, and better than the umbrellas they sent the past two years that broke after just a few uses.
Hey There Hurley x2
Just had another run in with Jorge Garcia from LOST. I was just sitting in the car with napping kids when I see him going into his car parked right in front of ours. With the kids sleeping, all I could do was wave hello, and “Uncle Hurley” (as the kids call him) waved back.
Sorry, I didn’t take a paparazzi pic since I know Jorge doesn’t dig those pics but is very willing to take a picture if approached politely. I still get a kick when I randomly come across stars from LOST doing their daily business around town.
What’s New in the English Language?
Our quirky English language has more than 100 new additions this year according to Merriam-Webster. Here’s a sampling to add to your mangous vocabulary:
Carbon footprint (1999): the negative impact that something (as a person or business) has on the environment; specifically: the amount of carbon emitted by something during a given period.
Flash mob (1987): a group of people summoned (as by e-mail or text message) to a designated location at a specified time to perform an indicated action before dispersing.
Frenemy (1977): one who pretends to be a friend but is actually an enemy.
Sock puppet (1959): a false online identity used for deceptive purposes.
Staycation (2005): a vacation spent at home or nearby.
Vlog (2002): a blog that contains video material.
Webisode (1996): an episode esp. of a TV show that may or may not have been telecast but can be viewed at a Web site.
Top Viral Videos for June
Advertising Age lists its top viral videos for June. Hmm, interesting… LeBron James has two videos in the top ten. Carl’s Jr. occupies the 6th and 10th spots. A bra commercial is at #3. Mountain Dew is new at the #7 position.
Serious Technical Issues
Pulpconnection has been experiencing some serious technical issues recently. Hosting provider Dreamhost has provided some support to no avail. So if the site vanishes again, you know there are still problems.
Fortunately, I know a smart dude who’s been helping troubleshoot the root of the problem (thanks Ryan Kanno!). That and I’m doing the brute force method of maximizing server resources to see if that helps. Pulpconnection will be moving to a Dreamhost Private Server (PS) to see if having more dedicated resources can temporarily overcome the real technical issues.
The switch to Dreamhost PS won’t mean anything to viewers since it should be one of those “seamless” transitions.
Petco Pearl City Now Open
The new Petco location in Pearl City is now open for business according to this sign.
Your Social Network and You
What does your favorite social network say about you? There’s a study being published that makes correlations like LinkedIn users gravitate to soap operas and MySpacers tend not to exercise. If you use Twitter then the study indicates you’re more interested in the hunka chunka than users of other social networks.
Other Twitterer behaviors?
They also especially like pop culture, with music, movies, TV and reading, ranking higher than average. And their buying habits mirror that. They’re more likely to buy books, movies, shoes and cosmetics online than the other groups.
How do they keep going? Coffee, apparently. Some 31% buy coffee online, far above the average 21% of other social networkers.
How accurate do you think this study is? Go read more.
Disney’s BFF Extended Edition Marketing Genius
What genius Disney has using new school lingo like BFF in their latest DVD release, Princess Protection Program: Royal B.F.F Extended Edition. What other marketing terms could there be?
How about the LOL version? Or the even better, ROFLMAO rendition. I’d be sure to get products tagged as ZOMG, and the NSFW edition is sure to draw some attention. Too tempting would be the WTF! edit.
What a goldmine Disney’s tapped!
The Alien Ninja Still Lives
Here I had given up on the Alien Ninja, not seeing any significant progress on this project for some time. But who am I to understand the ways of a ninja, especially an alien one!
Yes, the Alien Ninja series is still alive according to this interview with movie producer Sheri Bryant.
In the meantime, I’m in post on our first web series called “Alien Ninja”. I wanted to get into the new media space and thought that a sci-fi comedy would be the best way to go. So we shot for a week in Hawaii and ended up with something very funny! Who can resist an Alien who happens to also be a Ninja crash landed on Oahu?
So despite the non-existent domains at alienninja.tv and alienninja.net (these both now default to GoDaddy.com ads), the Alien Ninja could still be making an online appearance in the foreseeable future. Then you could see some mad acting skills! 😉
Extras for Alien Ninja from Gee Why on Vimeo.
Starbucks Giving Away Free Ice Cream to Facebookers
If you’re lucky, you might be able to get free Starbucks ice cream as a Facebook fan of the green mermaid logo.
As part of National Ice Cream month, Facebook users can install the Starbucks Share application and see if you can get one of the highly sought 20,000 free pints of ice cream. Supposedly 800 coupons are given out each hour (don’t try now since this hour’s 800 is already gone). From the wording of the promotion, it sounds like you pick a friend to gift the free ice cream to?? Promotion ends July 19. Good luck!
At worst, you can still get a $1 off coupon for Starbucks ice cream.
The Dance DJ Trifecta
First, there was Paul van Dyk’s Best of
on sale at Amazon. iTunes followed with Jason Nevins presenting Ultra Weekend 5. Now the mainstream dance and trance DJ trifecta is complete with Amazon’s pre-release of Paul Oakenfold’s Perfecto Vegas. 2 CDs worth of tunes for $4!
Awww man, my Amazon affiliate account is still shut down. 🙁 Now that Governor Linda Lingle has vetoed bill HB1405, I hope Amazon reactivates its affiliate program for Hawaii soon.
About the Amazon Kindle and the Scare of iPods
I don’t have an Amazon Kindle but have heard good things about it. I’m old school with books and would rather have printed material for the most part. This Fast Company article about the Kindle is pretty interesting and worth a read.
The potential showdown with Apple’s iPod line is provoking and as a non-publisher, reading how traditional publishing works and how Amazon is changing the game is fascinating. Overall, a very well written article!