FYI to anyone that doesn’t have a clue and needs one — the new Girl Talk CD just came out at midnight. It’s called ‘Feed the Animals’ and it’s a 40-minute mashup of over 300 songs — you’ll know at least 100 of them. If you need a work-out mix, this is it. If you need to dance your face off, this is the CD.

No sophomore slump here — get his last one ‘Night Ripper’ if you like this one.

The new one is free or pay-what-you-want. IT’S AMAZING! I wish everyday was a Girl Talk CD Release party!!!

I use iTunes when I listen to songs. My buddy listens using Winamp. We both have Last.fm and PC’s. We have similar music collections, if not same songs here and there.

We like to instant message [IM] each other and listen to songs or entire albums together. He’s in Virginia, I’m in Buffalo.

To do this, we both IM each other and say “ok – hit play – NOW”. We do that, then we IM each other to get each other sync’d up – “10 secs”, “20 secs”, then we are basically in sync.

I WISH IT WAS EASIER. In fact, I wish I could just “tune in” to his music player. It wouldn’t even have to stream the song to me if I already have the same song on my computer, it just needs to start playing the song exactly sync’d with his.

This seems like a plugin that we could both install — like Last.fm, sitting in our system tray. Or maybe it needs to be in iTunes and Winamp.

I’d also love the ability for us to basically create a playlist that plays for both of us — let’s say it’s 10 songs long — he’d get to put 5 songs into the queue, and I’d get to put 5 songs in the queue. This way we could expose each other to new songs that we really love.

It’s basically like a radio station with interactivity and customization to just the people [friends] listening. This could be a few of my friends and I doing this together — exposing each other to the same songs.

I don’t know what the revenue model is — but maybe it’s “buy this track”, and if the thing really takes off you’ll probably have influencers and have data on what tracks are getting the most exposure between friends. But hell, I’d personally pay money for this software — but you’d likely need to make it free to gain traction.

Here’s an example IM session between us regarding a new track by Wolf Parade: [pardon the vulgarities] (more…)

Valleywag is reporting Google is digging around to acquire Digg. A few months ago I felt the best acquirer would be CNET — I wasn’t thinking of the bigger picture. I was thinking Digg/CNET would be a natural fit, given their focus on technology news [Digg is still primarily for the geek, but has slowly diversified].

Digg is the social bookmarking utility of the web for news. How many websites out there have a ‘digg this’ button on them? I have no clue, but it’s huge.

That little Digg image that loads on all those webpages loads from Digg’s web servers — meaning that Digg knows exactly when their Digg image loads (meaning a webpage load) and thus can see how many pageloads a specific webpage is getting and how often. If a Digg image was on every webpage of Techcrunch, Digg would know exactly how many pageviews Techcrunch gets. Digg would know what webpages a user views during a session across the web (on webpages that have a Digg image loading) and if that user was doing Google searches at the same time, Google could determine higher relevant results based on the user’s behavior.

Digg has a TON of data in the back-end — valuable data that shows them the most popular viewed webpages on the web at any given time — not to mention when their own users ‘digg’ a webpage.

But Techcrunch doesn’t have a Digg image/button on their webpages — they have an AddThis button on their webpages — which contains a Digg image, but it isn’t loading off of Digg’s servers, so Digg has no clue the total Techcrunch pageviews happening — AddThis does. Another competitor of AddThis is ShareThis.

Digg should be an AddThis/ShareThis, and allow users to easily ‘del.icio.us’, ‘twitter’, ‘facebook share’, etc, the webpages — because as websites replace their Digg button with an AddThis or ShareThis, Digg loses tons of valuable data — and tons of value.

Back to Google acquiring Digg — this is like Google acquiring Feedburner. There’s not much of a business model now, but the back-end data will improve the relevancy of Google’s search results, which is worth a lot to Google.

…or Yahoo …or Microsoft …or Ask …

Since Yahoo just threw in the towel to Google, and Microsoft threw in the towel on acquiring Yahoo, and Ask.com hasn’t made any progress in market share in how many years…

The losers need to get together and join forces in a competitive effort against Google. Banded together, MSFT/YHOO/IACI would reach ~33% of all US searches. That’s nothing to sneeze at.

They need to pool their resources and focus on one platform. I’d create an independent company and pool the appropriate human, technological, and financial resources to it. Either take MSN AdCenter or Yahoo’s Panama and make that the lead horse, then make it the better horse against Google.

I’ll now include the only video clip Microsoft, Yahoo, and IAC executives need to watch together:

“We either heal… NOW… as a TEAM…… or we will die, …. as individuals.” – Al Pacino, Any Given Sunday

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Yahoo has now signed a paid search agreement with Google. People are saying the obvious – this gives Google monopoly power – and will drive down bid prices on Yahoo, which will make Yahoo need Google even more in the future. I can agree with that, but given Yahoo’s beating, it’s tough for them to turn down the increased revenue they’ll be seeing from the Google deal.

Yahoo basically did say “we give up” in regards to the paid search market. Such a shame too, considering they were the leader [and purchased the founder of this technology - Overture].

But what I’d like to see now is Yahoo and AOL merge. They are so alike, it’s sick. And they control nearly all the display advertising companies that exist (aside from Google’s Doubleclick and Microsoft’s aQuantative).

And since Google now has the deal with Yahoo, Google likely wouldn’t oppose an AOL/Yahoo merger (given Google’s 5% stake in AOL). Then, Yahoo/AOL would have a combined XXXmm daily pageviews and YYYmm monthly unique visitors.

I think privacy concerns have lessened these days and they could put that combined power into delivery very targeted display ads. I’d also get in cahoots with the ISPs and track users’ webpage viewing habits even more precisely [knowing every single webpage a user visits, not just those that have Yahoo/AOL display ads on them].

I don’t actually know much about health/fitness web startups, so maybe this is already being done but I’m just unaware. I know some people publicly are “fatblogging” (the practice of blogging about their daily struggle to get in better shape).

Mint.com is a cool service for your finances — and it doesn’t require much work at all; it automatically goes into your financial accounts, pulls information for you, and puts that data into context that actually means something to you.

Health/fitness is a different animal that would require the user to input their habits daily, but I think it could be made simple. This website would allow me to easily input what I eat during the day [quickly/easily], what I drink during the day, and what exercise I do during the day (and duration). It can then estimate the calories and fat [and other nutritional info - vitamin c, iron, etc]. And based on knowing my shape, size, weight, height, and body fat (maybe that is calculated at a health club; or via one of those scales you can buy at the store). Daily or weekly it could also ask for your weight — and maybe it’ll be able to more accurately calculate calories burned and such at that point.

It could put you on a plan to “budget” your eating, drinking, and work-out habits. You could set goals — losing 10 lbs in 10 weeks, or something. During the 10 weeks, it can tell you if you’re ahead of the curve, or behind, or on a good pace. It’ll estimate calorie/fat intake you need.

The interface would be super simple. I could input eat/drink/work-out stuff easily via my webpage [and see what my peers are up to -- kind of a Twitter but for health/fitness stuff]. Heck, I could even Twitter when I eat/drink/work-out [i.e. "@healthy just drank 12 oz water"].

It would show me all these pretty charts and such. It would be my website for my fatblogging. It would give me tips on what I’m eating — if I’m eating white bread, it’ll suggest wheat bread to increase my fiber intake. If I’m drinking too much coffee, it’ll suggest I try cutting down on that. Kind of like Mint.com does with my finances [i.e. "get a better interest rate with X credit card instead"].

Revenues come from any advertisers related to health [healthy foods, gym memberships, free food samples, etc].

If this is already being done, great! Please let me know in the comments as I’m looking for something like this.

Birthday Alarm. You go to the website, it crawls through your address book, sends out an email to all your friends and simply asks them for their birthday. Free sign-up, or users pay $14/yr to have ecards they can send to those friends.

Such a simple idea. Has 50mm users right now grossing $4mm revenues/year. Had 50mm more users years ago — might not be an opportunity to get those other 50mm (given Facebook, Bebo, MySpace these days), but I think there is the opportunity still.

More info at TechCrunch.

I just watched An Inconvenient Truth — the movie by(?) Al Gore that is about the impact of Global Warming and what this globe will go through together in next 10 years (and more) if we don’t dramatically change our ways. The facts are just undisputed in this documentary/movie.

The movie is a must see for everyone in this world.

Which got me thinking — considering my last post, in which I claim the book ‘The Richest Man in Babylon’ is a must read by everyone in this world.

It would be great to have a website (digg-like) that has various categories and encourages people to tell what they feel is Must See, Must Hear, Must Read, or Must Do. Whether it’s stuff to truly help the Environment (recycle; watch ‘An Inconvenient Truth’), or help ones-self (stop smoking), or even non-urgent things such as a category called Comedy (must see ‘Little Miss Sunshine’), or Music (must see a ‘Bruce Springsteen’ concert).

Everyone could rally for things they agree with and each day a newsletter could even go out to people with those latest things that reached a ‘tipping point’ relative to the number of users on our Site.

This month I finally paid off all credit card debt I’ve been hanging onto since various crazy entrepreneurial excursions in my past life.

About 3.5 years ago I contacted a debt management company [non-profit] that helped out a lot. I paid them $39/month to be a customer of theirs, but it was worth it, because they were able to negotiate my interest rates down with all the credit card companies I had outstanding debts with (totaling ~$23k). I closed out all 5 credit cards and then paid them a lump sum $500 each month that was EFT’d out of my bank account each month. I was on a 5-year plan to pay off my debt at that rate. When you work that out, it’s $30k — on $23k debt — which honestly was more like $18-$20k in debt, but the finance charges were really adding up.

Out of the 5 creditors, HSBC was the best – they had me at 9.99% on my ~$4k debt, and they received notice that I was trying to be responsible and get out of debt by hiring a debt management company, and they wrote me saying they were going to charge no further interest — 0% for rest of the debt! I have told that to many people and spread good will about HSBC.

I’m sure some of you have plenty of debt and think there’s no possible way to get out of it. Well, there is a way. The problem with the USA and society is that we just buy what we want, when we want, even if we don’t have the means to afford it. The other problem with us is that when we come into a lump sum of cash from something, we think, “Oh my god! I just got $1,200! What am I going to spend it on?! The new flat-screen or a down-payment on that leased ’08 automobile?!” No, you should be saving and investing it — even if in a CD that earns 3% — interest accrues interest accrues interest.

Spending the money on something totally not necessary is the worst thinking — and that’s why the majority of America is in debt. I use to always say I’m living my days to their greatest extent, because “I might not be here tomorrow.” Well – truth be told for most of us – you’re going to be here tomorrow. And the day after that. And 20 years after that.

If you’re not saving money, or actively working to pay off your debts so that you can save, you’re doing yourself an injustice.

Did you know that the average wealthy person spends ~8.5 hours per month managing their finances (budgeting, finding better interest rates, paying bills, etc), and the average poor/lower/middle-class person spends ~1 hour per month? You know those people that are in super healthy shape and jog every single day, even though they don’t need to? They probably spend 25 hours per month doing a good cardio work-out, while the average overweight person spends 3-5 hours per month of cardio — likely not even as good work-outs.

The real wealthy people in this world aren’t buying $5,000 suits and the latest Porsche. Those are the people making big salaries, but don’t have a pot to piss in. (ok, not all – but they aren’t being very careful with their finances – they are living a life of luxury, that they most likely couldn’t sustain the rest of their life if they lost their job today). I recall hearing around the time eBay went IPO that Pierre Omidyar, sitting on billions of dollars in stocks, drove a Volkswagen Jetta. I imagine the same is true for Warren Buffet, Bill Gates, and tons of other truly wealthy people out there.

It’s all a mindset — and if you want to change your mindset and perception — I highly recommend a quick book (30-60 min read) called The Richest Man in Babylon by Clason ($0.75 used at half.com). I was never taught the mindset in that book by my parents. You either are raised with that mindset, or you aren’t — in my case, as a cocky 18 year old (with my brand new sports car I leased as soon as I got my first real job that paid nearly 1.5x my Mom’s salary), I lined up 5 credit cards and couldn’t get my head above water.

That book is the greatest piece of advice I could give anyone that’s in debt — and either thinks they have no hope of getting out of it; or thinks they can get out of it (but years later find they are still in debt — and won’t face the fact that they are an over-spender and not AT ALL focused on getting out of debt, because they think they’re going to “make it someday” by some crazy means).

The other book I recommend reading (at least the first 20 pages — you can likely skip the rest of the book) is the Millionaire Next Door ($0.75 used via that link).

This financial life isn’t a sprint, it’s a marathon. Rich and wealthy are two different things — go become wealthy — yes, even on your measly income (if you feel it’s measly) — you can become wealthy.

Special thanks to Eric – he recommended both of those books months back, I stalled for like 4 months before I finally cracked it open [Babylon book], and then I kicked myself for not reading it earlier. Eric has attempted for many many years to show me a different mindset.

My Mom brought up a good point — if someone sends a link to their photos that they posted on Kodak.com, then can she get them printed at Walgreens? I believe the answer is no — and I don’t believe you can download high-resolution photos off the Kodak site and then reupload them to Walgreens.

Would be great if everyone used one website that users could then get the photos printed where-ever they wanted. But the chances of everyone switching their ways to some new photo site as the defacto, are slim. And the chances of Kodak.com allowing you to print at Walgreens, or vice-versa, are even slimmer.