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Back in June, I ran a quick post about the Pure Digital FlipVideo Camera over at DVGadgets. I was so taken by this new camera, that I purchased the 30 minute version the very next week.  And I wasn’t alone - over 300,000 Flips have sold since they came out, and the company expects to sell 1 Million over its first year.  That would make it the second largest Camcorder manufacturer in the world behind Sony.  Not bad for a new product.

How has the experience been over the last few months?  My wife and I haven’t had this much fun with a video camera. Ever.

We are acknowledged video freaks. We bought the Canon GL-1 when it launched years ago, and have a variety of Sony and Panasonic MiniDV (standard and Widescreen) camcorders to go along with our digital cameras as well.

But here’s the rub. When we’re heading out and know we want to take video, we’ll grab one of our camcorders, as well as one of our tripods if the occasion warrants. When you want high-quality video, nothing beats videotape. We very rarely just want pictures, but on occasion will also have our digital camera packed away somewhere in our car - “Just in Case”.

The problem comes when we’re just out and about on a casual trip and didn’t plan on taking any video. And that’s where the FlipVideo comes to the rescue.

Small and very light, Jean has taken to bringing the FlipVideo everywhere in her purse. After 10 days of using it, she has claimed it as her own. The casual, candid, everyday family moments that were usually a story to tell to my parents over the phone are now being preserved and shared in video form with my family over the web. Extremely easily.

Although the FlipVideo comes with easy-to-use software to upload your videos to Grouper or YouTube, I choose to upload all our video to stashSpace. Yes, I am a co-founder of the company [disclosure], but my free account at stashSpace lets me trim the starts & ends off of the individual clips, and arrange them in a movie sequence. This way, I can share one movie (made up of a number of clips) with my family, instead of having to share a whole range of individual clips. The video management features (movies, collections, tagging, search, etc.) make it very easy to customize movies for different family members, as well as just keep track of all the video that you take.

I was hoping the FlipVideo would be a convenient would be an easy-to-use way for Jean to take video and post it online for our families without having to get me involved. I am glad these hopes were not in vain.

What else can I say except if you are currently using a photo sharing or video sharing service, buy a FlipVideo now! I very rarely feel this strong about product recommendations, but this is a video device that makes video accessible across all generations.

Even if you own a digital camcorder or camera that can take video, you still need to go out and buy a FlipVideo now! It is not a replacement for your current camera or camcorder - but it will allow you to preserve so many more of your precious moments on video for the future.

Category Web/Tech | 1 Comment »

Congratulations Cheryl and Colleen! You are both winners of June’s Get a Gadget Contest, and will each receive a free ZoFunk Video iPod case.

Be sure to come back and check out our July Get a Gadget Contest.  You will absolutely “Flip” over this month’s prize!

Category Get A Gadget Contest | 2 Comments »

The only true constant is change, it’s how we deal with it that matters.

This is how Leigh Davis starts out her newest blog (fourth blog, I believe) located at Eternal Flux.  It just started at the beginning of this month, but if her other blogs are any indication, it will soon be chock-full of posts and good information.

Leigh’s opening to Eternal Flux is very similar to one of my favorites - “What happens happens - Get over it.” 

So often people will encounter changes in their life that were unplanned or unexpected, and spend too much time aimlessly complaining or wondering “Why did this have to happen to me???” instead of figuring out a way to deal with it and move forward. It’s always good advice, and if you do want to complain a little bit - that’s OK!  Just make it short and then move on!

Leigh is married with two daughters and two cats, Colby and Sugar.  She is a part-time blogger who also runs a MaryKay distributorship along with working full time.  Phew! That must be a load.  Keep your head up, and your dream in clear site Leigh, and you and hubby can make it to Key West!  Go For It!

Category BlogNuts | No Comments »

When it’s attached to the harriest, funkiest anime protector you’ll ever see. 

Now I’m normally not much for watching anime, but my son and I watched a couple of episodes from the newest DVD set from Illumitoon Entertainment - Bobobo-bo Bobobo. (check out the Official Website)

It’s a fast-paced anime series of standard good vs. bad fare that has you finding out that Bobobo’s second biggest weakness is pasta (because you don’t have to floss, and it tastes good with fruit or butter sauce) — in fact, he wants to become a “Pasta Primadonna”.

The writing has some major tongue twisters in it that my kids got a kick out of.  My favorite was:

“Holy kowabunga.  What a mind-hoggin noggin. That guy’s wearing an entire ice cream parlor on his head.  Frosty.  Looks like he went for a single and came back with a double dip.”

While my son’s favorite was the Spring Drum Festival from Episode #8:

“To swing out sweet, go go go with the beat.
spiky hairs and shaggy doo nappy locks peach fuzz too.
It’s in your nose, and it runs to your toes.
Just turn your butt around, cause you are upside down
Fling em to the sky.  Fling em to the ground.
Let your buggers fly, don’t flick em in your eye.
Summer has begun.  For fun without a care.
Forget your sticky hair and smelly underwear.
Go grab your almnac and nifty sack of tea.
You have got the world to crack and that’s ok with me.
Come on, Come on, it’s time to get movin’ on. 
Celebrate!  Celebrate!”

You can watch for Bobobo on Cartoon Network, or buy the Bobobo DVDs  (Volume 1 has episodes 1-4, Volume 2 has episodes 5 -8) for $19.98 each. 

Category Sponsored Reviews | No Comments »

Building traffic to a new blog can be a challenge, especially if you are new to the blogging community all together. One of the best ways to start getting traffic is by getting links to your site from other blogs through link exchanges. Basically, you agree to trade links between your sites, either as a link within their Blogroll, or as a link within a blog post that reviews your site (preferred).

I saw another option that I hadn’t seen before over at Total Web Review, that can get you as many as 120 links at once. Read more below to find out more.

———copy and paste the Viralink and instructions below this line———

Below is a matrix of 120 stars, I have already added a link to my blog onto one of the stars, all you need to do is copy and paste the grid into your blog and add your own link to one of the other spare stars, and tell others to do the same!

Viralink

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New Addition: When I receive a ping back once you have added the Viralink to your site I will add your link to this grid, and each person who copies the grid from here will also link to your site!

———copy and paste the Viralink and instructions above this line———

Also, be sure to write your own original introduction paragraph so you (and others participating) are not penalized by search engines for duplicate content!

Category Weblogs | 5 Comments »

I told myself that I would never buy a gun for my kids, and I’ve stuck to that for the last ten years.  I finally broke down and bought a rifle last October — but I justified the purchased because it was only an air rifle (although it can hit targets as far as 1,000 feet away).

My son likes it because it has a magnified scope, and he’s gotten pretty good at hitting targets as far as 400 feet away.  But over the winter, I didn’t have a chance to do much with it, because I usually don’t get done with work until after it’s dark (or darn close).

So I’ve been thinking of getting a night vision rifle scope, and found an online site that has a great selection. Unfortunately it’s summer now, so I would have to stay up extra late to use one… I might need to wait until next winter.

Optics Planet also has a large selection of other night vision equipment — ranging from camera viewers to binoculars, so check it out and have some late-night fun!

Category Sponsored Reviews | No Comments »

Tyler Cruz is a 23-year old Internet Entrpreneur that hails from Vancouver Island in British Columbia.

Tyler got his start on the Internet with Movie-Vault.com, a site that generated substantial content from both Tyler and a group of volunteer movie critics after being started as a homework assignment for one of his classes.  It currently houses over 1,800 movie reviews, with a goal of reaching 5,000!

There are some great articles on the site about domain brokering, an area in which Tyler himself made over $23,000 brokering the sale of someone else’s domain.  He has a great perspective on domain name values, which I take to mean that very rarely is the value of a domain in the name.  Rather it is in the value of the content, the brand, and the network that the author has been able to create.

We’ll be tracking his income in our upcoming monthly series ”What Blogger’s earn.”  THe majority of Tyler’s income comes from advertising on his sites, so he calculates his monthly earnings based on his average earnings over the last six months.  It’s already sizeable - $256/day - and he’s thrown down the PPP gauntlet, vowing to overtake Colleen as top network owner.  It’s a lofty goal, but if experience is any indicator, Tyler should be able to give it a good run!

Category BlogNuts | 4 Comments »

It seems like online sweepstakes sites are popping up like flies, but here’s one with a decidedly American Idol twist — You get to vote for who wins the prize! 

Here’s how it works — prizes are posted at whogets.com for about 20-30 days.  For the first half of the contest, any member of the site (it’s free with no spam) can enter to win one of the posted prizes (one entry per prize is allowed).  After this initial posting period, seven finalists are randomly selected to be in the contest finals.

And here’s the twist — each of the seven finalists gets to post as to why they should or want to win, and over the next 7 to 10 days, the community gets to discuss and vote on who should win the prize! 

Category Online Contests, Sponsored Reviews | No Comments »

I found a Best Scenery Picture Contest at JAB. You just need to submit your best scenery picture along with a mention of their blog url on the picture (It will be used on their blog as an ad, I believe). Here’s my submission, a picture taken from our backyard toward our garden with our field in the background.

It was taken last November, just as our winter snowfall was about to hit (you can see it coming down in the background). We were wildly trying to pick everything up in our yard, as we were shortly covered (in only a couple of hours) with 12 inches of snow, which lasted until our spring thaw in early April.

Category Online Contests | 1 Comment »

Here’s the first in a new series of contests & giveaways for some cool gear for your electronics.

First up? Two ultra-stylish ZoFunk Video iPod protective cases (No, they do not include an iPod!) perfectly suitable for your 60 or 80GB Video iPod. Don’t have one? Enter the contest and win the ZoFunk case for a gift for your friend or family member that does!

Contest Rules
I’ll make it simple for this one. Everyone knows that the iPod screens are notorious for scratching if you even look at them the wrong way. I want to hear your stories about how your iPod screen got scratched — Did you drop it? Did your existing case break? Did your cat chew on the screen (mine did)?

I’ll be selecting one winner based on the completely subjective opinion of which comment or post my wife and kids find to be the funniest/stupidest/most outrageous/most unfortunate/etc., so spend some time on your post and be creative (but honest!).

The other winner will be randomly chosen, and you can earn entries into the drawing four ways:

• 1 Entry
  Comment on my ZoFunk iPod cover review over at DVGadgets.com. This needs to be a real comment (i.e. not just a “Hey” or “Hi”, but a real entry about your existing iPod case, how your iPod got scratched, how cool these covers look, etc.).
• 1 Entry
  Comment on this post about the contest and how much you’d like to win the iPod case, or how your iPod screen got scratched.
• 2 Entries + Bonus Entry
  Post a story on your own blog about your iPod scratches or how much you’d like to win this iPod cover and link to the ZoFunk iPod cover review (2 entries). Earn an extra entry by linking to this contest page.
• 1 Entry + Bonus Entry
  Digg this contest page. Be the first to digg it and email me to earn an extra bonus entry!

Do all of these actions listed above, and you will get up to 6 entries into the competition. You can submit up to a total of three blog postings to get a total of 12 entries.

**IMPORTANT**
Please email me at lugnut22 [at] gmail [dot] com with the subject “June Contest” when you are done and let me know which of the these activities you have completed (along with the link to your posts). If you don’t email me, you will not be entered into the contest!

Also, this contest is only open to residents of the United States who have blogs with over 20 total postings (i.e. no new blogs just for the contest!)

Get your post up by June 15th, and you’ll receive an extra bonus entry (for each post) into the contest! The contest will be closed June 23rd at 5:00 PDT, and the winners will be announced on this blog on June 26th.

Go have some fun! And check back in July for next month’s contest!

**Update 6/6 8:40 PDT** I do want to make it clear that this contest was completely inspired by Colleen’s two just-launched June contests over at GeakySpeaky (win a 1GB USB Flash Drive) and a Simple Kind of Life, (win both Pirates of the Caribbean movies).  I definitely recommend visiting both these sites and entering both of Colleen’s contests.  You’ll notice the contest rules to be very similar

Category Get A Gadget Contest | 6 Comments »