Product placement in books?

I finished read my first Steven King book, Cell. I know that King is kind of a weird guy. I know hist other books and movies have been pretty wird. You would need a twisted mind to come up with some of these stories. But what really tweaked me about this book was blatant product placement. I have a hard time believing King was responsible for it, but it was distracting. Here are some examples:



Ok, so you tell me, are we trying to tell a story or sell products. Is this a book equivalent of a subliminal message? It just really looks bad. The story was alright, but all these ads just honestly pissed me off. I paid full price for the book just to find out the cost was offset by a whole bunch of strategically placed ads.

You know, I wonder, when editing the book, did the publisher look for opportunities to place products or was the story actually written with the product placement in mind?

Now, I could be wrong about this whole thing and it's just a "coincidence", but I doubt it.

Del.icio.us: books writing ads

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Yahoo! Mail and Ads, not for me

I'm all for making money on products, but come on, do we really need huge ads all over the place? Yahoo! Mail has all these large size image ads. If they were text ads I wouldn't care so much. Look at the different between Yahoo! Mail and Gmail. I'll stick with Gmail for now.

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Good Sunday for Tony Stewart

Having to start at the rear of a NASCAR race isn't an easy thing to over come, unless of course you're Tony Stewart. Although 2nd place is always the first loser, I still give Tony credit for finishing beyond 10th. He stayed at number 5 in the points. That's also not bad.

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Using the new Yahoo! Mail Beta

Wow, this worked really well. I just changed the Content Preference to Yahoo! UK and I was in. Thanks for the hack.

Get in on the Yahoo! Mail beta - Lifehacker

del.icio.us hacks yahoo mail

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New Orleans Jazz Festival

Even though New Orleans has been through hell over the past fwew months, it hasn't stopped the famed New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival. This could really put some life back into a city on the verge of death. Take some time to learn more about this festival here:  Jazz Festival in New Orleans.

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Sweet Jazz Podcast #3

Step Into It - Ryan Welton (download.com)
Is That Right - J.R. Byrd (download.com)
Wolf - Ipiman (download.com)
Orange - Futurejazz (soundclick.com)
Softly as in a Morning Sunrise - Jazz Guitar Gala at the Crow (soundclick.com)
Shine - Daryl Johnson (soundclick.com) (http://www.daryljohnson.com)
The Temple - Daryl Johnson (soundclick.com) (http://www.daryljohnson.com)
Moonlit Rain - 9th Street Jazz (soundclick.com)
Next Time Chicago - Jeff Smith and Friends (soundclick.com)
Solar - Jazzable (soundclick.com)

Please visit these sites and consider purchasing music from the artists. Thanks!

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Sweet Jazz Podcast #2

This weeks podcast features some really great music. Here is the play list:

1. Café Arecibo - Jay Rose
2. Datz it (Live) - Joseph Patrick Moore
3. In an Instant - Joseph Patrick Moore
4. Wait - Kenn Smith
5. Blackheart Blues - Melissa Forbes
6. Sound View - Bill LeFaive
7. Latiné - Comaticos
8. Train Shuffle - George Levas Group
9. Sun in My Eyes - Elisa
10. Secret Place - Tim Watson

Please take a moment to visit these performers web sites and also consider purchasing their music. Purchasing music keeps the dream alive and the groovey jazz and blues coming.

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My favorite one liner

My favorite one liner is from Yoda -

"no, try not, do or do not... there is no try..."

What is your favorite one liner?

del.icio.us: yoda

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Sweet Jazz Podcast update

After receiving feedback from the first Sweet Jazz Podcast I did, I decided to keep the number of tracks to 4 or 5, and from time to time I'll create a compilation of just music. We'll see how it goes.

Del.icio.us : podcast

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Build your own DVR; I am

Now this is cool; building your own DVR. The price to get all the parts seems pretty cheap considering the cost of TiVo and the DVR box. Now going online to get all the stuff I need. Hope the wife doesn't mind.

Del.icio.us : dvr diy pvr blog video tv howto

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Tony Stewart: 3rd place is the second loser

Again Tony has the race at his fingers and some how manages to fall back. He led the most laps, but could only finish 3rd. Bright point? He moved up 3 in the points standings. I guess in the end it only matters where you are in the points. For the fan's, they want to see a win.

Del.icio.us : nascar tonystewart

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Finally I can post with wbloggar

Well, it's been a couple of months, and maybe I wasn't looking hard enough, but I finally found the problem with blogging clients not connecting to my WordPress system. It was the damn xmlrpc.php file. Apparently, for reasons I still need to investigate, after reading this post I tried renaming xmprpc.php to something else, and I'll be, it worked. Now on to figure out what the problem really was.

...later, I discovered that my hosting company had removed the use of XMLRPC. So, I asked nicely and they agreed that give me access to I could again use wBloggar.

Del.icio.us : wbloggar technology sitenews

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Today is CSS Naked Day

Today is CSS Naked Day. Basically, remove any CSS from your site and let it run wild. My site is pretty generic and so I won't be removing my CSS. But, if you are interested in learning more, check out the links below.

[1] CSS Naked Day

[2] Shedding Wordpress CSS

Del.icio.us : css blogging wordpress

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Tony Stewart finally get’s it right

I love the short tracks and Martinsville is one of my favorite. No matter what place you are in when entering the pits, it could change drastically. It was funny to watch Tony Stewart comes into the pit first then exits the pits just behind Jimmy Johnson. Man that had to be frustrating. It's all about positioning.

Good job Tony, hope to keep it going. Only moved up one spot in the rankings, but it's better than falling down one.

Del.icio.us : nascar

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Blogging tools need built in spell checker

Ok, so I'm tired of using blogging tools that don't have a spell checker. wBloggar has one built in, but I can't seemt to get it to work right. It shows me a word that is spelled wrong but doesn't give me a list to choose from. I'm a lazzy blogger. Microsoft Word has spoiled me.

I use Zoundry mostly and it doesn't even have spell checking. It has a great interface and does everything I want but lacks spell checking. Come on, give me spell checking.

Del.icio.us : blogging software

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