Although I am not technologically in-the-dark per se, I do take my time before buying the latest gadgets…actually most people have the latest and greatest “new item” in their home for a good five years before I finally put the money and energy into the same purchase. I am not a fan of being part of the ‘weeding-out’ process when it comes to the quality of new gadgets on the market and I rather enjoy holding onto the majority of money I make.

This leads me to a recent birthday present that I received from my family - a GPS (Garmin Street Pilot). Now, aside from the obvious underlying message, – that I may be directionally challenged or that I am often late, or both – I was thrilled! I had been secretly coveting one of these inventions after a recent snafu that caused me to drive an hour out of my way after taking a wrong turn in Boston. This is an incredible little toy which allows me not only to be hands-free while talking on the phone (the system integrates bluetooth technology), but also helps me to avoid traffic, plays my favorite mp3 music files, and helps to keep my eyes and attention on the road with cool voice commands and prompts.

I use my Garmin daily…often, I’m embarrassed to admit, to get to places of which I have no problem getting to; like to Chitika or even home. But no longer do I drive my standard route; I’m finding all sorts of clever and interesting ways to get to my daily destinations, all with an estimated arrival time. I travel roads I would have never had a reason to venture down before with ease. No more racing pulse when I see detour signs or when I inevitably miss my exit.

I know enough not to rely on my new toy solely to get me from point A to B, especially in unchartered waters…but quite frankly I trust and enjoy it a lot more than I do the directions and travel advice of many of my friends as it doesn’t roll its eyes when I choose to ignore its advice or unintentionally miss an exit. Perhaps they will one day make a GPS on how to get around in my personal life as well.

I’m admittedly still in the honeymoon phase of the world of GPS. Are you still walking on air or do you feel a sense of GPS disenchantment?

By: Norah Treptow, Strategic Media Buyer -Chitika Inc.

Anyone that has had the pleasure of speaking to me for me than 15 minutes has probably heard me mention my love of “The West Wing”

There’s a fantastic episode in the first season called “Take out the Trash Day”, in which White House Deputy Chief of Staff Josh Lyman is explaining to his assistant, Donna, why a large number of stories are being released to the press on a Friday:

Donna: Why do you do it on Friday?
Josh: Because no one reads the paper on Saturday.

Further banter in this conversation reveals more information – if a newspaper has a certain section of a page earmarked for White House news, and there’s 10 different stories in that space, then each unsavory story is 1/10^th the size of a “normal” story (it’s no wonder Donna remarks “You guys are real populists, aren’t you?”).

While I could chalk this up to Aaron Sorkin’s vivid imagination, there seems to be a morsel of truth to it. News released on Friday will be in the Saturday news cycle, typically the day with the lowest newspaper circulation and the lowest rating for news (which is why news programs have “weekend anchors” who are typically not on the billboards) and will be forgotten by the time the Sunday talk shows introduce new topics.

Upon watching this episode for the 25^th time I wondered if this concept will exist in 10 years (”Trash Day”, not The West Wing). As more and more mediums move online, the calendar will seemingly play a smaller role in determining the life cycle of a story. There’s no need to rummage through a pile of newspapers or catch a news report at the right time; all one needs to do is search a news site or blog for any story under the sun from any date and instantly catch up with the cultural zeitgeist (or find out what that “Bradley Pitt” fellow is up to).

Of course, this also means that bloggers can’t take a day off and throw out their sub-par stories; while they may publish it on a Saturday with the mainstream media’s “trash”, it’s instantly accessible on any day after that for any reader, wanderer, or searcher to find. It can also depend on the reading rhythms of a blogger’s audience; with RSS readers becoming more and more mainstream, you can go away for a few days and catch up on your favorite sites in 15 minutes, (which is more than I can say for that stack of newspapers that piled up while you and the family were at the Grand Canyon - are you really going to read them all?) and feel like you missed nothing of consequence.

Am I off-base? Can bloggers dump stories in the trash, or are we truly in the midst of a 24-7 news cycle?

-Written by Daniel Dore, Sales Support Engineer/Deputy Chief of Staff

They say that there are 5 stages of grief. I’m proud to say that I’m finally at acceptance where my VCR is concerned.

I had spent much of my teens & twenties acquiring VHS tapes through trips to the mall and via those (ahem…rip off) online video clubs where my library of hardcover books at home was quickly overtaken by black, plastic cassettes in their cardboard sleeves.

So began my journey…

Denial
I had collected tapes of all my favorite movies, plays and television series. I had so many tapes that I spent the better part of the late 90’s without cable television as I caught up on all my acquisitions. I heard some scuttlebutt about DVDs.. now, I am not saying I was so naive as to think that that contraption hadn’t arrived to stay, but I had already made such an investment and commitment in the world of VHS that I couldn’t bear to start over.

Anger
My television had a built in VCR and I had hundreds of tapes, it would seem that I would have to purge myself of all these items, only to replace them with the newest version; and who knew how long that newest trend was going to last?!? I was annoyed. All of those empty promises. I felt jilted.

Bargaining
The likes of Sony & Panasonic brought us the combo DVD/VCR combo player. After buying our first 48 inch plasma screen television, I bridged into this century with the purchase of one of these dual players where I was able to give equal playing time to both mediums.

Acceptance
Finding VHS tapes had become nearly impossible (especially renting) - so I joined the masses. I have, of course, rented many DVDs now through Netflix and have even purchased a few new DVDs but not with the same abandon I did it’s predecessor. I guess I just don’t want to get hurt again. :-)

So now I have come full circle. Are there any other “closet VHS” folks out there with boxes full of VHS (and maybe even Beta) tapes just waiting for their revival, similar to the bell bottom jean?

By Norah Treptow, Account Manager

Have you ever played the boxing game for Nintendo Wii? That game is a workout in itself; my arms were sore the next day (a side-effect-first for me during a Nintendo session). As a parent, it was a bit of a relief that there was finally a gaming system available that would get my kids off the couch.

That itself was enough; but now they are offering what they are calling “an exercise product” for the system
called Wii Fit.

I thought the thinking behind the Nintendo Wii was to get people out of the chair and moving instead of sitting glued to the TV without actually saying it ;) - kind of like hiding broccoli in brownies, but I guess not. I foresee this game as not being too popular among most teens.

Rather, it seems to be aimed at moms who are looking for a fun way to get a workout, kind of the way the Balance Board is presented in this video. And if that’s who will be interested in it, how many of them are going to purchase a $250.00 exercise video?

The Nintendo Wii Fit & Wii Balance Board is said to be shipped May 19th, 2008 after their announcement of this product in 2007.

I am interested in how you rate this new concept introduced as a video game, please add your vote in the poll below:

Get excited about Agency TastyBytes 2008, held this year on March 27th at Radius Restaurant in Boston! Chitika will be co-hosting this media ad industry networking event with web analytics company Compete.

TastyBytes lunches were created to be “a fun, informal way to bring people together to network and share new ideas about the web, marketing and technology.”

To join-in on the fun, sign-up at the event Wiki!

Texting while driving; I admit it, I’m completely guilty of this offense. But I’m trying to stop…really.

The recent statistics report that I am one of 20% of US drivers that text while driving (with a whopping 60% of all drivers between the ages of 18-24 being self-proclaimed text-drivers.) There is even a new acronym floating around – DWT (Driving While Texting) – which, like DWI, is a punishable offense in at least two states with many more planning to jump on the bandwagon…I can’t say that this is a bad thing.

I have, actually, gotten to be quite skilled at this feat; as I join the thousands of others that don’t need to even look at the keypad when messaging so that we can keep our eyes on the road and at least one hand on the wheel. I can press send quickly after a glance at the screen to confirm that my message is going to who I intended (a subject for another blog). I’m relieved to say that my texting hasn’t caused any accidents (that I’m aware of), and I hope a change of practice will allow me to never be a cause of text message accident to come. I haven’t gone cold turkey; instead changing my behavior slowly but surely. It’s an addiction really. :-)

Having a cellphone (even the antiquated one that I own) is both a blessing and curse. I am available and in constant contact with all of my family, friends, Chitika colleagues, and (soon to come) telemarketers. I used to love chatting on the phone, but now my preferred method of communication is text messaging.

Yes, a simple phone call would do and would be much faster and less painstaking than texting - and yet I choose to do the latter. A loving message sent to family is more often “delivered” with an icon of an envelope than it is spoken, which is admittedly odd, cold and impersonal on one hand. On the other hand, it can be stored for future viewing at a later time, the way we used to save old love letters…so I feel that I am still being “warm and fuzzy”.

So texting seems to be here to stay; and while hands-free headsets abound for the talkers amongst us…we texters have no alternatives to traditional messaging except to use our hands. I wonder if there are any plans for voice-command texting out there in the works? What do you think of Driving While Texting (DWT)? Should they outlaw this behavior?

By Norah Treptow, Account Manager

Data from Chitika’s network indicates that overall interest in YouTube has soared in the weeks following the the release of YouTube for Mobile. YouTube related search has increased two-fold (from the week following the Jan. 08 release, to the third week in Feb. 08) among online consumers in Chitika’s network.

In the week following YouTube’s January release (Feb. 4-11), YouTube related search queries comprised 7.32% percent of the top 50 keywords in Chitika’s network.

Find out more about YouTube for Mobile; Click here to read this weeks Chitika | Pulse, Issue IX…

One of our premier Chitika | VBU advertisers, mimoco, brings mimobot Designer USB Flash Drives to Chitika’s network.

mimoco’s mission is “to bring style and soul to personal tech devices and to inject interactivity into the underground Art Toy movement,” and the two 2” ‘little friendly data fiends’ host 512MB, 1GB, 2GB, and 4GB capabilities.

New Web Approved.
To succeed in the new web, brands need to be innovative and carry a storyline that online consumers will want to interact with; mimoco certainly accomplishes this.

The Story.
mimobots of planet blõôh , have traveled a long time across multiple parallel systems to reach earth, suffer from ‘flash events’ that raze their memory, and take part in an incomparable adventure of human/mimobot symbiosis. Check out the mimoco site to learn more about mimobot history.

We are impressed with mimoco’s stylish mimobots, available in three ‘flavors’; core series, artist series, and officially licensed crossovers of entertainment franchises, from Star Wars to Domo. Look out for Chitika | VBUs, powered by mimoco, and watch the mimobot line-up in action!

By Tessa Rudd, Strategic Partnerships Coordinator - Advertising Media Division

I didn’t think I’d be going into more detail about ABC’s successful promo during the season premiere of ‘Lost’ last Thursday evening, but Robert Seidman from TV by the Numbers posted some interesting web data of Flyoceanicair.com that was provided by Hitwise.

Robert says that the ratings to the promo by ABC weren’t as successful as he thought due to the decrease in traffic to the originally promoted site Flyoceanicair.com. However, not only do I disagree I have actually realized the promo was even more brilliant than I originally thought.

The decrease in traffic to Flyoceanair.com is completely expected since the site itself contains nothing but pretty clouds and flight attendants. People that are still going to Flyoeanicair.com are going out of curiosity or because they don’t know better; “Losties” like to share what they think (there are hundreds of forums with thousands of discussions on theories, etc.), and when something interesting leaks, they flock.

In this case people are going straight to Find815.com because it starts a mysterious story where you can help an as-yet-unknown man find his missing girlfriend. ‘Lost’ fans are taking it as some sort of spoiler from the producers or hoping it has something to do with what will happen soon in the show; neither of which we know yet. This probably would explain the sudden spike in traffic to Find815.com and not Flyoceanicair.com.

So I guess this wouldn’t make for good convergence to the original site that we saw on TV but not only was ABC able to grab the attention with this commercial, they were then able to get the website within the website MORE traffic than the original promoted site!

Why is this impressive?
Let take for instance the “10-second rule”. You have 10 seconds to get your audience’s attention, so you had better make your point or forget it - you lost them. Not to mention if you ask them to click through to a site, you’ll lose 50%, then ask them to click through again, you lost 40%, maybe more. So dare I say that this promo was twice as successful that I had thought?