Shoppers following their own advice. (And , no, we didn't have to pay to use this image.) (Photo by Brave New Films) When getting or giving a gift, we often hear, "It's the thought that counts," implying that it doesn't matter what we buy, as long as we buy something. So, every year on the day after Thanksgiving, American shoppers hurl themselves into malls in a frenzy, desperately hunting for Black Friday bargains. After the shelves been picked clean and the registers closed out, economists anxiously await the day's totals, hoping to forecast a strong economy for the upcoming holiday season. But there are some who believe that the only forecast this consumerism points to is damage to ourselves and our planet. And if folks like the Reverend Billy have anything to say about it, we won't be buying anything. The good Reverend is one of those critics of rampant consumerism who urge you to participate in the holiday madness by not participating in it. "Reverend Billy" is the nom du theatre of performance artist Bill Talen, who founded the Church of Stop Shopping. His mock gospel of anti-consumerism became deadly serious when he attacked a certain mouse-headed corporation for its "Disneyfication" of New York's Times Square, and Starbucks for driving out small local businesses in the name of creating a "fake Bohemia." It's not that Billy is anti-capitalist; rather, he stands for a "real human experience" and against corporations that seek to homogenize or erase the uniqueness of small mom 'n' pop stores in the name of efficiency and profit. But it's not just Reverend Billy. On this day of all days, there's a whole movement that asks you to buy nothing at all -- not even gas, bread, or coffee! Proponents of "Buy Nothing Day" claim that it serves as a brake on the rampant consumerism that has spoiled society. If you do decide you must shop this weekend, remember that wise spending -- such as understanding where purchases come from and what kind of an impact they'll have on our environment -- may make all the difference between wasteful overconsumption and practical resource conservation on our planet. So before you make that rush to the mall over the next few weeks, ask yourself if you're doing all that shopping just for shopping's sake. And pause to think if your purchase will be the one that brings on the Shopocalypse. Suggested Sites... Adbusters: Buy Nothing Day - information on observations worldwide. Reverend Billy and the Church of Life After Shopping - stop the insanity. Buy Nothing Day.org - sit around the house and get to know your family. What Would Jesus Buy? - official site for the documentary about Reverend Billy's work. But would it be a sin to buy it? Money Can't Buy Happiness, Er, Can It? - Nobel Prize-winning economist asks whether America's consumption boom is really a good thing.

Directory categories: Buy Nothing Day, Reverend Billy, Black Friday Sales, Anti-Consumerism, Consumer Advocacy

Archived under: Business, Consumer Advocacy, Counterculture, Culture Jamming, Economics, Environment, Events, Issues and Causes, Shopping, Society and Culture

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(Photo by Mike Licht) We cruised into the office parking lot in our mint-condition Edsel, blasting Chris Gaines on the stereo, and sipping an ice cold New Coke (from the stockpile we've been hoarding since the '80s), when we suddenly realized something disturbing: We're marketing outsiders. You see, in our youth, the popular kids scoffed at our "Howard the Duck" lunchbox, our disc film camera, and our Betamax copy of "Hudson Hawk." And maturity didn't improve things. As adults, we've tried to get friends to enjoy our favorite movies ("Gigli," "Showgirls," "Wild Wild West," "Basic Instinct 2") and we tell them about the revolutionary innovations (Segway, Microsoft Bob, boo.com) that are going to change the world. Those looks of skepticism tell us what we already knew -- that we are in a sad minority of consumers who enjoy flops. The fickle public may not appreciate the genius of Crystal Pepsi, "Cop Rock," and "Battlefield Earth," but there are still some of us who don't think that comparisons to "Ishtar" are insults. Suggested Sites... Cokelore: New Coke - on the 24th anniversary weekend of the introduction of our favorite beverage, we raise a big, frosty mug of New Coke in a salute to marketing flops. Failure Magazine: Auto Biography - the sad history of the Edsel. Product and Brand Failures: A Marketing Perspective - learning from marketing mistakes. 9 Famous TV Flops - oh, come on! "Supertrain" rocked! NPR: A Salute to Famous Movie Flops - all kidding aside, "Cleopatra" is a pretty entertaining film.

Directory categories: Edsel, Coca-Cola, Pepsi-Cola, Worst Films, Worst of the Web

Archived under: Advertising, Anniversaries, Autos, Brands, Business, Coca Cola, Disasters, Edsel, Flops, Food and Drink, Marketing, Movies, Pepsi, TV

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Free Napkins It's a bright and lovely Springtime for the Internet. The lines are a-buzzin', the keyboards are a-clickin', and the engineers are a-innovatin'. Here are a few of my favorite websites to recently emerge... FreeNapkins.com is the introductory page for an ad network called NapAds owned by JI Worldwide, Inc. They offer free napkins to their network of bars and nightclubs with their clients' logos and advertisements featured in beautiful, full color, "high-definition" graphics. While advertising on napkins is nothing new, creating an ad network which utilizes napkin-space as real estate to be bid on by a variety of different advertisers takes the former Budweiser-logo-on-bar-napkins model to the next level. So, if you happen to be (or know) a bar owner, get in touch with NapAds for some beautiful, free napkins. I wonder what the next commonplace object to be utilized by advertising networks will be ... Dishware? Cigarettes? Condoms (yikes!)? People? Face.com: Although Face.com is still in alpha testing, I had to give you a little preview of this remarkable new digital image recognition technology. Face.com's Facebook application scans all of the photos in your Facebook account, detects all the faces in them, and then learns to recognize all of the people in those photos so that it can automatically tag those faces with the names of the individuals in the photos. The end result is that you can find your friends in pictures that you didn't know your friends were in. As a Facebook application, it's a fun little novelty, because you don't have to rely on someone hand-tagging a face in a photo in order to know that you or your friend (or even your mother) is in that photo. The image recognition technology used to power this app is pretty astonishing. Imagine what image search engines will be like once the engine is no longer relying on uncertain metadata and can start actually recognizing people, places, and things within the photos. Wow. For more info on this developing technology, check out the Facial Recognition Systems category in the Yahoo! Directory. Continue reading below for more of my favorite new websites... Suggested Sites... ZooBorns - blog showcasing pictures and video clips of the newest and cutest exotic animal babies from zoos and aquariums around the world. Topics - BBC - a full list of topics, nations, people, and subjects from current events and news from the BBC. Garden - Sunset.com - online version of the "Sunset Western Garden Book." Includes articles about gardening in the western United States, recipes, and a searchable guide to what plants grow best in your area. Watch TED 2009 - watch some really fascinating lectures by some really smart people on all kinds of different fun topics from the 2009 TED (Technology, Entertainment, and Design) Conference. Making Home Affordable - program from the Federal Government to help homeowners obtain loans and refinance their current home loans into more affordable monthly payments.

Directory categories: Advertising and Promotional Items, Facial Recognition Systems, News and Media Web Directories, Lawn and Garden Information, Buying a Home

Archived under: Advertising, Animals, Brands, Business, Creativity, Cyberculture, Design, Education, Gadgets, Gardening, Government, Home and Garden, Housing, In Character, Internet, Invention, Landscaping, Lawn Care, Marketing, Photography, Social Networking, Technology, Yahoo! Directory

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(Photo by Timothy K. Hamilton) It's been 142 years since the United States purchased the Alaskan territories from Russia for 7.2 million dollars -- less than two cents per acre. To put that another way, today, Alaska’s purchase price would buy only fourteen half-million dollar houses like the one belonging to that state’s famous governor. That’s a good value by any standard, especially this year, with houses going for fire sale prices in cities like Stockton, CA, and Detroit. And when you consider the cultural value of Alaska, it’s clear it was a bargain by any standard. In 2008, we learned a lot about the Land of the Midnight Sun. Here are some highlights: It's beautiful up there. To control predator populations, Alaska allows tightly regulated wolf-hunting from the air. Real dudes race snowmobiles. Forget soccer, hockey moms are going to puck you up. You can see Russia from your backyard. Alaskans aren’t really like the rest of us. In fact, many don’t want to be like the rest of us. Alaskans are paid for the privilege of living in the last frontier -- last year, every man, woman, and child rresiding in the state eceived $2,069 from the state’s oil royalty program. Real Alaskans wouldn’t want to live anywhere else. Suggested Sites... I Eat Gravel - musings on Alaska by a real live Alaskan. The Mudflats - award-winning political blog, slinging only a moderate amount of mud. Official site of the State of Alaska - includes information for residents, visitors, and the curious Internet horde.

Directory categories: Alaska, Alaska Travel Destination Guides, History of Alaksa

Archived under: 19th Century, Alaska, American History, Animals, Anniversaries, Business, Cultures, Detroit, Elections, History, Outdoors, Regional, United States, Wildlife, Winter

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Thomas Edison's Electric Pen On August 8, 1869, Thomas Alva Edison was granted the patent for his mimeograph machine. This copying device was the predecessor of ditto machines and today's copiers. Such is often the story of great inventions -- they are improved upon with time. The cotton gin of old gave way to modern versions, and photographs have morphed from daguerreotypes to digitals. To improve upon a brilliant idea is understandable, but what about those inventions whose first incarnation should be their last? From noodle-splash faceguards to the self-twirling spaghetti fork, the world is full of pointless and unnecessary inventions. While one can usually discern the impetus for the device's creation, that doesn't mean the idea is a good one. Sadly, many inventions appear to be inspired by profound laziness or an alarming lack of reason, and knowledge of their existence persists only because of their sheer entertainment value. Though some of these imbecilic inventions may leave us fearing for the future (and the priorities) of mankind, we must remember that even the greats didn't always get it right. Suggested Sites... The Daily Telegraph: Pointless Inventions Gallery - browse the best of the worst. Stupid.com: Brilliant Inventions - buy your own worthless invention today! ScottSeegert.com - marvel at the manly patents discovered by Mr. Seegert. CreativePro.com: Heavy Metal Madness: Making Copies from Carbon to Kinkos - watch a useful invention's historical progress.

Directory categories: Inventions, TIME.com: Inventions of the Year, Patents, Engineers and Inventors

Archived under: Business, Flops, History, Humor, Invention, Inventors, Science, Technology

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