GoodBuyGuys Blog

If you check by here periodically, you know that I have written several times about the proposed change in wireless mic frequency allocation and how it might impact the pro sound industry. The plot thickens.

On the positive side, US Rep. Bobby Rush (D Illinois) has introduced a bill that would go a long way towards protecting the frequencies currently in use by UHF wireless mics. Rep Rush’s bill (HR 1320) would require that unlicensed consumer electrnonics would require “smart” technology which would detect the presence of other frequency users like wireless mics that were in use in the proximity of the unlicensed device. So far, so good.

Unfortunately, on the negative side of this argument, such “smart” technology doesn’t exist. Even if such technology can be brought to market at a reasonable price by the February 2009 date proposed by Rep. Rush, the intermittent nature of the use of wireless mics would probably make “smart” technology designed to locate “in use” frequencies of little value. Either way, the problem of battery life is going to pale, compared to the problems this changeover will bring.

While its good to know that someone in Congress is taking this potential train wreck for the pro sound industry seriously, it is more than a little discouraging that his solution is based on phantom technology. The companies that want to bring all these new wireless devices using UHF channels to market are powerful consumer goods manufacturers and they are sure to fight against any technology that increases the price for their products.

There are two bright spots in HR 132o. One requires that unlicensed devices must provide “adequate safeuards” to not interfere with other devices operating on these UHF television channels. The other sets a date of Feb. 17, 2009 as the earliest date these new devices could be brought into use.

If nothing else, his proposed date gives our industry a little breathing room.

GoodBuyGuys.com is your online source for Permacel gaffers tape, Duracell Procell batteries, MagLite flashlights, Nashua duct tape, Bay State wire ties, Electratrac and Coast Wire extension cords, OnStage Stand mic stands, and lots of other useful products for audio production.

A lot of my time is spent in evaluating new products and deciding how they might meet our customers needs. We have always focused on expendables, but lately we have added some other products because they seemed like a logical extension of our product line.

Now a new challenge is on my desk. Periodically, I write about the good work of our web developer, Dale. He works tirelessly to build good web sites and get our pages highly ranked with the most important search engines.

Soon after he began working with us, we started a number of design projects as a way to see how we might best collaborate. One of these was wirelessmic.net. We did a lot of work on this site and then put it on the shelf while we moved on to something else. We learned a lot about web design and about collaborating. Building this site was a lot of fun.

Well, now that site has climbed to the top of the ladder for non-paid search for Google, Yahoo, and MSN for the search term “wireless mic”. Dale believes that building information-only sites like this can be used to bring traffic to our e-commerce sites. Buywirelessmic.net will bring customers to buybattery.com, or so the theory goes. Our customers prove the value of Dale’s theory every day.

Having such great search engine results for a very valuable search term makes it very tempting to begin selling wireless microphones. There have been lots of new developments in this field, and every new product generation seems to bring lower prices and greater features.

Still, the idea of tying up a lot of money in this sort of inventory is a difficult decision and would require that we reconsider how products are marketed to our customers.

Is it time to roll out buywirelessmic.com? We’ll let you know.

GoodBuyGuys.com is your online source for Permacel gaffers tape, Duracell Procell batteries, MagLite flashlights, Nashua duct tape, Bay State wire ties, Electratrac and Coast Wire extension cords, OnStage Stand mic stands, and lots of other useful products for audio production.

I’ve lived in North Carolina my entire life and have been in some aspect of the entertainment business since the mid 1970’s. North Carolina is a healthy business environment and I have been at this long enough to have survived a number of economic cycles. Sunrise, sunset!

One of the most interesting rise and fall stories of our state’s economy has been the film industry. The area around Wilmington has been the host to the film and television production industry for over 20 years and there have been a number of boom and bust cycles. Major motion pictures like Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and television series like Matlock and Dawson’s Creek have called Wilmington home.

I get an online news letter from the NC Film Office and if their newsletter is a true indication of what is going on in our state, then this industry is pretty healthy.

Unfortunately, one reason for the increase in in-state productions is the continued efforts by our state government to favor certain industries with tax breaks. It seems that a production company can accumulate as much as $7.5 million in tax breaks on sales tax, payroll taxes and services taxes. All because they are willing to set up business in NC long enough to make a movie.

I’ve written about similar tax advantages provided when Google decided to locate a server farm in western North Carolina earlier this year. While I understand the importance of bringing jobs to the state (even temporary ones) it is difficult to see how this is so much more important than giving tax breaks to the businesses that have been providing jobs for North Carolinians for years. These are businesses that don’t immediately pick up and move on when some other state (or country) lures them with a better tax incentive. NC has seen major film and television productions move to other states or abroad based solely on who would give the producer the most tax advantages.

Maybe its time to add long term loyalty to the requirements for getting a tax break.

GoodBuyGuys.com is your online source for Permacel gaffers tape, Duracell Procell batteries, MagLite flashlights, Nashua duct tape, Bay State wire ties, Electratrac and Coast Wire extension cords, OnStage Stand mic stands, and lots of other useful products for film and television production.

You don’t usually think of car batteries as expendables, but it looks like that is changing. An interesting article in this weeks Wall Street Journal talks about how the demands of today’s electronic-laden cars are taking a real toll on their batteries. A car battery has traditionally lasted 3-5 years but the addition of power sapping devices like DVD players, GPS systems, heated cup holders and security systems has radically altered the life of these batteries.

The design of the auto battery is little changed in decades and what we ask these batteries to do was never imagined 10 years ago. It used to be that about the only thing that used power when the car was shut off was the clock. Now all sorts of items from the cooling fan to your cell phone charger continue to use power long after the car has been parked.

Experts in battery maintenance recommend that the battery be disconnected when the vehicle is parked for more than a couple of weeks. Better yet, use a device called a “trickle charger” to keep the battery charged up even when the car is not being used. These same experts warn that the biggest threats to battery life, extreme weather and harsh vibtration,can’t be avoided.

With the cost of a replacement battery sometimes exceeding $200.oo a little thought given to battery mainteance can go a long way.

GoodBuyGuys.com is your online source for Permacel gaffers tape, Duracell Procell batteries, MagLite flashlights, Nashua duct tape, Bay State wire ties, Electratrac and Coast Wire extension cords, OnStage Stand mic stands, and lots of other useful maintenance supplies

Daylight savings time began yesterday, and the best part of an extra hour of daylight is the chance to get into the garden after work. Yesterday was a beautiful early spring day and the extra hour was put to good use getting things ready for early spring planting.

I regulary haul home various samples of products we sell or consider offering to customers, as lots of them have applications in non-production uses. If you’re an avid gardener, you might find these are useful things to have on your garden workbench.

Cotton tie line is the best thing I have ever found for tying plants to stakes. It’s soft so it doesn’t damage the plant and it is easy to tie and untie over and over.

I keep a roll of paper label tape and a Sharpie Marker handy for quick labels. The Sharpie is waterproof and the adhesive on Permacel 724 label tape allows it to be removed and replaced.

Tool hands can be repaired or padded with a quick turn of gaffers tape.

Need to do some color coding? Electrical tape comes in lots of colors and it is waterproof.

My fences are getting pretty old since I have been gardening the same space for a long time. A quick and strong fence repair is easy with a nylon wire tie. Black ties with UV protection will hold up outdoors for years.

A quick waterproof repair to a boot or a glove can be made with a strip of duct tape.

Happy gardening!

Goodbuyguys.com is a collection of web sites (including buytape.com, buybattery.com, buyextensioncord.com, buyaflashlight.com and buywireties.com) designed to deliver a great selection of hard to find products for use around the home.

Daylight savings time starts this weekend. The clock is being set forward three weeks earlier this year and some confusion is probably in order.

One thing you don’t want to be confused about is the need to change your smoke detector battery. Using the time change as a reminder to change these batteries twice a year is a great idea, and the date change doesn’t diminish the need to attend to this important task. It takes just a minute and its easy to do.

Lots of new residential construction uses hard wired smoke detectors and some homeowners don’t realize that these detectors need battery changes too! The battery provides a backup in case there is a power failure. Quite often an electrical fire can lead to a quick shutdown of your electrical service, leaving the smoke detector without a fresh battery useless. Just because the LED indicator on the smoke detector is glowing doesn’t mean that the battery is good.

A battery that is no longer adequate for your smoke detector may still have enough power to use in other non-critical applications. Try it in some other device before throwing it away.

Goodbuyguys.com is a collection of web sites (including buytape.com, buybattery.com, buymicstand.com, buyextensioncord.com, buyaflashlight.com and buywireties.com) designed to deliver a great selection of hard to find products.

We’ve had a satisfaction guaranteed warranty for everything we sell since the day we opened. Its unusual for someone to have a problem, but we are always happy to stand behind the guarantee, no matter why the customer is unsatisfied.

Still, it was tough to give this customer their money back. The customer was an avant garde dance company doing a performance on a vinyl dance floor that they had soaked with water (think slip & slide)

The customer was unhappy because the vinyl dance floor tape they had purchased wouldn’t stick properly. “But your website said it was waterproof“, she kep saying over and over.

After a little more discussion, I realized that she was unhappy because the tape wouldn’t stick properly AFTER they had soaked the floor. Maybe there is a tape that will stick to water, but we haven’t found it yet.

We’ll keep working on it, but name Liquid Tape is already spoken for.

Goodbuyguys.com is a collection of web sites (including buytape.com, buybattery.com, buymicstand.com, buyextensioncord.com, buyaflashlight.com and buywireties.com) designed to deliver a great selection of theatrical supplies.

I spend several hours a day reading, and the bulk of my time is spent with technical journals. I never cease to be amazed at how willing publishers of magazines oriented towards the entertaiment production and audio visual industries are to underwrite the publication of dozens of really valuable journals. How can they do this? Advertisers like Duracell and Pro Tapes pay, not you!

Maybe this model is used in other industries, but this is the only one I am familiar with. These magazines are filled with dozens of really useful articles, and, many times, the advertising is filled with good info as well.

I use these journals regularly to find new products for our catalog. Its also really great to come across articles about our customers. I even saw one of our products in a photo accompanying a story about the NFL Playoffs.

Any student or hobbyist in sound, lighting or theatre tech can easily begin receving these journals by simply making up a business name. The magazines base their ad rates on the number of subscribers, so they are happy to add you to their subscriber list. They rarely do much to insure that you are a legitimate business with a large purchasing budget.

Journals like Pro Sound News, Sound & Video Contractor , Live Sound International, Church Production, and FOH Magazine are yours for the asking. They have great columns, handy “how to” articles, and honest equipment reveiws. The photo quality is first good and the editorial content, while advertiser driven, is still useful. Most of the writing is first rate.

Interested? You can sign up for regular subscriptions at any of the publication web sites in this article.

Goodbuyguys.com is a collection of web sites (including buytape.com, buybattery.com, buymicstand.com, buyextensioncord.com, buyaflashlight.com and buywireties.com) designed to deliver a great selection of production supplies.