GoodBuyGuys Blog

Some dismiss Google’s announcement that they plan to enter the business of providing broadband internet service as just more dabbling by a company that has too much money. They will probably regret it.

Taking on the problem of slow internet access that puts the US near the bottom of the world’s developed countries in internet speed could end up making Google a lot more wealthy and powerful than just online advertising ever could.

If Google is able to build and control the data delivery pipeline, then we have a clear historical example of what could happen next.  This is what broadcast television was about 70 years ago.  The moves that the three major tv networks made in controlling the airwaves gave them decades of exclusive control over the ability to deliver advertising to the entire country with little or no competition.

If or when Google builds and controls a data delivery system-particularly if it is better (read, faster) than what is currently in place, then the value of their advertising delivery capability to ad buyers will go through the roof.

If all you have to do in order to download a movie in minutes rather than hours is watch a couple of ads during the downlaod, then most people will happily watch those ads served up by Google while the download is going on.

If a doctor can stream 3D medical images at almost real time speed, then an ad from a pharmaceutical company being served up at the same time is, at worst, a minor annoyance.

Real time sports in high definition online?  I’ll click on the Budweiser ad.

Delivery of internet services by the telephone or cable companies is basically an “add on” that is burdened by infrastructure built for a very different purpose.  Their networks are already overloaded and their ability to expand has severe limitations.

When Google builds a network that shows consumers, advertisers and the government what really fast, open broadband networks can do, then they’ll have a choke hold on the ultimate ad delivery system.

Would I sit through a few sales pitches to have my internet speed increase by a factor of 10?  Can I have it now?

GoodBuyGuys.com is your online source for Permacel gaffers tape,Duracell Procell batteries,  Nashua duct tape, Bay State wire ties, Hosa and Entertainment One extension cords and OnStage Stand mic stands.

We sell speaker cables.  Lots of cables.  They are intended for the pro audio market and and work great in high end concert  and audio visual production.  They’re fairly priced   and come with a solid guarantee.

I’m always amazed at how much black magic is applied to the science of selling cables.  No one excels at this as well as Monster Cable, a manufacturer of high end cables marketed both to the pro and the home market.

Believe it or not, Monster sells a HDMI hi definition video cable for as much as $1000.00.  That’s not the price for the television.  Just the cable!

An article in Monday’s New York Times shed a little light on why Monster wires are so incredibly expensive.  Chalk it up (mark it up?)to a very special sort of high end marketing.

At this week’s Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, Monster sponsored an invitation-only concert featuring John Legend and Stevie Wonder.  A Monster party featured Dr. Dre and Diddy, along with Monster CEO  Noel Lee riding a Segway scooter trimmed in flames.

A Monster press conference featured Lady Gaga, who was in Las Vegas to introduce a new line of Monster headphones.

Talent like this doesn’t come cheap.

Study after study has shown that most of  Monster’s claims regarding the superiority of their cables is mostly hype.  One of our favorite  tests even compared their speaker cables to coat hanger wire and claimed to hear no difference in audio quality between the two.

Did I mention, the Las Vegas events were not for Monster customers, they were for Monster Cable dealers, the sellers who share in the astronomical markups sales of these cables genterate.  Those heaping plates of shrimp and the flowing champagne at the event hosted by Diddy and Dr. Dre were paid for by you,  if you’re a purchaser of Monster Cables.

GoodBuyGuys.com is your online source for Permacel gaffers tape,Duracell Procell batteries,  Nashua duct tape, Bay State wire ties, Hosa and Entertainment One extension cords and OnStage Stand mic stands.

The ongoing battle between the Google mobile operating system for cell phones and Apple’s IPhone was accelerated last week with the release of the Nexus One, a smart phone that is actually branded as a Google device.

There has been lots of speculation as to why Google was interested in getting into the hardware business, as they are primarily a search engine driven advertising company.

This article in Forbes makes it clear why Google has such a keen interest in this market.  The profit potential is amazing.

The Nexus One is sold directly from Google (web sales only) and can be purchased in one of two ways.  You can purchase a subsidized phone along with a two year contract for service from T-Mobile.  The price of the phone is $179.00.

Or, you can purchase the phone outright-unlocked (no service contract) for $529.00 and make a deal with your own choice of service providers.

Forbes estimates that the actual cost of manufacturing the phone is $174.15.  That means that Google’s gross profit on every phone is  $354.85, a whopping $204% markup.

If Google is successful in getting a phone to market that people will buy without a contract, then it might force cell carriers to open up their market and be more competitive when it comes to pricing.

Google’s decision to price the Nexus One at such a ridiculously high price means that this probably won’t happen any time soon.

GoodBuyGuys.com is your online source for Permacel gaffers tape,Duracell Procell batteries,  Nashua duct tape, Bay State wire ties, Hosa and Entertainment One extension cords and OnStage Stand mic stands.

The saddest days of the year for me is the day in the late fall that I decide to put the removable hard top on my car in place of the convertible top.  One of my guiltiest pleasures is long fall drives with the top down and it’s always depressing to see that come to an end.

All that is an intro to a new product announcement by Duracell. They are rolling out a new line of  automotive batteries.

Duracell is positioning this product line as a battery intended to meet the needs of today’s automobiles that have so many electrical accessories.  We gone from batteries that start your car and let you listen to the radio to needing a power source that will handle a two bedroom apartment.

There is no end to the electrical accessories that cars can have these days. Cars have become workplaces and auto batteries need to be able to power all sorts of devices when the engine is not running.  That’s a prescription for a dead battery.

Oddly, this line of auto batteries does not yet appear on Durcell’s web site, so detail are hard to come by.  They are currently available in limited areas and there has been no announcement about a national roll out.

We’ve been a distributor of Duracell Procell batteries for many years and are always surprised at how poorly this company uses the web to support product information.  It is amazing to me that the day after you announce a new product line that there is no mention of it on your corporate web page.

Duracell may not understand how to use the web, but they sure understand the value of their brand. Auto batteries by Duracell is a logical extension of how brands are leveraged and if this is a good product, they should be able to grab a big percentage of the market.

GoodBuyGuys.com is your online source for Permacel gaffers tape,Duracell Procell batteries, MagLite flashlights, Nashua duct tape, Bay State wire ties, Hosa and Entertainment One extension cords andOnStage Stand mic stands. You might enjoy our “How Not To Test A Battery” animation

So, I’m watching a Metacafe video of the drummer for The Dave Matthews Band (Carter Beauford) while the site serves ads for “printer drums”, drum heaters” and “ear drum” protection.

I realize that keyword driven advertising has a long way to go before it can be counted on to deliver up relevant ads, but this is ridiculous.

What most advertisers don’t seem to recognize that only they are in a position to be specific about how their ads are served up.

It would be fascinating to know what percentage of keyword advertising is  totally irrelevant to the subject matter being delivered.

Just a quick thought!

GoodBuyGuys.com is your online source for Permacel gaffers tape, Duracell Procell batteries, MagLite flashlights, Nashua duct tape, Bay State wire ties, Hosa and Entertainment One extension cords, OnStage Stand mic stands. Sometimes we have some interesting ideas about web development too!  Click here to sign up for our newsletter.

As part of our new marketing strategy built around goodideaguys.com, I am trying to work on a new social media presence for our business.

I have resisted using sites like Facebook and Twitter to date, partly because they can be pretty complicated to use effectively, but more importantly, they are so difficult to read.

I’m not talking about actual postings (not too hard to read a 140 character twitter posting).  I’m talking about reading the instructions for setting up profiles.

I realize that most of these administrative pages are intended for eyes younger than mine, but who thinks that green type against a blue background is easy to read, even if you are a twenty-something?

The basis of good design may be negotiable on the web, but the presentation of information that requires the reader to comprehend instructions and actually do something still call for good contrast, an easily readable font and text size large enough that you don’t have to constantly zoom the text in order to get the job done.

The standard settings for web text that present black type against a white background are one of the most powerful tools the web has for presenting information and it is something that most people take for granted.

Just because it’s the “default” doesn’t mean that it isn’t also the best!

GoodBuyGuys.com is your online source for Permacel gaffers tape, Duracell Procell batteries, MagLite flashlights, Nashua duct tape, Bay State wire ties, Hosa and Entertainment One extension cords, OnStage Stand mic stands. Sometimes we have some interesting ideas about web development too!  Click here to sign up for our newsletter.

I keep my Google News Alerts set for stories about the manufacturers products we sell.  Today I got this one about Shurtape, a tape manufacturer in Hickory, NC.

Sun Kwak, a Korean artist, is using over three miles of black masking tape to create an abstract art installation at the Brooklyn Museum.

Deploying a special six inch width black masking tape provided by Shurtape, Kwak has developed a method of applying and then tearing the tape she applied to columns in the museum’s rotunda.  This appears as wavy lines and patterns contrasted against the museum gallerie’s walls.  The effect is stunning.  To a casual observer, it looks like thousands of feet of painted patterns.

The artist has spent almost 300 hours on this installation and it will be on display until July 5.

After that,  its three miles of tape headed for the landfill.

GoodBuyGuys.com is your online source for Permacel gaffers tape, Duracell Procell batteries, MagLite flashlights, Nashua duct tape, Bay State wire ties, Hosa and Entertainment ONe extension cords, OnStage Stand mic stands. Click here for lots of useful graphic arts supplies.