RaveRantRage has re-branded

ATTENTION SHOPPERS!!

AT THE REQUEST OF MANY OF MY VALUED FOLLOWERS,

RAVE RANT RAGE HAS RE-BRANDED AND MOVED...

PLEASE VISIT THE NEW SITE TO READ ALL ABOUT IT:

madtexter.com

See you there....

America's dirtiest hotels

“...she pulled her sheets down and a ton of bed bugs scattered all over the place.”

According to a TripAdvisor.com survey, the Hotel Carter in New York City tops the list of America’s dirtiest hotels. The guest comments say it all. Are you ready for your stomach to turn?

Check out the reviews:

1.Hotel Carter, New York City, New York
2.Continental Bayside Hotel, Miami Beach, Florida
3.New York Inn, New York City, New York
4.Eden Roc Motel, Wildwood, New Jersey
5.Days Inn Cleveland Airport, Brook Park, Ohio
6.Days Inn Airport / Stadium Tampa, Tampa, Florida
7.Travelodge Bangor, Bangor, Maine
8.Velda Rose Resort Hotel, Hot Springs, Arkansas
9.Ramada Plaza Hotel JFK International Airport, Jamaica, New York
10.Days Inn & Suites Gatlinburg, Gatlinburg, Tennessee

(based on TripAdvisor traveler reviews)

Above photo: Craig Duncan of the Shetland Islands, Scotland, shows rusty water from the tap.

Photo: Photo byStan Godlewski

How NOT to generate traffic in Blogger

Since I began this blog a few months ago, it has been nothing but a magnificent carnival ride and a whopper of a creative outlet for my writing and comic musings.

I am a letter writer and an advocate for consumers everywhere. If I feel wronged by a company I do business with, I go into attack mode, and fire off a letter to its senior management, and sometimes copying the Better Business Bureau and the Post Master General in the process. I always get a response, and any problems are resolved to amicable satisfaction.

My very first posting was a long narrative about driver etiquette, which was the catalyst for this site. It was an editorial for the local paper, but they never ran it.

So I thought, that’s it – if the newspaper won’t publish my story, then I’m going to become a publisher, and run my own story!

Since that meager beginning, I’ve had nearly 7,000 visitors to my blog, and am slowly gathering an audience of followers. Most days I may get anywhere from 50 – 100 hits, and a couple weeks ago I got over 1,500 hits in one day. I attribute that banner day to my snarky comments about the book I Can Make You Thin. However, recently realized I had to rethink and re-center myself about what it is I want RaveRantRage to be exactly. Should it become a one-topic site, or remain a general interest site?

Through trial and error, I discovered what makes people land on my blog – a hot topic and well-written content. Through StatCounter, I can see where visitors are coming from, what link brought them to the site, what link takes them away, what posts they read, what photos or articles they download, how long they stay, etc.

There is no secret formula for driving traffic to your blog, but the generally accepted ways are:

* List other blogs as your favorites, and hope they reciprocate, or even link back from their site, or better yet, reference you in their posts.

* Comment on their blog, hoping they’ll comment on yours.

* Use the same blog post title as the same news headline that is running on CNN, MSNBC, Yahoo!, or any of the other big name news outlets. This may list you higher in Google results.)

* Send out mass emails to friends and colleagues informing them that you have a great new post for them to read.

* Add fancy content-driven advertising to flash it up a bit.

You can do all these things, but in my case, I become so focused on posting a hot topic, one that may have already been covered in the mainstream media, that I was simply regurgitating already run news, and my creativity stifled.

Surefire tips to create a better blog (and possibly drive more repeat traffic):

Remove the visitor counter from the landing page – it’s too distracting, because you will always be focused on that, and not the content. Besides, you don’t want just hits to your site. You want visitors to stay for a while and peruse your other posts.

Write about a hot topic, but put your own twist on it. Relate it to something comical that you’ve similarly experienced, or observed lately. Co-workers are excellent idea fodder. If you sit in a cube garden like I do, there are hundreds of untold stories you could write about that are just an earshot away.

Write about something that you are not an expert in. I’m doing that right now. I’m not an expert on blogging, but I do know from trial and error what works for my blog. By researching or blogging about something new, you are not only teaching, you are learning, too.

Insert related video from YouTube or other sources to coincide with your most recent post.

Keep the screen space clean and easily readable. Many people lose interest if the screen is not easy to navigate because of video and flash running all over the place. Put yourself in the mind’s eye of the visitor. Do you enjoy reading blogs that have all kinds of flash jumping up all over the place?

Don’t focus on making money from ads on your site. There are only miniscule amounts of big name blogs out there that actually make beaucoup bucks. I never started my blog to make money, but as it turns out, I’ve made a meager $47.53 so far.

Don’t just post a pix or video that is hot in the press now, just so you can get lots of visitors to your site. (I am guilty of this, and probably will still be from time to time.) If you’re in it for the money, sure, you may get a thousand hits for writing a quick, one sentence blurb about someone slowing a shoe at the president, and it may yield you 10 cents in revenue.

Just getting hits is not the goal. If someone lands on your blog and sees a quick blurb about “the shoe throwing”, they will click away from your blog just as fast to search for other sites that will have more content about the topic.

Again, the goal is to keep visitors at your site, so they can route around your other topics of interest: well-written content will do that. The more they stay and read for a while, the more likely they will click through on one of your content-driven ads – that’s where the real money will come from.

Rethink comments. Sure it’s nice to read what your visitors like or dislike, and it may even lead to a discussion, but blogging is not just about getting responses, it’s mostly about getting your message out for people to read. Do you think news outlets are sitting around waiting for their audience to respond to every story they write?

Silly rabbit, MySpace is for kids



It’s no secret that social networking has integrated itself into our lives. Just ask any teenager (any kid, for that matter), and they’ll tell you they have their own MySpace page.

They know how to create, design and in some cases know how to manipulate the HTML to make their MySpace site OMG!

While MySpace is primarily for kids and teens, Facebook is increasingly popular with the 35-plus set, and has become a mainstream marketing medium. Marketers are rethinking the paradigm in their staid demographics models.

In an article in Advertising Age, writer Michael Learmonth profiles Facebook in a refreshing way that attributes Facebook with bringing together 170 million people worldwide – 52 million in the U.S. alone, with its fastest demographic being 55-plus.

As a fellow Facebook member, I’ll admit I was drawn to the site because it has a no-nonsense, adult feel to it. I had toggled around on MySpace, but it just seemed bell-and-whistle for me – juvenile, and I was searching for a social networking site that catered more to creativity and a more mature way of thinking.

And I’m glad to say Facebook has continued to keep that format, changing very little in the process. (Although the ‘Poke’ feature and the ‘Requests to join...whatever group’ are a bit annoying at times.)

Facebook’s recent, very public blunder of trying to quietly change their terms of service agreement, whereby allowing itself to use any and all writings and photos of its members now and in perpetuity, without compensation or credit, drives the point home that its more mature demographic are crusaders and consumer advocates who are not to be messed with.

After the service agreement change was continually commented on and criticized in the blogosphere for a mere 24 hours, Facebook relented and reverted back to its previous terms of service agreement.

Related article: Marketers adapt as social networks attract older users

3 words to save your home

In the midst of the economic crisis that's crippling the US and other countries, which began with Wall Street greed and shady banks giving loans to those who couldn't afford them, homeowners who are near foreclosure have a secret weapon to stop banks dead in their tracks.

Three little, but extremely powerful words: "Produce the note".

If your home is near foreclosure, and you are trying to buy some time (because that's all you can afford to buy at the moment), your bank may cringe like you have the plague if you use those three little words. And many judges are siding with homeowners by stalling foreclosures because some banks in their haste to make a buck are losing original loan documentation - actual proof that the loan was made.

It's no wonder some banks are falling all over themselves now, because over the past decade and even longer, many banks have been buying and selling mortgages to each other so much so, that they cannot even find the original mortgage documentation of the loans that they have extended to homeowners. In their attempt to get more, get more, get more at whatever the cost to the economy, they are now in dire straights, just as they have put many homeowners in.

While we should all be responsible and pay off our debt, the banks as well should be holding on to the original mortgage documentation. As consumers, we have to show extensive forms and proof of identity to corporations to conduct business. Why shouldn't banks be accountable as well?

If a bank cannot produce the note, I sure bet they can produce the deed!

Mardi Gras bad juju

I knew that sin city was soon upon us, but I had no idea until while rushing past a colleague’s office this morning I heard projected at me, “HAPPY MARDI GRAS, C!”

And there it was, the official firing gun of the sin and atonement season, the time when we get stupid on debauchery, and promise and pray to be holier than thou for the next month before Easter – LENT! Being raised the son of a Southern Baptist minister, I had never heard of lent – I suspect it’s mostly a Catholic thing – oh, those Catholics, perpetually punishing themselves in the teachings that ‘once a sinner, always a sinner’.

When I first heard of this lent thing, I was well into my sophomore year at university, and just seeing some of my friends get so worked up over having to give something up for lent, made me insane. Give something up? Give what up? And what determined if what you gave up was sacred enough or not? Well, I sure wasn’t about to give anything up for a month to atone for anything. I had been giving it up as a preacher’s kid since the day I was born! Give it up – hah! Not! If anything, lent was going to see debauchery like it had never seen before. (But that’s a separate story for my life’s tome.)

So, here it is late in the day, and I find myself staring down the clock awaiting the 5:30pm Fred Flintstone rock quarry whistle to blow. And what a day it has been, trying administrate all that needs to be done in so little time, while working in an environment where it seems you have to jump through hoops like some circus poodle to get the most miniscule of projects completed.

You need a pink form for this, you need a blue form for that; and you need an orange form for the other (not the day-glo color orange form – just the regular orange colored form), you need a cost center, you need authorization, you need to go six floors up, take the magical elevator that climbs at a 45 degree angle to the far reaches of nowhereland to sign your name in blood, promise your first born, and swear allegiance to the almighty copy room gods so you can get the Xerox machine fixed.

Here’s an example of just one thing that would cause anyone to reach for the gallon jug of Pepto-Bismol they keep stashed in their desk. I needed to get a security keycard for a new employee we are on-boarding this week (the names have been changed to squelch the carnage:

CJames asks Christy for keycard.
Christy asks Bob for keycard.
Bob asks Charlotte for keycard info.
Charlotte asks Lucy for keycard info.
Lucy gives CJames form to fill out.
CJames receives email from Christy (after Lucy gives CJames forms to fill out) stating that Bob will handle directly with Dick to resolve keycard issue, CJames need not do anything further.
CJames emails Bob (and cc's Christy) for follow-up, to confirm if Bob has contacted Dick yet.
Bob tells CJames to sign the form that Lucy gave him last week.
CJames fills out form and takes it to Bob for additional signature authorization.
Bob informs CJames that Bob cannot sign, and that Dick must sign the form instead.
CJames has the form completed and sends it to Dick for signature.
Dick now says the form must be signed by someone named ‘authority’.
CJames then goes back to Bob to get Bob's signature.
CJames gets signature and elusive keycard.

Ugh! There’s bad juju everywhere today...and when I ask the magic 8-Ball sitting on my desk if there is relief within sight, it reads, "Prospect not likely." Today, I feel like someone trying to get their last nickel out of a ponzi scheme before the gig is up.

I’ll be giving up lint for lent.

jetBlue new ad campaign offers backhanded compliment to c-suite celebs

In light of the serious economic downfall that many companies are feeling today, jetBlue, in its quirky service style is welcoming those once lauded as big bankrolled execs who were once used to flying private, or first class, a seat at the end of the economy airline’s red carpet.

These days, it’s become a public relations coup (out of necessity) and the new chic for these execs to fly commercial, and in many cases, flying coach to save every penny they can, in a rush to shore up their public image and their balance sheets.

The airline saw an opportunity and flew with it. The headline on jetblue.com/deals/welcomebigwigs includes a bit of the following:

“Greetings, Bigwigs, Former Treasury Secretaries, Recipients of Secret Seven-Figure Bonuses, Big Cheeses, Head Honchos, CEO’s, CFO’s, CMO’s, Anyone with a 'C' in their title, Hedge Funders, Investment Bankers, Moguls, Tycoons, Captains of Industry...Welcome Aboard!"

The website lists all the ‘advantages’ to flying with jetBlue, but in a very sarcastic way – pure smart-alecky marketing at its best.


I wouldn’t be surprised if many of these companies joined forces with jetBlue to capture the halo effect of such an ad campaign.

Imagine what would have happened if some of those hard hit Wall Street companies had joined forces with jetBlue months ago in an effort to proactively cut the bloat, and grasp the fun spirit of a hip, stylish company that continually finds a niche in a rollercoaster market.

Is there a Golden Girls 12-Step program?

I don’t think there’s been more than 10 nights in the last 8 years that I have gone without watching The Golden Girls in reruns. Rue, Betty, Estelle and Bea are constantly knocking on my brain to watch even more.

Lately, I’ve slowly weaned myself from watching their crazy antics, and trying to drive that energy into experiencing newer programs, and I now feel I’m tiring of them.

I’ll admit, watching the episodes over and over...and over throughout the years, it’s still quite unbelievable how the writing is still relevant to any situation today. It’s a show that was written for the 80’s, but the subject matter is still ahead of its time, and right on time.

So, here I am thinking about how I got to the point of GG addiction, and I’ve come up with a list that I think many of you GG fans out there may want to check off to see if you too are falling into the grasp of GG overdose:

The 10 signs that you are addicted to The Golden Girls:

1) You can’t go to sleep without watching at least one episode.

2) You find yourself working the one-liners from the show’s script into your everyday conversation.

3) You took a trip to the back lot of Disney Studios, so you could see the façade they used for outside cutaway scenes of the GG house.

4) You taped the GG Reunion that aired about 5 years ago, and kept it on your DVR to watch over and over for nearly a year after.

5) You attend every Broadway show that any of the ladies has been in since GG ended nearly 16 years ago.

6) You pre-ordered every DVD release of all 7 seasons of the show from Amazon.com, so that you could be the first to get it

7) You watch the shows and compare notes about what has changed since the pilot episode, and catch all the little inconsistencies in the scripts over the years. Like Blanche’s bedroom used to be where the lanai is, and how the island in the kitchen got bigger.

8) While watching other current TV shows or films, you see an actor or actress that was once featured on GG, and you abruptly point out to whoever’s within earshot, “Hey, they were on the GG!”

9) You play GG trivia on Lifetimetv.com and you cringe when you get one of the answers wrong, and you keep taking the test until you get them all correct.

10) You are desperately waiting for the day they release a DVD full of all the bloopers and outtakes from the show. (That day probably won’t come, but one can dream, can’t they?)

Okay, maybe one more #11 - you find yourself watching repeats of Roseanne as an excuse to not watch GG.

And another...#12 - you find yourself blogging about it!

Tiffany Style

You know, I could slap myself for not collecting these Tiffany ads and making a scrapbook-type of collection of them. Two years ago I thought about doing that, but thought that's dumb, they'll stop placing the ads soon enough.

Now, two years later, every day on the top right-hand of page three of the New York Times there is an ad by Tiffany & Co. that highlights one of their products, but what makes the ads unique and interesting is that the tag lines are relevant to current news and events. Today's ad is no exception; it highlights the Oscars.

My personal favorite ad in the series highlights etiquette for guests. I took the text of the ad, added Tiffany's robin egg blue and framed it. Now, it sits in the guest bathroom, as a reminder to all that etiquette and common sense are not of days long ago.

At first, I thought it may be uncouth to be so direct with house guests, but I am a stickler for good manners and proper etiquette, especially when others are in my own home.

Now, I'm not that old that I dwell on the days of chivalry, calling cards and tipping one's hat to the ladies, but etiquette and common sense have taken a backseat to rudeness and and indifference. When did we become a society of disconnection and bitterness?

Tiffany, if you're reading this, would you please make a coffee table book of these ads?

Welcome to Walt Disney City

Well, it's official (and for a while now)...Disney has taken over New York City's heart (and by 'heart', I mean center, not the public's). There used to be a time when Broadway and Times Square had an edge to it. A gritty, seedy, but energetic vibe to it. Now, it's nothing but a tourista trap for people from the midwest who desperately want to see Sex and the City locales or their favorite Disney movie live.

I don't blame Disney for wanting to make a buck or two, but why don't they back plays and musicals that offer something different, cutting edge and mind-expanding? And now, they're running ads in the same format that Andrew Lloyd Webber used to run. If by running the likes of Mary Poppins and The Little Mermaid gets children to experience theatre, that's a good thing, but the opposite is true - Disney wants a buck, and they'll do anything to dumb-down the American public (although The Lion King was phenomenal - it was written on many levels).

After having left NYC just over a year ago, I still miss the old girl. I thoroughly enjoy where I live now, but I'll always love New York's streets filled with the bliss of multiculturalism, her buildings and spires reaching for the stars, her people warm as toast, but with an edge about them.

A true New Yorker is not someone who was just born in NYC, nor just lives there. A true New Yorker is someone who has lived there and is still pulled to her by her magnanimous spirit. NYC is vanishing, and although I applaud change and creativity, I fear the Old Gal is losing her character to commercialism.

The Awesome Açaí Berry

Açaí berry schmai berry. Of recent years we’ve heard of Ester-C, CoQ10, wheat grass, hoodia, pomegranate, and now the Açaí Berry (ah-sah-EE). It’s just one more in a long list of fads that hit the market as the miracle/end all super weight loss/rejuvenator product.

Oprah and her exulted Dr. Oz made mention of this berry-of-the-moment (at least in the US market) on her show, and soon the whole world is a twitter with buzz around this berry, and will shill out tons of money just to get it.

Did the pomegranate phenomenon teach us nothing? I personally, thought that pomegranate gum was a bit of a stretch.

I don't care what anyone says, you can't take 10 years off your face without using a scalpel.

(And now that I’ve written a post on this subject, my entire content-driven advertising will all be about the açaí berry and face lifts – ha!)

NVDRS Tape - Prototype retro cassette tape MP3 player

How cool is this?! All roads lead to retro. As much as we love our new gadgets and gizmos, we will always have an affinity for products reminicient of memory-filled years of long ago. This cassette tape styled MP3 player is the latest in a slew of retro gadgets to hit the market lately. The concept is not necessarily new or cutting edge, but it sure looks cool!

Here's what this little diddy boasts:

• Eco-friendly - you power the device using your finger to rotate one of the holes in the cassette to kinetically charge it. And it made of recyclable materials.
• You can FFWD or RWD by inserting your finger in one of the holes - and here's the really cool part, you can FFWD or RWD to any part of a song.
• Comes in three models: 45/60/90 just like a cassette tape does, which gives you more or less memory for song storage depending on the model you prefer.
• A monitor that models what the actual tape of a real cassette would look like through the tape window - it digitally displays the elapsed time.
• Battery life LED light that displays varying levels of power
• Pop-out USB drive for loading music

It appears from the mock-up ad that the player is slightly larger than an actual cassette tape, but probably intentional to accommodate being able to put your finger through one of the holes.

Designers: Stefano Pertegato, Massimiliano Rampoldi, Eloisa Tolu, Francesco Schiraldi & Giovanni Mendini

Backlink: Yanko Design