╠ Free Ride ╣

Most of you probably noticed the free metropolitan travel that happened on Christmas Eve and Christmas day. Now I'm not sure about the rest of you but this was completely under advertised in my opinion. I only found out when going to my station in the morning when there is actually staff and as I was going to validate my ticket I was told there was free travel today. I was skeptical but went along with it. I later saw the small A4 sheet posted at each station clearly made in Microsoft Word that stated that there was free travel. Personally I didn't think that much of it, particularly in the morning it was more of an inconvenience to not validate due to my uneasyness and disbelief of it truly being free travel. Also later in the day ticket inspectors haunted every train I was on, not checking tickets obviously but still unnerving everyone else. I'm not sure if they were collecting statistics or what but it seemed plenty unnecessary.

This was a huge opportunity for Connex to get some good cred and they seem to have not taken it at all. Not having to pay for a day could make you feel so much better about them but the constant presence of inspectors on the train just makes you not able to forget how bad Connex is.

Sure they were forced into it by the travel minister but there was still so much more they could have done to improve the brand image in commuters minds. I consider this to be a huge chance wasted. They get another with New Years also being free travel but we'll have to wait to see if it's actually any better.

╠ Free Gruen ╣

Recently Zac Martin commented on a certain tool which he learned about from Simon Small's blog. This tool allows you to calculate the value of your blog. Zac Martin wracked up over 20,000 while Simon was able to get a cool $1,700. Thinking that I'd be able to give myself a little confidence booster by being worth something, I decided to try this on myself.

The Gruen Transfer ranked in at being worth a whopping $0.00. After turning green, growing to twice my height and going on a rampage I decided that I should look at this a little closer. The tool utilizes Technorati ratings of which I'd basically ignored. I've been doing things to gain popularity for years on the internet to no avail and simply figured it was the same and perhaps even a fad...however this does not seem to be the case. It's a smart system and currently appears to be ruling the blogging world with an iron fist.

The way it works is every time you get linked posted withing the last six months in a blog you get an authority point. So Simon, Zac as well as the tool should all get a point for this blog. This changes things from what I originally thought. Getting high ranks isn't directly correlated to success, what matters is making blogs that will be talked about.

One thing I wonder is whether karma plays a large role in this. Julian Cole often posts about other blogs and often mentions newcomers as well giving them what is usually their first technorati hits and via this tool his blog ranked over $40,000.

The interesting thing that Technorati reates is a need to utilize your blog well from a marketing perspective. You have to build relationships with your readers in order to be successful. I quite like the idea that not only am I doing a marketing blog but I also have to perform marketing type activites with it in order to achieve success.

If there are any potential bloggers out there or early starters I recommend you look into this stuff early. It adds a new level to your blog and will save you from playing the wrong game for six months like I have been.

╠ Save the World, Embrace Christmas Reprise ╣

Most of you probably remember my AniBlog about the Global Economic Crisis. In this video I mentioned the way to solving this problem was simply to spend more and therefore embracing Christmas was the answer.

Now this is not entirely true...in theory at least. If inflation goes up that doesn't mean all of a sudden problem solved. People simply spending money isn't going to fix the problems of the world such as the banks constant battle to stay afloat and the stock markets huge slump.

All inflation does is mask the problem to a degree. However there are follow on effects that work with this. People spending more means businesses are more successful and end up with more money. This means they don't have to fire people and the recession cycle hopefully begins to dissipate. So it solves a conventional recession. The fault with this though is if it happens it may not fix what we currently have. There are so many large businesses on breaking point so spending more may not be able to outweigh the losses if we were to say lose a bank, even if it weren't a big four bank.

So in essence it should help and certainly shouldn't hurt and when the alternative is to invest it in the stock market and lose money or in a fixed interest account and get a measly few percent then why not go for it! Spend, spend spend!

╠ S*** Shirts ╣

More and more recently I have started noticing shirts that bend the border on what is appropriate or not. Now I'm no fan of swearing so I've particularly taken notice or swear words slipping in more and more. The example to the left involving the S word. In fact the S word is probably the most common word I see on T-shirts these days.

Today I also noticed a shirt "Fu_k to live, live to Fu_k" as if blanking one letter changed anything.

I must admit in this day and age with words like this expressed so freely I really don't see myself if I were a child able to grow up to be the same person I am today.

It also raises an interesting point though. With self expression able to include such things, how long is it until brand expression can get away with the same. Censorship seems to be crazy on organizations however it almost seems unfair that individuals can get away with these sorts of tshirts on a daily basis while campaigns such as 'Where the Bloody hell are you?' and Ultimate care down there for your beaver are considered too risque.

This may be beyond my grounds to say but personally I think this all stems from enjoying picking on the person who can't fight back. If someone tells someone wearing one of these shirts it's rude theres a large chance it could go down very not well. However picking on organizations is different because while they are legal entities they cannot fight for themselves. I think people are simply justifying to themself that when they pick on organizations they aren't actually hurting anyones emotions and therefore don't feel bad, in fact they feel better because they can claim they're making the world a better place.

I'm not sayng all of a sudden ads should be able to swear but I just think we need more equality around. Why can people parade around flaunting swear words while organizations have to be perfect gentleman?

╠ AniBlog - The Global Economic Crisis for Dummies╣

So here I am with another one of these things. This time trying to share my knowledge of economics towards the global economic crisis.

As far as quality goes with this AniBlog I tried something different here with trying to explain something with both sound and image at the same time which I think didn't work because at around the 30sec mark you either aren't paying attention to whats on the screen or have completely lost what I'm saying.

However this time at least I was able to keep it below 2 minutes so the bursts are getting shorter and shorter. As usual any recommendations or comments are welcome

The Script: (Not kept to 100%)

So stock markets are crashing, banks are being stingy, dollars are plummeting and America as usual is to blame. Now most of you probably know the housing loan issue that caused all of this but very has been said about the economic factors that contribute to a recession.

Now the main part of importance is inflation. An economies inflation is the percentage increase on what a country spends each year. In a perfect world this stays still at a low rate. However this usually isn't possible because when people negotiate things such as wage and price increases they usually increase by inflation and then because they're greedy and wish to grow tap some on top of it therefore inadvertantly increasing inflation.

Left to its own will this usually continues to rise, however the Reserve Bank of Australia tries to keep this at around two to three percent. They do this by changing interest rates. Raising interest rates means people are more inclined to save reducing inflation, lowering them obviously does the opposite.

What makes a recession is when inflation drops over an extended period. This means people aren't spending at the increasing rate that they were expected to, this unfortunately leads to unemployment increasing which means that those people aren't spending their wages which negatively affects inflation causing the horrible cycle that is a recession

So basically thanks to how interconnected the world is when a huge economy like America gets the sniffles, the rest of the world catches a cold.

The solution to this problem is relatively simple, if a country spending less overall puts them into recession, the solution is simply to spend more. So if you're listening to this here's my recommendation. Save the world, Embrace Christmas! If you run out of people to buy gifts for I'm sure you could find it in your heart to think of a Uni Student blogger who is deserving

╠ Do Grades Matter? ╣

Zac Martin made a post a while ago back when everyone elses grades were released about failing a law subject and whether that had any effect on anything. Well today Melbourne Uni finally got their results and I managed to get no better than a pass for my market research class. In fact I got 3 passes and one H2B in one class I hated. I seem to have a habit of flunking the classes I love.

So my question is does this stuff actually matter? I spend all of my spare time volunteering for the Melbourne Anime Festival, working or doing stuff for this blog as opposed to studying. This seems to reflect in my scores.

Can I argue this or is there simply a level of low scoring that means people will stop looking at you? Should I actually really aim for doing as much outside uni as possible or actually aim to do well in my classes ^^;

╠ AniBlog - The Talk of Techxperts ╣

With the previous semi success of my previous AniBlog I decided to try again and in this second try improve the faults of the previous. The main fault of the first was the sound quality which for the most parts I have improved on. There are a few faults in my reading the script but thats a minor think to fix for the future.

This installment is on Dick Smith's rebranding and their new slogan 'Talk to the techxperts' which I have some insight as a personal worker of theirs. Anyway if you have any comments at all let me know and I'll try and fix it should I do any more of these.




Script for the video: (Not 100% accurate due to adlibs)


A competitive advantage is something that one organization does that gives it an edge on it's opposition. To dumb it down it's usually the reason you purchase one item over another, this can be but isn't limited to being the cheapest, the best or simply has a particular feature you're after.

Something I'd like to bring attention to is claiming a competitive advantage that may not actually exist. As most of you probably don't know Dick Smith is currently going through a rebranding excersize. One part of this was their new slogan 'Talk to the Techsperts'. Basically claiming they have allpowerfully knowledge of anything techological.

Now I am unfortunately as a worker of theirs meant to be a so called techspert. Although when it comes to certain technology I'm as knowledgeable as a cave dwellers pet goldfish and therefore feel it necessary to poke at the flaws in this apparent advantage of ours.

It all stems from the hiring process. Basically us and all our competitors hire from what is majoritvely a pool of uni students looking for a part time job to fund their school supplies. So first of all we're no better, but wait it gets worse. Take JB Hifi as the main competitor. They offer better commission, better discount and aren't required to know stuff or even approach customers...although it may just be me they don't approach thanks to the countless hours I spent in their stores making use of their free guitar hero. But overall the point is that it is a better deal to work there and therefore they should have their pick of applicants first putting the Dick Smith hires at the bottom of the barrel.

This would all be fine and well if we received special training...however we don't. There's usually one optional far from exhaustive online training for one specific program about every month which is relatively useless when you consider the amount of stock we have.

So to summarize...we aren't techsperts, we're workers, just like those you'll find anywhere else yet somehow we're able to claim a competitive advantage about this. In fact it seems little more than a trick at consumers expense..

However for their own sake hope consumers are becoming smart enough to see through ortherwise they will face my techspert way of responding to hard questions with a blank stare!