Here's how to turn heartbreak into gold. It's the story of how a spurned lover created a new online business. From,Mi David E. Williams CNN
(CNN) -- Joshua Opperman thought he'd met the woman he'd marry and spend the rest of his life with. But when they broke up a few years ago, he was left with a broken heart, an expensive ring and an idea that he's turning into a business.
Niagara Falls Getaway
Opperman said he was depressed after the split and even more depressed when he tried to sell the engagement ring he'd spent most of his life savings on.
"I tried to sell the ring back where I bought it and they wanted to give me 32 percent back," he said.
Long Distance Discount Plans
The 29-year-old real estate broker decided to open the online jewelry auction site "I Do ... Now I Don't" after reading an article about other people in the same predicament. He runs the site with his sister Mara and three employees.
"I wanted to make a safe venue for buying and selling diamond engagement rings," Opperman said.
Opperman didn't have any jewelry experience, so he teamed up with a jeweler in New York City's diamond district.
"When someone wins the (auction), the ring is sent to us and the money's sent to us so our in house jeweler can make sure the diamond is real, first of all and you're getting exactly what was offered," he said.
If the ring doesn't match the description, they send it back and refund the buyer's money. If the sale goes through, "I Do ... Now I Don't" keeps 5 percent of the price.
The jewelry ranges in price and quality -- from a pearl and silver ring the seller hopes to get $150 for to a 3 ct. Tacori platinum engagement ring with an $18,000 minimum bid.
Working with the shards of other people's shattered relationships might sound depressing, but Opperman said he's getting a lot of positive feedback.
"I feel good about it because they tell me the stories and then they say 'this is a great idea, I'm glad you came up with this Web site,'" he said.
He said he gets lots of e-mail from potential sellers and plans to add a "tell us your stories" page to his Web site.
One person, who wanted to sell a $1,200 engagement set wrote that "I need to find a way to get rid of them, I have way too many memories with them sitting around the house."
"I just want to say that there is a silver lining in some clouds," wrote a woman who said she was having her "nest egg" appraised.
Amanda Gizzi, a Spokeswoman for the Jewelry Information Center, says it's important to be able to contact the jeweler, especially when buying online.
"Buying jewelry is something that's very visual and when you can't actually see and feel the piece, you need to be able to ask those questions," she said.
She also recommended getting an independent appraisal when buying or selling jewelry.
"It's always good to have something that's independently appraised. You don't want to buy anything that has an appraisal coming from the person who sold it to you or is looking to buy it from you," Gizzi said.
Opperman said they'd only made a handful of sales so far, but things were picking up enough that he may have to quit his real estate job.
He said buyers don't seem to be superstitious about buying break-up diamonds; or at least not superstitious enough to pass up a good deal. Most rings sell for about 50 to 60 percent of their asking price.
"There really hasn't been any questions about whether they're buying a doomed engagement ring," he said. "It might be doomed for somebody and it might be better luck for someone else."
Thursday, February 15, 2007
Friday, February 9, 2007
Michael Robertson's Response To Steve Jobs Call
February 8, 2007
Dear Steve,
First let me say that your iTunes/iPod success is unprecedented and awe inspiring to me. Your impact on digital music is astounding. I read your open letter to the music industry and wanted to respond. It's great seeing the #1 DRM vendor in the world acknowledging that DRM is an issue. I've been talking about this since I founded MP3.com so it's nice to finally have someone with your prominence raising awareness on this topic (read You Own Nothing - the highest rated blog post I've ever written).
Rubbermaid
I want to challenge you to take actions to bolster your words to insure you are genuine and your letter wasn't simply a deflection shield to escape government scrutiny. In your letter you stated that currently "customers are being well served with a continuing stream of innovative products and a wide variety of choices." The incompatible chaos of digital music today is not serving customers or the music industry particularly well. I think you know this too which is why you posted your letter calling for change. I agree with your suggestion that the industry is already selling non-DRM files on CDs so it's not a big leap to selling them online (of course, as you know, non-DRM files are available online from many unlicensed sources so now it's just a question of whether the industry is going to put a price tag and make some money on this behavior). You mentioned that licensing your FairPlay DRM technology is problematic. Microsoft widely licenses its similar DRM technology and it doesn't seem to be any more or less secure than yours, so I'm not sure I agree with you. But instead of focusing on political posturing I want to focus on real solutions that can change the industry.
Tuesday, February 6, 2007
New Storage Device Promises To Rival Internal Combustion Engine
A new storage device created by EEStor may replace the electrochemical battery in virtually every application, from fully electric cars and hybrids to laptop computers, with their battery-ultracapacitor hybrids.
EEStor, a Texas company, has been developing an energy storage device that has the potential to rival the supremacy of the internal combustion engine. According to a patent issued in April, the device is made of a ceramic powder with a barium-titanate insulator, coated with aluminum oxide and glass.It works as a combination of energy store and ultracapacitor. It can completely absorb and release a charge at high rates.
EEStor's astonishing ultracapcitor technology could usher in a revolution in car battery technology. According to EEStor's patent documents its EESU not only will outperform the best lithium-ion batteries, but will also be ten times more powerful than present lead-acid batteries. It estimates that it will have half the production costs of current batteries and will not use any toxic chemicals.
If EEStor's new device works as it is discribed, it will store enough electricity in five minutes of charging to drive 500 miles for about $9(or abour 45 cents a gallon for current gas cars).
Whether this new device will withstand the rigors of real life performance in cars will be soon seen as Canadian based ZENN Motor plans to put the EESU into their electric cars later this year.
Sunday, February 4, 2007
Meraki: Promising Low Cost Wi Fi Mesh Network
New directions for the internet lie in extending affordable broadband service to everyone’s doorstep. This is the famous last mile problem. Wi Fi looks promising but because Wi-Fi signals do not bend, and you can’t get much of a useful bounce from them there are obvious obstacles. Also Wi-Fi uses unlicensed bands of the radio spectrum and by law it must rely on low-power transmitters.This reduces its ability to penetrate walls.
One of the heavily backed solutions is WiMax.It comes in two aspects: mobile, which has not yet been certified, and fixed, which is theoretically well suited for residential deployment. Unfortunately, it’s not low price. Peter Bell, a research analyst at TeleGeography Research in Washington, said fixed WiMax would not be able to compete against cable and DSL service: “It makes more economic sense in semirural areas that have no broadband coverage.”
Coming on the scene is a new inexpensive alternative from Meraki Networks. This is a Wi-Fi network that is not top-down but rather ground-level, peer-to-peer. It relies on $50 boxes that serve, depending upon population density, more than one household and can be installed easily by anyone.
Meraki , a 15-employee start-up in Mountain View, Calif., has been field-testing Wi-Fi boxes that offer a very inexpensive solution to the “last 10 yards” problem. Rather than starting from outside the house and trying to send signals in, Meraki starts from the inside and sends signals out, to the neighbors.
Some of those neighbors will also have Meraki boxes that serve as repeaters, relaying the signal still farther to more neighbors. Meraki's boxes have software that maintains a “mesh network.” This network dynamically reroutes signals as boxes are added or removed. It also takes into account environmental conditions that affect network performance.
Last January two of Meraki’s co-founders — Sanjit Biswas and John Bicket — were still Ph.D. students at M.I.T., doing research on wireless mesh networks in the course of building Roofnet. Roofnet was an experimental network offering free service to one-third of residents of Cambridge, Mass. Later in the year Biswas gave a presentation about his experience to Google which was testing its first municipal Wi-Fi network in its hometown, Mountain View, Calif., using transmitters attached to street lamps.
After Mr. Biswas’s talk, a Google engineer told him that people using Google’s network said they could get online at home only by holding their laptops against a window. Mr. Biswas said he was not surprised. Using municipal Wi-Fi for residential coverage, he said, was “the equivalent of expecting street lamps to light everyone’s homes.”
Biswas and Bicket saw that their mesh-network gear designed for residential use could speed up the widening of Internet access everywhere. Along with a third co-founder, Hans Robertson, they moved to Silicon Valley and set up Meraki. Google and then Sequoia Capital, one of Google’s original venture capital backers, promptly invested in Meraki. Meraki’s products are still being tested, but word-of-mouth has attracted 15,000 users in 25 countries.
Meraki’s products are not yet for sale, and its networks have not been tested with extensive deployment across a large city. However, the advantages of its grass-roots approach, with miniscule expenditure for both equipment and operations, make it a a player to watch.
Meraki says it does not want to become an Internet service provider itself. Its goal is to equip any interested nontechnical person to become a “micro” service provider for his or her local community. .
This low-cost network model seems to be the way broadband service might reach many more home.
Milton Drepaul
One of the heavily backed solutions is WiMax.It comes in two aspects: mobile, which has not yet been certified, and fixed, which is theoretically well suited for residential deployment. Unfortunately, it’s not low price. Peter Bell, a research analyst at TeleGeography Research in Washington, said fixed WiMax would not be able to compete against cable and DSL service: “It makes more economic sense in semirural areas that have no broadband coverage.”
Coming on the scene is a new inexpensive alternative from Meraki Networks. This is a Wi-Fi network that is not top-down but rather ground-level, peer-to-peer. It relies on $50 boxes that serve, depending upon population density, more than one household and can be installed easily by anyone.
Meraki , a 15-employee start-up in Mountain View, Calif., has been field-testing Wi-Fi boxes that offer a very inexpensive solution to the “last 10 yards” problem. Rather than starting from outside the house and trying to send signals in, Meraki starts from the inside and sends signals out, to the neighbors.
Some of those neighbors will also have Meraki boxes that serve as repeaters, relaying the signal still farther to more neighbors. Meraki's boxes have software that maintains a “mesh network.” This network dynamically reroutes signals as boxes are added or removed. It also takes into account environmental conditions that affect network performance.
Last January two of Meraki’s co-founders — Sanjit Biswas and John Bicket — were still Ph.D. students at M.I.T., doing research on wireless mesh networks in the course of building Roofnet. Roofnet was an experimental network offering free service to one-third of residents of Cambridge, Mass. Later in the year Biswas gave a presentation about his experience to Google which was testing its first municipal Wi-Fi network in its hometown, Mountain View, Calif., using transmitters attached to street lamps.
After Mr. Biswas’s talk, a Google engineer told him that people using Google’s network said they could get online at home only by holding their laptops against a window. Mr. Biswas said he was not surprised. Using municipal Wi-Fi for residential coverage, he said, was “the equivalent of expecting street lamps to light everyone’s homes.”
Biswas and Bicket saw that their mesh-network gear designed for residential use could speed up the widening of Internet access everywhere. Along with a third co-founder, Hans Robertson, they moved to Silicon Valley and set up Meraki. Google and then Sequoia Capital, one of Google’s original venture capital backers, promptly invested in Meraki. Meraki’s products are still being tested, but word-of-mouth has attracted 15,000 users in 25 countries.
Meraki’s products are not yet for sale, and its networks have not been tested with extensive deployment across a large city. However, the advantages of its grass-roots approach, with miniscule expenditure for both equipment and operations, make it a a player to watch.
Meraki says it does not want to become an Internet service provider itself. Its goal is to equip any interested nontechnical person to become a “micro” service provider for his or her local community. .
This low-cost network model seems to be the way broadband service might reach many more home.
Milton Drepaul
New Music Social Interactive Site
New site, www.newbandtv.com, boasts an ever-growing list of exclusive content, behind-the-scenes, music videos, and community aspect of the highly sought-after underground and independent music market. The features and content are at some of the highest quality flash video available anywhere on the web.
Discount Long Distance
Irvine, CA (PRWEB) February 4, 2007 -- Based on the premise that 90% of the world's best music never gets heard, PowerJam Entertainment announced the launch of New Band TV.com (www.newbandtv.com), a music first interactive social website targeting underground bands and fans looking for creative outlets.
This new concept gives signed and unsigned musicians a destination site to share songs and videos on the Web. In addition, fans who sign up are able to interact with robust video that features high quality full screen resolution, digital audio quality and a fully functional social networking environment.
The site incorporates the best of social networking with an emphasis on an expanding music video library, exclusive content consisting of original Webisode and Webumentary programming, interviews, in-studio performances and concert footage.
Fans can set up personal profiles and are encouraged to interact and network with each other. t, New Band TV.com founder, H. Eugene Fouchia says: "I am absolutely tired of the pre-processed Star Making Monopoly of Hollywood and the Major Record Labels. There is so much great talent out there that cannot fit through that tiny corporate portal.
New Band TV.com is about putting stardom and recognition on a level playing field. A place for bands and singers to showcase their talent worldwide! Think of all the bands you've seen over the years in local clubs, never to hear from again. Consolidation of the recording and media industries has constricted the music funnel into tiny boxes of playlists. Not any more. We are democratizing the music scene and bringing it directly to the people, permanently!"
New Band TV.com's team of experienced media executives and young, hip staff considers the company a natural extension of the boom in social networking for the 14-24 year old "Generation You." Intuitive graphics make the site easy to navigate, browse and upload video and pictures. It has already garnered a large library of music videos produced by independent labels, personalized band videos and even launched a pilot show, "NoiseLink," into syndicated television.
Milton Drepaul
Discount Long Distance
Irvine, CA (PRWEB) February 4, 2007 -- Based on the premise that 90% of the world's best music never gets heard, PowerJam Entertainment announced the launch of New Band TV.com (www.newbandtv.com), a music first interactive social website targeting underground bands and fans looking for creative outlets.
This new concept gives signed and unsigned musicians a destination site to share songs and videos on the Web. In addition, fans who sign up are able to interact with robust video that features high quality full screen resolution, digital audio quality and a fully functional social networking environment.
The site incorporates the best of social networking with an emphasis on an expanding music video library, exclusive content consisting of original Webisode and Webumentary programming, interviews, in-studio performances and concert footage.
Fans can set up personal profiles and are encouraged to interact and network with each other. t, New Band TV.com founder, H. Eugene Fouchia says: "I am absolutely tired of the pre-processed Star Making Monopoly of Hollywood and the Major Record Labels. There is so much great talent out there that cannot fit through that tiny corporate portal.
New Band TV.com is about putting stardom and recognition on a level playing field. A place for bands and singers to showcase their talent worldwide! Think of all the bands you've seen over the years in local clubs, never to hear from again. Consolidation of the recording and media industries has constricted the music funnel into tiny boxes of playlists. Not any more. We are democratizing the music scene and bringing it directly to the people, permanently!"
New Band TV.com's team of experienced media executives and young, hip staff considers the company a natural extension of the boom in social networking for the 14-24 year old "Generation You." Intuitive graphics make the site easy to navigate, browse and upload video and pictures. It has already garnered a large library of music videos produced by independent labels, personalized band videos and even launched a pilot show, "NoiseLink," into syndicated television.
Milton Drepaul
Friday, February 2, 2007
Stephen King Writes First Marvel Comic Book
- Stephen King and Marvel Comics will premiere a comic book next week, "The Dark Tower: The Gunslinger Born,". King, an iconic novelist with a huge fan base will be debuting in a form traditionally associated with teenagers of another era.
I will be giving away my age when I recall how my bother and I lovingly received some 'Superman' comics from a school friend. Comics preceded TV for us and added a visual element to our reading. I haven't read one since the late sixties. I have noticed the growing movie stardom of some of Marvel's heroes. So King's entrance into this field arouses great interest. I understand that The Dark Tower's will get Harry Potter like treatment with about 150 retailers across the country having "midnight release" parties, as Tuesday turns to Wednesday, to celebrate the release of the first of a planned seven issues.
STEPHEN KING's "The Dark Tower," is a huge sprawling work about a haunted gunslinger on a quest for a mysterious spire. It has stretched out over 22 years, and seven novels.
"The Dark Tower" seemingly ended like a damp squid in 2004. Some readers felt letdown with the saga's final pages and the blurred fate of its hero, Roland Deschain.
"With the last novel's ending, there really was a sense of 'You must be kidding,' so that certainly adds to the anticipation for the comics," Marvel's Meyers said.
"This is Stephen King's first dip into this pop-culture medium, and there's a lot of excitement. You haven't seen anything like this in comics, so we're getting this 'Harry Potter'-style event.
Pet Grooming
King has promised promises plenty of shocks in the "Dark Tower" universe in the series, which will be drawn by fan-favorite comics artist Jae Lee.
The public appetite for King's works appear to be bottomless. He is reported to be working on three novels in various stages of completion (a resuscitated 1970s manuscript called "Blaze," a new work called "Duma Key" and another installment of "The Talisman" with Peter Straub. King also writes a column for Entertainment Weekly and keeps tabs on Hollywood adaptations of his work, like the current Frank Darabont film of "The Mist" and a TV miniseries of "The Talisman."
The End of Harry Potter-Out July 31
The news is out. The final Harry Potter book "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows,"will be released at midnight July 21 this year.
J.K. Rowling and her British and U.S. publishers, Bloomsbury and Scholastic Inc. announced this today. Rowling will end the magical saga of the famous boy wizard ten years and a few hundred million book sales after the first Harry Potter book,
The news set off a booking frenzy. Almost instantly, like the waving of a magic wand, "Deathly Hallows" topped the bestseller lists on Amazon.com and Barnes & Noble.com.Oprah's book selection, Sidney Poitier's "The Measure of a Man" sank into second place.
LONG DISTANCE DISCOUNTS
J.K. Rowling and her British and U.S. publishers, Bloomsbury and Scholastic Inc. announced this today. Rowling will end the magical saga of the famous boy wizard ten years and a few hundred million book sales after the first Harry Potter book,
The news set off a booking frenzy. Almost instantly, like the waving of a magic wand, "Deathly Hallows" topped the bestseller lists on Amazon.com and Barnes & Noble.com.Oprah's book selection, Sidney Poitier's "The Measure of a Man" sank into second place.
LONG DISTANCE DISCOUNTS
Sleep--The New Bottled Water?
An article in the New York Times discribes Yelo a new salon on West 57th Street that sells anxious New Yorkers the promise of a brief but cocooning sleep.
Is it likely that a business in selling sleep could thrive?
Read the Full Article and decide whether selling sleepis a great idea
Is it likely that a business in selling sleep could thrive?
Yelo 's model is seven private chambers that can be rented for 20- to 40-minute naps. Twenty minute naps cost $12.Each hexagonal pod has a beige leather recliner, dimmed lighting, a soporific soundtrack and a blanket of Nepalese cashmere. Clients may also book reflexology treatments, designed to lull the body to sleep, for their hands or feet starting at $65.
"Sleep is the new bottled water. Although it can be had free, it is increasingly being marketed as an upscale amenity. Nationwide, sales of prescription sleeping medications reached about $3 billion in the first nine months of last year, according to IMS Health, a healthcare research firm. That does not include the more than $20 billion spent on nocturnal accouterments like pillowtop mattresses, adjustable beds, hypoallergenic pillows, white-noise machines and monogrammed cashmere pajamas."--according to a quote from the article.Read the Full Article and decide whether selling sleepis a great idea
Thursday, February 1, 2007
Uniden's Cool Cordless Submersible Phone
The 5.8-gigahertz cordless phone is completely sealed and the handset’s cradle recharges it by magnetic induction, so there are no exposed metal parts. You can use it in the pool or shower. One neat feature is that the WX1477 floats!
Other features are:a 100-name phone book, caller ID with a 100-number memory and 20 ring tones that can be assigned to your contacts so you know right away who is calling.
A phone with a base unit is $90. Additional handsets and chargers are $100, and the system can accommodate up to 10 handsets. The phones will be available this month from http://www.unidendirect.com/.
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