Aaron Ewer
Aaron Ewers thoughts about everything

Not sure why Paris Hilton would ever agree to go back on the David Letterman show, after she was so verbally beat up by him on her last appearance, fresh out of jail. He really badgered her about that and the poor thing just stammered and stuttered and fought to keep her composure. She was supposed to be promoting the release of her new perfume, but the conversation never really got headed in that direction.

Tonight he was much more hospitable, and she was plugging a new “reality” show based on her living with a group of commoners who all have hopes of becoming Paris’ new “best friend.” There was also some discussion of her new boyfriend, a heavily tattoed singer in a grunge rock band.

Interesting to see how her life has changed, but one wonders if it’s even for the better?

Everyone in my house is looking forward for the new movie, Speed Racer, to be released this summer. We’ve seen the commercials for a couple of weeks and we are waiting with baited breath. Some of the commercials include an exciting new technology called fade out technology. A company called Jokeroo pioneered the video fade-out technique.

Check out this Video Fade-Out Example.

I heard about this cool technology from a press release about high impact advertising:

Press Release:

TORONTO, Ontario–(BUSINESS WIRE)—-Jokeroo.com, http://www.jokeroo.com, one of the pioneers in internet video and entertainment, has premiered the video fade-out advertisement with the upcoming movie, Speed Racer. The new format was designed to attract marketers across the globe with an advertisement that’s high impact and engaging, while avoiding any negative impact on the user.

Although the campaign is still in its infancy, it has produced spectacular results posting a click-through north of 4 percent, which is much higher than eMarketer’s quoted preroll standard of 0.5 to 0.9 percent. “When coming up with the idea we were looking for something that offered great performance for the advertiser while keeping the user happy,” says Aleks Dugonjic, the President of Jokeroo.com.

The creative takes up the full screen outside of the video player environment, which avoids interrupting the user experience but allows the advertiser’s brand to go unnoticed. The fade-out can last up to thirty seconds until it slowly starts fading out and the Jokeroo.com webpage appears. A live example can be found here: http://www.jokeroo.com/funnyvideos/transformers_stop_motion.html

About Jokeroo.com

Jokeroo.com is one of the leading video entertainment websites on the market today, ranked in the top 50 by comScore in multimedia and 2nd in humor. The company currently hosts over 6 million unique visitors, 150,000+ community members, and has over 1 million active email subscriptions.

What is the longest titled song to ever chart in Billboard?

There is a clue in the previous post. The original “Sugar, Sugar” song was by a fictional band but was later covered by several groups, including a studio guy who put together a bunch of mostly Beatles melodies and released this song:

Medley: Intro ‘Venus’ / Sugar Sugar / No Reply / I’ll Be Back / Drive My Car / Do You Want to Know a Secret / We Can Work It Out / I Should Have Known Better / Nowhere Man / You’re Going to Lose That Girl / Stars on 45

Otherwise known as the song that hit number one in June 1981 called by the nickname, “Stars on 45.”

Back in 1969 the song, “Sugar, Sugar” was a number one hit for 4 straight weeks. The weird thing about this accomplishment is that the band, “The Archies,” was not a real band. The song was created in a studio specifically to be a bubblegum pop hit by a group of studio musicians managed by Don Kirshner. And that’s another Wikipedia tidbit of trivia that lead me to yet another search and interesting info: Sugar.

Sugar is made from either sugar cane or sugar beets, and it goes through several different processing steps in the refinery. Depending upon how white the sugar is when the processing is finished will determine the sugar grade, and the grade determines the sugar’s selling price.

The best grade of sugar is called Icumsa 45, which means it is the whitest and purest sugar available. I learned a lot about sugar processing and grading by reading a website called www.IC45.com. If you’ve ever liked to tour manufacturing plants and factories to see how things are made, you should read this site’s one page explanation of how sugar is refined and graded - it is fascinating.

This group first appeared in July 1954 at the Overton Park Shell as the opening act for Slim Whitman. Do you know who were the three guys in “The Blue Moon Boys?” I have to admit that even though I consider myself a fan I did not know this little tidbit.

The answer is:

1. Winfield “Scotty” Moore
2. Bill Black
3. Elvis Presley

This was their after they had made studio recordings and tried a couple other gigs in local bars as a new band.

Read this in a Wikipedia entry on Elvis Presley, which was a link in a different Wikipedia article about “Rags to Riches” stories and people. The idea of rags to riches is a powerfully motivating force in America and one of the reasons that so many people buy lottery tickets.

In my personal experience, the people who acquire a sudden surge of wealth behave very differently from the people who grew up with financial security. It is interesting to see how many celebrities and lottery winners who are today’s Nouveau Riche seem to implode or sabotage their own success and happiness. The history pages of full of suicides, drug overdoses and overspending that results in the person being broke all over again.

It’s a shame about Elvis. I miss his smooth distinctive voice. Great article in Wikipedia about Elvis though - read it to find out why they called themselves The Blue Moon Boys and more great trivia.