Owner: Cube-Business URL:www.cube1986.blogspot.com Join Date: Wed, 07 Mar 2007 13:16:25 -0600 Rating:0 Site Description: An Irish business students views and thoughts on business, techonolgy and life Site statistics:Click here
EH? google, can be wrong sometimes 2007-03-07 23:43:00 Im sure that Google have all their search techniques sorted and all that, but when checking my sitemeter refferels list I couldn't help but notice, that the above page (screenshot from bottom of the screen) is quite unusual.It seems while searching for a rather lude service, in a location that I am well known to despise, gogole search has thrown up my site as the 27th best place on the web to locate "escort girls" in the small seaside town of almunecar....blogging ogne wrong I think
Randy Couture - UFC 68 2007-03-05 04:48:00 Tonight I watched one of the greatest sporting moments I have ever seen.....EVER RandyCouture
, the 43 year old 2 time heavyweight and 1 time light heavyweight champion, came out of retirement, one year after hanging up his gloves to go toe to toe in the octogon once again. His opponent was the reigning champion Tim "The Maine-iac" Sylvia, the strong favorite to win and put the old man 13 years his senior back into retirement. As the match got under way, the size difference was obvious for all to see, Couture gave a good half foot and over 40 pounds to his opponent, but within the first few moments BOOM, couture struck and knocked Sylvia on his ass! The "fight" that ensued saw Couture truly dominated his larger opponent by using his agility to dodge the akward punches slung by Sylvia, and used his superior clinch and wrestling skills to get the big man on the ground. The match was a perfect example of "Fail to prepare, prepare to fail" Randy had spent the last few months training with Read more:Randy Couture
The Sega days 2007-03-04 18:05:00 In the early 1990s Sega held a 65% hold of the home console market with their revolutionary “Genesis/ Megadrive”, the console had a huge array of games and with its (at the time) impressive 16bit technology it won gamers over in their droves. However in 1994 along came the SNES the Nintendo’s answer to the 16bit console, this entry quickly eroded Sega’s dominance and left them much closer to 35% of the market.1998 saw the release of the Sega dreamcast, Segas last ditch attempt to catch up with Nintendo, and it quickly became the fastest selling console of all time, that was until Sony came in and ruined their party by releasing the “Sony Playstation” which brought gaming to a new level and would change the console landscape forever.In 2001 Sega decided to depart from the console war and have since become a software development company, creating games for Nintendo’s gamecube, DS and Wii, Sony’s playstation series and also the xbox series.Despite their fall from grace in
Michael Jordan sued for....looking like Michael jordan 2007-03-04 03:01:00 When we were young ‘uns in fourth year and were all doing work experience, I spent a spell in the four courts, watching our legal system at work. I visited many different courts, including circuit courts, high courts, the special criminal court (the ones for the ‘ra dave) and even the supreme court. My personal favourite however was the Garda compensation court. There is something weird about compensation courts, mostly cause what they are attempting to do is to put a financial figure on an emotional or physical injury, surely no amount of money can make up for an injury or attack. . .right? Well there was one chappy in question, who while chasing some dastardly criminal hurt his knee. This left him with a sore knee and unable to play rugby with his pals as he told, he got awarded €64,000! Which if u ask me is heavily retarded. . .considering he was about 55 or 60 and was some fat old man whose main sporting activities were cow tipping and occasional wife beating. Another man of Read more:Michael
Utah Jazz: Old School Basketball 2007-03-03 19:20:00 My first encounter with basketball was way back in 1998. There used to be NBA games aired really early in the morning on a saturday, and being a kiddy then and not lazy, I was happy to wake up early to watch it while having my breakfast. The first game I can remember with any sort of clarity was one of the games in the 1998 Finals between the Utah Jazz and the Chicago Bulls, I saw the way the two teams played and their unique styles and chose the guys in white (Jazz) as my favourite team, even though they went on to lose, because they played as a team. (unlike Jordan and his INVISI-bulls)After that I learned all about the Jazz and came to love them, and although they didn’t have the best/strongest/quickest players, they played so well together as a team it truly was sickening. Stockton, Hornacek, Russell, Malone and …..Ostertag (howd he make it to the NBA?) were a bunch of players that knew the way they played inside out, and it made for some truly amazing moments of team basketbal Read more:School
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The Problem with TV advertising 2007-03-03 03:11:00 Back in “the day” things were easier, marketing being one of them. It used to be that you paid the big bad tv broadcaster a whole load of cash, they broadcast your message between the scheduled programming, and then…. You sold units and made yourself a bit of money to buy nice things with etc.The population back then thought “surely any product on this new “television” is superior”, right? Well that was the golden era of when “as seen on TV” made a difference, and people sat at their seats like they were supposed to, and watched your ads.The problem is, people aren’t playing by the rules anymore, in fact, they are stomping all over them.Example 1: Take the average household as an example, the ads come on, “oh timeto make tea”, go potty, etc,So while Procter and Gamble throw millions of dollars at you across the screen to buy their latest product, you remain gleefully unaware of this, and you genuinely don’t care.Another more worrying problem TV advertisers fac Read more:Problem
Knock, Knock, Whos there? 2007-03-01 05:17:00 I love writing blogs, and I think it really is a great way of getting things out of your head and on to some sort storage before they just fade away into space, never to reappear.I also love the way that you can spread ideas about whatever, to whoever, at any time of the day. But blogging poses my brain several problems, and I think they are probably common to many writers throughout the entire blogosphere 1. Is anyone reading this? Who? and how many?2. How do I let people know I have great stuff to say?The first question has been solved for me by www.sitemeter.com, this site gives you a piece of html you add to your blog, from the time you put this on your page it will show you so many details it will make you cry: the daily hits, visits, average time stayed, where they came from (google, link etc), and how they left. Picture shows how people got to my siteThe second site that can show you great detail is Google Analytics. Here, you can get some pretty nifty graphs and tables of where Read more:Knock
The problem with Mac ads 2007-02-27 19:15:00 I recently watched one of the many episodes of the “I’m a mac” ad series. To get things straight, I like macs…alot, and although some of the ads in this series are just not funny, I do like the way they poke fun at pcs and deliver them a much overdue comedic beating. However from a business perspective there are numerous problems with the whole series of ads, some of them very fundamental in nature.I personally like them because I understand them, and I think they cater to the whole Apple “in joke” brand of humour. However for your average computer user, who we can presume is relatively computer ignorant, the ads serve no real purpose at all. They don’t inform or persuade in any meaningful manner, conversely if we look at a typical Dell ad, it tells us what we get, when we’ll get it, and what a great deal we are getting. And obviously this has brought them great success, where as Apples “we’re cooler than thou” approach has had relatively limited success.The most
Save the internet 2007-02-26 14:24:00 Using the printing press people started to publish their thought and ideas about 600 years ago, this was the first major explosion of sharing of thoughts and ideas and has taken the world to where it is today, however within a reasonably short amount of time, the boom, was over. Sure publishing still existed, and in terms of volume it was greater than ever, the difference? Publishing was not done by the humble printing press anymore, and cost of entry were so high that the entire market for publishing print was controlled by a select few major players. This meant that the stream of ideas, thoughts and opinions was a one way process and was heavily controlled by the interests of those major players.If we look back to the 1920s we see another explosion. This was the golden age of the radio where thousands of users would broadcast their own shows and could access large numbers of people instantly and led to a resurgence of communication. But this was not to last very long and the US gover
Web 2.0 2007-02-23 11:10:00 Not that long ago when i was a little whipper snapper, the Internet was very different from the way it is now. There was no way that i could have searched for a video like the way i can on youtube, and there is no way this blog would have existed. It may have been that somewhere on the unsearchable web these facilities did exist, but my point is that it is now supremely easier to create a video, a story and within minutes broadcast it to potential millions.The web has come a loooong way in recent years and is now in a place nerds like to call web 2.0.So next time you leave a comment on a bebo, upload a video to youtube, or write into your blog, give that a thought.The above video is pretty great.
Spring Break (nerd style) 2007-02-21 16:45:00 My planned trip to Canada (for business competition) in picsstarts march 14th go to canada, that first buliding is my hotel!Second venue is where the competition will be going down.Then after that gonna greyhpund it up to Toronto for a bit.Then on to New York!Then back to ....Dublin... Read more:Spring
, Break
Bad Presenting 2007-02-19 20:07:00 Presenting, for many people, places above spiders and tinkers on the all time fear list. To present well and effectivly you must practice and learn from the mistakes of the past. I had a presentation today that will decide whether I get to go to Canada to compete for UCD, i probably went over my piece (under 3 minutes) about 40 or 50 times to get it perfect, but most people do not do this.In Rowan Manahans blog, he talks about the qualities (or not) of terrible presenters, and usually even the best suffer from one of the below, Rowan writesTHE APPALLING PRESENTER MANIFESTOJust in case there’s anyone who doubts your ineptitude, indolence, ignorance and supercilious nature, make sure you include the following elements in your next presentation:Ass Narcissism - "I’m just going to turn my back on you now and read all my slides off the screen. Enjoy the view!" Tolstoy wannabe - "I know that I can fit the entire text of War & Peace onto the next three slides. Thank God for sub-bullets!"
Worlds Happiest 2007-02-18 10:13:00 The table of the "worlds happiest countries" (fruity I Know) was released recently, it reflects data from UNESCO, the CIA, the New Economics Foundation, the WHO, the Veenhoven Database, the Latinbarometer, the Afrobarometer, and the UNHDR.The twenty happiest countries are:DenmarkSwitzerlandAustriaIceland The Bahamas Finland Sweden Bhutan Brunei Canada Ireland Luxembourg Costa Rica Malta The Netherlands Antigua and Barbuda Malaysia New Zealand Norway The SeychellesAs a side note, Finaldn no.6 also has the worlds highest suicide rate...and by a long way. You figure Read more:Worlds
Phone Love 2007-02-16 11:41:00 I love my iPod, i love it ALOT, and were i in a situation where my house was on fire and i needed to take a few things with me, the ipod and my brother would be high on the list. Other people love their phones and couldnt do without them, like the gentleman i will tell you about.A polish student, studying English in Pennsylvania was recently visiting Niagra falls, strolling along while talking to his friend, his phone fell down onto some trecherous hilly land off the main trail, so, being smart person, he decided he should go after it. Waldek Kubicki ended up slipping on the snowy rocks and ended up sliding over 200 ft towards the BIG drop, and a seeming definate death, but stopped 50ft short, where he had to wait for 45mins to be rescued by helicopter. All i want to know is what type of phone is worth risking a life for...I want it.
The Ruler 2007-02-16 06:13:00 I watched a documentary on Google video yesterday about the history of numbers, it was really quite good and covered it all in a very casual and comical way. One of the things you don’t really realise is that almost everything around you is possible because of numbers, more specifically that we all agree on the same numbers. The ancient Egyptians were the first to introduce the ruler, it was based on the length of a mans forearm and the width of his hand and was made on mass. The fact that they could agree on a common measuring system enabled them to do great things, and brought us structures such as the great pyramids.Just as they key to effective building is measurement and common understanding, the same can be said to be true to effective communication. We need to use the same basic language to get our message across, but when we have that out of the way we need to make sure that we understand the details of that language.Too many times arguments and disagreements are based on mi Read more:Ruler
The importance of a 2nd opinion 2007-02-15 18:55:00 Google like to play around with their logo and often make pretty cool topical versions, like snow covered for xmas etc. However yesterday the logo was different, so much so that in fact the logo did not even say google anymore, however it did say "GOOGE"... As Seth Godin put it "Id like to buy a consonant please".I think this can teach us mere mortals a few lessonseven if you think what you have created/designed/written is perfect, and that you dont need someone to recheck it for you. YOU DO. The goog incident really would have been quite easy to avoid.Also not to get over elaborate with decoration to the point of losing focus of what the actual matter at hand is. This can be seen by people who over format essays/presentations to the point where the core message is blurred.Some people are silly Read more:opinion
iPiano 2007-02-14 17:04:00 Apple really are innovators gotta say, i saw this today and i was real impressed, it really does look like its gonna make a difference in the world of music. The keys are going to be on a giant touchscreen and its all going to be digital. The profitability of the piano is quite slim though and has a retail price of $13,999.Its hitting the shops early in the summer and I think that maybe after this guitar wont be seen as the "cool" instrument to play.Long live the iPiano
Design defects 2007-02-13 05:32:00 Designers at times purposefully build defects in to products so as to shorten their lifespan, or generate repeat custom, but this.... well this is just silly.It really does astonish me that no one down the entire line of command questioned how the customer who purchased the scissors (therefore obviously needing a pair) is to open them without the aid of a.....scissors?My hat is off to them, bravo good sirs
Lessons from Basketball 2007-02-13 02:57:00 I have played basketball since primary school and despite the injuries and what not, it really has been one of the more influential parts of my life. I have met most of my better friends through basketball, and despite St Andrews best efforts, managed to play basketball for the full six years of my stay there. Team sports offer lots of informal education and teaches you lessons that you can apply to all aspects of life.I attribute most of my learning in this area to a certain Mr Conan Doyle ,basketball coach for four of my six years at the school. He taught me that to get the best out of people you don't scream, shout and insult at someone to teach them (See Dick Dunne school of coaching), instead he would bring you aside, ask you what you think you did wrong and then teach you the correct way and made sure you understood him until the message was clear and the lesson was taught. These lessons can be applied to life, and nowhere more clearly than the world of business. For example, y Read more:Basketball
, Lessons
eBay: the pez connection 2007-02-10 05:06:00 I have to admit i was never a huge fan of Pez. Pez for those of you not in the know, or born after the 70's are small crappy sweets that really are quite terrible. However the sweets came in dispencers, and this was inevitably what shot them to fame. They often depicted characters from movies such as star wars and popular cartoons, it was because of this they aquired somewhat of a cult following amonst the nerd population.In 1995 a gentleman by the name of Pierre Omidyar was speaking to his wife (a nerd) who was interested in trading pez dispencers with other collectors (nerds) but didn't know where to look. Pierre thought that perhaps he could set up a simple website where people could trade or purchase these delightful little fancies. He constructed that site 12 years ago......it is now EBAY the masters of ecommerce, and vendor of virtually anything. The site remains the biggest online retailer to date and has the unique appeal of bringing customers together rather than business to Read more:connection
We better be quiet homes......mackas view 2007-02-09 11:57:00 This is perhaps the most artistic description of the moped incident I have ever heard uttered by a human. Possibly the best blog post ever.Mackas version of the sordid incident Read more:better
A thousand words? 2007-02-07 18:30:00 "A picture tells a thousand words"I believe that to be very true. I was watching a presentation by Seth Godin (my hero) last wekk and he put up the above slide to describe the differences between competitors in the motor industry. Two circles... and that was it, the entire slide consisted of two circles. The traditional method of "presenting" utilised by people and encouraged by the powerpoint interface, is to use bullet points and invariably to fill the slide with endless reams of text, that the person proceeds to simply read aloud while looking at the screen.The slide actually showed an important fact too, the small circle showed the amount per car revenue (the white screen) was spent by Mercedes on advertising, because the car is aimed at a specific group and is an exeptional car that really sells itself. The great big grey circle is the amount of advertising per car that Ford spend. Because they have to sell average cars to average people they have to spend alot of money on lettin
Stress in the workplace leads to penisectemy 2007-01-28 17:31:00 This was in the classy free "metro" paper recentlyDoctors' unions in Romania have criticised a decision to make a surgeon pay£100,000 in damages after he lost his temper and hacked off a patient's penisduring surgery. Surgeon Naum Ciomu, who had been suffering from stress atthe time, had been operating on patient Nelu Radonescu, 36, to correct atesticular malformation when he suddenly lost his temper. Grabbing a scalpel, he sliced off the penis in front of shocked nursing staff, and then placed it on the operating table where he chopped it into small pieces before storming out of the operating theatre at Bucharest hospital.
The cost of living in the Capital 2007-03-11 04:14:00 The following statisics were released this year by the Central Statistics Office regarding prices of goods in Dublin relative to the average of that outside the capital. Full report hereTop 5 More expensiveCinema +20.3%Ladies wash, dry and cut +18,9%Salmon Steak +17.2%Leg of Lamb +16.1%Pint +14.6%Top 5 less expensiveLeg of Pork -17.1%White Flour (self raising) -15.7%Spaghetti -11.8%White Flour plain -10.6%Low fat milk -9.9%The over all consumer price indew shows that overall, in a basket of 73 products dublin is 3.5% more expensive than the rest of the country
Alex Tew - The Million Dollar Hompage 2007-03-11 03:31:00 Attending University can bring with it huge expenses, in part due to the sky high prices of books, materials and living costs, but for the most part the crippling fees are what makes the debt a sometimes lifelong problem. No one realised this more than Alex Tew a 21 year old student about to commence a business management degree at the University of Nottingham. The young man from Wiltshire in England lay in bed one night, jotter by his side determined to come up with an innovative way to raise the necessary finances to attend his desired course, without the hardship of a part time job. After many hours of contemplation, an idea struck him, it was unusual, but it might just work.Mr Tew had a keen interest in computers and the internet and realised that a simple web page consisting of a 1000 x 1000 pixel grid could solve all his fiscal worries and in fact leave him a millionaire, that is, if he could convince people to buy them at one dollar a go!He named the site simple as the “The Mi Read more:Dollar
3 things I learned this week 2007-03-11 02:50:00 Every time you and I get a flight we invariably get the big… long… spiel about how "in the event of an emergency" should we crash into the ocean we should make our ways to the escape funnels in a calm organised manner AND THEN and only then, you may open your flotation device. A little known fact is that in as long as records have been kept on flights, there have been a grand total of ZERO successful landings by wide bodied aircraft on water...stop wasting my time air hostess OR ELSEIn Korea over 30% of the under 18 population are registered for online games. In the same country a month ago, a 28 year old man dropped dead from playing computer for 60 hours non stop, having died of exhaustion, (he was also severely obese)On the Argos Ireland website, you CANNOT find TVs or Cameras, however you CAN find television brackets and speakers, and a case for your camera. I cannot see the point of having on online shop that excludes a large section of its high revenue stock willingly. Read more:things
Irish Times 2007-03-12 20:16:00 Odd when you are flicking throught the paper, and you see....you.Times
ran a pic today (monday) about the team i'm in heading to Canada for the competition.Seems we were also in The Examiner and.... metro(booooooo).Sorry about low quality pic, but the big one is me, i swear Read more:Irish
Canada EH? 2007-03-14 17:30:00 emptying pockets and checking thru security 3 times in a day is annoyingflying on Air Canada
is a true pleasure, customer servie = amazingHeathrow sucksToronto airport sucksFlying over the icy bit of the atlantic is coolThere are no real shopping street, they are all in malls out of town (poo to that)There are sweet cars here (pontic and lincolns)Delta Armouries hotel is sweet
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