Before I got a chance to write my strongly worded follow-up e-mail to Warner Bros. to let them know hoe dissatisfied I have been with their customer service, I actually received a response to my previous inquiry. As you may recall, I did a pre-order for CHESS IN CONCERT that was supposed to include MP3 recordings released on June 16th. My order did not come with the links and I was less than happy. (For full details, click here.)

Apparently they’ve had more than a few issues for orders placed directly through their site as opposed to linking in through the webshops on both Josh Groban’s and Idina Menzel’s websites. So they cancelled my order and requested that I go through the process again using a link they provided to Josh Groban’s webshop and I would have access to my instant downloads.

Sure enough, this time it worked like it was supposed to and I had my downloads within a few minutes. Thanks to Warner Bros., for finally following up, even though their poor timing left much to be desired, they at least responded and provided the information necessary to solve the problem I was having.

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PhotoSwap by Podadaz is a cool iPhone application where the premise is simple, you have to take a photo. That photo can be of anything, and it will get swapped with another person using the application anywhere in the world. They could be a mile away or half a world a way. The selection is completely at random. You never who will get the picture you send, and you never know who you’re talking to. You get two option when you get a photo back. You can take a new picture to go to another completely random person, or you can hit reply and send another picture with the same person. The key though is that you can only send another photo. You can’t call the other person, nor can you send a text message, just another photograph. The best you can do is add a little bit of info to your profile such as a couple of lines of text, like a nickname and a little about you or what you want to see.

In order to start a conversation, it requires a picture. You don’t get to see one until you’ve taken one and released it to the randomness of the world. What do you use to start a photo conversation, well, it could be anything, maybe some trinket on your coffee table or a close up of something on the ceiling or a close up of your shoe. It’s interesting because the picture needs to be something interesting to spark a response. If you have enabled the program’s access to your location, the recipient can click on the info button and see a map of the neighborhood where you’re at (without it pinpointing exactly where) on Google Maps. I’ve seen people take photos of their pets, the time on their watch, alarm clocks, logos on products, and of course, some even just take self portraits.

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Warner Bros., normally the producer of great entertainment in everything from movies to music releases, has royally annoyed me when I elected to purchase the CHESS IN CONCERT Deluxe Edition, available exclusively from them at Chess.WarnerBrosRecords.com. Warner Bros. is also selling the sets through the stores on official webpages for both Josh Groban and Idina Menzel (both are powered by WarnerBrosRecords.com). The exclusive version of the “Chess In Concert” set in addition to packaging together the 2-CD version of the recording with the DVD version of the show in a special package and includes as bonuses sheet music for the songs “Anthem” and “I Know Him So Well” and the deluxe set is limited to 3,000 copies world wide.

As the set was not originally scheduled to be released until June 30th, well after the June 16th release date of the standard versions, Warner Bros. also is including as part of the package, the ability to download the 2 CDs digitally on the June 16th release date. However, just prior to the 16th, the release date for the deluxe package has been shifted to July 21st, with Warner Bros claiming that the materials won’t be fully ready to meet the original release date.

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The Animal Rescue Site is having trouble getting enough people to click on it daily so they can meet their quota of getting free food donated every day to abused and neglected animals. It takes less than a minute (about 15 seconds) to go to their site and click on the purple box ‘fund food for animals for free’. This doesn’t cost you a thing.

Their corporate sponsors/advertisers use the number of daily visits to donate food to abandoned/neglected animals in exchange for advertising.

Here’s the web site! Please pass it along to people you know.

TheAnimalRescueSite.com

Please share the URL with 10 people or invite 10 people to come view this page. The same site has on other tabs also has opportunities to click for helping feed hungry people, raise money for breast cancer, children’s health, literacy, and the rainforest. A couple of minutes of your time helps fund these organizations.

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After having been on Jorge Cruise’s Belly Fat Cure program for a while, I’d been craving Chocolate Chip cookies. There had to be a way to make sugar free chocolate chip cookies, and probably a better way than chopping up chunks of unsweetened chocolate. Well, Kim Barry, another person who’s been through the Belly Fat Cure program recommended finding Hershey’s Sugar Free Chocolate Chips. Easier said than done.

A Google search for Hershey’s Sugar Free Chocolate chips reveals Wal-Mart carries the chips, but according to their store locator, none of them within 100 miles of me carry any. By plugging in some random cities, it seems that it’s only the Wal-Mart Supercenters that have them, and there’s none of those in San Diego county. I found some various online stores that seem to sell them for about $6 a bag. A bag of the sugar free chocolate chips is only 8 ounces, so that sounds like a complete rip off to me. Plus they also want $6 more just to ship a bag, so I’m sorry, I’m not spending $12 for a half pound of sugar free chocolate chips.

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In my time in Jorge Cruise’s Belly Fat Cure program, one of the best new product recommendations I’ve received is to replace soda with Zevia Brand Sodas. Zevia’s tag line is “Natural Diet Soda” and by natural, it means the ingredients are all derived from natural sources. Zevia is naturally sweetened with Stevia (a natural sweetener made from the leaves of plants from the sunflower family originating from Central and South America) and Erythritol (a sugar alcohol made from fruits and vegetables). Even the caffeine in Zevia Cola (the only flavor to contain any caffeine) is derived from coffee.

Sure you may have seen “Natural” sodas before, but most of those are loaded with even more sugar than Coca-Cola. And you’ve probably seen “Diet” sodas which are usually loaded with artificial sweeteners like aspartame (Nutrasweet), sucralose (Splenda), and saccharin (Sweet ‘N Low). Zevia is different because its an all natural soda that is zero calories, zero sugar, zero net carbs, zero rating on glycemic index and it’s even certified as Kosher. Anther healthy benefits of Zevia is that the soda will not cause tooth decay. The natural sweeteners don’t ferment when they come into contact with bacteria in the mouth and Zevia doesn’t use phosphoric acid found in other sodas which has been known to eat away at tooth enamel and deplete the body of calcium.

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Last year, Roku introduced to the market the Netflix Player, a small “box” that gets connected directly to a television and with either a wired Internet connection or using the built in Wi-Fi access capability, the box instantly enables the connected television to have access to Netflix‘s entire catalogue of Instantly Viewable movies and television shows. Initially the selection seemed mostly limited to older title movies and television shows, but a partnership with Starz, Netflix has been able to offer considerably more current material. Also Roku and Netflix have enhanced the capabilities of the player by allowing for High Definition content to be streamed through the player. And more recently Roku has additionally partnered with Amazon On-Demand to further expand the capabilities of the Netflix Box, that it truly has become the best value for enhancing a home entertainment system.

For a one-time fee, the Netflix Box costs $99.99 (and is available to purchase through Amazon.com by clicking here). The allows instant access to an already existing Netflix account. If you don’t have a Netflix account, then you’ll love hearing what an incredible bargain the system is. For as little as $8.99 a month, you get unlimited access to any program Netflix features for instant viewing. Technically, the $8.99 fee is for a one month subscription to the DVD rental service, where you’re allowed one DVD at a time, as many as want in a month, just send the disc back and as soon as they get it, they send you the next disc on your list. The instant viewing is included free with your subscription. If you want additional discs at a time, then the subscription fee increases depending on how many discs you want to be able to have out at one time. Netflix allows up to 8 discs to be out at one time.

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As of June 13, 2001 at 12:01 Eastern Time Zone (US East Coast) Facebook is allowing users the opportunity to pick their own username URL. You could essentially call it a vanity URL. So instead of a user name being a very unrelenting random series of numbers, you can actually get one in your own name or nickname. It makes it easier to share with others.

For example, my previous Facebook URL was (and technically still is) http://www.facebook.com/people/Ryan-Cameron/690149531. As you can see it’s a little relentless with the numbers, but it won’t connect to my page without the numbers.

Now that the vanity URLs are available, my new URL is http://www.facebook.com/RyanCameron. This is a definite improvement.

Thank you Facebook for finally getting with the program, as now my Facebook URL is now as easy to remember as my Twitter URL (http://www.twitter.com/RyanCCameron), my MySpace URL (http://www.myspace.com/roxabba), and of course, my blog URL (http://www.RyansIncredibleWorld.com).

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If you think the only musical theatre entry of Björn Ulvaeus and Benny Andersson of ABBA is MAMMA MIA!, you’d be wrong. Shortly after the last songs of ABBA’s catalogue were completed, the members of ABBA decided to take a break from the group, and Björn & Benny decided to try their hand at writing a musical. Tim Rice, well known for his collaborations with Andrew Lloyd Webber, was in the market for new composers to work with for his idea of building a musical around the idea of a Chess championship. After having met Björn & Benny and deciding to work together, the process of bringing Chess to life was born.

Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice established a successful formula of trying out the songs from shows they wrote in a “Concept Album” format that got released to the public long before a staged version of the show got made. This methodology was an invaluable way to see if the songs were good enough to warrant the time and expense of launching a full scale musical. Instead of going to the expense of launching a full show, it’s a chance to release the album to the public and see if it generates enough interest. If the album tanks, a fortune has been saved, and if it succeeds, then it creates an audience for the show when it gets launched.

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Connie Ragen Green, an Internet Marketer, introduced to me through Raymond Aaron’s “Double Your Income Challenge” has brought back a power blogging challenge that she did earlier this year. The challenge consisted of writing 30 blog posts in 30 days and I was one of the I took part in the previous challenge and was one of the 15 people who completed the challenge. To see a complete list of bloggers who completed the challenge, click here to visit Connie Ragen Green’s site.

Connie has decided to bring the challenge back for another 30 days and you’re reading a post relating to the new challenge. It’s not too late to start, all that is required is that 30 posts be completed within 30 days ending on July 7th, 2009. Multiple posts in one day are allowed. There are some additional rules, please see Connie’s blog entry by clicking here for full details. The goal is to drive additional traffic to your site through the use of constantly updated content, and Connie will post a link to your blog at the completion of the challenge.

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