In the first of what will be a continuing series of posts I examine great ways to blow the 10 grand bonus you just got as part of your annual review. Up first, the Classic Car Club of Manhattan.

In the words of the owners “Buying a million dollars worth of cars is a tough job, but Zac, Phil and I took one on the chin for you.” The Classic Car Club of Manhattan allows access to some of the greatest cars ever built as well as membership into a swanky private lounge. Cars include 1965 AC Shelby Cobra, 2005 Lotus Elise HRM Edition and the 1957 Porsche Speedster as well as many others. If you just absolutely need to ride in style then these guys are for you. For a set annual fee they take care of all of the business end so all you have to do is pay for gas and burn rubber.

Check it all out Cool Cars, Go Fast!

I stumbled upon a new piece of beta software called Chatsum.  This one allows you to chat with web surfers on the same wave (website) as you.  You can chat, leave messages, and read other user messages.  This would make the web browsing experience completely different.  You can now surf with other people!  It currently works with FireFox, and a version is coming for Safari on Mac OS X Tiger.

I don’t like the idea of allowing other people to talk about a corporate website while looking at it.  If you had an upset customer, they could sit there and bad mouth you.  Even worse would be if they attempted to act like a company rep. and promise things or lie to the client or potential customer.  Not many websites allow/sponsor chat between users on the site, but it is possible with things like IRC and Java plug-ins.  A lot are using chat programs to offer sales help to potential clients.  I know HP, Dell, EarthLink, and smaller online shops use services like BoldChat, LivePerson, or ProvideSupport.  This is controlled chat, and I think that is okay, but I don’t like the idea of uncontrolled chat from a corporate perspective.

First Verdict? I Love it. Cingular’s new Windows Mobile based smart phone is a hit. I have had Windows Mobile phones in the past but this one just simply works, and works as you would expect. Set up your mail, how often you would like to sync and you are set. Not only does it keep track of my corporate mail but it tracks my hotmail, calendar and of course acts as a phone. One of the coolest features is the new way Windows Mobile displays contacts, the graphics now live up to the phone. This is a system you want to use. Also included are a 1.3 mega pixel camera, bluetooth and EDGE. The internet is fast, the antenna seems to pick up coverage everywhere, in elevators, on P5 in my apartment building and in the dead zone I call an office. One gripe, it is impossible to turn on or off as the power button doesn’t seem to work very well…however given all that is great on this phone I don’t see having to turn it off very often.

If you are one of the millions of blackberry users terrified of what might happen in the next couple weeks you may want to check out this HTC built phone, you won’t be disappointed.

This is kind of old news, but does anyone else think this whole AT&T/SBC advertising blitz is dumb? Or have you seen an ad about the AT&T/SBC merger and thought, “well great, why should I care?!” They seem to be promising big things as can be summed up in their “Your World. Delivered.” tag line. What does that mean?! What from my world are you going to deliver to me? AT&T’s homepage says “[the two companies] have come together to create the most complete and secure network, delivering what matters most in your world.” That sounds great and all, but what are they going to actually deliver? I look at the two companies as providers of commodities in a super-competitive market with no major differentiators from the other suppliers of the commodity.

Here’s an example pointed out by Sean Coon. See the billboard to the right? Yeah, now check out the screen shot from AT&T’s website below.

A+ for those in charge of executing this marketing vision, but those in charge of creating it and making sure what the company is doing actually matches its marketing messages should be fired.

Moreover, they are spending $1 billion on this ad campaign. I could see plenty more useful ways to spend a billion dollars then by firing ambiguous advertising off at every eyeball in America. How about spending that cash on achieving these epic ambiguous goals they are promising?

Update: Joseph Jaffe over at JaffeJuice has posted about the same thing, and has said it quite nicely too.

I have been archiving corporate email since 2004, and just started indexing it today. This is a huge process, and I am not going to bore you with the details or software that I am using. But I find it really interesting how I will need to sort and find “what I am looking for”. Most search engines are based on lexicons or the letters/numbers that make words. But our brains don’t always function like that.

For example, let’s say I had to submit a document to my boss regarding an upcoming meeting. I can remember if I did it during the during the week, and not on a weekend. I remember it was sent to me on a Monday because I got it in a meeting, and I remember the document came from someone in Sales. Well that seems logical to me and my brain, but there isn’t a way for me to put that in the Outlook search box or even the more powerful MSN/Google/Yahoo! desktop search tools.

Those are just a few ways I would like to search/query my email archive. Want more ideas? Tie it to phone logs (desk and mobile), calendar, and tasks (which I don’t use enough, so I think that needs some redesign). Give me a GUI that allows me to look at my history of where I was and what I was doing. That will help me find “what I am looking for”.

This is something I have discussed with a few colleagues awhile back, but I thought this would be a good time to bring it up. Everyone has heard about the massive computer virus breakouts of 2003 and 2004. Well, 2005 kept pace with 2004, but we didn’t see much growth in infected email. So why have we not been able to prevent the outbreaks? Well the problem is with the system of deploying definitions.Think about it this way. Once a virus is created, if done well, it would be deployed and start to spread exponentially. Symantec and antivirus companies then take 30minutes to and recognize the virus. Well instantly, the virus has a 30min+ head start, and thousands, if not millions, are infected before the definition is made. Next, every computer needs to download the new virus definition. This is where the process breaks. Your computer needs to get a new definition before the virus hits it. No matter what happens, you are going to strain the networks. Well, most software vendors try to minimize the number of times the software checks. For example, Symantec releases weekly definitions using their standard setup. You can customize it to update every 60 minutes, but I would guess that a vast majority don’t do this.

I would like to propose an idea. Create universal definitions that can reside on firewalls & gateways so that they can be deployed to local machines without straining the global internet. This would help push definitions to clients, but I think the next step would be to give definitions away for free. Remember, everyone who isn’t running antivirus software is opening your entire network to evil eyes and fingers.  So please keep your OS, software, and security software up-to-date.

What to look for in 2006? The hype is around instant messaging. We saw some hits of it in the 2nd half of 05, and it will continue to be affected until corporate IT staff can control the networks. We used to be able to control them by blocking ports, but now they all run over normal web ports (TCP 80&443) and the virus is being deployed as a url and not an attachment.  I would look for open wifi, mobile spam, and blog spam to take a hit this year too. All three have been in early stages without standards for the last couple of years, and this could be the year that they have one major outbreak.

How many ways can your company get its brand in front the eyes of the public? Tons. Well, according to many blogs out there Target has thought of a new and unique way by taking advantage of aerial mapping services such as Google Maps and MSN’s Virtualearth. Apparently they’ve emblazoned the top of one of their buildings with their logo so that map service users get a little Target brand exposure as they view a location or directions in the general vicinity of the building.

That’s a great idea, and I would commend Target for coming up with it… but when you zoom out a few clicks you find a large airport nearby. Oh that’s Chicago’s O’Hare airport. Considering that and the fact that the imagery is probably at least 2 years old, this logo was definitely meant to be seen by passengers on flights departing from or arriving at O’Hare. I wonder if they ever get helicopters mistakenly landing on their roof?!

Bonus brand exposure for Target though. As I am sure the quality of aerial photography that is publicly available on these sites will continue to improve, I wonder if this will become a trend? Check out the Ford logo and the United Airlines logo as other examples.

It is that time of year again, you can vote for the new Kettle Chips Flavor. This year they have added a twist and you can actually taste each of the proposed new chips before voting. This years options are: Buffalo Bleu Cheese, Dirty martini, Tuscan Three Cheese, Spicy Mary, and Creamy Caesar. Without tasting any of them I think my choice may be the Tuscan Three Cheese, but then again maybe I am too Euro or something.

Check it all out for yourself at Flavor Station

To refresh your memory Kettle Chips are all natural, come in a ton of great flavors and are made in Oregon and pair nicely with pizza, nachos, beer and of course football.

Today the US Auto industry proved once again that they have a complete lack of new ideas. This week is of course the North American International Auto Show, a chance for all of the auto companies to give us a taste of the new models and concepts coming out in the next couple of years. This year with coasts soaring and losses pilling up many were hoping that the big three would introduce innovative new models that will help them better compete with the flood of Asian and European imports containing updated designs and the latest features.

Rather than taking a bold step forward the US automakers took a step backward, to the 1970’s to be exact. Following in Ford’s lead Chevy and Dodge are releasing muscle cars that look very similar to the models released during the hey day of American manufacturing. I would love to sit in the decision making meetings at the American Auto Companies, who approves these designs, who actually thinks they will be well accepted by the public?

Quick, if you were forced to purchase an American car today what would you buy? Interesting thought isn’t it? For companies losing billions of dollars the lack of innovation is spellbinding, imagine what would happen to a tech firm if they relied on this type of thinking (No Microsoft Jokes). If the US Auto industry is serious about competing they had better figure out a way to breathe new life into their design teams as well as taking a serious look at their decision making structure. In business today innovation is key, and though old school is hip these cars are not going to do anything but leave the big three languishing further and further behind the competition.

There’s a good post on TechCrunch about this whole “beta” fad that companies are partaking in to release web applications. It talks about the balance between making your site public too early and keeping it under wraps too long and going to market too late in the game.

It seems that when you distill the “beta” fad down to its elements, the purpose of it is purely for marketing. I doubt that any public beta has really benefited more from being public than private in terms of adding functionality and fixing bugs. A properly run private beta can be just as useful. But as far as marketing goes, TechCrunch provides some great pointers on how to use this marketing strategy.

The one thing I would add to this list is to write software for yourself. Create an application that you will use and then use it. You are your own best critic. If you don’t like it or don’t think it’s useful, then there’s a good chance that other people are going to feel the same way.