This “Private-Label Growth Outpacing Brands” article published at MarketingDaily [1] is fact filled and very insightful business information barely readable by anybody not in the business of selling alcoholic beverages. What the article proves is what I have been attempting to convey to our METROmilwaukee customers who own or operate bars, nightclubs and restaurants: people change and people have changed. What they like and dislike has changed for reasons economic but change has also come because the consumer has been provided with more choice than “What’ll it be pal? Miller Light or Miller Genuine Draft?”  This is why we now have 35 different flavors of banana strawberry mango fruitcake this and that; this phenomena is called the Long Tail of Marketing.

Milwaukee and the surrounding counties for example are swamped with Miller Brands products. Miller spends a lot of money to put their brand in front of as many eyeballs as possible which has influenced many buying decisions. Miller beer is perhaps in every business that is allowed to sell beer throughout our region. Personally, I do not care for Miller Beer (anymore). Miller beer reminds me of what Archie Bunker once said to one of his customers when he ran his corner bar “Archie’s Place.”  Archie said “ya’ can’t buy beer pal ya’ see, ya’ can only rent it so what’ll it be?” From my point of view Miller’s beers taste the same going in as it does reminding me of what it probably tastes like on its way out.

For the last several years I’ve been buying local; as everybody should of course. Local brews are very good in fact and they say supporting local business is going to help me get into Heaven when I meet St. Paul at those pearly gates. I also no longer have a favorite cocktail either and buy one or two of the same when going out but rarely order the same thing the next time out. Variety is the spice of life and people change their preferences.

It’s a good idea for our local hospitality establishment owners and operators to understand the Long Tail. Its also a good idea for them to start stocking and selling what the customers will actually buy given the opportunity to know they have a choice to do so…

[1] http://tinyurl.com/ygzn429

As some of our friends and neighbors throughout METROmilwaukee know we are “all in” helping to make it possible for people like you and I to create and broadcast our own TV channels. Last year CES 2009 was the first year we began to “formally” hear the public announcements the HDTV manufacturers released as they sold the first generation of their products manufactured to display digital media transported using the WWW. This year CES 2010 proves what I’ve been beating the streets and talking about to anybody that I could get to sit still for a few minutes and listen to the facts:

June 12th 2009 was the date that will become understood as a historical date as it ended the era that the over-the-air TV broadcasters retained exclusive control of everything that could be displayed on a TV set. The ~$70 billion annual revenues they and they alone have exclusively controlled are now up for grabs. This is because they are now mandated by law to broadcast digitally and digital broadcasting and the Internet Protocols mean the same thing. In other words, in due time most if not all TV will be broadcast over the web in one way or another.

Its also another reason the local liars of ommission from Channel 4, 6, 12 and 24 et al. have not said a peep about the fact that digital broadcasting and the Internet Protocols fundamentally mean the same thing. So it has been to their advantage to keep the general public uninformed as they do in so many other regards with their slanted and biased “truth” and “facts” that come from their talking heads; 70 million reasons is a lot of reasons. So be advised if you want some too its up for grabs.

During the 2009 market the TV manufacturers released “crippleware” product imitating Apple’s “put lipstick on the pig” strategy by selling “pretty” but crippled HDTV sets that only allow access to the WWW through a walled garden: compelling customers to pay extraordinarily high prices for new HDTV sets that could only be used to tune in and view the channels they and they alone mandated.

Furthermore, access to any web app that could be used on their HDTV set still has to accessed through their walled garden as the HDTV cabal(s) that have recently formed are trying to create proprietary “app stores” in an attempt to wall off the web and create a private entry and exit points which is exactly what Apple has gotten away with because so many fools have funded them by paying for over-priced lipstick on a pig; iPod, iPhone and iPad neat as they are as they are what they are: over-priced prettied up lipstick on a pig.

CES 2010 held this past January proves without question that HDTV is rapidly changing as this video helps us all learn.

I’m certain (and hopeful) this trend to privatize the web will not last much longer if the HDTV goes the way the microcomputer was when it was first developed and sold changing for the better over the years. In due time anybody with the technical skills can now spec and put a PC or a server together themselves. But then again, the dumbed down consumer is clearly funding the lipstick on the pig and the future may not be so bright after all.

[youtube.com/watch?v=dc56JxjX0gA&feature=player_embedded]

Disclaimer: I provide web development software services and am involved with several of the “big names” mentioned in this November 2009 USA TODAY article “Could this finally be the season for Web TV? “ [1]. In fact, I am working with two of the organizations and am bound by non-disclosure agreements which obligate me to not disclose their names or what work we are doing together which may enable METROmilwaukee ^(sm) to release software services the general public may use to send digital media to HDTV sets like we do using our computers and other digital devices; digital signs, desktops, servers, notebooks, netbooks or mobile phones: any and all digital devices with some type of display (television screen).

That said, when USA TODAY asks “Could this finally be the season for Web TV?” the answer is a resounding “yes, but…”  to discuss and answer that question honestly also requires some “Howevers” and “Furthermores” because the status quo propaganda from USA TODAY and others of that ilk do not disclose any of the the whys, whats and wherefores as they pertain to the self interest of the consumer; people like you and I that actually purchase and own HDTVs presumably as our private property.

USA TODAY and the many others writing about this timely topic of web-enabled HDTV are quite exciting and seemingly believable at face value -–however— informed consumers who really understand and demand value when spending their money will read between the lines and continue to heed my advise:

This –-period of transition-- is the worst time in history to buy a new HDTV because the HDTV manufacturers are selling crippleware: HDTV sets that are intentionally crippled down to hinder or otherwise prevent using a web browser to send and receive from the WWW.

The USA TODAY article repeats the allegation put forth by HDTV marketers “we (TV manufacturers) do not want to allow a browser to be used on the TV because our research indicates customers do not want to use their TV to access the web the same way they can when using any other way to do so.”

Your research? WTF? Their allegation is a fallacy being only partly true because there have to be some consumers that do not want anything to do with the WWW but the larger number of the rest of humanity is not quite that disconnected.

I contend the larger part of our society are able to understand the facts as they are. At this point in time when consumer electronic products are “digital” there is not a wit of difference between an HDTV and any other contemporary digital device with a screen but for one distinguishing feature: a “tuner” which enables the owner (operator) of the HDTV to select a “channel” representing what an over-the-air broadcaster exclusively controlled what was and what was not displayed on the screen. Even cable operators use some forms of over-the-air but in general they are also now our Internet Service Provider that allows us to use the WWW. Can they to be involved in what is a conspiracy to deprive you and I the full use and enjoyment of our own private property? Well, yes, but only if we decide to purchase it that way from them.

When TV was first invented the tuner was an electro-mechanical device. Now tuners are digital. In fact “tuners” are not even really needed anymore. Instead of over-the-air broadcasting and doing it the way it used to be done anybody can now presumably broadcast digitally using the WWW using the HyperText Transfer Protocol. In fact tens of millions of us do broadcast digitally every day and every night in every nation on this entire planet. I am still compelled to say presumably because it seems to be an apparent fact that the over-the-air broadcasters and the HDTV manufacturers and their collaborators do not want your or I to use our HDTV sets that way.

They claim “the customer wants us to keep things simple.” Well, wasn’t Web TV ^® simple enough? Hell yes. We owned Web TV in our household. The original Web TV was simple, so simple my mother and other older grandmas were using Web TV because it was so simple. But that kind of “simple” actually failed because Web TV could not be used to allow people to access the WWW to view the web pages and other types of digital media the way the customer may have actually needed or wanted.

That type of simple failed for two reasons:

1. The TV screens could not display higher resolutions (loosely defined as “readability”) and the Web TV hardware could not be used to change the resolution of the TV screen so an entire web page could be displayed; we could not zoom into portions of the page and attempts to scroll were so terrible nobody cared to do so. 
   
2. The Web TV hardware required web pages to use a required type of web page template (formatting) so owners of Web TV could not view an entire web page published to the WWW unless the web page(s) used the page formatting template imposed by the Web TV hardware.

In other words, that kind of simple failed because the Web TV hardware was intentionally crippled to prevent the use of a web browser to view the many types of web pages that have been created and the same damn reasons are currently being forced upon us by the HDTV manufacturers who are intentionally crippling the HDTV to prevent the use of the browser all over again.

Yes folks, the over-the-air broadcasters are in collusion with the HDTV manufacturers to manipulate “simplicity” to try to achieve the same goal they happened to fail at the last time: complete control of your private property you bought and paid for so they and only they can determine exclusively what can and what can not be displayed on your HDTV set, who pays the money (you and I) and who gets the money (them and only them).

Deciphered: the over-the-air broadcasters, the HDTV manufacturer’s and their collaborators marketing propaganda really means:

• We know TV has become a marketplace that generates tens of billions of dollars every year that we and we alone have exclusively controlled and if unopposed we intend to continue to do so (sniff).
• Because the WWW is a free market we now realize we cannot continue to exclusively control all of that money so we are going to try to sell crippled HDTV sets and we really don’t give a damn if we cause even more jobs to be lost or prevent any new forms of business to emerge as long as we and we alone control the billions of dollars we take out of the pockets of advertisers and consumers (sniff-sniff).
• We realize if we do not cripple HDTV and prevent the emergence of new business and new jobs in America we will lose our ability to exclusively control 100% –everything-- that is or is not allowed to be displayed on an HDTV screen a browser could be used with the WWW!

So the HDTV manufacturers are going to try to do everything they can do as long as they can to keep the consumer ignorant and locked in by attempting to sell crippled HDTV that cannot be used to fully send and receive to and from the WWW.

BUT ONLY AS LONG AS YOU KEEP GIVING THEM YOUR MONEY FOR CRIPPLED HDTV PRODUCTS!

The strategy of attempting to sell proprietary crippled products has not worked for desktop computers, mobile computers, phones or any other type of digital device that connects to the WWW has it? They tried in the beginning and every one of them failed and many of the companies no longer even exist. Is this not the reality you have observed over the past decade? Is this not the truth as you yourself have experienced it?

Well, the same facts and truths will become true of the HDTV but:

IF AND ONLY IF WE DO NOT FUND THE HDTV MANUFACTURERES BY PURCHASING CRIPPLED HDTV SETS.

Pandora’s box has been opened. Sure, for the time-being plenty of ignorant consumers are going to keep showing up at WalMart, Target and Best Buy to waste their money on crippled HDTV products simply because TV HAS BECOME A MEANS TO CONTROL WHAT PEOPLE ARE LED TO BELIEVE KEEPING THEM IGNORANT WHILE THE WWW HAS BECOME THE MEANS TO EDUCATE PEOPLE AND BECOME INFORMED.

The informed consumer will be patient and let the market competition that is already occurring compel HDTV manufacturers to sell products which provide real value: HDTV that supports web browsers that allow each of us to send or receive to the WWW anytime we want, to whatever source of content on the web we want, unhindered and without obstruction. I do not need the over-the-air broadcasting networks or any HDTV manufacturer to dictate how I can or cannot use my own private property with the WWW. Do you?

[1] http://www.usatoday.com/tech/news/techinnovations/2009-11-13-1Awebtv13_CV_N.htm

These steps will force booting into “Safe Mode”
===================================================

1. Start Button
2. msconfig => loads System Configuration Window
3. Boot (tab)
4. Check Safe Boot/Minimal
5. Restart

After using Safe Mode return and clear the Safe Boot/Minimal checkbox.

Intel Developer Forum 2009
Eric Kim - The Platform for CE Innovation [1]

A surprise guest addresses the audience with a conceptualized keynote followed by Kim's introduction of Intel's CE 4100; the latest type of video system on a chip which is enabling the convergence of the World Wide Web with HDTV devices clearly enabling the networking of HDTVs as "the next big thing."

As I've said all along.

While I scoff at some of Kim’s presumptuous and self-serving remarks about “what people want” the formation of the Intel/Yahoo/Adobe cartel leaves no doubt Adobe Flash is now positioned to become an exclusive and integral part of how the web is rapidly being made to converge with the TV experience.

I’m also quite sure Microsoft’s .NET and Silverlight developers are asking themselves how they are going to remain relevant as this most exciting market opportunity occurs with nary a trace of anything reminiscent of Microsoft. I happen to be one of them.

[1] Video SlideShow Eric Kim Keynote Intel Developer Forum 2009

Danny’s lucid and extensive review of URL shortening services [1] brings his expertise in these matters to our attention once again. However, one "short" coming of many such services is the fact that some may not provide a history of the actual URL and page title for efficient review and reuse over time.

WTF was u0Bf0 again?

Appending an edited version of a shortened URL to a saved Favorite/Bookmark has become yet another step in efficient URL management that could and should be managed by the shortening service itself.

It always pays to scroll past the fold on a web page which is how I actually discovered that bit.ly does in fact store a history of all URLs I can easily review and reuse but I have to be on the bit.ly page which I think is a trade-off I am okay with.

[1] http://bit.ly/u0Bf0

…is the best article about this aspect of e-commerce I have ever read. The article authored by Dr. Ralph F. Wilson Web Marketing Today on Sep 15, 2009 [1] is very well organized and lucidly defines and explains the process of obtaining and using merchant credit card accounts.

Definitions:

• Independent Selling Organization (ISO)
• Acquiring bank
• Issuing bank
• Payment processor
• Payment gateway
• Chargebacks

Fees:

• Application Fees
• Discount Rates
• Transaction Fees
• Monthly Fees or Statement Fees
• Monthly Minimum Fees
• Payment Gateway Fees
• Early Termination Fees
• Chargeback Fees

There is a lot of high quality content at wilsonweb.com. I think I have been subscribed to Mr. Wilson’s e-mail newsletter longer than any other of the many other newsletters I read through on a regular basis. Over the many years Wilson’s newsletter remains a must review for leads back to his website for pertinent and timely advice and insights. I must admit I am at a loss not understanding why Ralph Wilson has not been snapped up as a consultant by any of the most well known technology publishing brands. On the other hand, when you have the success he has earned why bother?

[1] http://www.wilsonweb.com/ecommerce/wilson-merchant-account.htm

Are you a fan of the teeny-text literally unreadable black Web pages?

Internet Explorer can be used to disable the style sheet but it takes --SIX STEPS-- to move back and forth:

IE > Tools > Internet Options > Accessibility > [x] Ignore colors specified on webpages > Okay

However, I ask a simple common sense question, "Are people generally willing to perform six steps back and forth just to try to read an otherwise literally unreadable website and then perform all six steps to return to the standard operational mode?" Hello? Are there any rationale adults working here?

Other browsers also require many steps to disable style sheets but we’re still right back to where we started: visual impairment imposed by some artsy-fartsy almost always twenty-something morons who think of themselves as designers.

People of all age groups should know we've been through this ridiculous phase of “designeritis” before; all the way back in the 1980s the so-called "designers" attempted to turn the entire User Interface of Computer Aided Design (CAD) software products unreadable because they thought it was "cool" with fallacious rationale --which proved false then and is false now-- because their claims that teeny-text no-contrast black allegedly improves the ability to use the computer for long periods of time which is not true. At all. Medical science disproves this kind of ca-ca de toro [1].

For example, I’m saying say so myself because I’ve been around since the proverbial Day One but I ask you to ask any architect or engineer over the age of 40 who has sat for many long hours using CAD software to design and draw. Not one of us could cope with it and not one CAD vendor thought it was a good idea to impose visual impairment to make their software products unusable by large numbers of people simply because some snotty-nosed designer thought it was a neat-o concept back in the day. So what happened along the way? Prozac? What?

Well, here's some twenty-something logic for you to ask these young turks. "if the User Interface cannot literally be read at all by a significant number of persons is there going to be --any time at all-- spent trying to use the webpage or the product?" By whom?

This currently cruel, inhumane and demonstrably unprofitable trend is not about aesthetics it is about foolish design for the sake of design violating all principles of design along the way imposed by twenty-somethings who have nothing to contribute anymore literally allowed to impose visual impairment into a company’s product line and into a company’s Web site properties to be trendy.

This is actually now being done by Adobe and by the copy-cats at Microsoft who have Web design and development products that are completely unusable by a large number of persons in the market, i.e. generally people over the age of 30-40 years old which medical science has proven are vulnerable [1]. What kind of common sense doesn’t understand the simple notion of imposed visual impairment? We've all seen this on the web innumerable times in Web pages; teeny-text unreadable web pages.

So I ask once again, “What kind of stoopit?”

[1] search: visual impairment research etc.

[1] Broadband-Enabled TVs: There are more than 50 broadband-enabled TV models due out in 2009, but analysts estimate that only about 3 million total sets will be sold in the next 2 years combined.

I’m all for “broadband-enabled TV” however only somebody with money to burn or an ignorant fool would throw away their money purchasing the type of broadband-enabled HDTV the HDTV manufacturer’s are trying to sell to ignorant consumers.

The HDTV manufacturer’s continue to intentionally cripple their products to disallow people from using their own private property they have spent many hundreds of dollars and in some cases many thousands of dollars from being freely able to send or receive from the World Wide Web (WWW).

Even referring to these HDTVs as “broadband-enabled” is marketing bullshit because the products are intentionally crippled so they may only be used to receive what the *sshole manufacturers allow to be viewed from the WWW.

Let’s understand something, June 12th the date requiring the licensed over-the-air TV broadcasters to begin digital broadcasting must be explained to many people.

DIGITAL BROADCASTING = WORLD WIDE WEB USING INTERNET PROTOCOLS

That’s right. Both of these terms are synonyms and fundamentally mean the same thing. The over-the-air TV broadcasters are trying to take over the WWW so they can continue to control what can and what cannot be displayed on our own private property: our HDTV sets.

So the TV manufacturers are stuck between a rock and hard place crippling their product to serve the over-the-air hegemony while hoping the consumers will stay dumbed down and will continue to waste their money purchasing new HDTV sets that cannot be used to “change the channel” to freely send or receive from the WWW because the over-the-air broadcasters do not want anybody to be able to do so.

When all is said and done the HDTV manufacturers will choose who to serve depending on who pays them the most money: the over-the-air broadcasters who are clearly paying back room bribes renamed using the word “lobbying” to keep the TV crippled as long as possible –or-- the HDTV manufacturers will begin serving the interests of the hundreds of millions of people who actually spend their money buying the HDTV products.

So its up to you Mr. and Mrs. America. Is it in your best interest to continue to purchase their crippled HDTV if you want the over-the-air broadcasters to take over and control the WWW to control what can and what cannot be displayed on your own TV without you having a choice? Are you happy you are being told what you can and cannot watch on your own TV because it is now possible to use any HDTV that has not been crippled to send or receive anything we want to and from the WWW?

On the other hand, if you have any sense at all I do not think you will choose to spend your money on crippled HDTV until the HDTV manufacturers stop crippling their products and enable each of us to use the HDTV as a type of digital device just like any other digital device like our desktop computers or mobile phones for example which can freely send and receive using the WWW.

Objective:

Use SQL Server Management Studio to generate a script which describes an object or stored procedure saved as a .sql text file on the local file system. Then use an instance of a SQL Server manager running on the host provider's servers to run the generated script(s) which will recreate the object(s) on the host provider's server.

Migrate Object Step 1:

• Load the local instance of the SQL database in SQL Server Management Studio.
• Select an object such as a Table object.
• Use the object's Context menu and select Script Table as > CREATE to > file.
• Save the file to the local file system, for example c:\scripted_TableToMigrate.sql

Migrate Object Step 2:

Migrate Data Step 1:

To migrate data use SQL Server Management Studio, connect to the Database Engine server type, expand Databases, right-click a database, point to Tasks, and then click Import Data or Export data.

• Importing and Exporting Data by Using the SQL Server Import and Export Wizard
• How to: Start the SQL Server Import and Export Wizard