Mattel gave me an update which was that they simply have no record of the bat; and this was after an exhaustive search of their closets.  I might just ask some off shore sourcing company to give me a quote on manufacturing it.

After watching an exciting game of Mongo Ball using an old obsolete Mongo Bat, I have been given the assignment of determining if there are any more Mongo Bats in existance, and if not, locating the tooling.
I tracked them to Aviva in California and then to Mattel.  Mattel is checking their dusty old closets for the bats and/or the tooling.  Waiting to hear from them....
 

I have tried placing the U-LOCS in kennels, hardware stores, pool supply stores with absolutely no results in 2 months! I have contacted Stanley Works and they appeared somewhat interested, but they have not contacted me lately. I tried Lowes but they referred me to the lock manufacturers who are their vendors. I saw that a child drowned in a pool in Charlotte, but I could not get the city or the health department interested in preventing any future drownings. I believe that I will start to seek another muse.....

Posted by JMaslar at 9:21 AM 0 comments

In the Four Hour Work Week, there was a section where Tim talked about analyzing customer preferences by using Google's AdWords.  The idea is to try different messages, different names, different approaches, and see which ones get the most clicks.  This gives you some idea of what catches peoples' attention and ultimately what they want. 
I'm taking a Marketing Class at the University of South Carolina's Moore School of Business, and in that class we are studying something called Conjoint Analysis.  (By the way, the Moore School was recently ranked #1 in the world for International MBA programs-- click here to read more.)  
Conjoint Analysis is a technique for sudying the preferences of consumers.  What I like about it is that it takes something that seems to be high on feelings and intuition and turns it into a science.  There's an excellent video tutorial on Conjoint Analysis found here at Sawtooth Software's Web Site. 
As I watched it, I was thinking about my business, which is building Web Sites and small communities and small businesses, and thinking about how I might better understand a specific market such as attorneys.  In my opinion, every attorney ought to have a Web site, but why?  And why don't they all have them now?  What do attorneys think when they think of a Web site?  Do they not have one because they don't know who to call?  Do they think it will cost $5000?  Do they just not have the time? 
These are all questions that could be answered with some careful market analysis. 

Now that I'm focused, what can my muse be?  After considering numerous options, I decided to try devoping two new products, based on my wife's and my experience.  One idea is a new fishing product based on my experience.  The other idea is an informational product based on my wife's teaching experience. The one idea allows me to go fishing for my job; the other allows my wife to do most of the work.  That sounds like a good start.  Now, time to develop, market, and refine the products.

One of the things that struck me (as I've often struggled with it, as will be demonstrated shortly) about Tim Ferris's advice on achieving a four hour workweek is the need to stay absolutely focused on the main objective and not getting distracted.  One of the most salient points in the book is when he was talking about attending meetings in Corporate America that are dragging on and losing focus.  He said something to the effect of, "Get the bleep out of there!"  Now, even though I don't like profanity, the message of his statement struck a chord -- "Hurry, save yourself!  Get out of there now, before it's too late!!!"  Not only does that apply in the halls of time-wasting Corporate America, but more generally in life.  Still, I found myself on a recent Saturday drenched in used motor oil, throwing a wrench across the garage, and regretting my loss of focus, while trying to change the oil in my two vehicles.  The one vehicle had no clearance under it to so much as turn a wrench, and on the other one, I forgot that the integrated funnel on the used oil container needed to be moved from its stored location to an opening in the container.  This led to oil, like rainwater, running down my driveway.  (Don’t tell the EPA.)  For a few more bucks, I could’ve had someone else do the dirty work while I focused on more important things --  Oil change at Wal-Mart: $25.  Focusing in the meanwhile on getting to the Five Hour Workweek, so that I can avoid the vast majority of such frustration in the future: Pricless.  I guess it’s time to stop blogging, and get to work.

How to win your case for telecommuting - With gas prices soaring toward $4 a gallon, a solution seems obvious: skip the commute. U.S. drivers travel an average of about 15 miles, one way, to work. Working from home a few days each week would be the quickest route to relief at the pump. It would ease pressure on clogged roadways, too. But telecommuting appears to be stalled in the driveway. Once considered the rightful inheritance of the 21st Century workforce, teleworking has barely made a dent at many companies. Even the most gener [4HWW Around the Web]

I thought I had it this time. I came up with a great idea that I’d never heard of before. I was going to design a new notebook-sized product that would electronically store and display sheet music for musicians. It would advance from page to page with a foot pedal, be modular so that you could have up to four screens side by side, and store gazillions of pieces of sheet music. Problem is, a number of other people have already thought of all that, and more, and are currently selling them.  Look at  http://www.musiciansfriend.com. I know, I’ll tweak the idea by integrating it into a piano, and sell the idea to OEM’s. Except that there’s already a patent for that. Who knows, maybe I’ll get one for my piano-playing wife someday. Once I can afford it.

I want my business to "Take Off." I want to be able to sell as much as I can and work as little as possible in the process. I want to be able to do the things I'm passionate about. I want all my passions as well as my business and my faith and sense of purpose all to fit together. No dis-jointedness, no inconsistencies.
I am currently spending a lot of time building the internal processes for Broadstreet Consulting. Before my business takes off, I want to make sure I don't have to go through that painful process of figuring out how to handle all the business. A big part of my success will be bringing in the business, but more important will be getting the work done efficiently and delivering happy customers.
One of the things I've been working on is a presentation called Web 2.0 for Your Business. The goal is to speak to small business groups and help them understand what Web 2.0 is, and how their business can take advantage of the changes happening on the Web. So Tim Ferris's latest blog post about Al Gore's speech writer was very timely. I took away several key points-- stuff I've heard before, but always good to get reinforcement of important information. My main take-aways from Tim's Interview with Dan Pink:
Answer these two questions clearly:

• What is your point?
• Why does it matter?

The three essential ingredients of a good speech are:

• brevity
• levity
• repetition

I will definitely keep these things in mind as I deliver my first presentation on Web 2.0 next month.
 

One of my hopes for this site is that it will be a one-stop-shop for people wanting to read about the experiences of people trying to implement the Four Hour Work Week.   An important part of this is an RSS Feed Aggregator that allows us to pull information from around the Web.
If you read some of the items in the right-hand column, you will find that Tim Ferris and the Four Hour Work Week are mentioned in the news on a pretty regular basis.