Koo’s Corner

This week’s commercial of the week goes to a pair of new Sharp Aquos ads promoting their D64 television. Sharp is considered by most to be a a second tier consumer electronics maker behind the likes of Sony and Samsung. This new ad is visually stimulating, engaging, and does a great job promoting the new features (size and picture quality) of their next generation of LCD tv’s. Simply put these are two cool ads. Enjoy

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PQT_jRZ4-Zk]

This is my first movie review for benkoo.com and before I jump into it, I thought I would give some background on my overall tastes. I am very selective and am skeptical of most movie going opportunities that come my way (my 2 roommates want me to see Beowolf at an Imax theater in the East bay). In college I soaked up a lot of good new movies and caught up on a lot of the classics but haven’t had the time to see a lot of good flicks this year.

With all that being said the Coen Brothers are two of my favorite movie makers and I was enthralled with the preview and subsequent reviews for No Country for Old Men. In particular I was excited to see Tommy Lee Jones in this movie as this seemed to be an extension of his performance in The Three Burial of Melquiades Estrada, a movie that I really enjoyed.

So I ventured to my local theater on opening night, opting to forgo the unpleasantness of bars the night before Thanksgiving. For 90 minutes the movie was everything I expected and much much more. Great acting, great direction, gripping suspense, and memorable action sequences that will be forever etched into my memory. Up until I read more about the movie I thought it was Kurt Russel playing the protagonist, Llewelyn Moss, but as it turns out it was Josh Brolin who put in stellar performance. Picture and spoilers below

No Country for Old Men doesn’t dilly dally as the movie opens with Anton Chigurgh, one of the most scary and evil bad guys I have ever seen killing a deputy and subsequently using his car to pull over a driver in order to steal his car (yeah he kills him too). Llewelyn Moss then stumbles upon the aftermath of a drug deal gone bad. Dead bodies everywhere, with a truck- full of drugs still waiting to be claimed. Several miles away Moss finds one final dead body and more importantly a case of $2 million. Moss takes the money back to his trailer where he and his wife engage in some classic banter.

In the middle of the night Moss decides to go back to the scene as there was one man who had survived the massive shootout and was in need of water. Moss finds the man dead, shot by a second barrage of attackers. In the distance Moss sees a group find his truck and begins to chase after him. In an exciting but somewhat unbelievable scene, Moss is able to escape without catching sight of his attackers. Moss knows that with his truck at the scene, its only a matter of time until he is hunted down.

Later we come to find that Moss’s would be assassins was not Chigurgh but rather “The Mexicans”. Through out the movie Chigurgh and “The Mexicans” in addition to Carson Wells, played by Woody Harrelson, track a shrewd and determined Moss who is smart enough to send his wife away from what would ensue. Unfortunately for Moss the money has a tracking system in the case, one that can pick up a signal from short distances. Moss, Chigurgh, Wells, and the Mexicans do battle in a variety of border towns. The middle portion of this movie is absolutely fantastic as the resourceful Moss is barely able to survive wave after wave of attacks.

This great movie will draw mixed reactions as the ending seemingly falls short of all the build up in the first 3/4 a movie. No Country for Old Men racks up gun fights, dead bodies, comical dialogue, and epic chase scene during the first 90 minutes but slows to a crawl as Moss’s final demise is not shown but is only inferred. We do not know how or who finally ended Moss’s heroic attempt to defy the odds.

Moss’s death slows down the movie although it seems one last confrontation between Tommy Lee Jones’ character (sheriff) and Chigurgh will unfold. Surprisingly it does not happen and there is much debate on why and how the two sidestep what seemingly would be an epic showdown. Keep in mind this movie follows the book, so all criticism on that front should not be targeted at the Coen brothers.

The final 10 minute stretch of No Country also raises some eye brows as Chigurgh confronts Moss’s wife and presumable kills her although that is up for debate as well. In the aftermath of this confrontation Chigurh is injured in a random car accident one that seems to veer away from the direction of the entire film. Tommy Lee Jones closes the movie with a somewhat lackluster monologue citing his rationale for retiring as sheriff. The screen suddenly goes black thus ending one of the better films of 2007, but one that could culminated with an A+finish to go along with the rest of the movie.

The ending is what you make of it. Although most of us would have liked to seen the continuance of action, violence, and suspense spill over into the final 4th of the movie, this movie stayed true to the novel and focused on the subplot of a sheriff wanting to keep peace while avoiding danger. I think this movie will grow on me and others as its really a unique story, executed terrificly by the Coen Brothers. However still many of us wonder what could have been, if the ending closed out the film with the level of intensity, excitement, and suspense that captivated the audience through out.

It was about 4 years ago when I predicted the demise of DirectTV, the largest satellite tv company and biggest rival to cable providers. I made the proclamation after seeing the new On Demand DVR’s that have since been rolled out to the masses (I lived in one of the initial test markets and was enthralled by the new technology). I hypothesized that in the end consumers would opt for digital cable because of the new On Demand technology in addition to the inclusive telecom bundles being offered by Time Warner, Comcast, and others that included phone, internet, and cable (or 2 out of 3).

4 years later I now think the opposite as Digital cable providers have stagnated in terms of product and service while DirectTV has revamped their offering. Below are three key differentiation points where DirectTV has seized a clear competitive advantage.

1) HD-

6 months ago regardless of who your cable or satellite provider was, HD content was not widely available. While cable companies have added to their HD lineups, the recent Direct launch of a new satellite which has added a wide assortment of HD channels has anointed DirectTV the HD king.

HD has their own group of enthusiasts who fiend for anything and everything in HD. Many of these enthusiasts have migrated to DirectTV or have recently relocated and have found this once difficult decision to be made a whole lot easier. In fact Direct TV grew its customer base by a net quarter million subscibers in 2006, with much of that growth attributed to their market leader status in HD content.

2) Sports Progamming

DirectTV has made it a priority to out pace the cable companies in available sports programming. Below are 3 examples

a) The widely popular NFL Sunday Ticket is only available on DirectTV. The Sunday Ticket and therefore DirectTV serves as the only option for displaced fans outside of their team’s television market as well as the only viable option for eateries, pubs, and other commercial locations that hope to attract patrons by having the total assortment of NFL football games. Direct TV not only makes extra revenue from this popular package ($$$$$$ for businesses who subscribe) but is now offering their Super Fan package for an extra $100 bucks to fans looking to view every single touchdown on a Sunday afternoon.

b) The NFL network. DirectTV was one of the first providers to pick up the NFL Network and was wise to do so as the once upstart NFL network now broadcasts some of their games on their increasingly popular cable channel. Last year cable providers who had yet to strike a deal with the NFL Network (some vow to never carry it) felt the wrath of multiple fan bases who were not able to watch late season showdowns that were showcased on the network. With no deal still in place with some of the largest cable providers, DirectTV stands to absorb a second wave of pissed off NFL fans.

c) With the help of DirectTV, the upstart Big Ten Network became the first cable network in history to be in 30 million households in their first 30 days. The big 3 cable companies have yet to join the party though and are losing subscribers at a fast rate to Dish Network, smaller cable companies, and Direct TV who do carry the network. Cities inside the Big Ten region include Chicago, Columbus, Cleveland, Cincinnati, Indianapolis, Detroit, and Minneapolis. The Big Ten also has the largest alumni base of any athletic conference thus extending the number of people who are steamed they cannot view their alma amateur’s athletic events on television. In fact the game of the year, Appalacian State vs Michigan was the Big Ten Network’s inaugural broadcast and was predicted by cable executives to be an example of the “second class” programming.

3) Customer Service

The cable company is notoriously known for having the worst customer service and product quality of any industry in the United States. In fact consumer reports place Comcast with the lowest customer service quality in the United States with Time Warner and others close behind. With high customer service internal turnover combined with hardware and network issues constantly irritating consumers, the cable companies are entrenched as US consumers number one foe.

While DirectTV gets mixed reviews for their customer service, the majority of subscribers swear by the companies ulta responsive customer service efforts. DirectTV is known to go to extreme in keeping disgruntled customers often throwing in premium channels, sports packages, lowered rates, or new hardware in exchange for a chance to “earn back your business”. This customer centric approach combined with a more robust and streamlined website has allowed DirectTV to retain customers at a higher rate while also appealing to customers like this lady who have found themselves at war with their local cable company.

Conclusion: Similar to US auto manufacturers, the big 3 cable conglomerates have some catching up to do. Instead of focusing on emerging market trends and consumer needs, these companies were too busy focusing on mergers and acquisitions rather than focusing on product and now find themselves with a more and more hostile customer base who are seeing added value in making the switch.

A couple of weeks back I sang the praises of a company and product called Vudu. Last week my Vudu box arrived. A week later here are my initial thoughts.

Setup and unpacking: A-

Vudu is packaged neatly and will be up and running in less than 20 minutes for the majority of the population. I had to purchase a Wireless bridge adaptor which took an extra 20 minutes of configuration for me as I am a rookie in dealing with Wireless gaming bridges. The wireless bridge purchase also will allow me to play PS3 online, something that I have not found the time to do in the almost full year of ownership of the device. All in all I found setup to be fairly simple and manageable.

User Interface: A+

It’s almost fun just to play Vudu in search of the perfect movie that has eluded you all these years. Easy to navigate with multiple ways of searching and sorting through movies. Interface is clean, sharp, and bursting with movie posters. Being able to watch a lot of the trailers is a huge plus too.

Remote: A

The remote is awesome. The remote to the fan in my room is actually bigger and has more buttons than the Vudu remote. I have actually freaked out twice thinking I lost the remote because its so small.

Movie Selection: C-

I will revisit this as the months go on as I know the movie studios are doing a lot of experimenting around Vudu. General rule of thumb is that VUDU has about 1/2 the movies you can think of. However of the ones they do have some are only able to be purchased or only rented but not both. It was disappointing to see that they didn’t have a lot of Coen brothers movies and only had Knocked Up out of Judd Appatow’s impressive recent string of hits. I am under the impression that Vudu will be introducing more and more titles and would go bonkers if television shows became available on Vudu. For now this is the biggest issue.

Technology: A-

Everything works. You pick movies, they play. Its pretty sweet.
What have I watched on Vudu?

Thus far I have purchased Knocked up and Who Killed the Electric car, which has the trailer below. Although I do not consider myself an environmentalist by any stretch of the imagination, I found the documentary about the demise of electric cars to be very compelling. Definitely recommended. The documentary’s title is pretty self explanatory and featured lot of different perspective and insight on how and why the electric car went from a very promising technology to a thing of the past.

I found it very troubling that electric cars (which were somewhat prevalent in California in the nineties) were essentially wiped off the market in order to make way for the introduction of Hydrogen fueled cars. While this may sound reasonable, most experts believe that Hydrogen cars are more than a full decade away from being a viable consumer option.

Electric cars were enjoyed and adored by Californian owners for years only to be repossessed by various automakers in an effort to focus all alternative energy car efforts to mainly Hydrogen. With multiple hurdles in front of hydrogen fueled cars, the question of Who Killed the Electric Car is one that should rightfully be asked and investigated.

This commercial of the week goes to BMW’s new 3 Series ad. This advertisement really strikes a chord with BMW enthusiasts while also being memorable and catchy to the the average viewer. Simple yet affective.

Ever since picking up my part time writing position for bucknuts.com, I have constantly wondered if I had the skill, knowledge, and ability to be a full time college football writer. After reading Jon Wilner’s top 25, its pretty apparent it doesn’t take much and that this career path is indeed very possible.

This morning I looked at the AP top 25 rankings and noticed that a) 1 idiot voted for Arizona State as the best team in the country and b) an even bigger idiot voted LSU (who just lost) as the number one team in the country. This evening I found out the identity of the bigger idiot. No other than San Jose Mercury News’ (my local paper) writer Jon Wilner

Check out his blog where he discusses his rankings and the rationale behind them. Here are some of the most glaring anomalies from this college football “expert”.

IQ < 75

1) LSU is number one…. Seriously?

2) South Carolina somehow jumps the likes of Ohio State and Oklahoma for #2

3) Wilner’s hard on for the SEC is blatant with a whopping 5 SEC teams ranked in the top 12

4) 2 loss Florida and Auburn teams are ahead of USC

5) Ohio State destroys Kent State and is the clear number one, yet Wilner drops them from number 6 to number 7. Somehow LSU stays at the top?

6) Virginia Tech omitted from the top 15 despite their only loss being to the his heartthrob LSU.

7) Missouri in the top ten?

8 ) Wilner gets an AP vote and a paycheck

Although this commercial is somewhat of an inside joke (a spoof on an earlier incident), the Fowler Toyota commercial might be the most genius advertisement of 2007. Rewind two weeks ago to when Mike Gundy, the Oklahoma State football coach, went on a long mean spirited tirade at the expense of a local journalist. The youtube clip of his blow up will be forever immortalized on youtube and was also featured here at benkoo.com.

Fowler Toyota, an obscure Toyota dealership now finds itself featured on ESPN and media outlets all over the country thanks to this spoof commercial. Its funny, dings its main competitor, and will be blasted to the masses without a massive advertising campaign behind it. Pure genius.

For some odd reason I spend a lot of time researching/contemplating Generation Y’s unique upbringing and pending impact on the world. Down the road I wouldn’t mind specializing in Generation Y media and marketing concepts. Anyways I stumbled upon the below video. David Gillette is new to me but I am quickly becoming a big fan. I think their is an unprecedented amount of “20’s angst” as Gen Y comes to age and hits the real world. This video really sums it up nicely.