Shared iDiz

Home equity signs of life

Brian Wringer — Wed, 08 Sep 2010 14:43:22 +0000

We had some very interesting results from last week’s Question of the Week: How are Home Equity Loans and HELOCs doing in your corner of the country? The results are shown to the right.

Good boss or bad boss? Take the survey.

Kent Dicken — Wed, 08 Sep 2010 14:11:28 +0000

Most people find their bosses to be decent people, but you may have a doozy. To find out how your boss rates, take the Boss Reality Assessment Survey System (BRASS) developed by Bob Sutton PhD, blogger and author of (what else?) Good Boss, Bad Boss.

The electric car loan boogaloo

Brian Wringer — Wed, 08 Sep 2010 06:49:10 +0000

Electric cars have been around for a hundred years or so, but until now, they’ve been at the fringes of the automotive world. This fall, the Nissan Leaf and Chevrolet Volt will go on sale, and Ford and Mitsubishi are planning to launch their electric cars sometime next year. Oh, and let’s not forget there are at least two companies (Zero and Brammo) selling street legal electric motorcycles right now.

Give me what I like

Kent Dicken — Wed, 01 Sep 2010 14:33:00 +0000

Sure, I liked it when Amazon started showing me what others bought based on items I have purchased, and when Pandora started picking the music in our office based on bands and musicians we prefer. But now it seems as if every site wants to profile me and make recommendations based on little more than a few clicks.

Are newspapers a joke?

Kent Dicken — Tue, 31 Aug 2010 14:37:53 +0000

You can tell a lot about a person by the paper they read. See if you can find the marketing truth in this joke about newspaper readers:

1. The Wall Street Journal is read by the people who run the country.
2. The Washington Post is read by people who think they run the country.
3. The New York Times is read by people who think they should run the country and who are very good at crossword puzzles.
4. USA Today is read by people who think they ought to run the country but don’t really understand The New York Times. They do, however, like their statistics shown in pie charts.
5. The Los Angeles Times is read by people who wouldn’t mind running the country — if they didn’t have to leave Southern California to do it.
6. The Boston Globe is read by people whose parents used to run the country, thank you very much.
7. The New York Daily News is read by people who aren’t too sure who’s running the country and don’t really care as long as they can get a seat on the train.
8. The New York Post is read by people who don’t care who is running the country as long as they do something really scandalous, preferably while intoxicated.
9. The Miami Herald is read by people who are running another country but need the baseball scores.
10. The San Francisco Chronicle is read by people who aren’t sure if there is a country or that anyone is running it; but if so, they oppose all that they stand for — unless the leaders are handicapped minority feminist atheist dwarfs who also happen to be illegal aliens from any other country or galaxy.
11. The National Enquirer is read by people trapped in line at the grocery store.
12. The Minneapolis Star Tribune is read by people who have recently caught a walleye and need something in which to wrap it.