Faithful reader Mr. Scolex writes:
Wanted to share a tip for you guys regarding the iTunes 1 billionth song download contest. Apple has made this deliberately confusing so I poured over the official rules to see what the skinny was.
freebies
iTunes Billionth Song Contest: Play for Free
By 2.8.06
‘The Corporation’ for Free on Google Video
By 12.27.05
We haven’t yet watched the documentary ‘The Corporation, although it’s sitting in our Netflix queue right below The Odd Couple. So while we’d love to make a comment about watching the movie for free being some sort of ironic comeuppance for the companies they’re railing against, we don’t actually know if The Corporation is critical of corporations at all. It could be that the movie praises the intellectual property and copyright laws to which many of our largest companies are tethered, which would make it a little bit sad that someone has uploaded the whole three-hour thing to Google Video, where you can watch it for free.
Free 411 for a Short Ad
By 12.19.05
Here’s a quick tip that’s worth the trouble, we think: 1-800-FREE-411 (373-3411) is a totally free directly service. How do they make money?
The way it works in practice is that a caller who requests a business number is first presented with a short (about 12 seconds) audio advertisement for a sponsor who operates a competing business in that area; the caller is then given the option of being connected to either that competitor or the business he originally requested. If no sponsor operates a local competing business, then the caller hears no advertisement at all.
So you’ll wait a hair longer than you would with your phone company’s directory service, but we think 10-to-15 seconds of easily-ignored ads are worth the $2 or more charge you’ll often receive.
Afternoon Freebies: Asteroid Lotion Elves
By 12.16.05
• Get your name on a microchip that isn’t inside a robot from the future, thanks to NASA’s Dawn space craft. Soon your name will reside with thousands of others on a dead rock in the cold reaches of space.
Afternoon Freebies: FÜNDE RAZOR
By 12.13.05
• Dell Game! Guess what we won today? What is the opposite of our dignity?
PaperBackSwap.com: Free Books by Post
By 12.13.05
PaperbackSwap.com is a place to, you know, swap books. The idea is pretty swell.
Gray Tuesday: Green Day Mash Ups for Free
By 12.13.05
Bundled rootkits and spyware are just the latest valid reason to stop buying music CDs from big labels, but they still don’t trump the primary: No better value than free. But ignoring that, here’s another: Record companies want to make not-for-profit remixes of music illegal. We’re as up in armchairs about that as anybody, but we still think our first colon-infested sentence has more punch, because free trumps all.
Afternoon Freebies: Vermont Bee Balm
By 12.12.05
• Dell Game! Dell Game! Choose the middle stocking and win nothing, again and again!
Afternoon Freebies: Gay Wallet Follies
By 12.7.05
• The Dell Game continues apace. Tug the stockings to win a prize, or more likely, a coupon for percentage off discounts on Dell products.
