a big deal for small businesses?

After all the excitement of Cyber Monday, when amazon and the likes were filling their coffers as millions of people elected to spread christmas cheer via CDs, DVDs and books, the smaller businesses of the world didn't want to be outdone and miss out on all the action.

and by action, I mean money.

What better way to raise awareness and profits, than by arranging a 'day', in particular 'small business saturday', which was yesterday, which you may or may not have spotted posters for around your town. The aim, to to divert some attention to your local traders and small businesses.

and who is behind this super-duper-fantastic idea?

oh, it's American Express.

the one credit card that small businesses, and quite often larger businesses do not accept, since the charges to the retailer per transaction are higher than that of your other credit and debit cards.

so go ahead and support your local business, just don't expect them to be able to take payment if you're waving that AmEx about...

The return of cyber Monday, heralding the return of cynical christmas download

Waking up yet again to the 'news' that today is Cyber Monday reminded me...

I still have my christmas single that I like to trot out each year in the hope of spreading a little christmas joy to all the girls and boys that are writing out their lists for Santa


Bah Humbug

'tis a lie, as much of a lie as the newspapers and media force feeding you this Cyber Monday baloney...

when they 'report' on this being the busiest shopping day online pre-xmas, all they are really doing is fanning the flames for Internet based vendors who somehow managed to convince journalists and the like that reminding people to 'get there arse in gear and get onto amazon pronto to spend some of your hard earned' is actually a valid news item... it is not, it is simply another cog in the wheel of commerce

and when I say that my christmas single is hear to spread joy, what I really mean is that you should really check out my cynical bleatings about the shallow commerciality of this joyous time of year, whilst an unrelenting electronic beat grumbles and pulses with all the christmas spirit of landing arse first in a bushel of holly...

wow, glad I got that out my system...

and relax, I'm not that grumpy about the whole thing really, but I will call a spade a spade, and I will offer you this festive gift once again as an alternative to the usual standards from Noddy Holder and Mary Carey...

Hunchbakk - www.xmas.com

door number 1

I've been off my blog-game, that much is clear, but that doesn't mean I've been slacking

in fact I've been trying to build up my empire slowly over at Desperately Seeking Susan Boyle, working hard on mixtapes and making connections, tweeting, pushing and cross-pollinating

it's been a strange journey, I started the seeking subo blog when I noticed that I was devoting a lot of blog space to music over here, and I reasoned that people looking to get a fix of a music blog may not be quite as appreciative of some of the other random crap that mixes in along with the music talk over here, whether it be my own music (kinda the reason I sorta set this blog up originally), my poetry, my thoughts, or just anything else that I felt the need to throw in with the rest of it

of course, since choosing to devote a blog to the music of others I then found myself blogging less about the music of others, I now seem to have come back around on myself and am blogging more over at seeking subo than I am over here...

and the one thing I tell myself that I probly shouldn't blog about is my own lack of blogging, frankly I feel that it must make a terrible read, but dammit, I'm human and things get in the way of other things, and if I didn't admit to this and instead gave of an air of the infallible then I doubt I would be very much like myself at all

all of which is a rather long winded way of saying that in recognition of the usual practises of blogmas and adventness I thought I should blog just a little bit more this month, don't be daft and expect a blog every day... I wouldn't want to disappoint you, but maybe if I can tap tap tap away for a bundle of minutes on a number of evenings this month and share my brainwaves, then perhaps that would be a good thing for me to get my creative juices going again (not guaranteeing that this is a good thing for anyone else tho....)

so... one post down!