AFC and NFC Championship 2011 - Steelers and Bears Will Win

On Sunday the AFC and NFC Championship 2011 are upon us. Save your brain, the Steelers and Bears will win. Why? Over the last 11 games, the home team has won 8 times. That's a 72.7 percent home field win rate advantage. Moreover, the Packers' win over the Atlanta Falcons came on the fast track over the dome that defines the Georgia Dome. The temperature? About 70 degrees.

The NFC Championship Game will be played outdoors at Soldiers Field in Chicago, and in temperatures that may be as low as 8 degrees. The elements will play a factor here and that wasn't the case in Atlanta for the Packers.

Additionally, the Chicago Bears know the Green Bay Packers and Lovie Smith, more than any other coach in 21st Century Bears history, understands the objective is always to beat the Packers. He said so when he was hired.

The other x-factor is Bears Offensive Coordinator Mike Martz. He saves his best work for championship games, and its been a long time since he's been with a team in this position. Look for Martz to bring in new formations to confuse the Packers and cause receivers to be wide open.

Pick the Bears to blow-out the Packers.

The home field advantage also applies to the Steelers versus the Jets. Moreover while the New York Jets defense is good, The Steelers have the NFL's number one ranked defense. The Jets Offense is going to have a hard time getting anything going in a game that means so much to a team playing as much for history as it is against the Jets.

If the Steelers win, they will hold the NFL record for Super Bowl appearances with nine.

Pick the Steelers.

Steelers vs. Bears in Super Bowl 45, with the Chicago Bears winning it all!

Animoto Pre-Crunchies Party, San Francisco, CA 2011 #Tech

The Crunchies, the annual Tech Community event hosted by Tech Crunch with Venture Beat and Gigaom got off to a rousing start for those invited to the Animoto Pre-Crunchies Party. The event, staged to present the online platform's new offices at 333 Kearny St. in San Francisco, was every bit the "go-go-era" happening.

The ultra-modern glass and utilitarian office provided the perfect backdrop for an audience so tech, hip, and sexy, with black the prevailing dress color, that it looked like the set for a stylish sci-fi movie. Yep, DJ included; this is the 21st Century. Moreover, Animoto is a 21st Century product.

Animoto is a platform that takes your uploaded photos and music and other media and turns them into high-quality videos. The video can, if you wish, be shared with YouTube, RealBird, or other platforms. Animoto has been on a fast growth path, with over 1 million visitors as of this writing, and gained 750,000 sign-ups in just three days via its Facebook app. This blogger is a registered user of Animoto, and was before this blog post and the interview with Brad Jefferson, its CEO.

Back To The Animoto Party

The party was well-attended, with about half of the revelers going to The Crunchies, and the other half, not. Some familiar friends to this blogger were there, like Sylvia Paul, the East Bay PR specialist Fast Company calls a "Silicon Valley Public Relations Icon", and who's known for her lunches connecting brilliant and interesting people and sometimes just plain good-old folks.

Andrew Mager was there, and someone known to this space since 2007, when Owen Thomas, then the Editor of ValleyWag, had his Friday cocktail gatherings at Moose's. Now, Mager's with SimpleGeo, a platform that allows you to make location-based apps.

There was an abundance of four things: pulsating music, conversation, food, and drink. Add to that the eye-candy (for girls too, I hope, but some of the guys, new to this kind of party said they were actually surprised the women looked so good! Seriously.)

Around 6:30, Jefferson announced that those going to The Crunchies should leave to board one of two complementary busses headed to the event at The Palace of Fine Arts.   Cool.

Now, I expected a standard large "airport bus" style vehicle with all seats facing forward.

Hell no.

What we got was a bus that was a giant limo, with all seats, save the ones in back, facing sideways, and a stripper poll at the center.  And if you think I'm kidding, look at the video.  You'll see it.

We were allowed to bring our drinks on the bus and Animoto provided more buckets of bottles of beer for the riders.  The drink, the rocking bus, the company, the pole, and the sideways passenger positioning, and one man's claim that a woman on the bus invented the Internet, made for an interesting trip to the The Crunchies.

Thankfully, I know my cut-off point for cocktails, and I hit it on the bus.

Besides, I had to do some live blogging.

CNN Should Get Keith Olbermann Now Before Fox News Does

If CNN has any hunger for success, any backbone or spine, and any interest in gaining ratings, the Cable News Network would grab Keith Olbermann and sign him to a contract today. To say that MSNBC will be hurt by Keith's ouster is an understatement.

MSNBC has nothing else to offer to even half-way challenge Fox News in the prime time show segment areas. Keith grew into the MSNBC theme park attraction; the Cinderella's Castle around which all other shows were connected to like the spokes in a wheel.

Now, the hub is gone.

MSNBC President Phil Griffin's famous ego battles with Keith prove once again that ego is first the friend, then the enemy, of success. If Griffin wants to prove he's a capable manager of top-notch talent, he has to find a new way of dealing with people who have large egos. Keith's a diva - deal with it. It's worth it.

CNN needs Keith Olbermann. It's prime time show program ratings are terrible. Parker / Spitzer still hasn't taken off. Piers Morgan's not going to catch on any time soon unless he tweaks his show, and Anderson Cooper 360 isn't the powerhouse it used to be.

CNN needs a spark, and Keith Olbermann, with his following of millions of people, can provide it.

More on the Keith Olbermann ouster here.

Keith Olbermann Leaves MSNBC

USA Today online is one of the many news sources reporting that Keith Olbermann has permanently left MSNBC:

"There were many occasions, particularly in the last 2 years, where all that surrounded the show — but never the show itself — was just too much for me," Olbermann said.


The 51-year-old had the MSNBC's highest rated evening anchor. The New York Times reports that in 2008 he signed a four-year contract extension that estimated to be $30 million.

The Crunchies By TechCrunch - Livestream Live Blog

The 2011 Crunches are underway, and it starting with a great piano solo by someone no one knows the name of. Whatever his hame, and you can see him on livestream, he's good. Jmmin.

The hosts are Sara Lacy and Paul Carr. Great for Sara. But I'm not going to any place she tells me to go to. (Just kidding.)

The Awards. Best Technology Achievement: Google Self-Driving Car. Runner-up: Quickie. Sara Lacy said the last year's runner up was Google Wave, so who wants to be that? Ha.

Next: Best Internet Application Award: Pandora wins the award (!) Rdio is the runner-up. Owen Thomas of VentureBeat is pissed. He yells "WRONG!" I said "RIGHT!"

Best Social Application: Presented by Google VP Marissa Mayer. (It's obvious she's been working out the abs by the way.) The winner: Dailybooth. Twitter is the runner-up. (No Foursquare? Shocking.)

Best Social Commerce Application. Presented by Chris Sacca, who's bashed Blippy for being actually founded by Indian labor, who are over-used and under-recognized. The winner is Groupon and the runner-up is ShopKick.

Best Booststrapped Startup:: Addmired Runner-up was Instapaper.

Best Enterprise App: Of the nominees here, I'm rooting for BuddyMedia, but let's see what happens. The Runner-up is Millienial Media, and the winner is BuddyMedia (I got it right.) But the applause was almost nil.

Best Clean Tech: ( I think the presenter Matt Marshall of Venture Beat may have had too much wine, but..) The runner-up is Kopenik and the winner is SolarCity.

Best Time Sink Application:  Runner-up is Angry Birds and the winner is CityVille.

Bad joke about MySpace by Sara, using a poster (redone) from Weekend At Bernies to say it was being supported by friends (Weekend at Bernies was about a person, Bernie who was dead that two young men tried to make others think he was alive.)

Best International: Viki (well deserved). Runner-up: Soluto.

Best Design: Runner-up: About.me. Gogobot is the winner.

Best Device: Runner-up: X-Box Connect. Winner: iPad

Sara says we're in the home stretch - 20 down. And she takes time to tell us how the next category has nothing to do with Julian Assange. Now...

Best Touch Interface: Winner: Flipboard Runner-up? Matt Marshall says he thinks it was Instagram.

Best Mobile Application: Winner: Google Mobile Maps.

Angel of The Year: Runner-up: Ron Conway. Paul Graham is the winner.

VC of The Year: (Hopefully it's Fred Wilson, but let's see.) Runner-up is Fred Wilson. Yuri Milner of DST is the winner.

Founder Of The Year: Runner-up: Dennis Crowley. Winner: Mark Pincus of Zynga.

CEO of The Year: Runner-up: Mark Zuckerberg. Winner is Andrew Mason of Groupon. Andrew Mason is just a hoot. He says he has no idea why he's got the award and it's good because it comes before he "can fuck this up."

Best New Startup Or Product Of 2010: Runner-up: Square. Winner: Quora!

The founders of Flipboard and Instagram live together as roommates, by the way.

Best Overall Startup Or Product: Runner-up: Groupon Winner: Twitter. Wow. Facebook didn't win this year.

And it's over! The 2010 Crunchies are history. Now on to the party!

Jersey Shore Episode 4 Season 3.

Last night was the forth episode of the third season of Jersey Shore on MTV. This episode was filled with drama and emotion along with laughter. This was definitely the best episode so far and definitely can be considers one of the best episodes EVER in the history of Jersey Shore.

In the beginning Snooki is still in jail for her public intoxication and JWOWW is seen wearing a "FREE SNOOKI" shirt. I seem to remember this over the summer while the season was being filmed - does anyone remember reading JWOWW's twitter account and seeing a tweet about "bailing Snooki out of jail, the things I do for that girl" or something along those lines? Should have done a screenshot, but didn't think that'd be necessary at the time. Anyway, that brings up a question of how was she able to tweet - maybe an Internet cafe.

Snooki gets back to the house and is lectured by her father.

Courtesy of MTV

Deena goes to the club with Mike, Vinny and Pauly (MVP) and turns it into MVPD. She becomes a stereotypical drunk girl that a majority of guys find to be "hott" as she makes out with other girls and takes body shots off them as well. Not all guys find girl on girl action to be appealing, but MVP seemed to be enjoying the show.

Deena ends up with a guy named Dean who looks exactly like Ronnie - faux-hawk and everything. This guy looks just like Ronnie and the guys keep calling him Ronnie. Since Deena is hooking up with Dean (oh ha, Dean and Deena) they find it right to bring him back to the house and try to fool Sammi.

To the surprise of MVP[D] when they bring Dean up to the bedroom where Sammi and Ronnie are asleep and tell the couple that they found someone who looks just like Ronnie, Ronnie responds, "Are you talking about Dean?"

At this time the guys are all laughing and find it hilarious. Deena is downstairs at this time getting into some more casual attire, but upstairs Ronnie reveals to the boys that another similarity between Dean and him is that they both have girlfriends named Sam.

Well, that doesn't seem to matter when Dean tells Deena he has no girlfriend as they cuddle and grope one another in the hot tub.

Then, one of the world's most hilarious scenes in television history (okay, maybe that's a stretch, but it was so hilarious that even Dennis Rose, who refuses to admit he likes Jersey Shore,  laughed out loud):

Since Dean looks like Ronnie is in the hot tub with Deena, who is not Sammi, Pauly and Vinny decide to talk about writing Sammi a note about Ronnie cheating on her again. How could he? They say they will type up a note and use big vocabulary so no one will know they wrote it. Those who saw last season will find this hilarious and understand the reference to JWOWW and Snooki writing a note.  A video clip can be found here.

In the morning after Dean and Deena do everything except have intercourse Sammi tells Deena that Dean has a girlfriend - she plays it off like "whatever," when really it actually is a big deal since the night before he was going on about how he's single: hope the other Sam had fun watching that.

Tom and JWOWW start to have some problems - JWOWW is going out with her ex-hook up Roger who she has had a crush on since high school. It isn't until the after show (which was on immediately following this episode) that she is able to explain herself and for once she is relatable and it is really heartbreaking to really hear what she went through, but while watching the episode it just seems like she's being unfaithful to Tom by going around with another guy. While watching the episode eyes can be rolled at her for doing what she yelled at Ronnie for doing, but those who watch the after show know that the two cannot be compared.

JWOWW's breasts do a video with Pauly as a voiceover, but then the episode's tone changes.

JWOWW and Tom have a break up, and JWOWW's dad lets her know that Tom has left her dogs at the house. JWOWW and Snooki immediately drive to New York and get her dogs, but when Snooki goes upstairs to use the bathroom she sees that Tom stole her bed. Tom also took a very expensive watch, some files and a hard-drive that contained photos of JWOWW from when she was younger and with her mother all before the age of 21, and since her mother is very sick now she would like to be able to keep those memories. On the after show she updates that she still has not received her hard drive back.

JWOWW introduces Snooki to a "gorilla juicehead" named Nick who she at first is apprehensive about since he is part Italian, but then she decides to have sex with him. Over the summer while filming the two were seen and there was blog posts talking about the two and Snooki finally finding the perfect guy, but the two have since split - but it's still fun to enjoy during watching the show.

The previews for the next episode include Sammi crying and saying that she needs to go home - so this could prove to be even more dramatic.

Stay tuned: this season is definitely one that will end the Jersey Shore series with a big bang (if in fact this is the last season).

Second-Grader Classroom Sex In Oakland, MTV's Skins Called Child Porn. What's Up?

What's this world coming to? In Oakland, at Markham Elementary school, a two second-grade students were engaging in oral sex while the teacher was present in the classroom. MTV's catching heat for it's new TV program Skins, which features racy scenes of sex, violence and drug use among minors and using real minors in the cast.

While Oakland and the nation expresses outrage, this blogger asks why? Look, we created the environment that allows this behavior to surface, and now we're shocked when it hits the media?

For at least the last five years friends who are teachers in Oakland and in suburban New York have told me about catching kids as young as 13 "in the act" in Oakland and in New York, one girl giving oral to two boys in a closet. Story after story of kids behaving badly and now we're shocked.

But look at what we've done to create this: a society that's actively afraid of disciplining kids in public. A society with a larger number of single-parent families than ever before. A society were kids send "sex-based" text messages in an act called "sexting." With all that, and more, we're shocked.

But the ultimate shocker should be our collective fear of changing society so this stops. We must all get out of our shells, talk to each other, and not fear to step in to tell kids how to behave, even if they're not our kids.

In today's America we leave problem kids to the teachers. In fact, we're doing this in the Oakland case. No one has asked who the parents of these kids are. The punishment should be outing them for public information. After all, it's the parents, and not the teachers, who brought the kids into this World. They can start taking care of them, for a change.

Yes. Parents work more hours than ever. But that's where society can take up the slack: the neighbor next door or down the street. The police officer just giving advice and direction instead of a ticket. We don't have authority figures anymore. We have military weekday warriors. That's not solving the problem.

We have to look at society, and to see it just look in the mirror.

Jesse James Engaged To Kat Von D, Says She's "Best Friend"

Jesse James, the American television personality and CEO of West Coast Choppers (did you know?) but more famous for having been Oscar-winner Sandra Bullock's husband, is now, almost a year after it was revealed he was cheating on Bullock, engaged to one of the women he was having an affair with, tattoo-laden Kat Von D.

And the kicker is he calls Kat Von D is "best friend." Yep.

According to People Magazine James said:

"You know, sometimes the public and press gets it wrong. This is one of those times. 2010 was actually the best year of my life, because I fell in love with my best friend, an amazing woman who stood behind me when the world turned their backs."

Jesse James got it wrong. This blogger, at least, wasn't saying it was a bad year for James, but a bad time for Sandra Bullock. But his statement shows just how zeroed-in James was on his own needs, and not those of Bullock, his wife.

Jesse James cheated on Sandra Bullock, and while she was working her tail off, and with not one but four women (with rumors of a fifth), and now he calls Kat Von D his best friend?

What a slap in the face to Sandra Bullock.

Chevron Ecuador Plaintiff's Information Fraud Continues In 2011

Want an example of The Matrix? The Chevron Ecuador case. Just look at the cultural environment of information fraud that some so-called activists have created around the Chevron Ecuador issue. The lie is that American Oil Company Chevron polluted the Ecuadorian Amazon without cleaning it up between 1968 and 1992. The lie is that Chevron caused $27 billion of environmental damage to Ecuador. The lie is that Chevron is still operating in Ecuador.

Organizations like The Rainforest Action Network keep spreading that lie. They should try telling the truth. Of course, if they did, it would mean whatever funding they get would dry up in a heartbeat. But telling the truth would be a good start toward better community relations.

The truth is that Ecuador itself, and not "a group of Ecuadorians" as Justmeans.com reports, is behind the Chevron lawsuit. The truth is that Ecuador has recently stated that it, and not lead plaintiffs lawyer Steve Donziger, would collect 90 percent of any lawsuit award if Chevron lost the Ecuador case. The truth is that Steve Donziger himself admitted a few years ago that he would get rich from this case.

The fact is that, according to outtakes from the movie Crude, Donziger himself conspired to plan to intimidate the Ecuadorian court, considered issuing a threat to kill a judge, and said he had met with Rafael Correa, the President of Ecuador and the executives of Petroecuador, the state-owned oil company.

The fact is that under Correa, Ecuador has kicked out all American Oil Companies, and embarked on a plan of nationalization of the oil industry, even passing a law to take more revenues under certain conditions.

All of this, while Ecuador's poor stuffers. In Ecuador, the 20 percent of the nations wealthiest people own half the nations total income. And according to the CIA World Factbook, income distribution in Ecuador has gotten worse, not better, in the 2000s all the way up to 2009. In fact, it's so bad, it compares to that of Sub-Saharan countries.

Meanwhile, Chevron has not been active in Ecuador since 1992, yet the so-called activists have created The Matrix, where the truth is met with attack by minions who behave like controlled Androids.

God help them if they're ever released from The Matrix.  They may find the truth of The Real World hard to deal with, and want to crawl back into it.  

Debby Kaplan Helps With a Better Lifestyle

Debby Kaplan is a Life Agent who has become my personal trainer & nutritionist. Within these weekly posts there will be vlog posts regarding diet and exercise and how to lose weight in a healthy way and be fit for the summer bikini months. This is targeted toward females in college, like myself. There are a lot of unhealthy choices in the college cafeteria and as most college students are not able to buy the most healthy food most are going to Burger King or McDonalds at 10 p.m. looking for a quick fix. There is also a lack of exercise part of this, and sometimes stress can contribute and also lead to this.

Debby Kaplan has given me a detox plan and diet. I will be interviewing other college girls and showing that her plan truly does work - and I shall be the proof. Weekly documenting of this. Debby K has been a long time friend of Zennie Abraham and is all for helping women.

It's hard for girls in college - there is lots of partying, alcohol and this inevitably will also contribute to the "freshman 15" which is not always easy to lose.

So - this will include my own body transformation. Stay tuned. This will include the food eaten that week, the exercises done, interviews with other females, progress made and other insight and facts that will help others achieve results.

Miss Saigon Vietnamese Restaurant In Oakland, CA

Vietnamese Restaurant ? Oakland? In Oakland it's hard to top the food at Miss Saigon Restaurant, at 3345 Grand Avenue.

A local favorite since 1998, Timmy Nguyen, its owner, and his staff consistently serves good, fresh, and lovely-to-look at Vietnamese food, and well into the night. On all week nights except Wednesday, Miss Saigon is open until Midnight.

What this blogger recommends is a combination of the Spring Rolls, a Claypot dish, a Chow Mein dish, noodle soup, steamed rice, and a glass of red wine and a glass of water. Ordering all of that for two, including two glases of wine, is about $50. Want to cut down the price? Order water, only.

But regardless of your budget, you really can't go wrong at Miss Saigon. And, yes, I paid for my meal in full, no comp.

Is Google's Larry Page For Eric Schmidt As CEO Mark Zuckerberg Envy?

In an Internet splash, Google made a change at the top at the right time, just as Google revenues grew in the last quarter of 2010, and the overall future for the giant search firm looks bright. Google Co-Founder Larry Page (in photo) takes over for CEO Eric Schmidt in a move that starts April 4th, 2011.

The basic reason given for the announcement is that Page is ready, or as Schmidt's own tweet reported, "Day-to-day adult supervision no longer needed!." Here's what Schmidt's blog post reads:

For the last 10 years, we have all been equally involved in making decisions. This triumvirate approach has real benefits in terms of shared wisdom, and we will continue to discuss the big decisions among the three of us. But we have also agreed to clarify our individual roles so there’s clear responsibility and accountability at the top of the company.


Larry will now lead product development and technology strategy, his greatest strengths, and starting from April 4 he will take charge of our day-to-day operations as Google’s Chief Executive Officer. In this new role I know he will merge Google’s technology and business vision brilliantly. I am enormously proud of my last decade as CEO, and I am certain that the next 10 years under Larry will be even better! Larry, in my clear opinion, is ready to lead.

Reading between the lines, this blogger thinks the rise of Mark Zuckerberg, right in Google's San Francisco Bay Area Silicon Valley backyard, has a lot to do with it. In other words, the move is pure and simple Mark Zuckerberg envy.

Look, every entrepreneur, from awful ones like myself to great ones like Steve Jobs, want to be known as the face of their product. And that desire is increased manyfold when the product is something you made by, in this case, programming hand. That's true for Google, for Apple, and for Facebook, and while far less so for Yahoo, which Co-Founder Jerry Yang allowed to spin so far beyond its original identity it may be impossible for it to recover, it's still basically so.

It's ego.

Larry Page wants to be seen as the face of his company Google again. When we think of Facebook, we think of Mark Zuckerberg. Period. That was true before The Social Network, and its more true today after the success of the movie. Google has no such flick about its formation and its early years. Moreover, Facebook has grown faster than Google has over an equivalent amount of time, and is now equal in Internet influence to Google. It's only a matter of time before Facebook extends its reach into consumer electronics.

All of this is Mark Zuckerberg.

While Larry and Sergey share duties with Eric Schmidt, Zuckerberg calls the shot in a business staff that's part friends, part family, and certainly more compact. Over this time, the triplets of Larry, Sergey, and Eric have done some extraordinary things with Google. But over that same time, the "face" of Google was more Eric than Larry or Sergey.

Now, in a full nod to Mark Zuckerberg, who calls the shots at Facebook, Larry Page's calling the shots at Google.  Round One of this epic Internet business cage match has begun.

Stay tuned.