ALS Ice Bucket Challenge (Tennis Buddies Nominated)

Star Wars: Tech Museum @ San Jose

For all you Star Wars fans, check out San Jose's Tech Museum Star Wars Exhibit. Pretty awesome stuff with life sized models used in the filming of the original Star Wars series and fun tidbits.

Click the link to see all 88 photos.

Star Wars Museum San Jose, a set on Flickr.

Black Friday Computer Deals (Dell eCoupons + eCoupon Promo + Discount = :)

So I've been hunting for a new PC/laptop and was wondering what a good deal would be. I'm the type to wait around a month to see if anything pops up and I must say that I am pretty happy with what I found.

My uses:

• Watching HD videos (without lag)
• Potential HD video editing
• Light gaming

I already have a laptop, so portability was not a main factor and for now, the old school desktops has a much better bang for your buck in terms of specs.

Naturally, with Black Friday around the corner, one would think to wait for that but after seeing all the flyers, only the low end stuff was going on sale. I was set on either the Dell XPS 8700 beast below from Costco or the Lenovo IdeaPad Y410p laptop.

Today I Learned How To Make A Gif

Fun at Sawyer Camp Trail :)

A Look Inside Facebook's Campus, Part 2

Are you a Pirate, Ninja or Jedi Master? Another cool piece of art at Facebook's HQ

Part 2 of 2. See Part 1 here.

This is the second of a two-part article about my visit to Facebook's headquarters in Menlo Park, California. I must say that it's pretty impressive. I can't think of many other companies, (maybe Google but I've never visited them), that offer the same level of benefits and perks. 

The Food

Sweets Store
Baked goods, ice cream and froyo...all free. I'd gain 100 pounds if I worked here. Seriously. I imagine that the people who work here have developed some sort of internal mechanism to avoid eating ice cream and brownies every day. 

Facebook has a lot of  free food on campus

A Look Inside Facebook's Campus, Part 1

Map of Facebook's Campus

Part 1 of 2. See Part 2 here.

I had the opportunity to visit Facebook's campus and I must say that it's pretty impressive. I can't think of many other companies, other than Google (from what I've heard), that offer the same level of benefits and perks. I took some unprofessional pictures (all on campus) to try and show off what I saw, but I didn't want to be too much of a burden for my host, Chiao. 

Facebook campus panorama

Transformers Costume: 2 Years and $2,000 Later...

Here is a really cool costume that Marc Derepentigny created himself. It seems that he was an ex-machinist and has a lifelong passion for making costumes and the results are certainly incredible. Well done!

ad:tech San Francisco 2013 Key Learnings

Pandora's Keynote

Technology is changing the way that people behave and at the same time, forcing a change in how brands try to distinguish themselves from the herd. Think about this: When was the last time you clicked on an online banner or even remember what banner was shown? I think I intentionally click on one banner a month and I probably views thousands of web pages. I sat through a few sessions and keynotes and I've highlighted the most interesting parts below.

The recurring themes that were communicated by various panelists were as follows:

·         Old school online advertising, like banners ads, have lost much of its effectiveness

·         Brands must be experts at storytelling

·         Marketers must learn to tap into advocates or influencers (not the same thing) when trying to build their communities

ad:tech Digital Marketing Conference April 9-10, 2013

[Update: Exclusive OddBubbles ad:tech coupon code at end of article]

The next tech conference on my list to attend is ad:tech San Francisco. If you're wondering what the show is about here is what they have on their site:

"ad:tech is the leading digital marketing event for marketing and technology professionals from all over the world – a marketplace for buying and selling, a community for networking, a forum for exchanging ideas and an opportunity for contributing to industry trends and initiatives."

There are a lot of sessions that can help shed some light on how to better understand upcoming tech trends and I've highlights a few below:

Google Shopping Express, Free Delivery in San Francisco

Google launched its shopping express service today for select test users in the San Francisco bay area. They are offering a free 6-month membership for unlimited same-day delivery. Participating retailers include:

SXSWi 2013: Innovative Start-Ups and Random Stuff

I went to my first SXSW Interactive Festival last week to see what the fuss was all about. I heard that the city of Austin becomes a zoo with massive line ups everywhere. I was pleasantly surprised when I showed up to the convention center on Friday morning to get my badge. I was in line at 8:45am and the doors opened at 9am but man was the line fast. There were 42 workers manning the registration booths so yeah, pretty awesome and I was out at 9:15am. Kudos to SXSW for predicting this huge rush.

Chrome Super Sync Sports: Google Uses Your Mobile As a Second Screen

The Google Creative Lab and some partners created this interesting sports game that connects your mobile device to your computer. Your mobile becomes the controller for your athlete in the running.swimming and biking mini-games. You can choose between 50 cartoon athlete and even race against up to three friends.

Super Sync Sports uses the latest browser technologies like Canvas, CSS3, HTML5 audio, SVG, the Touch API (for your mobile touch screen) and WebSockets to sync your devices.