I thought that my response might be of interest to others, so I'm publishing it here too...

Hi Dave. I am currently taking Blogging 2.0 at [[major university]] and need to research Business Blogs. I am doing my "analysis of a Blog" on your blog and wanted to ask you two questions and have them answered by tomorrow midday if possible. (My assignment is due tomorrow evening.)

Great. I look forward to reading your assignment when you're done. Hopefully you'll have some insight and suggestions on ways I can improve things!

First, It seems like you do quite a bit of advertising for different companies. Is it free or are you compensated?

All advertising involves a financial relationship, whether it's free products for ads or money changing hands. Most all of my ads are through an advertising network run by Google called AdSense. You can learn more about it at http://www.google.com/adsense if you'd like.

Other ads are typically performance based: I don't get paid to run the ad, but if someone clicks on it and buys the merchant's product, I receive a small commission on the sale.

My blog Ask Dave Taylor is a business venture: I have put thousands of hours of my time into creating and maintaining the site and it's supported by advertising and adjunct revenue sources. It pays my mortgage and lets me feed my kids, so that's all good.

Secondly, If I were to consider advertising on my blog what would be the best and easiest way to start. (The blog was also created for school but I'd like to continue after the class ends.

The first thing to realize is that it's really darn hard to earn more than a few dollars/month on a blog. You have to work at it for years, produce good content, and write about something interesting to an audience that is also likely to buy related products or services. In other words, if your blog is "money saving tips" it's not going to make as much off ad revenue as "best high-end fashion purses". Make sense?

Having said that, I am a big fan of AdSense, as mentioned earlier. If you have good content and put the ads front and center, hopefully you can make a bit of money and get enthused to push further.

Good luck!

My topics: Are bloggers a meaningful part of the journalism landscape and how do bloggers make money blogging? I came prepared to discuss both topics, based on advance input and what I think are topics that should be important to students about to be pushed out into the bleak, unforgiving world of modern journalism.

I didn't expect a particularly warm welcome from the School of Journalism and Mass Communication, though, because as I have learned from a number of students and community members, many people in the department are convinced that they're the last bastion of true journalism and that the entire online world is worthless and that we're going to hell in a handbasket as democracy dies in lockstep with journalism dying.

The first question I had for the class, about 25 students, mixed male/female, was "how many of you have a blog?" One gal bravely raised her hand. "Okay, how many of you have a blog or write "Notes" on Facebook or otherwise write with some frequency?" Two hands went up. That's it. I was pretty darn surprised, needless to say. Journalism and mass communications students who aren't writers? And they're worried that us forward-thinking geeks are poisoning the well?

Then their instructor, Professor Dean Colby, jumped into the fray, positing that traditional, mainstream media is the heart of all journalism and that online bloggers "just aggregate but ultimately point back to traditional journalists". His position, as far as I could tell, is that since bloggers and online commentators don't have traditional journalistic training they have to piggyback on those that do, the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, BusinessWeek, and so on.

"Did you read the article in yesterday's New York Times about mom bloggers?" I asked. He hadn't, but two students had (extra points for them!) "That's the opposite of what you're talking about: that's a mainstream media piece written by a blogger likely without any journalistic training."

"Ah, okay, but all bloggers are commentators, not reporters." I got in response.

Okay, I can go down this rabbit hole, with some glee, truth be told, it's a favorite topic of mine and I've explored it from stage more than once...

"So can I debunk a popular myth of journalism? There is no such thing as objectivity. All journalists, all publications, all media is biased. Don't believe me? Compare the headlines in different papers for the exact same story. You can instantly see their bias. Or compare how two writers can "objectively" report on an event differently. Word choice, phrasing, how quotes are assembled, it all contributes."

And so it went. We talked about how CNN is a bastion of journalism, except it now also relies on iReport reporters who don't have any formal training, just a camera and access, and we did talk about how bloggers make money through advertising, sponsorships, and affiliate programs, using Dr. Colby's fave site Denver Stiffs (a sports site) as an example.

Ultimately, it was an interesting conversation, but it's been a while since I felt like I was in the position of defending what I see as the natural evolution of media and journalism. As I feared, my impression of the School of Journalism and Mass Communication remains that it's a dinosaur howling at the impending climate change, it's King Canute standing on the beach, commanding "Ocean, be thou still! I bid thee come not nearer to my feet!" even as the waves implacably roll in.

The world of information dissemination is evolving before our eyes, going from four channels of television to hundreds to thousands, from one or two major newspapers per community to dozens, and from mainstream outlets to everything being an outlet. Journalism is surely just as much about speed of dissemination as it is digging up the muck (a relatively modern invention in the journalistic world, btw), so Twitter users breaking the news of the Chilean earthquake way before any news outlets do is a harbinger of the future, not a change to be feared.

My thoughts to the students in the class are twofold. First, things change. Deal with it or be obsolete. The market determines what's important, not your professors. Second, writers write. You should be writing every single day, even if it's restaurant reviews or letters to your favorite pals. It's a muscle, exercise it and you'll thrive in a changing world of information.

And finally, to the department, this sea change in the world of news, journalism and information dissemination is way too big to deny and fear. Embrace it. Jump into the pool and see what happens. Otherwise you're failing at the core mission of the School of Journalism: to produce journalists ready for the modern world and what will come tomorrow.

But that's just an excuse. I just want one. :-)

So when I learned that pre-orders for the new iPad were going to happen at 5.30am PST on March 12, 2010, I dutifully set the alarm on my Apple iPhone to wake up at 6.25am MST and try to get to the head of the line. After all, it wouldn't be cool if my friends had one and I was still on the $#@$&# waiting list, would it?

I fired up Twitter, so I could watch the iPad chatter, and went to the Apple Store, where I got to see this:

Then, at precisely 6.30am, I saw a tweet that "Pre-orders have begun!! Whoohoo!" and refreshed one more time:

Well, heck, it's so early I'm a bit groggy, but I think I know what I want! Click on the "pre-order" button and:

Lots of options. Since I have a Verizon mifi unit, I have always just been interested in the Wi-fi version: I don't want to pay yet another cell bill to get data access through yet another device anyway. Size? Well, the smallest is inevitably going to be too small once I drop some films and my music and photo library on it (not to mention a ton of games!), and my iPhone is 16GB so... coin flip... a 32GB unit sounds nice. That's what I order.

A surprising number of accessories are included, notably a dock and a cable that lets you get VGA out of the iPad (what, no HDMI? No DVI? Interesting), but after a moments thought, I decide that the accessories will be easy to acquire later and skip 'em all on my pre-order.

$599 for the privilege of being an early adopter? Suuurrreeee....

Add $45.89 in Colorado sales tax and $12.00 shipping to get it a wee bit early and I click on the "Place Order Now" button.

Fingers crossed, hoping the Apple Store doesn't glitch, and ...

YES! SCORE!!!

Now the almost impossible wait for the product to actually ship and arrive.

Man, I am such a fanboy. But I admit it, and that's part of the solution, right? :-)

The answer is obvious if you spend a few minutes reading the WSJ and comparing it to other news sources: for breaking news, social media totally rocks. Twitter lets me know about things sometimes hours before mainstream media picks up on the story, but once it has broken, once there is important and often complicated news to report, in my experience it's up to professional journalists to dig up all the facts, gain access to interview the key players, and create a context and backstory that helps me understand the full issue, not just the knee-jerk punditry of the social media world.

In fact, if I may make a sweeping generalization, most online news seems to be focused almost exclusively on the "what" of the story, without ever digging into "why" or "who". Makes for a soundbite world that is entertaining, but ultimately leaves us in the dark.

So if you are interested in solid, professional, Pulitzer-prize winning journalism, I suggest you give the Wall Street Journal a shot. An online subscription is $1.99/week. That's, what, 33% of a tall latte?

Here's a link to sign up for your trial subscription: Sign up for the WSJ at a discount.

We fought it, I wrote letters to my representatives, and many of my friends camped out and testified in hearings, but it was obvious from their reports back to me that the zeal to raise money through closing a perceived tax "loophole" was greater than their interest in hearing how affilate merchants would leave the state, effectively meaning that there'd be no revenue and we affiliates would be screwed in the process.

The bill passed in a modified form, but Amazon.com's Affiliate team still thinks it's too onerous and as of today my account is shut down with them for the foreseeable future. Here's the email I -- and may other Coloradans -- received:

In a nutshell, Amazon believes that the sales tax isn't that onerous (indeed, the rise of Internet commerce has drastically affected tax revenue on transactions, as I have written about before) but that having to worry about hundreds of different taxation zones, and being potentially audited by any and all of these zones, is ridiculous.

Really, it's something that we need to address on a Federal level. We need a Federal online sales tax that is then distributed through some sort of formula so that it's easy to compute, easy to distribute, and helps alleviate the tax burden that brick and mortar stores face in an increasingly digital age.

Until then, well, Governor Ritter, I sure don't appreciate losing a revenue stream because of short-sighted greed in the legislature. I encourage you and the rest of the Colorado legislatures to reconsider the issue of implementing HB-1193 and tweak it before more and more affiliates drop us hard-working small businesses or we are forced to change our corporate headquarters to be in another state that is more Internet business friendly.

It's the Stealth iBot PC Monitor and, in essence, it's a simple device that enables you to install spyware on any PC computer in under ten seconds.

As the vendor describes in the Skymall catalog:

Easy To Use & Undetectable Total Computer Spying Tool Covertly Monitors Passwords, Chatting, Photos, Websites & More: Insert In USB, And In 5 Seconds Data Nano iBots Monitor All Computer Activity On ALL USER ACCOUNTS w/o Tell-Tale Hardware Left Behind

• Covertly Record Everything A Person Does On A Computer
• Remove Stealth iBot After 5 Seconds: No Hardware Left Behind
• Undetectable By Most Anti-Spyware Applications
• Store Up to 10,000 Screenshots & Virtually Unlimited Text
• Total Surveillance - Record All Computer Activity - Even On Other User Accounts
• Works With Any PC Computer Including Laptops

I think not! To complain, I went to the Skymall site and clicked on the convenient "Customer Service" link, filled in their form, and submitted this message:

I just noticed this product in your catalog:

    http://www.skymall.com/shopping/detail.htm?pid=203188705

As a computer security professional, I am shocked that you would promote this and would like to suggest that it has no good, legitimate or valid uses in any situation and that you should pull it from the catalog immediately.

Thank you for taking the time to contact us at SkyMall. We do appreciate your time and comments. However I am sadden about your dissatisfaction about one of items. Here at SkyMall we feel that all of our items are properly working items. I apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused you and thank you for bringing this to our attention. If you have any questions please feel free to contact us at 1-800-759-6255.
Thank you,
Dianna
SkyMall Customer Service

I will be optimistic and hope that my complaint is sent up the ladder from the first level customer service - obviously someone will minimal training - to someone in corporate who can actually respond in a meaningful manner.

Still, do you think I'll ever see another response from Skymall?

A bad storm threw a monkey wrench into our plans, however, and the Navy informed me that they had to postpone the Stennis visit. Did I cancel my entire trip and wait for the Navy to reschedule? I decided not to, and instead contacted some of my social media pals and changed the San Diego leg of my trip to include a meetup, some meetings and some consulting work. Perfect!

My friends at Bailey * Gardiner helped me get a room at the trés chic Sé San Diego hotel to save me from the hell of a cheap motel in the burbs.

I dutifully checked in with the popular geolocation game Foursquare when I arrived, and you can imagine my surprise when I got this:

To put it mildly, I was offended.

I would like to think that I have a good sense of humor (though my kids might disagree!), but I was not happy to be insulted because I had an opportunity to stay at a trendy place. Worse, from the perspective of someone who works with marketing and PR teams, I realized that this was a potential liability for the hotel as it tries to appeal to a younger audience: is being labeled a "douchebag" for staying at the hotel a good thing? I think not.

As a result, I posted a complaint on the Foursquare support boards, saying this:

Predictably, I got responses like this one: "The fact that you are so upset about the deuche[sic] bag award kind of shows you deserve it..." but they missed the point, as I highlighted in a follow-on message:

The problem here is a fundamental one: Web 2.0 companies need to grow up if they want to play in the bigger marketplace of business and corporate America. Does Foursquare? As far as I can tell, businesses are their only revenue stream, sponsorships and special promotions offered to Foursquare users, so that's an unequivocal yes in my book.

This is really no different from any previous era when companies had to decide whether they were going to stay within their target demographic or dilute the edginess of their brand and thereby appeal to a wider audience. Think 60s hippie demo, for example: did you stay a small company and highlight how you were "sticking it to the man" or did you become a bit less anti-establishment and get those advertising and sponsorship dollars from Fortune 500 companies that would let you grow? I'm thinking Ben & Jerry's here...

Subsequent to me bringing up the issue of the insulting "Douchebag Badge" on the Foursquare support forum, the issue was raised on TechCrunch with the subsequent comments being predictably vitrolic, since their audience is primarily the 20-somethings who think that a "douchebag" is a funny label and not insulting.

As one TechCrunch reader said, "Grow up, chill out, or get out!" and another, a better example of how there's a demographic that finds the word amusing and not crude or insulting: "the problem is not calling a badge 'douchebag' it's that as [Foursquare's] userbase grows, more actual douches will start using foursquare, rendering it too mainstream for early adopters to appreciate anymore."

Chrysanthe Tenentes of Foursquare did pipe in on the support forum and share that "the team is taking the sensitive nature of the db badge very seriously. The way that tagging works is also under review. Hearing user feedback is integral to improving foursquare features. Thanks everyone for piping in!"

What I find interesting in that remark? She didn't want to use the phrase "douchebag", so she abbreviated it "db". Indeed.

Ultimately, Foursquare faces the same dilemma that just about every self-consciously über-hip young Web 2.0 company is going to face: stick to your edgy personality and accept that you're going to be offensive to some of your potential audience and thereby limit your growth potential, or compromise, dilute some of the hipster vibe and be more appealing as a mainstream product or service?

In the case of Foursquare, geolocation check-in games are already a very competitive market segment (with Gowalla and Yelp doing well and, rumor has it, Facebook entering the space very soon) and if they hope to grow beyond their small market segment -- as is clearly the case given that they just signed TV network Bravo as a sponsor -- it's time for them to either make the douchebag badge optional or just scrub it entirely.

And as for the rest of these hip Web 2.0 companies, take a deep breath, it's time to grow up.

This year, I'm co-hosting with Jeff and we have a pretty amazing lineup of speakers for our half-day event on January 6th, 2010 in Las Vegas.

Here's Jeff's description of the event:

It's wild out there in the social media jungle! Unbridled growth and tens of millions of "addicts" have made social media an unstoppable force that's changing the way we live and work. Sit in on state-of-the-industry updates, and get a candid look at how social media disrupts the workplace by empowering companies to lower burn rates. Plus, you'll learn how companies can use social media to motivate consumers and drive product sales without increasing costs. This year our underlying theme is: "How the consumer electronics industry can benefit from social media."

So who do we have speaking at the event? I'll do you one better: here's our full schedule:

9:00-9:10 a.m. Welcome to the Jungle, Jeff Pulver

9:10-9:30 a.m. Consumer Marketing in the State of NOW, Jeff Pulver

9:30-9:45 a.m. Social Media Reputation, Dave Taylor

9:45-9:55 a.m. Brand Engagement in Social Media, Chris Rauschnot

9:55-10:20 a.m. Effects of twitter on Consumer Marketing, Jeffrey Sass

10:20-10:30 a.m. Building Trust in Social Media, Eric Weaver

10:30-10:50 a.m. What's Next in Social Media? Robert Scoble

10:50-11:00 a.m. Social Media ROI, Ben Grossman

11:00-11:10 a.m. Social Media Reciprocity, Warren Whitlock

11:10-11:25 a.m. Digital Presence in the NOW and Beyond, Dean Landsman

11:25-11:35 a.m. Effective PR Strategies in the era of Social Media, Susan Etlinger

11:35-11:45 a.m. Leveraging the Livestream in Consumer Marketing, Kevin Sablan

11:45-11:55 a.m. Social Media Lessons Learned during 2009, Justin Levy

11:55-12:15 p.m. Evolution of Trust Agents, Chris Brogan

Personally, I'm pretty psyched to be in such august company and consider many of the speakers good friends and all of them highly respected colleagues.

How much would you pay to pow-wow with these folk? Well, we won't have a fire going and we won't be passing around a peace pipe (though it is a pretty cool idea!) but we do very much welcome your attendance, but more, your participation in the Social Media Jungle next week in Las Vegas.

To join us please start here: CES Registration then follow the registration process and select Social Media Jungle as the registration option.

Hopefully we'll see you there!

Ayup, spell one word wrong in your ad title and the meaning changes rather dramatically, to say the least.

The problem here is that Facebook, for all it has an interesting self-service advertising model, also suffers from the problem of user-generated content. Ultimately this is not serving the community well, and I expect that either ads over time will prove less and less effective as users learn to tune them out, or that Facebook will need to hire quality control folks...

What's your reaction to the advertisement above?

"As an empirically-based economist, I would like to know whether there are studies that show the impact of twitter, Facebook and other social networking sites on business growth. I have a client (I do a small bit of consulting) that is pushing hard to get "into" social networking to grow the business. I am a bit reluctant, because there is no way to "control" the message. If there's even one former customer that is unhappy with my client, the negative effects can be explosive. I also wonderwhether paying Google for per-click exclusive use of specific words can really grow a business. Your thoughts would be most welcome!"

First though, are there non-empirical economists? What would that mean? That they follow economic theories even when actual real-life data proves them wrong? Hmmm...

More seriously, the first comment I have about this question is that the writer is already out of step with modern reality. As merchant after merchant has demonstrated, there is no controlling "the message" any more and the sooner marketing and PR people accept that, the sooner they can start helping their clients in this brave new world. Control always was an illusion anyway.

Given that fact, it also means that your customers, your competitors and your marketplace are already having discussions about your products, services and employees, and they're having it in online forums, whether it's a protest group on Facebook ("United Airlines Sucks!"), a persistent hashtag on Twitter (#attfail) or just a meme that travels from blogger to blogger.

The question then isn't whether it makes sense to delve into social networks even though you can't control the message, the question is whether you're paying attention to a medium where the message has long since escaped and has a life of its own. This means that your customer defines your brand. It's not about expensive TV spots, it's not about the right Pantone color in the logo when printed, it's not about the company at all.

This is both terrifying and exhilarating because it means that good companies with good products -- like Apple with its insanely popular iPod line -- can benefit even without any branding or marketing efforts, and bad companies -- like United Airlines -- are going to suffer from a bad reputation even as they spend money advertising and trying to position themselves as a market leader.

My take is that it's "step zero" to monitor what's going on in the social media space. Even if you don't want to participate, which is a mistake, you should at the very minimum be paying attention to what people are talking about. You can use individual services like search.twitter.com, but far smarter is to use a more sophisticated monitoring tool like Filtrbox or Radian 6.

There are many studies, some apocryphal, others actual more rigorous scientific research, on the topic of social media on business growth, and a quick search of Google will reveal quite a collection of data on the topic. Intuitively, though, if your customers are already talking about your product, service or competitor, how can that discussion not have an impact on your business, for better or worse?

My take away is this: if you are truly going to help your clients succeed in the brave new world of 21st Century business, you need to enthusiastically embrace social media, jumping in and learning best practices from such books as Trust Agents, The New Community Rules, The Tipping Point and Groundswell, along with by participating in the communities. The key is to remember to engage with your customer base, not just join these social media sites to create new bully pulpits for your marketing and sales messages.

Discuss your background and professional experiences.

I've been in public relations and marketing for over 21 years. I knew in college that I wanted to practice PR and started my career at an agency in New York City after interning there for two summers in row. My background has mostly been small agency PR. When I was running a very small firm for my employer in Northern, NJ, I realized that I could start my own PR/communications company and build a business for myself. I launched the Breakenridge Group with two employees in 1997, while I was still studying to receive my MBA degree.

The Breakenridge Group lasted a little less than a year, when one of my clients, at the time, PFS New Media, asked me if I was interested in becoming a full partner of their agency. They acquired my firm and the rest is history. I've practiced so many different kinds of PR over the years, working with brands in healthcare, broadcast electronics, non-profit, HR, technology and telecommunications. I've always enjoyed working with different types of brands and organizations both large and small. Every company, no matter its size, has unique challenges.

continues...

Me speaking on a panel at SXSW '09 earlier in the year

Aren't we all just wasting our time with social media?

I'm speaking as a representative of Boulder Digital Arts at the Goozmo open house in downtown Boulder. This is a free event, and you're definitely welcome to show up for my thirty-minute talk / discussion.

More information: Goozmo Open House

What's the Point of Social Networking?

This is a two-hour breakfast discussion / networking meeting in South Boulder, a part of the Stay Sharp! series I'm doing with Joyce Colson, Liz Ryan and Jeff Finkelstein and it's a nice, informal event at a fun venue: Eggcredible Cafe. There is a nominal fee for attendance.

More information: Stay Sharp!

Should I Blog, Or Should I Tweet?

This is a free, public discussion I'll be hosting at the Techstars Bunker in downtown Boulder, and it's my vision to spend more time having a discussion than to pontificate on my own opinion. I will say this, though: I do both.

More information: (please email me for details)

The Impact of Social Media on Cable Television

This is a closed event for the cable industry, but it's going to be a very interesting panel and we will be live-tweeting it. One of my great fellow panelists? Filtrbox's Ari Newman.

More information: (sorry, it's a closed industry conference)

Front Range Blogger Meetup, Broomfield CO

This is a discussion and social networking group that meets monthly, alternating between Boulder/Broomfield and Denver. Generally 30+ people show up and it's always an excellent discussion and great fun too. We're very welcoming to new folk, and even if you're just getting into the blogging space, you'll get great value from attending. Join us?

More information: see our meetup page

Holy cow, I'm exhausted just thinking about this! But I do hope you can join me at one of these venues and let me know what your thoughts are on these various topics!

The regulations seem to address the issue of disclosure: if I give you a copy of my book and you write about it, you have to let your readers know that. If I buy you dinner and then you write about my book or reference my site, you have to disclose that. And so on, and so on.

Problem is, this FTC guideline has gotten more and more onerous in the echo chamber of the blogosphere, and bloggers are getting a bit paranoid about the implications.

Luckily, it appears that this paranoia is misplaced, so you can all take a deep breath. Earlier this week - Oct 14th, 2009 - Mary Engle, associate director for advertising practices at the FTC's Bureau of Consumer Protection, had a conference call with reporters to clarify the situation and here's what she said:

"We're not going to be patrolling the blogosphere, we are not planning on investigating individual bloggers."

Engle emphasized that what they've released are new guidelines. "They aren't rules and regulations, and they don't have the force of law. They are guidelines intended to help advertisers comply with Section 5 of the FTC Act [PDF]" which focuses on unfair or deceptive practices.

So it's not the rebirth of the Blog Police as the Disclosure Police, as I tweeted earlier while listening to a panel on this subject here at Blogworld, but it is nonetheless a reminder that you should still be transparent anyway. If a vendor pays $200 to write about their product, don't run away in terror, just let your readers know.

And that's what this brouhaha is all about anyway: just be transparent and disclose what's going on, and you'll be in the clear from both the FTC and ethically on the right side of things too.

I woke up this morning to boldface warnings New virus on Twitter! Don't click on video links in DMs!

Of course, it didn't take long for me to get one:

Being the reckless tech guy I am (and running on a Mac, not PC, so far, far less susceptible to viruses), I clicked on the link anyway, and got this:

Ah, okay, so, duh. Here's an easy rule of thumb:

Surely you, dear reader, aren't so daft that you'd click on a link to see a video and then blindly log in to what appears to be Twitter to do so?

Btw, if you're curious, enter random user credentials on the phishing (NOT virus!) login screen, then you'll see a failwhale screen, then you'll be bounced to some random blogspot.com blog that doesn't even have an entry.

Okay. Last few times I've paid for a rental it's been through Redbox and that's $1/night, so inexpensive that you can forgive the tiny selection in the box.

At the local video rental place, however, it was $4.95 for a rental, and due in four days to boot. Five bucks? Seemed kinda steep, and when I got rave reviews from my little one of this movie I decided I'd buy a copy for her.

A quick visit to Amazon.com and here's what I found:

Can you see the price? $3.75 + $2.98 shipping. For less than $2 more than a short-term rental, I can buy and own a clean used copy with original packaging. Makes it hard to not just buy things that you might want to watch some day, doesn't it?

The problem is two-fold. One, most movies are worth a viewing and maybe, possibly, two, but how many movies have you watched a half-dozen or more times in the last decade? (and I'm a film reviewer with my own film blog, so I know movies pretty well).

The second is that the cost of the product doesn't reflect the cost of production as much as the cost of the studio system. A brand new DVD costs, what, $15? $18? but the disk and packaging cost less than a dollar. Therefore the item itself doesn't retain any sort of value once sold and the used DVD market floats down, down, down, to where you can get just about any movie for $5 or less.

Do you still rent movies, especially in a world of all-you-can-eat streaming services like Netflix and Hulu?