My 1 Month Schedule...

I'm going to sticky this as the top post until the end of August as a reminder that updates will be sporadic for the next month.
Please scroll down for new posts.

Will I be forgiven if I don't make 5 posts a day for the next month?

07/27-Drive to Pittsburgh for Shabbos.
07/29-Earning Jetblue tickets for flying PIT-JFK flights. Overnight at the Tudor hotel (Thanks Nadiv K.!)
07/30-Fly back to PIT, Drive back to Cleveland.
07/30-08/01-Take summer semester finals and hand in essays due for my grad school courses.
08/02-Fly to Israel!
08/26-Return to Cleveland.
08/27-First MBA class of the fall semester.

Weather Is Measured In The Shade...

My grandfather often reminds us that the weather that you see in forecasts is measured in the shade.
We had a reinforcement of this lesson while hiking down waterfalls and natural pools of water in the Yehudiyah nature reserve in the Golan Heights.



And yes, that does say 120.1 Degrees Fahrenheit!

To Blog About My Trip-Or Not To Blog?

I've never blogged about any of the trips that I have taken in the past. However because it seems that Israel is always a topic of interest in the comments here I was debating whether to write anything about it here.

Is there anything specific you would like to read about?
Reviews of the 5 Starwood hotels that I am staying at?

Or should I just stick to finding deals?

On another note, it's been a lot of fun bumping into some fans in NYC and here in Israel.

At the Tudor Hotel in Manhattan, where I stayed last Sunday night, I bumped into quite a few people who were there only because they saw the $19 deal on this site!
One couple even told me where to nab a free parking spot for the night!
Free parking in Manhattan? Who knew!

Have Any Israel Tips Or Great Itineraries? Please Send Me An Email!

I will be going to Israel with 2 of my brothers for the first time next Thursday-We will be there for 3.5 weeks!

If anyone has any helpful travel hints or any past itineraries that have worked out well, please send me an email!

Thanks!

5 Logo Revisions At Dansdeals.com!

3 logo designers have sent in 5 revisions on popular logos based on reader feedback.

Please go to dansdeals.com now and rate them!

There are now 43 logos posted on dansdeals.com
Thanks to all of the designers for their contributions!!!

19 New Logos Posted!

Please go to dansdeals.com now and rate them!

Also please post constructive feedback so that the authors can have the chance to improve their designs!

A big thanks goes out to all of the logo designers who participated in this contest.

Logo creators-If you would like to send me an improved version of any logo based on feedback posted, please do so asap!

A runoff between the best logos will occur next week, along with the announcement of the winner of this contest, as well as the winners of the 500,000th hit promo (I haven't forgotten about you guys!)

The Logo Wars Continue!

Today is the last chance to send me your new or updated logos for dansdeals.com!
Thanks to everyone who participated in this contest!!!!!

The best logo will win a free Samsung portable XM Satellite Radio+MP3 Player with a 3 month paid subscription!
Great for the baseball season!

Apple Not Happy With The Ctownbochur.com Iphone Article, Ends Affiliate Relationship!

This is truly bizarre...

On Friday I wrote a negative article on the iPhone hype.

The pictures of the iPhone in the article had embedded affiliate links with which people could use to buy the iPhone (if the article didn't already convince them otherwise.)

Last night I noticed that the links stopped working. Upon going into my affiliate account I saw that Apple had ended our affiliate relationship sometime after I had written the article!

There was no message or any communication from Apple to me at all.

If this is really how it seems and it doesn't turn out to be some sort of very strangely timed coincidence, that means that someone at Apple will be reading this message as well.


That being said, who's up for an iPhone boycott?

750,000!

The first 11 months (11/26/04-10/16/05) of this site saw 15,000 hits.
The next 9 months (10/16/05-07/20/06) saw 185,000 hits.
The past 11 months (07/20/06-06/29/07) saw 550,000 hits!
Have I really been posting stuff on a daily basis to this website for 31 months now?!?

Here's hoping for a smooth upcoming transition to DansDeals.com!

5 New Dansdeals Logos!

Please go to dansdeals.com now and rate them!

Special thanks to Yossi W. of Yosstek.com, and Menachem Krinsky for their new contributions!

Like them? Hate them?
Sound off!

Think you come up with a better logo? Send me an email!

The best logo will win a free Samsung portable XM Satellite Radio+MP3 Player with a 3 month paid subscription!
Great for the baseball season!

6 New Dansdeals Logos!

Please go to dansdeals.com now and rate them!

Special thanks to Laibel Berkowitz, DJ and JJ, Eli Z., Yossi W. of Yosstek.com, and Braintoaster Interactive for their new contributions!

Like them? Hate them?
Sound off!

Think you come up with a better logo? Send me an email!

The best logo will win a free Samsung portable XM Satellite Radio+MP3 Player with a 3 month paid subscription!
Great for the baseball season!

Dansdeals Logo Version #3!

Yossi W. of Yosstek.com has kindly donated his 2nd logo for Dansdeals.com!

Please go to dansdeals.com now and give it a rating!

Like it? Hate it?
Sound off!

Think you come up with a better logo? Send me an email!

The best logo will win a free Samsung portable XM Satellite Radio+MP3 Player with a 3 month paid subscription!
Great for the baseball season!

Stay Away From WD Passport Hard Drives!

I've been preoccupied trying to figure out how to recover important files from 2 of my WD passport hard drives.

They were working just fine 2 days ago, but today I discovered that one of them has what appears to be a dead motor, and the other has bad sectors!

Lesson learned-Avoid the ultra-portable WD passport hard drives like the plague! (and maybe all WD hard drives in general?)

At least I bought them from Costco, from where they'll be sent right back to WD where they can keep the garbage they sell...

At any rate if anyone has used any good data-recovery companies please let me know!

Dansdeals Logo Version #2!

Yossi W. of Yosstek.com has kindly donated another logo for Dansdeals.com!

Please go to dansdeals.com and give it a rating!

Like it? Hate it?
Sound off!

Think you come up with a better logo? Send me an email!


The best logo will win a free Samsung portable XM Satellite Radio+MP3 Player with a 3 month paid subscription for free after rebate!
Great for the baseball season!
(I'm just kidding about the rebate part...)

Dansdeals.com Beta 2.2

Braintoaster Interactive has kindly donated a logo for Dansdeals.com

Please go to dansdeals.com and give it a rating!

Like it? Hate it?
Sound off!

Think you come up with a better logo? Send me an email!

Dansdeals.com Beta 2.1

Dansdeals.com Beta 2.1 Linky

New Feature:
You can now rate posts from 1 to 10 stars!
Old Header:
The header is now with the classic ctown header background.
Bonus Feature:
The site is now compatible with the Treo web browser, and unlike dansdeals 1.x, it now displays the main content before the sidebar.
Post how the site works on your mobile device!


Don't just vote! Please post any problems/bugs/suggestions/complaints/compliments now!

Again, even if I switch over to dansdeals.com, when you will go to ctownbochur.com or ctowndeals.com you will be automatically forwarded you over to dansdeals.com, while ctownbochur.blogspot.com will continue to serve this site on a legacy basis.

Switch To Dansdeals.com?
	Yes!
	No!

Goodbye Dansdeals Beta 1.x, Hello 2.0!

Dansdeals.com Beta 2.0 Linky

Please post your thoughts and vote now!!!

The best news is that this new version should be fully compliant with all screen resolutions!

Is Dansdeals.com Beta 2.0 Better Than The Previous Attempts?
	Much Better!
	Somewhat Better.
	No Better Or Worse.
	Slightly Worse.
	Horrible!

Switch To Dansdeals.com Beta 1.3?

Dansdeals.com Beta 1.3 Linky
Should I switch over to Dansdeals.com?
I would reroute traffic to ctownbochur.com and ctowndeals.com over there, while ctownbochur.blogspot.com will continue to serve this site.

If you vote to ditch the proposed dansdeals site-Please explain why!

Also if the post lines are very short you probably have a screen resolution of 800x600.
Just go to into control panel and to display options to bump up your screen resolution!

VOTE NOW!

Dansdeals.com Beta 1.3
	Switch To It!
	Ditch It Already!

Dansdeals.com Beta 1.3

Dansdeals.com Beta 1.3 Linky

The more time I spend on trying to migrate to the Wordpress platform-the more I wish I had never started to leave Blogger...

Just the screen resolution bug in which some people see long post lines and others see short post lines is enough to make me want to stay put.

At any rate, some of the changes in Beta 1.3 include:
-Elimination of the much maligned third rail, er, third column for a cleaner look.
-A feeble attempt at separating out the knowledgebase into distinct pages, located at the top of the site.

Let's hear your thoughts...

Dansdeals.com Beta 1.2

Dansdeals.com Beta 1.2 Linky
Check it out and sound-off!
If you are having display issues please comment on your screen resolution and browser type.

If I had a dollar for each person telling me to hire a professional web-site builder (a.k.a. stick with finding deals instead of messing with CSS Coding) then I'd be able to build the nicest site on earth!

Some of the changes in Beta 1.2 include:
-Change in font type
-Increase of font size
-Posts moved to the left, while both sidebars move to the right.
-Background border changed to gray.
-Posts located below where the sidebars end no longer invade the "under the sidebar" space.

Known Issues:
-The site is optimized for the 45% of visitors who have a screen resolution of 1024x768.
-For the 23% of visitors who have 1280x800 screen resolution the posts are a little longer than I'd like them to be.
-No other screen resolution has more than 10%-if you dont use one of the above resolutions please comment on how the site looks.

-The site needs a better header/logo (Anyone here up for the job?)

-All posts and comments imported from this site display the time 4 hours later than they should.

What Do You Think Of Dansdeals.com Beta 1.2?
	I Like It-Switch To It!
	I Hate It-Ditch It!