The Hobbit Tickets

Posted on: 12/10/12 3:01 AM | by Jonathan McKee

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This week is a big week for film geeks… because this Friday (or Thursday night at midnight for real fans), The Hobbit comes to theaters!

This means fun for you, my blog readers, because I’ve got some great goodies for you, including free The Hobbit movie tickets for a couple of ya. Yes… it’s time for a little contest.

(WINNERS NOW POSTED AT BOTTOM OF POST)

The Contest is Simple:

  1. Use the comment feature below.
  2. List your three favorite movies, in order (not just Lord of the Rings films… your three favorite movies of all time).
  3. List your zipcode (other countries are welcome to participate in the contest for fun, but unfortunately, I only have movie tickets for America).
    (BONUS: If you Tweet about the contest, sharing my twitter name and linking this blog post, you’ll double your chances of winning.)

Look forward to three things from me later this week:

  1. I’ll post the winner to this contest by this Friday, December 14th, the release date of The Hobbit (I might contact the winners sooner to get them their tickets in time).
  2. My son Alec, film geek extraordinaire, is screening the film Monday night and writing a review. We’ll post that review as a guest post on my blog Thursday morning (we’re not allowed to post anything prior to Thursday because of an embargo).
  3. I’ll be Tweeting from The Hobbit premiere live on Thursday night at midnight (Pacific time) because I’ll be at the midnight premiere with my family. (Yes, we’re an entire family of nerds!)

May the odds be forever in your favor (whoops… wrong film).

WINNERS: Congrats to three winners, each winning a pair of tickets to The Hobbit premier!!! Thank you all for your awesome comments! I loved it! Here are your winners:

– Jono Davis
– Lori Fallon
– Chris Miller

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What iTunes Reveals about Teenagers

Posted on: 12/5/12 3:01 AM | by Jonathan McKee

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Where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.                                              -Matthew 6:21

If you want a glimpse into the window of youth culture, just take a peek at the music they’re buying. Lucky for us, you have access to an ongoing meter revealing the top-selling songs at any given moment. I’m referring to iTunes, the online music, TV and movie store that comes on all these online devices at the top of our kids’ Christmas lists.

This weekend I’m traveling to Kentucky to teach my last parenting workshop of the year. At these workshops, I always provide a quick tour of today’s music, TV and other media. This “tour” always includes a peek into iTunes. So today I popped onto iTunes to familiarize myself with what people are listening to this week (With the YS National Youth Workers Convention and Thanksgiving, it’s actually been a month since I’ve taught a parent workshop). It’s amazing how much you can learn about current pop culture in just a glimpse.

Let’s take a quick peek!

5 Observations about Our Culture from Today’s iTunes

1. TV is Still Huge!
Yes, when you open iTunes, the focus is music. Note the top singles listed on the right hand side of iTunes main page. But on any fall Tuesday morning, a quick peek at those top singles will reveal the power of television. This Tuesday morning, 5 of the top 10 singles were performances from last night’s episode of NBC’s hit TV show, The Voice.

A quick peek at TV ratings will reveal The Voice already is one of the top 5 shows watched by America in any given week (it usually lands at No. 3, right under The Walking Dead and football, and always lands among the top 10 shows watched by 12-17 year-olds). But The Voice isn’t limited to a one-screen experience. Following the steps of American Idol, The Voice sells its performances on iTunes immediately after the show Continue reading “What iTunes Reveals about Teenagers”

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Me Want Social Media

Posted on: 12/3/12 1:26 PM | by Jonathan McKee

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Nielsen Research released their brand new Social Media Report today with the latest data about exactly how much time people are spending on social networking sites like Facebook, Twitter… and which sites they prefer.

Consumers are spending 20 percent of their personal computer time on social networks, and 30 percent of their total time online on social networks via their mobile devices. I believe it. My daughter Ashley seems to live on Facebook, and my daughter Alyssa can’t get enough of Pinterest!

Yes, Facebook still reigns as the most popular social network site, with Twitter gaining popularity, and Pinterest exploding in growth (a year-over-year increase of 1,047%, compared to Facebooks 4% decrease).

Mobile access of social media is increasing the most rapidly, with a growing number of Continue reading “Me Want Social Media”

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Running Sad

Posted on: 12/3/12 3:01 AM | by Jonathan McKee

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Those of you who are my Twitter followers have read an occasional tweet about my training for a marathon. The marathon was this Sunday, December 2nd… a sad day for me.

The disappointment didn’t hit Sunday, it hit me like a knife 45 days ago.

Training was going great until that day. I was running one of my long days, with a goal of 17 miles that day, and Continue reading “Running Sad”

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