made

Made of Honor
$19.94
Made of Honor is your typical bland, predictable, thoroughly contrived romantic comedy. The only reason I'm not giving it one star is that the production values were excellent, the shots of Scotland were gorgeous, and, believe it or not, there are even worse romantic comedies out there. (Tiptoes immediately comes to mind.)

The basic problem with this film was not that it was predictable and formulaic (all romantic comedies are predictable and formulaic), but that every single person involved with this film was bored to tears. The actors were bored, the writers were bored, the producers were bored, the editors were bored, the grips were bored ... even the gofers were bored. And it showed. The jokes were lame, the chemistry non-existent, the lines well... "don't marry him", "I've always loved you", "these are glow-in-the-dark thunder beads." Need I say more?

If you are laid up with the flu and just need to kill a couple of hours, Made of Honor will probably do the trick. The good part is that you won't remember a thing afterwards.

MADE
$18.98
Do not buy from these crooks!BUYER BEWARE!! These simpletons stole my money over a cd that they never shipped. PLEASE avoid this seller. Never contacted me, never shipped never intended to ship...Mini-Maddoffs....don't do business with them! Over a month to process order and nothing yet! CROOKS.. CROOKS... CROOKS ...!!!!

Made
$9.98
Jon and Vince are great. If you liked them
in "Swingers", you'll love them in this!
Also, Peter Falk, is priceless!! Check it out!!

Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die
$26.00
Have you ever read a corporate website full of shop-talk? "The Company's flagship products include a variety of multi-port 10GB and Gigabit Ethernet, copper and fiber-optic, server adapters and innovative BYPASS adapters designed to increase throughput and availability of server-based systems, security appliances and other mission-critical gateway applications." Huh?

Without looking back at the passage, try to summarize in your mind what you just read. This passage, taken from a technology company's "About Us" section, highlights what Dan and Chip Heath refer to, in their book "Made to Stick", as "the Curse of Knowledge".

"Don't Be Evil" is the way Google defines its mission. Southwest? "We are THE low-fare airline." Google and Southwest are two complex companies that have been able to reduce their message and self-identity into simple and powerful core messages that help to guide the actions of not only their employees, but also of their consumers.

To combat "the Curse of Knowledge", and provide messages both simple and profound, the Heath brother's suggest that readers use the "Six Principles of Sticky Ideas" or SUCCESs (Simple, Unexpected, Concrete, Credentialed, Emotional, and Story). A salesperson, teacher, doctor, researcher, preacher? Doesn't matter. We all stand to gain from making our ideas stickier.

In "Made to Stick," the Heath's attack corporations, individuals, and other communicators for inundating listeners and readers with messages that fail to resonate. They laud those that adhere to time-tested principles that jive better with the way that the human brain is hardwired.

Take for example Subway's famous "Jared" ad-campaign, and compare it with their preceding campaign, "7 subs with 6 grams of fat." The Heath's argue that understanding the "Six Principles of Sticky Ideas" would have made it easy, ahead of time, to know which of the two campaigns were going to resonate more with audiences.

The "7 subs with 6 grams of fat" is abstract, fails to tell a story, and doesn't target human emotion. Is 6 grams a lot? What does this mean for me? The human brain is not hardwired to remember numbers. But it can remember stories. So to communicate how Subway can be a healthy fast food alternative, Subway decided to tell the story of an obese college student, who decided he needed to lose weight. This college student decided to reduce his diet to two Subway sandwiches per day (a tuna and a veggie sub), and combine this new diet with an increased walking regiment. This student was named Jared. And he lost over 150 pounds!

The story of Jared resonates with audiences, because it shows how Subway subs can lead to a healthier life, rather than merely telling audiences. Sticky ideas, after all, are easy to remember.

The Heath's principles are nothing revolutionary in the field of rhetoric, PR, or advertising. Like Malcolm Gladwell What the Dog Saw: And Other Adventures, the Heath's are mostly rewording old social psychology and rhetoric findings into a new, more accessible, popular format. This book has no new ideas. But the co-authors should be lauded for condensing into an easily digestible format the principles they espouse. The accessibility of the ideas in "Made to Stick" can be a powerful reminder to us all (from the Corporate PR Specialist to the bridesmaid in need of crafting an effective, moving wedding toast) that it is often not what you know that matters, but rather how well you can share what you know. The Heath's reiteration of old principles is a testament to those principles' timelessness.