The pocket camcorder market has certainly become popular, thanks largely to the Flip line of camcorders for Pure Digital. When they first started out, they were only capable of producing VGA resolution videos. Shortly thereafter, we started to see some HD variants that could shoot at 720p.

The Kodak Zi8 Pocket HD Camcorder goes above and beyond this by offering stunning 1080p HD video. This is full HD and meant to provide the same kind of quality you’d be able to enjoy from a Blu-ray movie. The timing couldn’t be better, since YouTube has just rolled out its support for 1080p HD video uploads and playbacks.

Looking at the rest of the specs on this pocket camcorder, you’ll find some familiar features. There is an integrated swing-out USB arm, so you don’t have to mess with extra cables, and the action can be previewed on the 2.5-inch color LCD. Unlike other pocket camcorders, the Kodak Zi8 can also shoot 5MP 16:9 widescreen HD still pictures too.

Using the expandable SD/SDHC memory card slot, which supports cards up to 32GB in capacity, you’ll have enough room to record up to 10 hours of HD video. Other highlights include smart face tracking technology, HDMI output, and external microphone jack. Find the Kodak Zi8 on Amazon.ca in three different colors, ranging in price from $179.49 to $199.99.

As we get closer to the end of the year, these two topics will inevitably start to fill your consciousness. Many people “go home” for the holidays, loading up on big turkey dinners with cranberry sauce. At the same time, financial concerns can start rising to the surface too, thanks to holiday shopping and year-end tax concerns. Let’s see what the blogopshere has to say about food and money.

Lesley Chang went back to school this fall to get educated on public relations, but this means that she’ll be a “starving college girl” for the next little while. While this may have otherwise led her to instant noodles and Kraft Dinner, she is learning how to eat healthy on a student budget. Yes, clam spaghetti is both delicious and affordable.

Scott Young enjoys eating out as much as the next person, since we all like being pampered with fancy meals. At the same time, Scott recognizes the joy of cooking meals from scratch too. Home-cooking is really where it’s at, especially if you have the time to make everything yourself. This is cheaper, healthier, and tastier too.

Lynne Beach shares an intimate story for us from her childhood. As a young girl, she was invited for dinner over at a wealthier person’s household and she was later told that she used her fork incorrectly. She thought she had proper manners, but the fork issue arose years later on a date too. She didn’t shovel, so what did she do wrong?

Free Money Finance describes an interesting piece from MSNBC saying that women are earning more than their husbands more than ever before. It’s still not egalitarian, since 25.9 percent of wives (as of 2007) were earning more money than their spouses, but this is up from 17.8 percent twenty years ago. This is for households where both spouses work.

Deb Ng is widely regarded as an expert in freelancing, so she knows how to get the job done. Interestingly, she can even tell you how to apply for location-specific gigs when you live outside the area. Just because the post is listed on a San Francisco job board doesn’t mean that you’re not eligible, right?

There’s no denying that the Apple iPhone did a lot to shape what the cell phone industry looks like today. If it were not for the astronomical success and popularity of the iPhone, we probably would not see the same kind of proliferation when it came to touchscreens and downloadable applications. However, many consumers have complained about the performance of the AT&T network. They complain about dropped calls and poor service.

To respond to this, Verizon Wireless has come up with a series of different advertising campaigns and television commercials. These started with some ads that said there was “a map for that,” playing off the iPhone commercial that told us there was an “app for that.” With the arrival of the Motorola Droid Android Phone with Verizon, the network has stepped up its marketing efforts with a series of holiday-themed commercials.

In these advertisements, we are shown the glaring difference in 3G coverage in the United States between Verizon Wireless and AT&T. Whereas the AT&T map seems to display very sparse pockets of “blue” coverage, the Verizon map seems to blanket nearly the entire country in “red” 3G coverage. This is a very strong visual and speaks a lot about the kind of coverage you can expect from Verizon.

One of the best commercials is the one that depicts the Apple iPhone as the latest product to join the land of misfit toys. The other toys say that the iPhone sure seems like a nice product with all of its features, but when asked why the iPhone is joining the misfit toys, the touchscreen smartphone shows the AT&T coverage map. Watch the Verizon Wireless commercial on YouTube. Just in time for the holidays!

When you go to most WordPress-based blogs, you’ll see that the blog owners allow for comments from the community. This is a great way to allow for reader interaction and it helps to build up content for your blog for free. The discussion is great for traffic and it can add a great deal of value to each individual post. However, the comment form is usually of a set size.

As a result, longer comments cannot be seen in their entirety while the reader is typing it out. Wouldn’t it be nice if the comment box was automatically expandable to accommodate for these longer comments? Well, a simple WordPress plugin provides this exact functionality. The Comment Autogrow plugin automatically extends the comment box vertically as the reader types out what they want to say.

You can see the plugin in action on this post, letting you see the simple and fluid animation that extends the text entry area. The current available version of this plugin requires at least WordPress 2.8 and it is compatible up to WordPress 2.9. And yes, it is a free download.

Download Comment Autogrow at Scribu.net.

Whether you own a local eatery or you run a yoga studio, it is possible to attract new customers even outside of regular business hours. What happens when an interested party arrives at your store during regular business hours? They may walk inside, talk to the clerk at the counter, ask for some basic information, and consider making a purchase of some kind. How can you can achieve a similar exchange without a physical person being there?

One of the easiest things that you can do for your business is to provide information even when you are not there. For a restaurant, this means making several copies of your takeout menu available outside the front door. This way, someone can pick up a copy of your menu outside of regular business hours. Your takeout menu will not only contain the food that you serve, but also your phone number, address, and website URL.

In like manner, any number of other product or service-based businesses can leave pamphlets and other kinds of simple promotional material outside the front doors. For a local gym or yoga studio, you could provide some information about your membership prices, the advantage of choosing your gym over the one down the street, and so on. This can be a copy-and-paste from your website or other promotional material.

Yes, it is very possible that many of the people walking away with these brochures will never return. It is also very possible that many can be stolen for no real reason in particular. However, you also have to realize that printing hundreds of takeout menus is very inexpensive and if it only results in a few extra sales or word-of-mouth, you’ve come out ahead.

Who doesn’t enjoy popping bubble wrap? Half the fun of receiving a new package in the mail is when you crack open the box and discover all sorts of bubble wrap. It can be quite wasteful, however, when you go through rolls and rolls of the office supply of bubble wrap just because you like hearing that “popping” sound. So, what can you do?

Leave it up to the geniuses at ThinkGeek to come up with the electronic bubble wrap keychain. This is exactly what you think it is. The keychain-sized device consists of a series of artificial bumps that mimic the look and feel of real bubble wrap. This isn’t just for appearance’s sake either, because when you press on any of these bubble-like buttons, you get that characteristic “popping” sound. Productive? Not really. Fun? Probably!

To add a little bit of extra value, for every 100 “bubbles” that you pop, you get treated to a special sound effect instead. You could get a boing, a bark, or any variety of other sounds. It’s a little bit of a bonus that could help you pass the time.

Find the electronic bubble wrap keychain on ThinkGeek for $9.99.