If it were not for my two younger nieces and Rite Aid, I would not have known about these “Pocket Change” products that basically change the look and feel of your pants pocket.

There’s an exclusive $5 off Pocket Change coupon available now on Facebook.com/riteaid on the “Rite Aid” tab. Pocket Change accessories are exclusive to Rite Aid and offer an affordable way to add glitz and glam to your pockets. These coupons are available for a limited time, so print yours now.

So for the young one, or for yourself, hit up Rite Aid’s Facebook page and print out a $5 off coupon on the Pocket Change product.

Of note, it’s pretty wise to go ahead and bookmark or become a fan of the Rite-Aid Facebook site. They often have exclusive coupons that can help you further save money.

[ Links: Rite Aid Facebook Page ]

After reading that a lot of my friends had hit up stores, waiting in line until 4am for $300 televisions or $180 laptops or some other madness, I decided to go the other way. I slept in – still suffering from the Thanksgiving food induced coma – and still got some killer deals via online purchases. But even that might pale in comparison to the upcoming Cyber Monday.

Where to go? Here’s a quick list:

Overstock.com – They have sales that have started on Black Friday and will continue through Cyber Monday.
Dealnews.com – Pretty much one of the deal sites that I go to almost daily.
Cyber Monday 2010 – Part of Bradsdeals.com that’s updated quite frequently.
Dealighted.com – A frequently updated list that scours Fatwallet, Slickdeals and other sites.
Top Hot Deal – A collection of heavily discounted Amazon offerings – I found Mad Men Seasons 1-3 on Blu-Ray for $9.99 here.

I’ll add more when I’m able to overcome my tryptophan overdose.

[ Links: Overstock.com, Top Hot Deal, Dealighted.com, Cyber Monday 2010 ]

Okay, I’m a day or so late, but there’s still a few more days left in the Bradsdeals.com Apple iPad giveaway.

Wilson, Founder of BradsDeals.com, is proud to announce a free iPad giveaway from November 16th through November 22nd.

This year BradsDeals.com has given away two iPads, seven Nintendo Wii’s, seven $100 restaurant.com gift cards, Adobe CS 5 Design Premium Software, over $500 in Amazon gift cards, and many other prizes. Now they are giving away another iPad for free!

To enter simply sign up for the contest at www.bradsdeals.com/contest – you will receive a BradsDeals Alert newsletter featuring the best handpicked deals and coupons of each day.

Yep… just sign up for a newsletter, perhaps win an Apple iPad, not bad at all.

[ Links: Free Apple iPad Contest, Bradsdeals.com ]

I’ll have to admit that this is the first Christmas shopping season where I’ve yet to complete my shopping – been way too busy and there’s been way too many gadgets that I’ve wanted for myself. With that said, it looks like BradsDeals.com and Yahoo! Shopping are trying to find a way to make the next 60 (or so) days of this shopping season and beyond that much easier for all of us online shoppers.

BradsDeals.com, the leading website for shopping deals and advice, and Yahoo! Shopping, the #1 comparison shopping site are expanding their commitment to providing consumers with the best deals this holiday season. This year they are building upon their successful partnership on with “60 Days of Deals!” where each day through January 5, 2011, Yahoo! Shopping, Yahoo! Deals and BradsDeals.com will showcase one exclusive offer from a major retailer.

“Our editorial team (at BradsDeal.com) is tracking sales and coupons for the season’s must-have items at nearly 1500 retailers. A ‘BradsDeal’ is what happens when we match one of those valuable coupons with a deeply-discounted sale item.”

With Yahoo! Shopping involved, over 20 million people have access to these 1500+ deals. Take the hint, don’t be lazy and check it all out. I know that I will.

[ Links: BradsDeals.com, Yahoo! Shopping ]

I love gadgets almost as much as I like saving money and finding deals. Got word about Bradsdeals launching Black Friday 2010, a website dedicated to bring together all of the upcoming November 26th Black Friday Deals.

Brad Wilson, Founder of BradsDeals.com is proud to announce the launch of BlackFriday2010.com, the leading website devoted to researching, planning and executing a fun and successful Black Friday shopping strategy.

BlackFriday2010.com is the source for pre-released Black Friday ads for major stores. Visitors will find the latest holiday shopping news and tips, plus printable coupons and Brad’s handpicked deals, many of which are provided on an exclusive basis by retailers to BlackFriday2010.com.

“Black Friday is more than great deals and it is more than shopping,” said Wilson. “It’s a social event. Mothers and daughters, cousins, friends – they all research for weeks, scouring through our leaked Black Friday Ads, planning the timing and tactics they need to get the best deals.”

Last year, more than 10 Million shoppers saved money using the Black Friday site. The average consumer saved nearly 25% on their purchase.

In order to make shopping as simple as possible, Wilson will provide a free Black Friday iPhone app that allows shoppers to take all the store ads and information on the go.

So the site combined with the free Apple iPhone app makes for a killer way to save a lot of money this Black Friday. Oh… and Brad’s Deals isn’t just a one or two trick pony. Immediately after Black Friday, Brad’s Deals will unveil CyberMonday2010.com to help you save even more online.

Be smart, use BradsDeals.com and BlackFriday2010.com and don’t miss out on the savings this year.

[ Links: Brads Deals, Black Friday 2010, Cyber Monday 2010 ]

Earlier this year Skype unveiled an “exclusive” arrangement with Verizon that involved releasing a somewhat-limited version of Skype for Verizon phones which in some cases eats user minutes, seemingly defeating some benefits of Skype. It was widely speculated that as part of the arrangement, Skype slowed their development of Skype for other platforms – though now they’ve finally released a version of Skype for the Apple iPhone. Unfortunately for users, this version too seems to have some odd restrictions:

iPhone users can make free Skype-to-Skype calls for the rest of the year but after that will have to pay a small, monthly subscription fee. Perhaps even more disconcerting for Skype users, the app – at least initially – apparently does not support background push notifications, meaning users must have the app up and running to receive incoming Skype calls.

These restrictions seem to be custom-made to help AT&T avoid the erosion of SMS and voice revenues in the face of smartphones, push IM clients and mobile VoIP. Of course it remains amusing that Skype keeps striking these kinds of restrictive, closed agreements with companies like AT&T and Verizon – after spending a large chunk of the last five years complaining about closed networks.

Link to the original article…

This is the second “One Year Later” review that I’ve done where I feel like a day, a week, or even a month just doesn’t do service to a review about an item(s) that should be used and critiqued over the year to find any and all problems, quirks and hopefully all of the good parts all enough time to come to the surface. Just a bit over a year ago, I purchased one of the Ooma Hub and Scout combo packages and decided I was going to test it. As with all over VoIP platforms, the Ooma Hub depends upon your internet connection. Your connection goes down, so goes your ability to use your phone.

That’s the nature of VoIP.

But just like Vonage, who I have been with for 7 years, or just like magicJack who I’ve kept for 2 years whenever I travel, and now Ooma – which I’ve kept now for slightly over a year. I tend to stick to commercial VoIP solutions because I like the support they give me. And in one year, I’ve had to contact Ooma only once for an outage last April that lasted for about 4 hours. Mind you, I don’t even make that many phone calls, but seeing that little red light just bothered me enough to send them an e-mail. They promptly responded and solved the problem in under a few hours for all users of Ooma. No problems since.

Unlike magicJack, there’s no implicit limit to how long a phone call can last. You can talk for 60, 90, 270 minutes and it will not disconnect you. The voice quality is on par, if not better than an AT&T landline. In fact, people have heard more of what was going on in my background than an AT&T landline. Sometimes, that’s not a good thing… but that’s another post

Ooma does require a hefty price for their equipment. Their newer Ooma Telo hardware just screams out über-sexy with that fingerprint magnet black plastic and smooth corners, while the older (see above) equipment would be just fine in a 1960 retro styled home alongside your childhood Han Solo blaster toy. Call me odd, but I love my older one just fine. Ooma Telo can be purchased from Amazon.com, Best Buy and other retailers starting around $199.99 to about $249.99. Good part though? There are zero monthly bills after that. But you have to hope that Ooma stays in business so you’ll still have the ability to call out and not just have a pricey piece of kit in your house.

So how does Ooma make money? Besides investments by people ranging from Ashton Kutcher, Ooma’s Creative Director, to venture capitalist that have put in as much as $18.3 million in investments just in Summer of 2009; Ooma makes money from Premier Subscribers and from pre-paid overseas phone calls. Mind you, their rates aren’t exactly the best, but I’d venture to say they’re pretty darn close. But the experience of calling overseas is hit or miss. Phone calls to Germany and Britain were flawless. Better than a cellphone in most cases. Phone calls to Japan, China and New Zealand… went badly. I had to call them again in order to be heard in most cases. And I have a 10mb digital cable connection that’s pretty solid most of the time.

Premier Subscriptions cost $9.99 a month, or $119.99 a year – up from $99.99 when I first purchased my Ooma Hub and Scout – and offers quite a few good perks: Instant Second Line™, Three-way Conferencing, Multi-Ring (the ability to ring more than one phone, like your cellphone for instance) and a rollover, Back-up Number when the internet isn’t being friendly.

For all intents and purposes, I didn’t renew my Premier subscription, despite being grand-fathered with a few other perks that are no longer part of the Premier subscriptions, I just didn’t find myself using it. I have call-waiting. I have caller ID. I can call all of the US without a problem. I have voicemail that I can check via the internet – Ooma’s web interface is actually quite decent and easy to use – or I can check directly on the machine itself. The speaker quality on the Ooma Hub is good and loud. I have e911 access that’s accurate to my house street address. And if you’re another Ooma subscriber, wherever you’re at, I can call you for free. Take the machine to China, once you’re plugged in, I can call you like it’s a free call.

To be honest, that’s all I need. I really don’t want nor need a landline, but having a second line in the house is cool to have in case somebody insists on sending a fax, which Ooma supports too.

But the bad parts about Ooma… I seriously can’t tell you how long they will be around. I’ve gotten a year, so I’ve gotten my money’s worth. They’ve secured more money, they have a presence in Best Buy and Radio Shack, as well as an online presence via Buy.com and Amazon. So I know they’re selling quite a few. Despite being extremely easy to set up, setting up the Ooma behind the router really isn’t suggested. I’ve had some quality problems and what I ended up doing was splitting from the modem to the Ooma Hub then to my wireless router. No problems sense.

Is this the telecom killer? Nope. Is it a good for everybody? No. Is it good if you can find an Ooma Telo or Ooma Hub for cheap? Heck yes. If you’re adventurous, I’d say get it – not knowing if Ooma will go all Sunrocket and instantly close shop on you is a serious fear to have. But for the last year, I’m actually impressed with my Ooma Hub. It saves me cellphone minutes per month. Heck, I have my Google Voice account hooked into my Ooma phone number… so I’ve gotten my money’s worth. But I’m hesitant to buy this for my mother, despite the Ooma Telo being sexy as all get out.

Final statement: Easy to set up, pretty kickass barebones without a Premier Subscription, but it’s just too risky to purchase if you’re not used to being on the edge. I’d call this a 3.5 out of 5 (Only If You’re Brave) – oh, and I don’t even use the Ooma Scout since I use only VoIP and not the landline functionality that Ooma supports.

[ Links: Ooma ] [ Related: magicJack "Year Later Review" ]

So, how about a small sampling of the Cyber Monday Sales? I’m not too thrilled so far, but if you know of any, send us a tip!

Newegg Cyber Monday Savings – Notable purchase, LG 37″ Widescreen LCD HDTV 37LG30 [ view here ]
Dell Cyber Monday Savings
Staples Cyber Monday Sales Event
Best Buy Cyber Monday 2-Day Sales Event – Best Buy is so bad, they’re changing the rules of what Monday truly means
MacMall 3-Day Cyber Monday Sales – Mac Mall ups the ante… Monday is now 3 days
Kmart Cyber Monday Savings – Hey, toys are an extra 5% off
Karmaloop Clothing – Save 15% extra via coupon: 15BF
Cyber Monday Listings from Dealighted.com – Many savings, notable purchase, Virgin America $39 flights
Cyber Monday Listings from Dealnews.com
Frys Cyber Monday Savings

I’ll update more after I find more that are worthwhile. A lot, just aren’t worth it so far it seems.

Got a tip? Send it on in

tips [at] removethelabels [dot] com

Blinkcase [ site here ] is offering 30% off on all of their fashionable Apple iPhone and Apple iPod Touch cases and accessories via the coupon “BLACKFRIDAY09“.

I’d jump on it guys if I were you… nothing like a good case for cheap.

Once again, I’ll be sitting back watching the news and surfing the internet while somebody unfortunately gets trampled for a relatively inexpensive gadget somewhere in America. Let’s save some lives as well as some money… the following links will hopefully save both.

Dealnews Black Friday Deals – Some Black Friday deals are already active, more tomorrow
Black Friday 2009 – Another collection of Black Friday deals and announcements of best deals
Dealighted’s Black Friday Deals – True to form, Dealighted.com also has some collected Black Friday Deals online
Fatwallet Black Friday/Cyber Monday Reviews – The great thing about Fatwallet is that the members will outright tell you the pros and cons of the ongoing sales
Black Friday Watcher by Deals2buy.com – Yet another ongoing list of Black Friday sales, with some online sales that aren’t highly publicized
Amazon.com Black Friday Deals – Get your refresh button finger ready… some killer deals indeed pop up there

Even though I joke, who knows… this might just save a life or two. Hope that you get everything that you’re looking for.

[ Related: RTL Deals ]

Dealnews.com [ site here ] is how I start my day. The site collects not only which Apple iPhone apps are free that day or which sales are going on at that moment – some sales are 24-hour only and by the time I read all of my e-mail, I just don’t see them until it is way too late – but in preparation for the Christmas shopping season, Dealnews is collecting any/all of the Black Friday (November 27th) ads available as they come to light [ view here ]

In short, I love Dealnews.com. Combined with the fact they also collect coupons and coupon codes, online sales and specials, you just need to bookmark Dealnews.

[ Dealnews ] [ Dealnews Black Friday ] [ Related: RTL Deals ]

Being up-to-date and/or being an early adopter in the realm of gadgets is very expensive. In this edition of Save Money Mondays, I’d love to share with you one of the places that collects a lot of software and hardware deals in one place for your perusal. I’ve been a fan of Deals2buy.com [ site here ] for years. I’ve bought my previous Aliph Jawbone 2 earpiece via a link from their site and saved about $45 dollars off of retail among other deals for software, coupons and other gadget deals over the years. Definitely a site worthy of bookmarking.

They also collect those hard to find Dell coupons as well.

[ Deals2buy.com ] [ Related: RTL Deals ]