We got an overwhelming response to our CityWaboo Halloween Costume Contest and our systems were flooded with images of police officers, flapper girls, lions, tigers, and bears, OH MY! To recap, we asked everyone to send in their pictures from Halloween to be entered in to win a $100 American Express Gift Card.

Thank you all for sending us your pictures, it was a VERY tough decision to pick the winner. With that said, The Winner Is…SELINEH!!!

Congratulations Selineh! You and your parents thought your costume rocked, and we couldn’t agree more!!! You looked just like Snow White!

Check out some of the other entries below!

Halloween is the one time during the year that you can let loose and take on a whole new personality and appearance and CityWaboo is rewarding one lucky winner with a featured article and a $100 American Express Gift Card for the most unique and impressive costume!

Enter To Win the CityWaboo Halloween Costume Contest

Take photos, and make sure to take ones that show your entire costume, as well as any special details that make your costume stand out! Then, simply SUBMIT them, via submission form, no later than 9 PM, November 4, 2008! We will select and notify the winner by Friday, November 7, 2008.

To enter, you must be 18 years of age to submit photos; however, feel free to submit photos of your children under the age of 18. You DO NOT have to be a member of CityWaboo to enter to win, but you MUST fill out the submission form completely! Make sure to notify all of your friends and family about our Halloween Costume Contest!!!

Thousands returned home to Galveston, Texas today after the city was blasted by Hurricane Ike almost two weeks ago. Warnings have been given to locals to be aware of snakes, mosquitoes, a lack of electricity and running water, destroyed homes, debris covering the area and much more devastation.

There are many ways in which you can help out the island of Galveston and other parts of Texas. The American Red Cross is an organization that is providing disaster relief in various forms. Blood drives are being held throughout multiple cities daily and it’s encouraged that everyone donate blood. The Red Cross lists the top 10 reasons to give blood:

1. You will get free juice and cookies.
2. You will weigh less - one pint less when you leave then when you came in.
3. It’s easy and convenient - it only takes about an hour and you can make the donation at a donor center, or at one of the many Red Cross mobile blood drives.
4. It’s something you can spare - most people have blood to spare… yet, there is still not enough to go around.
5. Nobody can ask you to do any heavy lifting as long as you have the bandage on. You can wear it for as long as you like. It’s your badge of honor.
6. You will walk a little taller afterwards - you will feel good about yourself.
7. You will be helping to ensure that blood is there when you or someone close to you may need it. Most people don’t think they’ll ever need blood, but many do.
8. It’s something you can do on equal footing with the rich and famous - blood is something money can’t buy. Only something one person can give to another.
9. You will be someone’s hero - you may give a newborn, a child, a mother or a father, a brother or a sister another chance at life. In fact, you may help save up to three lives with just one donation.
10. It’s the right thing to do.
    

The American Red Cross is also always excepting monetary donations and they have various funds to which you can donate to including the Disaster Relief Fund, Where the Need is Greatest Fund, Your Local Red Cross Chapter, and many many more.

Organizations like Relief International, the Gulf Coast Mercy Corps, and city emergency departments are all working hard to provide relief to the Galveston community. Galveston is seeking 2.2 billion dollars in disaster relief according to the Associated Press, in addition to the funds the city has already received from the Federal Emergency Management Agency. Its estimated to restore the port alone, to it’s original state, it would take at minimum half-billion dollars. Take part in a disaster relief organization, donate blood, or donate money to one of the disaster relief organizations to help Galveston and other cities damaged from the hurricane recover.

It’s been over a month, and still when I approach our offices, these yellow page phone books are laying beside the door. I wonder… has the time of hard copy yellow pages passed us? I remember the days that yellow page phone books were the only source of locating business information, it seems as the age of the internet is ever growing, the dependence on these older, more traditional forms of information have dissipated.

More and more people are turning to the internet as their main source of gathering information. Thus, online businesses, online advertising, and online marketing are a growing industry separate and more effective than that of traditional methods. When businesses target demographics locally, online advertising can reach a more streamlined demographic, which suits a businesses needs more adequately, thus enhancing traffic to their business and in turn increasing profitability of the business as a whole.

People want ease when looking for information and they find this in the internet, with search sites they simply type in what they want and pages appear providing them with results, as opposed to flipping through a huge bulky paper version that may or may not provide results. People also want simplicity and prefer compact items, having a paper copy means finding a place for it, it also means knowing the correct spelling and city that it’s located in.

With the internet, none of that is necessary, a person doesn’t even need to know the name of the business when searching for a particular service. Keywords on the net have enhanced searching to a level that paper versions can not compare with. To bring further clarity, using CityWaboo as an example, a person can type in a number of things and receive results, using words that describe something, such as “great hair stylist” instead of looking up “Frankie’s Salon”.

It’s no wonder that these books have laid outside stuffed into the corner between the building wall and the doors. They provide minimal value to a “user” and in the age of the internet, people want simplicity, quickness, ease and choice.

Some of you may experienced a few hiccups on the CityWaboo website yesterday, this was due to the overwhelming traffic on the CityWaboo website late yesterday afternoon. With so many people on the website, our servers temporarily crashed. If you were trying to access the site and could not, that is most likely the reason. We apologize for the inconvenience and appreciate all of the feedback that everyone has given us. Stay on the look out for the new and improved CityWaboo coming soon!

We’ve been working very hard at improving CityWaboo so that it provides you the user with a more valuable experience! We realize that you want to ask your friends for advice on where to go and what to do in your city and that’s exactly what we’re making happen! We’re not only improving things behind the scenes, but we’re also making the site more interactive and FUN for you the user!

CityWaboo is upgrading our social search platform enabling our users to fully customize their user pages, searches, and a black book of favorite businesses for your reference. We’ve also been improving our search engine, which means you get quicker more accurate results with every search you perform! The new version is highly anticipated, keep visiting the CityWaboo Blog for more details on the progress of our new social search platform!

Social Networking is half the fun of being a CityWaboo member and building that inner circle can help you to discover new and exciting places to visit and things to do. Each of your friends offer a different aspects to your life, for example, one of your friends is your “shopping” buddy, another friend is your “eat-out” buddy, another is your “spa-day” buddy, and yet another “fun” buddy. With your inner circle, all of your friends can simply rate and review the businesses they’ve visited and you’ll automatically have access to these recommended places in your “Friend’s Favorites”. With the “Friend’s Favorites” you’ve got your shopping buddy, eat out buddy, spa-day buddy, and fun buddy’s favorite places from restaurants to body shops and golf courses to nail salons.

Building your inner circle is easy and there are multiple ways that you can do this. Try inviting all of your friends by using your email accounts to send an invite, you can also individually type in your friends email addresses. Another way to increase your circle is to add other users to your friends list. How do you decide which users on CityWaboo to add? Well, it’s simple, just add those people who’s reviews you’ve found helpful. Encourage your inner circle to upload photos of their favorite places as well. This will only help you when deciding if you want to visit that particular business. Expand your inner circle and explore the new places that all your friends are raving about!

Events are occurring everyday in our cities and usually most pass us by without our even noticing. Festivals, concerts, plays, and other events offer fun for you, your friends and your family, so why not go and enjoy them?

We discovered that it’s simple, no one wants to take the time to go through tons of event websites to find something to do for the weekend and why should you have to? CityWaboo offers an event page full of the events happening in your city. We’ve got one place for you to plan your entire day going into the night. We’re even sending out a newsletter every Wednesday to fill you in on all the hottest events you won’t want to miss!

Are you throwing or hosting an event? No problem, add and upload your own event to the CityWaboo event page in order to create a guest list, post details, and massively spread the word to your city. You can upload photos and personalize the event as well!If you don’t receive the CityWaboo Event Newsletter, create a CityWaboo account and one will be sent to you. Look for your weekly event updates every Wednesday!