Forget Apple. Forget salespeople. Monster just won CES. The company’s just-announced Inspiration line of headphones combines the fashion of weirdoes with the technology of Monster. Perfection!

The company failed to announce anything about the headphones. Monster didn’t state the price, availability or even the retail channels. They simply paraded models up and down wearing headphones adorned with features, lace, and other random fashionista items. These so-called Inspiration models are perhaps the first people in the history of the human race to wear fashion-first headphones.

But fear not! These headphones are within reach of most people. Simply take any ol’ headphones — they probably sound as good as these anyway — and steal your wife’s hot glue gun. Proceed to glue random household objects onto the headphones with utter disregard. Used featherduster? Perfect! A swatch of your dog’s hair? Of course! A used bandaid? I would think that’s fine, too.

We are the cusp of a new era, friends. Soon we’ll all wear headphones like these. I can’t wait.

If you’ve found yourself yearning for a new memory card but all your options are just too pedestrian, then Monster and SDJ Technologies may have just brightened your day. The two companies have just announced that they have inked a long-term licensing deal that means Monster Digital flash memory products will soon hit store shelves.

That’s right — although neither company has gone into specific product types, we can hazard a few guesses as to what they’re working on. SDJ CEO Jay Tandon mentioned that people are focusing more on “mobile computing, smart phones, digital camera and video recording devices,” so expect some funky Monster-branded memory cards and flash drives to debut soon. Of course, these will bear Monster branding, so be prepared for a premium price tag too.

The thing to remember here is that it’s just a licensing agreement, so SDJ will actually make the products while the folks at Monster will do what they do best: market the hell out of these things.

Readers are probably already aware of Monster’s M.O., but those who have never had the pleasure, Monster takes commodity products like cables and uses their marketing prowess to give them something of a premium aura. There always seems to be a debate raging as to whether or not Monster products actually perform better than a run-of-the-mill replacement (I don’t think they do, personally), but enough people are Monster fans that the company keeps churning things out.

The first spate of Monster Digital products will be unveiled next month at the CES Unveiled event in New York City. Monster fans will also be glad to know that a wider rollout of Monster Digital goods will begin soon afterward.

I was lucky enough to get a look at Monster’s new Beats by Dre headphones at their Holiday Launch party recently, and it’s safe to say they’re pretty sweet cans. The company has developed two new sets of headphones: the Beats Wireless on-ear Headphones and the Beats Studio HD Powered Isolation Headphones, which come in a number of color flavors.

I got the chance to go ears-on with both of the new products, and I can honestly say I enjoyed my time with each of them. Both sets are super comfortable, too.

The Beats Wireless headphones come with controls on the ear cups, allowing you to adjust the volume, skip tracks, and power the headphones on and off. Since the cans use Bluetooth technology, you can even sync them up with your phone so that the music stops each time you receive a call. The headphones are battery-powered, and can be recharged.

The Beats Studio headphones are the flagship cans over at Beats, but for the holidays the company has thrown in some extra colors. What once was only available in black, white, and red is now offered in blue, orange, magenta and purple. They come with an extra Monster iSoniTalk headphone cable with a built-in mic and call answer button to let you chat on the phone if you get a call while rocking out.

The colorful new Beats Studio cans will be available on October 16 with an MSRP of $299, while the Beats Wireless headphones will be available exclusively at Apple Stores later this year, with an MSRP of $279.

It wasn’t that long ago that HTC partnered up with Beats Audio to give their phones a boost in the audio department, and now it seems Nokia may be contemplating something similar. A newly leaked pair of images popped up earlier today, and they reveal what may be the first Nokia-Monster phone accessory.

Given Monster’s history, it’s really no surprise that the first product to surface would be a pair of headphones. Dubbed the Nokia Purity HD Stereo Headset (try saying that three times fast), the images sent to PocketNow depict an electric blue pair of portable cans that seem to lack cables.

There’s a solid chance that if real, the Purity HDs will be run off of a Bluetooth connection, but sometimes headphone manufacturers leave unwieldy cables out of their press shots. With Nokia World just around the corner, more specifics are sure to surface before too long.

While it seems doubtful that the partnership could ever reach an HTC/Beats level of cooperation, it still seems like quite a coup for Nokia. I daresay it’s been a long time since the Finnish phone giant was considered cool, so co-branding a product with a known entity like Monster could be a step toward generating some street cred.

Then again, the idea could also backfire terribly. Monster Cable is best known to many for peddling overpriced cables, and that ultimately may not sit well with some of Nokia’s customers. We’ll have to wait and see how things play out, but here’s a quick word of advice for Nokia: it doesn’t matter how awesome your new headphones are if your new Windows Phones aren’t up to snuff. Keep those priorities straight, that’s all I’m saying.

Exclusive: Professional social network LinkedIn has shut down API access to a number of developers for terms of service violations, according to the company. The six developers whose access to LinkedIn’s API include Facebook-focused professional network BranchOut, Monster’s social recruiting app Beknown, brand management app Visible.me, resume service Daxtra, professional reputation manager Mixtent and CRM-Gadget.

The shut down of access for BranchOut and Monster’s similar (and recently launched) app BeKnown are particularly surprising. According to LinkedIn, BranchOut, which has been compared to a LinkedIn for Facebook, violated the network’s API TOS with its plans for a premium enterprise recruiting search tool. Charging fees for access to LinkedIn’s content, is a no-no, says the network.

LinkedIn says that it cut off access to its API for BeKnown because the app was using the LinkedIn APIs to send messages to promote BeKnown (and thus profit from the API). LinkedIn is also concerned that BeKnown will be charging for enterprise services related to the API, similar to BranchOut. Mixtent and Visible.me were also shut down for the same reasons. And CRM-Gadget and Daxtra were both shut down for storing LinkedIn member data.

In the case of BranchOut and BeKnown, it’s hard not to think of the whole Twitter-UberMedia debacle, in which Twitter shut down API access to UberMedia for TOS violations, including trademarks, privacy and monetization violations. UberMedia is a direct competitor to Twitter, with it army of third-party clients.

Likewise, BranchOut (and now BeKnown) are competitors to LinkedIn in some ways. BranchOut, which is backed by Accel, Norwest, Floodgate, and Redpoint, allows you to network and find jobs through your friends on Facebook. The company also allows you to import skills, education, and job history from LinkedIn as well. And the company is allowing brands and organizations to post jobs to users. The startup has been growing in a territory that LinkedIn has not yet invaded—Facebook.

LinkedIn, which has 20,000 developers using its APIs, has been on fairly good terms with its developers minus a few stumbles. In January, LinkedIn shut down access to CubeDuel, a service that mixes the best (or worst) of Hot or Not with the professional social network. Apparently CubeDuel exceeded LinkedIn’s API limits, but it was actually the startup’s fault.

LinkedIn says it is open to reinstating its APIs to these developers and startups if they comply with the network’s TOS. LinkedIn has partnership deals with some developers where startups pay fees for the API (which they can monetize off of).

But LinkedIn could probably learn a thing or two from Twitter’s tenuous situation with its developers, and should definitely navigate these waters very carefully.

Update:

BranchOut issued this statement in response to LinkedIn’s move:

At BranchOut we consider the next generation platform for professional networking to be Facebook. Changes to the LinkedIn API have little impact on the BranchOut experience, as it was only being used by a small fraction of our users. That said, we believe user data should be owned by the user, and that people should be allowed to share their data with the new services and contexts that provide the most utility.

We’ve analyzed our statistics, and it has led to a pretty exciting discovery for us—namely that we are causing a groundswell within a much larger audience than that addressed by the prior generation of career services. BranchOut users encompass not only the professional networker, but also the far larger base of 700 million Facebook users worldwide who would like to use their social graph to help them in business, recruiting, sales, and job search. For example, in addition to white collar professionals, our users are college students, workers in retail, manufacturing, hospitality, military, government, and others who have yet to find a professional voice within a social network. We are excited to be the first to give this larger global audience a relevant professional networking solution.

And here’s Monster’s response:

We are surprised and disappointed by LinkedIn’s decision, which we believe not only goes against the interests of LinkedIn users, but also contradicts what LinkedIn claims to stand for – openness and connectivity. Professional networkers are social in nature and LinkedIn has just limited their ability to connect when and where they want. They’ve taken away users’ rights to control how and when they can share their own profile data and personal contacts. We also note that it was within days of Monster’s launch of BeKnown that LinkedIn decided to block the API when there have been other networking-oriented apps using the API for months.While this move by LinkedIn creates an inconvenience for their users, BeKnown members will continue to build their networks from all the largest online sites including Facebook, Yahoo, Google and Monster.

Here’s something I want for Christmas: Daft Punk edition TRON headphones! Made by Monster—I’m assuming quality similar to the Beats—these ear cans come with LED lights. A first for Monster, the LEDs will light up and mimic movements from the character’s costumes.

The headphones are meant for gamers, movie watchers and of course, music listeners. Features include noise isolation and an attachable microphone for dual duty as a headset. I can just picture all those tf2 players with these, ahem, Around the World.

Unfortunately, you will not be able to celebrate and dance for free. Price is set at $350 and it comes with a surround version of Daft Punk’s soundtrack for TRON: Legacy.

In October, Job search engine Indeed.com slipped past Monster.com to become the largest job site in the U.S. According to comScore, 12.3 million people visited Indeed in October, up 19.6 percent. Monster.com attracted 12.1 million people, and CareerBuilder.com came in third with 11.3 million job seekers. It is still pretty close, with Indeed just barely edging out Monster. But this could very well be a turning point for leadership of the online job search category.

(Note: These numbers are just for the respective main sites, and do not include each property’s larger networks. CareerBuilder and Monster are still larger by that measure, with 21.2 million and 14.7 million monthly uniques, respectively, compared to 12.5 million for Indeed.)

Indeed passed Monster in pageviews last year, and currently gets an estimated 334 million pageviews a month, compared to 311 million for CareerBuilder and 205 million for Monster. And since most of those pageviews are pure job search, Indeed boasts more job search pageviews (305 million) than the other two combined, plus HotJobs search pageviews (299 million total for all three). Monster bought HotJobs from Yahoo earlier this year. The number of visitors to HotJobs.com is down 67 percent from a year ago.

These other sites offer other features and content besides job search resumes builders, career advice, or other tools. But the growth of Indeed once again suggests the power of search can trump everything else.

Although the press release, below, is full of garbage jargon, the bottom line is that Monster, in their infinite glory, has released a “universal” pair of RF 3D glasses. The glasses support almost any 3D TV kit and cost $249.95 for a starter kit with transmitter and and $169.95 per pair of standalone glasses.

Why are these good? Well, presumably if you’re moving from 3D TV to 3D TV, they’ll allow you to watch almost anything without having to buy new glasses. The rest of the mess of buzzwords in the press release makes little sense except that you program the glasses to work with future technologies, which is nice. Sadly, they’re expensive as heck.

Monster Vision Max 3D utilizes leading-edge RF technology to achieve its stunning results. The system uses Monster Vision Max 3D ACTIVE SYNC technology, based on Bit Cauldron’s HeartBeat technology. The result is an advancement that ensures reliable communication with the RF transmitter, producing the best and purest transmission of 3D content between the source and the eyeglasses and eliminating the common sync issues found in most IR based shutter glasses.
The system works through an innovative process whereby the ACTIVE SYNC technology allows the wireless Universal 3D Shutter Transmitter to listen to the signal from any 3D-enabled flat panel display. The transmitter then wirelessly decodes the shutter signals and transmits them to a sensor embedded in the glasses. Through this connection (via ZigBee’s 2.4 GHz radio technology), coupled with interference rejection software and sync correction, the specially designed lenses in the Monster Vision Max 3D glasses react electro-chromatically, literally blinking faster than the eye can see to create the most reliable, believable and immersive 3D images. Additionally, ACTIVE SYNC is the only technology that allows Monster Vision Max 3D glasses to work with one TV even when other 3D TVs or Monster Vision Max 3D Shutter Transmitters are in close proximity.
Importantly, Monster Vision Max 3D is the only system that has employed RF successfully and can work with ANY 3D-ready television set regardless of manufacturer. Notably, the glasses have a rechargeable lithium polymer battery enabling the user to enjoy thousands of hours of 3D content before replacing the battery. And to ensure total “future-readiness,” the glasses are adjustable to adapt to future standards – updating the system to learn new IR codes is simple via USB through the built-in Monster Vision update portal.

via ChipChick

Dost thou love Diddy? Then do not squander Diddy, for that’s the stuff life is made of. Monster has just announced the avilability of the Diddybeats earbuds in black, white, and pink for $179. Best of all? Les Diddybeats includes a free track from Diddy’s latest album, Last Train to Paris.

But wait! There’s more. Actually, that’s it. They’ll be available at Best Buy and, because they didn’t mention much about the audio, expect these things to be a little bass-heavy and actually fairly good, although the price is a bit high. Although folks complain about Monster all the time, I’ve been impressed with the Dr. Dre Beats, so these should be on par with those.

Sean “Diddy” Combs, Monster and Beats™ by Dr. Dre™ Announce Nationwide Availability of Diddybeats™ In-Ear Headphones in Black, White and Pink Exclusively at Best Buy®

Free Track Download of “Hello Good Morning” from Diddy-Dirty Money’s Upcoming Album

“Last Train to Paris” Available with Purchase
New York, NY, May 24, 2010 – Monster, the leader in audio/video accessories, and Beats™ by Dr. Dre™, co-founded by legendary artist and producer Dr. Dre and Interscope Geffen A&M Chairman Jimmy Iovine, are proud to announce the nationwide availability of Diddybeats™ (MSRP: $179.95), now in black, white and pink versions, exclusively at Best Buy® and Best Buy® Mobile stores. The latest addition to the hugely popular Beats by Dr. Dre headphone family from Monster, Diddybeats were created in conjunction with music entrepreneur and fashion icon Sean “Diddy” Combs.

Free Track Download from Diddy-Dirty Money’s New Album Last Train to Paris

For a limited time, all headphone purchasers will receive a “ticket” with an online promotional code that entitles them to receive a free track download of the hit single “Hello Good Morning” from Diddy-Dirty Money’s upcoming album Last Train to Paris, which is scheduled for release on June 28 from Bad Boy Records and Interscope Records. Purchasers may enter their special code for the free download at http://diddybeats.com/track/default.aspx. In addition to their availability at Best Buy Mobile outlets, Diddybeats are also available at www.bestbuy.com/diddybeats.

“I am excited to launch Diddybeats at Best Buy because when it comes to electronics and entertainment devices they are second to none. I trust their expertise and am confident that this partnership will be a huge success,” states Sean “Diddy” Combs.

“Dre and I wanted to design an earbud that was a combination of great style and powerful sound,” said Beats by Dr. Dre Co-Founder and Interscope Geffen A&M Chairman, Jimmy Iovine. “Diddy was the perfect choice for this because he’s a pioneer in marrying music with fashion.”

Advanced Audio Technologies from Monster Deliver Extreme Clarity and Deep Bass

Diddybeats feature advanced audio technologies that break new ground for in-ear headphone performance, combining the deepest bass tones with the clarity of high frequency production and making them ideal for use with all types of music, from hip-hop and rock to jazz and classical. The remarkable sonic performance is made possible through the use of new materials and innovative patent pending designs, allowing users to hear details in their music they may never had heard before.

Head Monster, Noel Lee noted: “The goal of Beats by Dr. Dre headphones has always been to bring serious music listeners a new way to enjoy truly great sound, and to hear every nuance of the music the way the original artist intended it to be heard. With Diddybeats, we were fortunate to be able to work closely with Diddy, one of the world’s most meticulous recording artists, to fine-tune the sound, and the results are nothing less than astounding.”

“Best Buy is proud to be the exclusive partner with Monster and Beats by Dr. Dre to launch these tremendous headphones for consumers who are looking to enhance their experiences with mobile technology,” said Shawn Score, president of Best Buy Mobile. “Smartphones are becoming the central point for staying connected to everything from work to family and from social media to music. And that is why Best Buy Mobile is so focused on featuring smartphones and accessories. Diddybeats adds to our tremendous assortment and is certain to be a great product for our customers.”

Trendsetting Design Echoes Diddy’s Sean John Fashion Label

In addition to their leading-edge sonic technologies, Diddybeats in-ear headphones also incorporate design elements that echo the sensibilities and trendsetting style of Diddy’s critically acclaimed international fashion label Sean John. As such, Diddybeats are a 21st century combination of sophisticated styling and cutting-edge technology. The elegant headphones are made from high-tech aluminum, wrapped with the look and feel of leather and polished endcaps. Customers can get more information on Diddybeats at www.diddybeats.com.

Diddybeats come in an exclusive Sean John-inspired travel case and with an assortment of eartips to ensure maximum comfort and fit for every wearer. They also feature Monster’s exclusive matching flat cable design that not only integrates into the overall look and feel of the headphones, but also makes them tangle-resistant.
Diddybeats are being made available with the Monster ControlTalk™ headphone cable*, which can be used with iPhone™ and iPod® for music playback control as well as to take hands-free calls with iPhone and many smartphones. The special Monster ControlTalk headphone cable features an integrated high-grade microphone and answer button and allows users to access their music and answer phone calls without having to reach into their pocketbook, backpack or pocket.
* The ControlTalk remote and mic functions are supported by iPod nano (4th and 5th generation), iPod classic (120GB/160GB), iPod touch (2nd generation), iPhone 3GS, and iPad. The remote is supported by iPod shuffle (3rd generation). Audio is supported by all iPod/iPhone/iPad models. Requires software version 1.0.3 for iPod nano (4th generation), 2.0.1 for iPod classic (120GB), and 2.2 or later for iPod touch (2nd generation).

Additional note regarding Diddybeats and BlackBerry®:
The white version of Diddybeats is compatible with all BlackBerry smartphones. The pink and black versions do not support volume and tracking control.

The Paris-based startup is targeting students and young professionals in the UK with its mix of career guidance and job vacancies. And considering that ‘youth’ unemployment in Britain is worryingly high, the site’s launch looks well timed, although it’s curious that a French company has chosen to launch this side of the Channel first.

PathMotion says it differs from traditional jobs boards such as Monster and CareerBuilder, which allow users to search vacancies based on job titles and require the candidate to know what they are looking for, by matching possible career paths via existing skills, experience and competencies to actual current job vacancies.

Job boards also don’t usually “contextualise” this information, says PathMotion, which instead provides tools to show how the candidate might progress next in their career. Perhaps one way to think of this aspect of the site is as a job recommendation engine.

For the job vacancy data itself, PathMotion is partnering with Indeed, although the startup is planning to develop its own recruiters section.

PathMotion is free to the end user, and the company plans to generate revenues by charging recruiters for job postings, company branding, and database access to PathMotion user profiles. They’ll also be able to screen users by their career goals and competencies, and “push job opportunities to targeted candidates.”

Another revenue stream is licensing fees from universities who are looking to provide their students with career guidance tools and “to leverage social networking to serve their students and alumni.” PathMotion hopes to announce the first such contract soon.

The company is currently Angel funded.

Monster’s acquisition of Yahoo HotJobs signals a significant landscape change for a job board industry facing significant economic pressure and I believe the deal also marks a “new normal” in how companies are hiring talent. Online recruiting is transitioning away from “the Big Three” job boards. The Internet is becoming the job board.

Of course, unloading and closing properties that are not part of Yahoo’s strategy going forward is smart. (Though selling a job advertising board smack in the middle of this downturn and extreme unemployment must have been as hard as selling an empty, foreclosed home in Las Vegas right now.)

But more importantly, this acquisition is an indicator of a rapid evolution as more hiring takes place online. Venture-backed startups are transforming this industry as new technologies begin to change how companies find and attract talent.  The elephant in the room is that the economic jolt of September 2008 has permanently altered the job market and dramatically accelerated labor trends underway for many years, such as the growth in job turnover throughout a person’s career.

Increases in unemployment, under-employment and turnover are boosting traffic to nearly all job boards and job search engines – and the number of online applications to resource-depleted recruiting departments. Companies are spending more money sifting through unqualified applications, so they are naturally spending less on job boards and taking advantage of free sites, like Indeed, to post and distribute their jobs.

To combat the influx of poor-fit applications, companies are turning to new technologies and online services to target talent and search across the open Web for people who may not be actively searching for a job on a board. This is possible because 42% of working adults in the US now maintain a profile somewhere online—most notably on LinkedIn and Facebook, but also on Twitter and services like Jigsaw, an SF-based, user-generated database of professionals. And the downturn is growing this number.

The more innovative recruiters at growing companies like Zappos and Dell are now are using social media to engage prospective candidates in a genuine and inexpensive way: building candidate communities in their career site and blogs, search engine optimizing job listings, distributing jobs through social networks to dramatically drive referrals, and tracking web analytics by job to determine their best sources of talent.

To me, the more interesting acquisition was Monster’s purchase 18 months ago of Trovix, a Bay Area startup that built a behavioral algorithm for matching jobs and resumes to help recruiters sift through applicants and jobseekers through jobs. But, the irony is that they will be “unveiling” this new technology, dubbed 6Sense, on this weekend’s (expensive) Super Bowl, the annual marketing battleground of the big, horizontal job boards.

As funny as those ads can be, they are not likely to solve the job boards’ bigger marketing challenge: how to convince companies to spend more money “posting and praying” that the best person applies for their job when the broader, open Internet is fast becoming the new, cost-effective “job board” of talent.  This week’s combination of Monster and Hotjobs isn’t going to solve that problem either.

Image via Flickr/Frank Gruber.

Even though unemployment is at the highest levels in a decade, companies are still finding it difficult to find the best qualified candidates to fill the positions that are available. The reason for that is because more often than not, the best qualified candidates are already employed and not necessarily looking for new jobs. Certainly not on job boards like Monster.com or HotJobs. So if the best candidates won’t seek out job openings on employment sites, the jobs need to seek them out.

That is the idea behind TalentSeekr, which is essentially an ad network for jobs. Companies fill out what jobs they are trying to fill in what locations, then TalentSeekr creates and tests multiple ads across the Web—social networks, blogs, forums, search engines, you name it. Based on the response rate and quality of the applicants that come through the ads, TalentSeekr optimizes the mix of ad types (banner, text, video, creative elements) and placement. (Watch the video below to see how it works). If more qualified applicants are coming in through LinkedIn than Facebook, it readjusts the mix. (In fact, LinkedIn makes a lot of money through recruitment ads on its own site in much the same manner. TalentSeeker is attempting to apply the same principles in a more distributed manner across the Web).

“What we are doing is what job boards did to newspapers. Everybody knows the space is about to shift big,” says Ryan Caldwell, the CEO of EnticeLabs, the company behind TalentSeekr. EnticeLabs was founded in August 2007, and funded with $1.3 million in angel money so far.  It’s been operating in a private beta until recently, and already counts among its customers Dell, GE, IBM, Adidas, Rebock, Google, and Microsoft. In addition to TalentSeekr, which is aimed at companies looking to recruit, EnticeLabs’ other product is CareerAds, which is aimed at blogs and Websites looking to display job-focused ads.

TalentSeekr’s approach takes longer than filling a job on Monster, but if you are looking for 3,000 SAP consultants, it could be a better approach.  If you are looking to just fill a single position quickly, you are probably still better off with Monster or some other job board.  Hiring managers get a dashboard (see screenshot below) which shows the number of ad impressions, clicks, and ultimate applications resulting from the ads, as well as the geographic distribution. The average clickthrough rates for TalentSeekre ads can range from 0.15 percent to 0.37 percent (see table below).  Then among those who click, the application rate can be anywhere from 0.22 percent for medical jobs to 2.68 percent for tech jobs.  But with an average cost-per-click of around $1, and an average cost per qualified applicant of anywhere from $200 to $2,600, it still beats hiring a headhunter.

Job ad networks have been tried before by both large companies (Monster has its Career Ad Network) and small. A Y Combinator company called SnapTalent tried this before shifting over to career fairs, and ultimately deadpooling (their site is no longer online). Caldwell isn’t worried about the same fate happening to EnticeLabs because he’s gone after big enterprise with thousands of employees first, rather than the other way around. “This is not something where you can do a cute little startup,” he says, “you need scale.”

The other thing that gives him confidence is that big employers like IBM and GE are talking about shifting large online recruiting budgets away from poorly-performing job boards. Since TalentSeekr already tracks the performance of its ads, it can also plug into applicant tracking systems used by HR departments to get feedback into how the people hired end up doing in terms of job evaluations, longevity and other factors.

In the early days of energy drinks, the tiny 8-ounce Red Bull can was the only game in town. Then somewhere along the line, someone decided to double the can size to 16 ounces. Great — twice the punch for the same price. Then came the 24-ounce energy drink can. A little excessive, sure, but sometimes you need a little extra, extra pick-me-up and a big 24-ounce can is always good for a laugh.

Then came the 32-ounce Monster Energy “BFC” — the biggest F-ing can I ever did see.

I have relatively gigantic hands and the BFC still looks silly.

Here’s what the side of the can says:

“Yeah, you know what ‘BFC’ stands for… No, you shouldn’t try to chug it! (We know you can, just don’t.) Instead kick back and enjoy the Biggest Baddest Energy Drink on the planet. In the biggest effen can we could find. Wimps, Health Nuts and Busy Bodies need not apply. Recommended use: 1 Big Can per day.”

Weird random capitalization aside, I’d never seen a can this big but apparently it’s not a new phenomenon in Alexandria, Minnesota, where I purchased the $3.99 can at a local gas station.

Here’s how my conversation with the clerk went down:

Me: How long has this been on the market?

Clerk: Oh, a while. Like six months maybe.

Customer with tattoo on his neck: Naw, like TWO YEARS!

Clerk: Well, we’ve been carrying it for about six months.

Me: I’ve never seen an energy drink this big.

Manager: Yeah, it’s not carried everywhere. There’s really not a huge demand for it. No demand for it at all, really. You’re actually the first person I’ve ever seen buy one.

Customer with tattoo on his neck: I bought one yesterday!

So there you have it — Monster Energy BFC. Available in regular and “lo-carb” for $3.99 at very few locations. Oh, and just a word of advice: I do NOT recommend consuming an energy drink of this size unless you’re really gonna nurse it for a while. I finished this can about six hours ago and I’m still plenty fidgety in an agitated kind of way. Also, my stomach hurts.

Here are some more photos. Note the size of the can when placed next to a car tire, some pennies, and a breath mint.

Now that I’ve had a couple days with the Turbines, I think it’s time for a full review.

I’m sad to say that my initial praise may have been premature having listened to a few CDs (I had to open up moving boxes in my apt to find one) and comparing these against my Shure SCL3s and Ultimate Ears Super.fi 5 Pros. I also brought in my secret weapon Dave R. to consult. He’s a professional sound engineer who specializes in monitors and has toured with The Cure, The Used, Linda Ronstadt, Interpol, Yellowcard and Fall Out Boy, so he knows this stuff inside and out.

With any in-ear monitor the biggest challenge is to find a tip that actually isolates and blocks everything out. I’ve found that foam tips work best, but the Turbines come with two types (trees and mushrooms) each having three sizes. You might as well skip the mushrooms because they don’t block anything out.

The Turbines impressed me because the highs snapped hard without any distortion, but the low-end just drops out. I found one track where the low-end could be felt, but couldn’t replicate that feeling or experience with any other track that I know has lots of low-end bass. Dave’s first response was just that, so we went through a number of tracks before concluding that the Turbines missed the mark there. I will, however, continue to try and replicate the thump I felt from Akon’s “I Wanna Love You.” But, as I said before, the highs snap and kick much ass.

Monster’s first effort into the in-ear monitor is a good start, but they’ve got some work to do. Compared to my Shures (these aren’t perfect, but they sound great from low to high) and UEs (these are amazing) the Turbines lack the full body experience. If Monster is as passionate about the true audiophile experience as Kevin Lee says they are, then I’m sure they can scale the experience down to an in-ear monitor. But for now, the Turbines are not it. Monster really needs to start making custom ear moldings for their monitors to take advantage of the drivers that are powering the Turbines. It’s the only way to get a proper seal. The Beats by Dr. Dre, on the other hand, are fantastic.

It’s become apparent that Monster is getting into the high-end audiophile game with the launch of the Beats earlier in the year and now the in-ear Turbine ‘speakers’. I’ve only had an hour or two to check them out, but I can honestly say that I’m pleasantly surprised at the performance of the Turbines thus far.

I’ve always been a proponent that you shouldn’t be doing something you’re not passionate about and Kevin Lee, Noel Lee’s son, is obviously passionate about what he does and I have the utmost respect for that.

“My father and I have always wanted to make a headphone that didn’t sound like a “headphone”. We have the up most respect for all the headphone companies that are in business, because we now know it is not easy. That said, we are humbly proud of what we’ve achieve in Monster Turbines. We only hope everyone else agrees”

You can really tell the difference between these and the shitty earbuds you get pre-packaged with all the MP3 players on the market like Apple and Microsoft’s earbuds. The Turbines really are high-end-like audiophile buds at a price point that’s not outrageous at $150.

The mid-range is crisp, but I’ve mainly been paying attention to the lows and highs. It really thumps on the low-end bass and reminds me of my high school days when I had a high-end stereo system in my car. The highs don’t get distorted when you crank up the volume like they do on other earbuds.

However, the Turbines aren’t going to replace your super high-end Shures or Etymotics with custom molded tips, but they do a very good job of isolating outside noise with the tips that are provided. Like I said before, you’ll notice the difference when playing higher bit rate tracks.

We’ll have a full review when I get a chance to use them on some more high-end tracks than what I have on my iPhone or laptop. But I like them so far and I’m used to high-end in-ears if that tells you anything.

Brisbane, CA, November 11, 2008 – Monster, well known for working with legendary
musicians on countless productions recorded with Monster Cable and Monster Power
products, is proud to announce the introduction of its new “Turbine In-Ear Speakers,” the
world’s first high-performance in-ear headphones with specially engineered drivers that deliver
impeccable audiophile-quality sound.

With the ever-increasing popularity of portable media devices, more and more people are using
headphones for music listening, making them the most important connection between people and
their music. Monster’s new Turbine In-Ear Speakers were personally designed by the Head
Monster Noel Lee, undergoing three years of rigorous research, development, and refinement.
The advanced design and engineering of Monster Turbines offer music lovers a new way to
enjoy big speaker sound in a compact in-ear headphone design.

Sound So Big We Had To Call Them Speakers
Monster Turbine In-Ear Speakers feature 8mm drivers precision-engineered for superb sonic
detail that delivers the big sound, deep bass, and clarity that you’d expect from full size high-end
speakers. To further enhance the listening experience, a selection of sound isolating eartips in
multiple sizes offer a secure custom fit to seal out unwanted external noise. In addition, the
advanced metal housing design minimizes unwanted vibration for even clearer sound.
Monster’s advanced cable technologies also enable Turbines to deliver superior performance.
Patented FluxTube delivers more accurate audio, while MicroStrand conductors ensure
maximum cable flexibility and better signal transfer.

Noel Lee, Head Monster, noted: “Life is too short to listen to bad headphones. Unfortunately,
ordinary headphones simply can’t reproduce the deep bass and rich highs of full-size speaker
systems. Monster is on a mission to make headphones sound better, and our new Turbine In-Ear
Speakers allow people to hear truly remarkable sound from in-ear headphones. Hearing is
believing. After all, the human ear can discern much more than any technical measuring device,
and the performance of Monster Turbines needs to be heard to be believed.”

Monster Turbine In-Ear Speakers will be rolled out in limited production beginning in
November, for a suggested retail price of $149.95 per pair. The debut of Turbine In-Ear Speakers
is part of Monster’s commitment to improve the quality of the portable audio experience,
complementing the company’s recent introduction of Beats™ by Dr. Dre™ , a brand new line
of headphones co-developed with legendary artist and producer Dr. Dre.

It’s gonna be a long, cold, dark, cord-filled winter for those of you waiting for wireless HDMI devices from the likes of Belkin (FlyWire shown above) and Monster Cable. Electronic House is reporting that the technology’s not quite there yet. An unidentified owner of an A/V store in Manhattan told EH the following:

“HDMI is not perfected yet. I was eagerly awaiting shipments from both Monster and Belkin but I understand there have been more difficulties in getting various products to talk to each other in this fashion.”

It was thought that Belkin would reveal ready-for-market devices at CES in January this year but company spokesperson Melody Chalaban says that Belkin is “now planning a spring launch and expect it to be perfect then.” Monster is expected to reveal its devices sometime in the second quarter of next year.

UPDATE: Apparently the FlyWire devices from Belkin will be available in late January, so that’s a good sign. Melody Chalaban sent over an e-mail saying the following:

“Just saw your post about FlyWire being delayed.  Yes, it’s been delayed due to compliance issues, and it will be available late January 2009.  I was misquoted in the original post from Electronic House.”

So that’s late January, not a spring launch as originally reported. Sorry for the mix-up.

Writing anything about Monster is fraught with peril. Everyone knows the traditional lime: Monster preys on morons. They sell expensive cables to people who don’t need them and they made a mint doing this over and over again. But this is a new era. Wireless is soon going to eat Monster Cable’s lunch and unless they can diversify – and convince the jaded public that they’re not out to screw them – they are stuck.

So where does that leave the Beats by Dr. Dre? This is a relative first for the company and I believe the headphones, taken at face value and considered in a vacuum, perform quite admirably.

First off, I’m coming at these headphones from a non-audiophiles perspective. I don’t know the lingo and I don’t want to get into a penis-length war with audiophiles because some of what they say is batshit crazy.

The question I tried to answer with the Beats is this: would I recommend them to a friend who flies a lot. No matter what anyone says, the majority of us use earbuds or headphones on flights. I know there are better headphones out there and I’ve used some of them but I’ve always gone back to the Bose QuietComfort 3, one of the most popular headset brands for road warriors.

How do the Beats compare? I’d say quite favorably. As Head Fi points out I was expecting a pair of bass-heavy headphones without much fidelity. What I found in tests at home and six hours of use on a plane were a pair of comfortable headphones with nice fidelity and good noise cancellation. Monster talks up the connection to Dr. Dre and I’m that the good Doctor knows his audio.

Music sounds great on these headphones. TV and movies – I was on JetBlue watching DirectTV and watching movies on the iPod – were a bit rougher. The headphones seem to be tuned for music and not speech and soundtracks.

Were the unlistenable? No. Because they were quite comfortable and cancelled a lot of plane noise I was happy to sit back and ignore whatever artifacts were happening in amplifier. Incidentally, these headphones were louder than the QC3′s. Plugging the Beats into an audio source and then the QC3′s showed a distinct difference in the volume.

Another slight complaint: the headphones aren’t very portable. The QC3′s pack flat but the Beats fold over, leaving a fairly large package. The cabling is also very nice and tangle-free – it comes with a standard audio cable, a 3/4″ converter, and an iPhone adapter.

As a whole these headphones are more than acceptable and quite nice. I’m not sure about the $349 price tag – as many have pointed out there are cheaper headphones out there – but for my money I’m sold on Bose QC3s and I’d be happy to swap the Beats out for extended music listening sessions. Monster is trying and, all things being equal, I’ll give them a chance. Just don’t buy the special anti-oxygen copper and gold coated super magneto-audio dongle that they sell alongside the phones – it’s just not worth it. I think it’s just a piece of plastic.

For more info on Beats By Dre Headphones go to www.beatsbydre.com

Monster Cable, the makers of cable, just sent the new Beats by Dr. Dre, a pair of noise cancelling “studio” headphones aimed at the mid-range audio consumer. At $349, these are priced at exactly the same point as the Bose QuietComfort 3, these headphones closest competitor. I’ve been wearing them for the past hour and found them on par with the QC3s in terms of noise reduction. They have very crisp tight bass and a nice separation as well.

Best of all the, the Beats use AAA batteries instead of the QC3′s battery pack, which means you’re not stuck if you forget to recharge. I’ll be taking a flight tomorrow and I’ll bring these along to test – I’m just about sold on the QC3s when it comes to noise reduction but I’m game to try these out in a real-world scenario.

The ear cups are quite nice and isolate the ear well and the styling is slightly younger and cooler than other massive headphones out there. Monster is entering a wireless age and they have to excel at stuff that doesn’t get electrons from point A to point B just to survive. In my brief testing, I’m willing to give them the benefit of the doubt on these.

It’s no secret that I love my Monster Outlets To Go power strip. It’s the most used gadget in my gear bag no matter where I am. Such a simple device with so many perks like instant friendship with the hot girl waiting at your gate. It won’t get you laid, but you’ll look cool in front of the other nerds. The release isn’t very clear on how many USB ports there are, but I’d assume it’s just one. There is no image attached either, so we’ll have to wait on that. However, the Outlets To Go 3 USB will retail for one penny less than $30 and comes in black.

The Digital Express HD kit is set for an October launch for $299.95.