PSPINC CEO Kenichi Uchikura's Blog

Unknown but Wonderful Vietnamese Food

3月

25日

I had Vietnamese food last night. The only Vietnamese food that I know was PHO. I had no idea the food like this existed. I was really wonderful.

I have no idea what it is called. You cook meet and wrap tem in the thin round paper like thing with vegetables and noodles that I dipped in the hot water to soften it. I had this in Portland, Oregon. I wish I have something like this in Washington.

#Gourmet

Do you know this person?

3月

24日

Do you know this man?

He is one of the most successful business people that I personally know. He is Mr. Junki Yoshida. We went to meet Yoshida-san, chairman of Yoshida Group, in Oregon. He owns and operates 18 companies including Yoshida Foods, Oregon International Airfreight. He is an extremely busy person, but he always spend entire afternoon. He sits on the board of directors of my company.

He will be involved more with the company that I am creating too. He is coming to Seattle to speak at Seattle Executives Association where I am a second VP. I will get to introduce him tomorrow.

#Business #Marketing

The Great Wolf Lodge

3月

24日

We went on a day trip to Portland Oregon. It is about 180 miles (290km) one way. It usually takes little less than three hours on Interstate 5. About a half way there, there is a place called Tenino and we saw great building being built for last several trips. The place is called The Great Wolf Lodge.

We decided to visit and have breakfast there. It was an amusement park with huge indoor swimming pools and rides. There are a lot of customers. It was a lot more than we were expecting. We had buffet style breakfast ($13 each). We all thought it was an Indian Tribal Casino, but no casino there. We were really surprised by the amount of businesses they are generating being in middle of Seattle and Portland.

No recession there! It is a good sight to see.

#Business #Marketing

On the way back from Portland

3月

24日

I am on the way back from the day trip to Portland. It will take two more hours.

I am writing this using my cellular phone.I will post something about this trip tomorrow.

#Travel

Japanese Tourists in Korea

3月

23日

My friend just came back from Korea. He tells me there are so many Japanese tourists everywhere in Korea. That is because of the currency. Compared to a year ago, Korean won is about a half. That means, everything that you see in Korea is a half price.

Last tome I was in Japan, there was a line of people checking in to the flight that is bound for Seoul and Pusan. Economy is a funny animal. Regardless of the financial situation, there is flow of money from the high to low. That is what we learned in college (Economics 101). Let the economy do its thing, it will somehow work out.

Let the private companies be private. There is nothing government can do. If the government can do anything about the economy, Soviet still be a communist country.

#Life #Politics #Society

How well is your Web site ranked?

3月

22日

Do you know ALEXA.COM?

If you dont, I suggest you take a look. This site ranks your site on the Internet. Is it accurate? Well, this is as good as you can get in quantifying how good your web site is doing. If you are ranked within top 100,000 you are doing very well. If you are not ranked at all, you may want to think about what you can do to your web page.

Here are some of PSP related Web pages.

PSPINC
Specializes in Japanese language software, Internet applications and web development. www.pspinc.com
Rank: 393,150

ClockLink.com - Free Flash World Clock
Free clock for your web page. provides fashionable yet free online clocks that can be easily embedded in your web page or in your blog. www.clocklink.com
Rank: 20,986

bloguru.com
Bloguru is a free blog publishing service provided by Pacific Software Publishing. Bloguru makes it simple and easy to Share your thoughts, post news, photos and video with the ... www.bloguru.com
Rank: 491,546

Seattle EXECUTIVES
Best in Business in Seattle WA. 120 year old Seattle Organization of reputable businesses. Seattle Executives offers top companies in Seattle! www.seattleexecs.org
Rank: 6,968,178

#Computer #Internet

Interesting Marketing Tactics

3月

21日

I received an interesting direct mail from one of the premier online golf store. It says, IF SERGIO WINS IN AUGUSTA, YOUR TAYLOR MADE DRIVER IS FREE.

Is it only me, it sounds like they are so confident that Sergio cannot win, Taylor Made is willing bet on it. I personally use Taylor Made Irons and like them very much. I am thinking about getting r9 Driver, but after seeing this I dont know if I want to buy this.

#Business #Marketing

Washington State

3月

20日

Washington State

It has a population of 6.6 million. Democratic Party runs the State for a long time. When Gary Lock (I believe he is the commerce secretary for Obama administration) was the governor, the State had balanced budget and 2 billion dollar surplus. After the first term of current governor Christine Gregoire, the State is now facing 9 billion dollar budget deficit. That is $1,363 per person in the State of Washington.

The State government is planning to spend $1,363 that they do not have and pass that on to us by means of additional taxes.

When will the government know that they can not just keep spending money. I know it is for a good cause, but you just dont have the money to do what you want.

I am not happy about all the idiots of the large corporate managements, But the amount of money the government is spending is out of control. We need to do something about this. I know it is not only Governor Gregoires fault that there is 9 billion dollar budget shotfall, but she is in the position to fix it. I hope she will. The governorship is not a popularity contest. I hope she knows that.

As a small business owner, I do not want to pay for any waste by the government.

#Life #Politics #Society

Sounders FC 3 - Red Bull NY 0

3月

20日

Now it has started. The Professional Football Club (Soccer Club) in America. We long knew that America has the most number of youth soccer population in the world. So, it was just a matter of time before we see professional soccer here. Seattle has SOUNDERS FC and they just won against Red Bull NY. The team sold over 20,000 season tickets. Tonight game had 31,000 people cheering. Great start. Just like the start of J-League.

I hope it does not come to the point where city, or county or state must raise tax to support this franchise, which is a private business. We are doing that to Mariners, Sea Hawks and Sonics (they left when we told them we are spending no more tax dollar). Why should our tax be used to help private businesses?

Oh, I for got we are spending our tax money on AIG, CITIBANK, GM, CHRIYSLER Last I check, they are private companies. I am working to make money to pay tax so that idiots at those private companies can get paid huge bonus. What a deal. I would like to be on the receiving end of that transaction. The only way I can do this is to make company big and run it down. Run it down part is somewhat new to me.

#Life #Politics #Society

Cyber Marketing

3月

19日

Cyber marketing. I have been spending last few weeks exploring what Linked In can do, or I should say what I do in Linked In. first of, I needed to join groups and participate in discussions. It is not easy. You so not want to SPAM people. So, I stayed away from creating a discussion. Instead, I focus on responding to some of the discussions. I try not to sell anything, but it is hard.

Like real networking, if you are quiet, nothing will come to you. You must be active in updating your profile, making sure you enter what you are working on and actively searching for people to link to. You also want to join groups. I have joined, eMarketing Association Network, Golf Executive Club, Hosting Industry, Linked:Seattle, Seattle Executives Association, SMB Technology Network, Software as a Service (SaaS) Group, Washington Technology Industry Association (WTIA) and Web Standards Design + Development groups within Linked In.

Now I must spend time to check each group and read discussions and reply to relevant postings. That is in addition to my personal blogs in English and Japanese. I am spending a lot of time in front of computer. But I am starting to realize that there is a real business potential in cyber space. Many of the sites are free but you need to account for time you spent. When you start generating leads from your participation in Linked In and other sites, you may need someone full time to just do that.

I never thought about cyber marketing can be a business by it self, but it is real. I seriously need to think about this and act very quickly.

#Business #Marketing