Sadly, the ushering in of 2009 has also signaled the end of those wacky "Novelty New Year" glasses. I've been telling people for weeks that they should stock up on these 2009s because with that awkwardly placed '1' in next year's date, this will be the final year of their charm.

My prediction was more accuarate than I imagined. Richard Sclafani and Peter Cicero, two beer buddies and Seattle inventors thought up the idea for the novelty glasses way back in 1990. Back then the big loops in the nines created a very prosperous decade followed by even more convenient zeroes in the new millenium.

As it has turned out, the increasing use of knock-off glasses bought at party shops and street corners from Times Square to the Space Needle have killed all the profit these two geniuses collected over the years. It's a sad turn of events, but interesting to realize that one forward thinking pair does still own patent 335,134 for "Novelty Eyeglass Frames".

The Seattle Times has a very interesting feature story on the pair here.

There were quite a lot to pick from, but I think the best representation is this list The Big Money put together.

Sit back, relax, relive the pain and hope for a bullish 2009.

Turns out text-messaging prices are a complete scam. Most phone carriers pay almost nothing for the service of sending and receiving space-limited text messages, but have recently upped the basic rate. It's pure profit, baby!

This will be my first time ever embedding a straight up Fox News video. Maybe this will be a great year?

Look out for the brilliant stock 'text messaging' b-roll that shows a "Missed da train!" text.

"Brandless Water" is a new company capitalizing on the crowded bottled water marketplace.

The idea behind Brandless is to find a distinction between over-branded logos and user-submitted designs. The Brandless bottles are ultra-minimalist. They only feature a small barcode design for scanning purposes in store.

Shown to the left are three of the most popular models - Dumbells, Giving The Finger, and Super Mario Pipe.

The Brandless website is equally plain and minimalist. However prices for the bottles of water start at $2.99, so someone is probably earning a decent profit.

As far as consumer advocacy, I guess it's one step above 'Tap'd' - the water company that literally bottles and markets New York City's delicious tap water. But personally, I'll always be a Fred man, myself.

Brandless via Animal NY

Happy New Year!

One of the most hilarious and viral videos we've seen in the past month has been the crazed Iraqi 'journalist' who threw BOTH his shoes at President Bush.

I'm still pissed off that the very next day the NY Post had the headline 'Lame Duck' on their cover to describe the incident. Were they blind? That was an exceptionally athletic and adroit duck to avoid those shoes on the part of President Bush. Nothing lame about it. Just because a pun is within reach doesn't mean you can just go about applying it when it's not accurate.

Either way, it looks like eBay is capitalizing on the shoe throwing incident with this mock-up for a clever new ad.

Sounds like everyone is getting a bit more practical and conservative with their fashion in the economic downturn. Does this mean we can't make fun of lame CEOs trying to look stylish anymore?

Just wanted to give you the heads up on this, for all those out there getting ready to redeem some holiday gift cards.

An interesting comparison is being made between good-natured but naive George Bailey from It's A Wonderful Life and the current state of economic peril derived from subprime lenders.

Portfolio made the original argument in full here, but I find it interesting to note that comparing Angelo Mozilo or some other dastardly and greedy subprime lender to George Bailey is a tough sell. Personality-wise, perhaps the greed is more similar to mean old Mr. Potter. After all, he's the one only looking out for himself.

But what it all comes down to is general business acumen. Sure, It's A Wonderful Life is a great story of honest people overcoming severe financial adversity, but it's really Bailey's naivety and unhindering trust in everyone to pay their bills that caused the whole problem. There's even a line of dialogue where Bailey discounts Potter as a heartless man for evicting tenants and homeowners who don't pay their rent or their mortgages. How is that "mean"? Is Potter supposed to just sit around and hope they'll pay up?

Judge for yourself after watching the beginning of this clip where Bailey and Potter duel on the reasoning behind lending to Ernie Bishop, the taxi driver (Who later became the namesake for Sesame Street's Ernie):

Here's a great Coca-Cola/Walmart holiday ad that I haven't seen enough of recently:

Unfortunately the American public at large polled by the Nielsen Ratings Company decided to name these 10 horrible commercials their 10 favorite for the season. Specifically the ad occupying the "#1 spot", how is this one even clever? Does it ever look like this at Walmart?

FBN's Adam Shapiro does some hard-hitting winter investigative journalism as he questions Bernie Madoff's former accountant, David Friehling.

Friehling's young (guido-esque?) son came out and threw some water on the Fox News Van. Also looks like Friehling the CPA is giving up his office space on account of the whole Madoff thing.

Also of note - the reason Friehling is at the police station: he was filing a complaint against Fox for harassing him.

I would love to get some of the year's best sound bites from financial news coverage and remix them into the ultimate economic downturn mash-up. I'd get Jim Cramer screaming "They know nothing" with Liz Claman dissin' CNBC in the chorus. Throw in Larry Kudlow's horribly grating tone with Neil Cavuto attempting to sound calm. Maybe I'd even give some props to Peter Schiff for being such a good predictor.

Don't worry, the music video will have all the hot on-screen visuals of 'the year in biz babes'.

Until this track drops, here is something to hold you over in the mean time. From The Big Money, an homage to the year when 'volatility', 'liquidity', 'recession', and 'Dow' became part of the general vernacular: