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Vulcan image by gageskidmore
As Geeks, we tend to spend our money (& time) differently than most people. The Debt Black Hole "Mind Meld"
is a special interview series designed to find out more about how Geek
actors, authors, journalists, artists, scientists, bloggers,
podcasters, entrepreneurs & others make, spend & manage their
money and fund their lifestyle.
This month's Mind Meld has been a long time coming. So many of the people I talk to about interviews are quite busy. And I don't think there are too many people I've interacted with who are busier than the ultimate movie Geek- Berge Garabedian (aka JoBlo) from JoBlo.com! Berge was
born in Holland to Armenian parents. He moved to Canada at the age of
eight, played a lot of hockey on the streets and eventually got an MBA
degree from McGill University. In 1998, he started a little website
called JoBlo.com which has grown into one of the most popular movie
fansites around the world (130k visitors/day). He enjoys movies, comic
books, poker and nachos. You can follow JoBlo on Twitter- @JoBlocom. 
>>What are your default movie/tv shows & genres?
I watch way too many movies to list here, but some of the ones I’ve
watched over 5-10 times include Star Wars, When Harry Met Sally, Alien,
Goodfellas, Total Recall, Jerry Maguire, Minority Report, The Matrix,
Edward Scissorhands. The TV shows I watch nowadays include “Curb your
Enthusiasm”, “American Dad”, “Eastbound & Down”, anything
sports-related like “PTI”, “Around the Horn”, etc…. I’m also Canadian
so anytime there’s hockey on TV, I’m there!
>>What kinds of stuff do you collect
(e.g. Action Figures, Comics, Props, Autographs, Art, etc.)?
A little bit of everything, to be honest with you. When I was a kid,
I collected hockey cards and comic books. I still own Wayne Gretzky’s
rookie card and X-Men #4 in near-mint condition. I probably still have
about 500 comic books in boxes, but mostly I buy graphic novels
nowadays, because I like to read them, as opposed to just slapping them
in plastic covers. Nowadays, I collect cool artwork for my home- my
current fave is Justin Reed Art (see 3 of his prints below)- you can purchase his reprints on AllPosters.com, as well as anything really awesome from Sideshow Collectibles- including my giant Hellboy “right hand of Doom”
(picture also below) in my office- tons of different busts including Iron Man, Incredible
Hulk and Alien, as well as anything to do with The Nightmare before
Christmas. I’ve also tried buying some cool memorabilia from movie
auctions, but they generally get really expensive, so I don’t end up
with shit, but I did win a prop from Kevin Smith’s JAY & SILENT BOB
STRIKE BACK, as well as the jacket Woody Harrelson wore throughout the
comedy KINGPIN. I dig that one.
>>What's the
pièce de résistance
of your collection?
Well, I mentioned a couple of them above (Gretzky card and X-Men
#4), but the first thing that I bought for my house was this 6-foot Jack
Skellington figure (pictured below) from Disney.com, and it still entertains folks to
this day. I actually wrote up a couple of articles
about my collection back in 2007, which you can read here and here. Videos of my DVD/BLU-RAY collection (from 2007) here.
>>What piece would you LOVE to add to your collection?
I’m waiting to become really rich before buying myself the life-size TERMINATOR figure from Sideshow Collectibles, which I would stick right in the entrance-way of my home…. ;) You
know, just to scare those people off who shouldn’t be there.
>>What projects/businesses are you involved with right now you'd like to promote to my readers?
The JOBLO MOVIE NETWORK is close to being complete in terms of
sections and what-not, but we’re refining what we have now and we’ll
soon be introducing a revamped front page, along with revamped news
sections, which we believe will only enrich the user experience on our
site. We recently launched our own YouTube channel which has already
garnered over 16,000,000 views in the past few months and continue to grow our brand across various social media
platforms, just because…well, apparently you have to do that nowadays!
(Twitter, Facebook, Reddit, Pinterest, etc….)
>>What is the last AMAZING book you read or movie you watched
(just pick one)
?
I honestly don’t read too many books anymore (magazines galore
though!), but the last book I read that was memorable for me was Deepak
Chopra’s REINVENTING THE BODY, RESURRECTING THE SOUL which helped me
through some health issues that I fought through over the past 5-6
years. I recommend it to anyone looking to get out of bad habits which
relate to your health issues. --------------------------------- Thanks again to Berge for allowing me to interview him for this installment of the Debt Black Hole "Mind Meld" interview series! If
you're a Geek actor, author, journalist, artist, scientist, blogger,
podcaster, entrepreneur or have friends/family/colleagues/acquaintances
who you think should participate in a Debt Black Hole "Mind Meld", please contact me on Twitter (@debtblackhole) or email me! I'm scheduling new interviews now!!! Have You Entered The Debt Black Hole $100 ThinkGeek Giveaway Yet?
CLICK THE GIFT CERTIFICATE ABOVE TO GET THE DETAILS!
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