Mark Schneider from MusicDirect (who posts as FZMan here on Head-fi) came over to my table at CanJam and told me he wanted me to listen to the effect of a new Mobile Fidelity (a brand name MusicDirect owns) called Sonic Connect, which is a two-step contact cleaning fluid system.
Info on it: http://www.musicdirect.com/product/83026
Mark knows that I am pretty skeptical of “tweaks” – for someone who is a long-time audiophile, I have been pretty tweak-free. I think that cables only marginally effect sound (meaning much, much less than amps or source components), and that I have never gone for anything like cable risers, or magic discs, or anything like that. At least in the case of contact cleaner, I can see that there is a good reason to use it – but the question he had for me was, could I hear an immediate difference?
So Mark put some Sonic Connect on my headphone plug. The process is pretty simple. You put on the Step one fluid, wipe off the excess, and then apply the Step two, and again wipe off the excess. Cloths for wiping are included. Mark then handed me back my headphones. I was surprised. I could immediately hear a cleaner treble, and more transparency. I was impressed enough to take home some of the fluids, to see if the effect was repeatable.
So I went about cleaning things that were easy to clean and then get a fairly quick A/B on – RCA plugs, headphone plugs, etc. And sure enough, to varying degrees, when I used the stuff, I would hear the treble clean up, and the overall transparency improve. I didn’t really notice any other changes, but just based on that, this stuff seems worth the $50 asking price to me, given that I think it’s a good idea to use a contact cleaner ANYWAY.
So check this stuff out – if you don’t hear an improvement, I will be surprised, just as I was when I heard one for the first time 
