Paid Media Creates Recognition, Earned Media Drives Recommendation. These Days, Brands are Opinions.
Without his mustache, he’d still be a mass-murdering, psycho-racist, but he’d be so much less…Fuhrer (photoshop courtesy of Buzzfeed).
Another totally-unrelated random thought from this past weekend: if you don’t believe we lose valuable things in the ever-increasing, pell-mell pace of modern life, than why did you miss that lost Daylight Savings hour so much Sunday? Hmm…
Tags: Adolph Hitler, Buzzfeed, Daylight Savings, Photoshop
Yesterday afternoon, I drove from Greenville, South Carolina to Charlotte, North Carolina. It’s a pretty easy trip: ninety miles of highway cutting across a softly rolling landscape littered with the occasional Waffle House and fireworks outlet. If it weren’t for the rich red earth piled around the occasional construction site, it could just as easily have been Pennsylvania or southern Ohio.
Just outside of Gaffney, this magnificent vision loomed out of the light fog, a monumental Claes Oldenburg vision of ripe, full peachiness. Officially, it’s known as “The Peachoid” which sounds rather unfortunate. Built at the outset of the 80’s, this 150 foot tall fully-functioning water tower stands as a testament to the local people’s civic pride and indignation. The state of Georgia gets all kind of credit for peaches, but South Carolina has long produced considerably more. The proud people of Cherokee County figure if it takes an enormous, Federally-funded, custom-painted tower replete with a seven ton green leaf to make that point, then so be it.
Local wags like to make fun of how, from certain angles, this shapely fruit makes an ass out of itself. But I found it nothing short of spectacular; a point of deserved civic pride and community art that immediately set my mouth watering for those sweet fuzzy skins of Summer.
You didn’t have to do that Gaffney, but you did. Bless you.
By Dennis Ryan, CCO, Element 79
Tags: Claes Oldenburg, Gaffney, Peaches, South Carolina, Summer, Waffle House
New techniques in behavioral targeting raise privacy issues very worthy of debate. Some might think this kind of thing is limited only to deep-pocketed, multi-national marketers. Au contraire…
As anyone who’s ever posted a blog realizes, the comments section attracts Spammers, or more specifically, their automated spambots. These annoying apps rove the web, looking for space to post paragraphs filled with endless variations of ”CHEAP VIAGRA!” In the year and half that I’ve been writing this weekly blog, a little filter Plugin from Akismet has stopped over 3,000 spams.
But the spammers seem to be getting wise. And they’re improving their come-ons. Increasingly, the spam Akismet captures for me includes a new generation that’s decidedly more subtle.
There’s now the “Blatant Appeal to the Blogger’s Ego” spam:
And it’s sibling, the “Blatant Appeal to the Blogger’s Ego with Uncalled for Enthusiasm” spam:
There’s the diligent variation, the “Blatant Appeal to the Blogger’s Ego with A Dutiful Promise of Follow Up Action, Despite the Odd Initial Automation Code Artifact” spam:
And there’s the exuberant variation, the “Blatant Appeal to the Blogger’s Ego that Starts With a Well-Recognized Web Brand” spam:
There’s the foot-in-the-door variant, the “Blatant Appeal to the Blogger’s Ego While Phishing for an E-Mail” spam:
Finally, there’s the type like this, which I’m sure is even cagier still, but the cyrillic type keeps me from ever really knowing:
If that last one offends anyone, I apologize. Seriously, it could pretty much say anything.
Tags: Akismet, Behavioral Targeting, Blog, Privacy, Spam, Spambots
Check out this 1969 IHOP spot that resurfaced around the internet this week. It is sixty seconds of wrong, from the polyester-clad balloonatic family tripping through a park in slo-mo to the unfortunate non-breakfast meals served at the table and most of all, the mopey sounding sad clown anthem apparently voiced by a syncopated Toulouse Lautrec on a helium binge. The tremolo track sounds as if they threaded the projector wrong. This ad lets its freak flag fly, and the effect is compellingly jaw-dropping…
Go ahead, make the easy drug references and try to explain away the cascading series of bad choices that lend this entire production a feeling of a badly-transferred vintage pharmaceutial ad for schizophrenia. This ad deserves the abuse. You can try to write it off to an unfortunate era but Led Zeppelin released their first album in 1969 and Neil Armstrong walked on the moon in 1969. The only plausible explanation could be that people were distracted by social upheaval.
But there’s one part of this experience that makes me wistfully nostalgic for IHOP. One image that sticks with me that still resonates powerfully for the brand: it’s iconic architecture. I don’t know if it would be classified as “Googie” or “Populuxe” or both; all I know is that the combination of a Disney-fied Old World Tudor with that steeply-pitched blue roof screamed “International House Of Pancakes” when I was growing up. It was fun, distinctive and absolutely unmistakable.
Compare then…and now. And tell me if the rising power of the line-item set doesn’t bum you out too.
Tags: 1969, Googie Architecture, IHOP, Led Zeppelin, Neil Armstrong, Polyester, Populuxe Architecture, Toulouse Lautrec, Wrong
So the Dude picked up the Best Actor award for Crazy Heart. Huh. That’s ‘gut-wrenching drama’ for you–Academy types eat it up. And yet this same group has no nose for comedy, and never has. All Jeff Bridges got for The Big Lebowski was the ongoing appreciation of legions of dialogue quoting fans, undimmed some twelve years later. The Dude abides…
Will “Bad” Blake? I don’t think so. Oh, his is a dramatic story–talented songwriter loses himself in booze/stumbles into a good-hearted woman/tries to fly right/fails/drinks himself into a puddle/hits rock bottom/decides to get sober/bravely faces one day at a time/the end. And yet, despite the considerable skills of Bridges, Maggie Gyllenhaal and even Robert Duvall, it was every bit as boringly predictable as it sounds. Oh it was dramatic–pukingly so–but that’s the problem. Drama can be so annoyingly formulaic. “I’m an addict–look at my journey!” ”I’ve got a disease–look at my plight!” ”I’m a beaten survivor–look at me every freakin’ night on Lifetime™!” Everyday, drama fills the Metro section of every major city’s dying newspaper. Gather a few talented actors, tell the sad story, then pick out your sparkly dress for the award show…
Now comedy is a whole another animal. To really work, it has to be new and unexpected. It can not survive without surprise. And that’s why comedy has a hard time gaining broad critical mass; it has a thousand niches and a thousand tiny audiences. Arenas full of people may enjoy Dane Cook; and yet the internet teems with people convinced he’s ‘not funny’ (proof he has been at least sporadically hilarious here). Almost every Pixar movie ever made qualifies as a comedy, despite the box-office poison of being ‘family friendly.’ And while The Hangover may not be everyone’s cup of tea, it became the third highest grossing R rated film ever in the U.S. last Summer.
People can agree on what constitutes drama: “My, what a terrible choice they gave Sophie.” But comedy comes in all sorts of flavors, from SpongeBob to Borat. What is hacky and broad to one group is inspired and hilarious to another. What feels tame to some is waaaay over the line to others. Worse, you need surprise in your material, which makes comedy really, really hard.
None of this amounts to particularly fresh insight of course, But it hopefully adds context to why for me, the big acting performance of the weekend didn’t happen Sunday night on the Oscars but Saturday night on pay-per-view. My wife and I ordered the uneven, but largely funny The Invention of Lying. In this slight film, the singular delivery of Ricky Gervais stands as a far more jaw-dropping achievement than the dramatic drunkenness of even the likable Jeff Bridges.
Gervais is pants-wettingly funny. He delivers lines brilliantly, but what he does perhaps better than anyone on the planet, is react. His reacting skills tower above the norm. He can deliver the quick reaction with great style but he’s far more amazing when dissembling over the course of ten to thirty seconds, doing nothing more than reacting with a constant stream of inventive nuance. In an industry thick with action heroes, he is the definitive re-action hero.
In the scene pictured at right, Gervais has just convinced his unrequited love that sex outside of marriage is a no-no, thus ruining Rob Lowe’s character’s designs on her. For a moment, he is the picture of smug self-satisfaction until he opens his birthday card and finds her handwritten coupon for birthday sex. Caught in his own web, his face meticulously catalogues the slow realization of his error over the course of twenty-two hilarious seconds. It is nothing but a reaction shot, executed by a virtuoso master of the art.
And in that reaction, that pitch-perfect, undeniably fresh and surprising reaction, Ricky Gervais reveals the depth of his truly remarkable talent. Even if it’s not the kind of performance that will win him an Oscar.
Comedy like that sticks with you. Ricky Gervais abides.
Tags: Borat, Crazy Heart, Dane Cook, Drama, Jeff Bridges, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Pixar, Ricky Gervais, Robert Duvall, SpongeBob, The Academy Awards, The Dude, The Hangover, The Invention of Lying, The Oscars, The Reaction Shot
That’s right–Sunday night I skipped the show and conducted an experiment: just how different would it be to experience the Oscars in a crowdsourced way, by logging onto Twitter and only following anything with an #oscars hashtag? Would it be as interesting to hear other’s thoughts about hosts Steve Martin and Alec Baldwin instead of developing my own? Would the community discussion influence how I felt about the ridiculously-addendumed title “Precious: Based on the novel “Push” by Sapphire”? Would I be more involved with an annual event I find leaden and boring?
No. No. And no. Experiencing the Oscars via Twitter doesn’t change much at all, aside from robbing one of seeing the dress Charlize Theron wore that apparently featured Cinnabons as pasties. In the end, I lasted about an hour and a half before snapping off the laptop and heading for bed…which pretty much mirrors how I experience the show on TV every year.
Twitter isn’t a replacement medium, it’s an adjacent medium–a way to add sociability to an otherwise snoreburger fest of sitting in front of the tube and waiting for something to happen. In the totally ephemeral 140 characters of @waxgirl333: “#oscars would be so boring without twitter” She’s right–it brings an engaging new layer to passively watching any major telecast, whether it’s the Academy Awards or the Super Bowl or the Olymics (Curling? Yes. Hockey? No–the game moves waaay too fast.). During the long, boring stretches, you can check Twitter and see if anyone has something snappy to say.
Ultimately, the show didn’t hold my attention for three or four hours, but then again, few things do. That said, from the literally tens of thousands of tweets that popped up during my shortened stint, here are twenty favorites:
@ trentvanegas LMAO!!!! As did the rest of the viewing audience #oscars RT @EW At Elton John party: The whole crowd just gasped at the sight of Judd Nelson
@ tommytrc RT @DonaBogart: Ouch. The John Hughes Tribute made me feel very old. #oscars
@MC1487 The song “Thank Heavens for Little Girls” will always creep me out, no matter the context. #Oscars #CreepyCreepy
@JacqKD Funny how Taylor Hackford doesn’t mention “Texas Chainsaw Massacre” in his career. #Oscars
@lilnerdette RT @popcandy: Actually, here’s a place where you can watch all of the animated shorts: http://bit.ly/j0KyP
@SuburbanTurmoil Hey Rachel McAdams. Grandma called. She wants her curtains back. #oscars
@ianedgar Weird racially profiling direction. Black people react to other black person winning prize! They must be so proud. #oscars
@TheOnion: King Latifah Returns For Wife http://onion.com/78XfU7 #Oscars
@matthewcrosby Not seen Precious but it looks like the world’s most depressing Eminem video #oscars (via @sonnypike)
@mtgcolorpie Coming up: Tyler Perry, Sarah Jessica Parker and a salute to horror films. My favorite sentence ever. /throws up
@TheDaveCarlson “Well I already have two of these” is the FAIL of the night. #oscars
@kateritchie Did charlieze not think before placing two cinnabons on top of her chest? Stylist fail. #oscars
daddyscratches I can’t remember ever seeing so many painfully sharp-looking shoulder blades and frightfully tissue-free collarbones in one place. #oscars
@moviecricket #oscars 12 down, 12 to go. Settle in, folks. On the bright side, no musical numbers since Neil Patrick Harris.
@quinnnorton: Have just realized this is the original awkward reality show. #oscars
@sreenet: Avatar: The second time you watch it, the special effects get better, but the acting and dialog get worse. #oscars
@NOLAnotes This co-hosting thing is not doing it for me. Two talents squandered instead of the usual one. #oscars
@nowtoronto Best way not to get your acceptance speech cut short: “Thirteen years ago, the doctors told me I wasn’t going to survive …” #oscars
@akmcquade Why isn’t bob costas explaining the difference between sound mixing and osund editing? #shutupcostas #oscars
@andylevy The first four hours of this show have really flown by! #oscars
Tags: Charlize Theron, Cinnabon, Precious: Based on the novel "Push" by Sapphire, social networking, The Oscars, Twitter
Technology makes this a halcyon time in human development. Medicine advances mightily on nanotechnology, computing speed and power doubles at such a stunning rate as to confine hardware to a state of perpetual obsolescence. My smartphone makes me feel stupid…
Well, not 'say' so much as 'type'
But like most things in life, technology’s benefits can be a double-edged sword. Our unprecedented digital interconnectedness made possible through web 2.0 creates both amazing opportunities for human good (after two weeks, people texting “90999″ to benefit tbe Red Cross’ Haitian relief raised $8 million, $10 at a time) and ugly examples of our basest impulses (browse the comments below basically any agencyspy.com post).
Which is why I can’t help but view a new website called “BetterMe.com” with deep suspicion. Its premise is depressingly unassailable: “open, honest communication is crucial, but not always easy.” Think about that–their entire business plan relies on our fundamental gutlessness when it comes to telling hard truths. BetterMe’s solution is anonymous opportunities to give, get and solicit feedback on any issue you’d like, from the professional (how would you rate my presentation style?) to the personal (how would you rate my hairstyle?).
Browsing through the site, the creators clearly intend this as a helpful tool. Under a page titled “Why it Works” they cite the power of anonymity and privacy to encourage genuine honesty and honest, constructive feedback.
But are we really so spineless that it has to come to this? Is honesty so difficult that we need this crutch to learn what people really think? Good intentions notwithstanding, will something like this be used for good or perverted for evil? It’s like the promise of time travel: would you use it to go back in time and stop Hitler or bet on Superbowl games since you know the outcome?
There’s a reason the expression is “Face it.”
Tags: Anonymity, BetterMe.com, Feedback, Haitian Relief Text "90999", Web 2.0
Mary Jo Foley, who regularly blogs on ZDNet regarding all things Microsoft, wrote a post yesterday describing how CEO Steve Ballmer neither confirms nor denies any purchase interest in Twitter. Responding to a question on Tuesday about whether he might buy the microblogging service outright, Ballmer did little more than top line pro and con arguments. In just five sentences, he used “not clear” twice and “far less clear” once.
In an earlier time, this kind of non-response response would suggest he’s dodging the question. But these days, there’s a very good chance the Microsoft leader is doing something far cagier…
He may be crowdsourcing it.
With all their resources, Microsoft can get a raft of M&A analysts on the job in no time (and no doubt already has). But as Ballmer goes on to say in his (non)response, “…as an independent, they have a lot of value and a lot of credibility, I think, with their user community. Would they have that same credibility with the user community if they were captive? Not clear.”
For those keeping score, that was his third “not clear.”
My supposition doesn’t mean he can’t make the decision on his own–quite the contrary. Ballmer definitely will make the call. But he might not be at that point yet. Raising the issue might be a brilliant tactic to quickly amass informed opinion from a huge diversity of viewpoints–a treasure trove of input unfettered by corporate myopia and much more representative of the marketplace. Just by suggesting the argument, someone of his stature fires online debate among informed and passionate industry pundits and opinion leaders. In short order, he will be able to assess a wide spectrum of prevailing thinking on issues like how Microsoft might leverage Twitter, how it could evolve this new asset into a ‘real time search’ unit, and how to align social-computing technology into Windows. Best of all, these perspectives come fast, cheap, and readily accessible.
Crowdsourcing opinion in this manner makes smart business sense. The final purchase opinion will be his, but the information informing it could come from sources far and wide.
Tags: Crowdsourcing, Mary Jo Foley, Microsoft, Steve Ballmer, Twitter, ZDNet
CTA Bus, Eastbound 290
On the plus side, they don’t belabor strategy and display admirable focus…
Tags: 290, CTA, Transit Advertising
If you are in your forties, you remember the early days of cable television when it did not carry commercials. And if you’re now a parent in your forties, you recognize just how saturated Disney Channel, Nickelodeon and the rest have become with their non-stop barrages of pop-up ads and relentless cross-promotion.
Marketers voraciously consume any platforms that aggregate a market, be it through broadcast or narrowcast. Thus Fan pages and the ever-expanding reach of Facebook Connect, CMO Twitter feeds and iPhone apps. It’s impossible to deny that advertising messed up cable when it was a nascent phenomenon, just as it will soon mess up Facebook, Twitter, et al. That’s already begun to happen as those platforms scramble for ways to cash in on marketing dollars and ’synergies’, but at the moment, the larger threat to Social Networks is legislation.
In Erik Sass’ provocative piece for MediaPost, he describes how the FDA is investigating the way over-the-counter pharmaceutical manufacturers leverage social media. This government body has already announced that they are considering imposing a code of conduct; a possibility that prompted the Word of Mouth Marketing Association (WOMMA) to submit its own voluntary standards in hopes of fending off legislation. The result has been loads of theoretical conjecture and debates over the limits of various marketers’ “spheres of influence.”
Pharma messages have always carried heavy legal constraints. If you watched the Olympic coverage of the Four Man Bobsled Finals, you saw three different pharma ads for three different products, each saddled with a disclaimer that mentioned the same potential side effect of “suicidal thoughts.” That’s a pretty strong deterrent in an erstwhile sales message; “On second thought, maybe I’ll just learn to live with my Restless Leg Syndrome, Doc…”
And so regulatory agencies will try to clamp down on social network messages, an act that will inevitably expand beyond marketers to influence and limit individual networking. Safeguards, filters, guidelines: right now, they are set at the platform level but soon, expect to see them emanating from regulatory bodies.
I don’t think this because I’m a pessimist, it’s just that I’ve seen it before. You know, back when MTV aired music videos.
Yeah, I know. I’m in my forties.
Tags: CMO Twitter Feeds, Disney Channel, Facebook, FDA, iPhone apps, Jeff Zuckerberg, Nickelodeon, OTC Pharma, Pharma Advertising, Regulation, Restless Leg Syndrome, Social Networks, Twitter, WOMMA
