November 1, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Lewis Lazare: Chicago-based veteran creative Gordon Robertson is giving Chicago something it needs more of -- a new boutique ad agency.

Robertson is teaming with Brainforest, a design firm specializing in Web, identity and strategic development, to launch the city's newest boutique shop, called Sway Creative Group, which will function as the advertising division at Brainforest. Clients at Brainforest include Motorola, Union Leasing, WXRT-FM and Millennium Park.

Robertson, formerly a group creative director at BBDO/Chicago, hopes to provide clients with the proverbial "big ideas" he hopes will work on both a visceral and rational level.

Robertson sees another opportunity at Sway. "As an industry, we've gotten away from advertising as a sales tool," he said. "Either it's hard-sell, hurry-in-now retail, or it's clever and soft, and often times irrelevant. I believe in doing advertising that moves a consumer along the path to a sale."

November 1, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

The Work Environment Index (WEI), rates working environments in all 50 states and Washington, D.C., in terms of average pay, employment opportunities, employee benefits, percentage of low-income workers, fair treatment between genders and ability for employees to unionize. It is the first index to evaluate worker climate as opposed to business climate on a state-by-state basis, and was developed by researchers at Political Economy Research Institute (PERI) at the University of Massachusetts. The WEI is included in PERI's new study, Decent Work in America.

A major finding of the study is a consistent correspondence between the quality of a state's environment for workers and its economic health. States ranking high on the list generally have faster economic growth and lower poverty rates, and conversely, states at the bottom of the list tend to have slower economic growth and higher poverty rates.

Delaware, New Hamshire and Minnesota are the top three states for worker climate. The lowest ranking states are found throughout the Sun Belt, or Bible Belt.

November 1, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Steve Rubel advises clients to let go of the idea that they can stuff their blog full of old-style advertising.

Give us a reason to read your blog. Give us something we can't find anywhere else. Provide information that your customers, partners and prospects care about, not necessarily what you care about. Be a resource and a connector.

This goes against the grain of how some organizations think. They want to talk about their widgets and how great they are.

You mean we can't just tell people how great our product is day after day?

Nope.

November 1, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

According to Wieden + Kennedy's London office, these guys - Dave and Ian - were outside this morning with their banner, no doubt encountering all sorts of abuse from passing students, drunks and conceptual artists.

November 1, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Media Post: Led by a surge in entertainment spending, U.S. consumers shelled out $987 million for online content during the first half of this year, marking a 16 percent increase from the first half of 2004, according to a report issued Monday by the Online Publishers Association.

Spending at entertainment and lifestyle soared by about 45 percent to $265 million in the first half of this year, from $183 million in the first six months of 2004. Almost half of the total entertainment/lifestyle spending--$115 million--was from single-purchase sales, such as digital music.

Other categories showing large gains were research sites, which surged by 39 percent to $73 million; games, which grew by 23 percent to $54 million; personal growth, which jumped 19 percent to $58 million; and personals and online dating sites, which grew by 8 percent to $245 million.

Still, the vast majority of Web surfers--around 89 percent--didn't pay for any content as of this June.

November 1, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

John Moore considers Adweek's report, Measuring Buzz.

The major reason why word-of-mouth hasn’t taken off is not because marketers lack the metrics to measure it. It’s because most products, services, and businesses simply aren’t worth talking about.

Johnnie Moore picks up on his thinking and adds to it.

Most boring conversations are only a heartbeat away from being very interesting... all it takes is one participant to take an emotional risk. I think the dullest business can have an interesting conversation, the moment it is willing to take the risk of getting out of bullshit mode.

November 1, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 2 Comments

c|net: "It is time to say that electricity and the Internet are very similar in end users' eyes," the sandy-haired Veljo Haamer said over a cup of smoky black tea.

Haamer, one of Estonia's unofficial chief geeks, is largely responsible for a level of Wi-Fi connectivity-–even in remote areas-–that puts the biggest cities in America to shame. For the last three years, he and a handful of volunteer evangelists with the WiFi.ee organization have successfully lobbied Estonian cafes, hotels, hospitals, city parks, local governments and even major gas stations to start offering Net access, helping to design and set up the networks.

The results have been nothing short of astounding. I recently spent nearly three weeks traveling around the small Baltic country, and found that in small-town cafes, city parks--even in a remote national park in a town without so much as a bar or restaurant-–I was able to turn on my laptop and go online at the touch of a button.

November 1, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

November 1, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Mobile technology evangelist and Yahooligan, Russell Beattie, went on one of his patented rants the other day. It's good stuff.

It just seems that no one is trying to change the world any more. No one is aiming to create “insanely great” products or do the impossible. Why not? Why are so many people grasping at the low-hanging fruit, when there’s so much more goodness for everyone if they just stretched a little higher?

No one seems to be coming up with the next interesting new business model. I’m not looking for anything wacky, but there’s got to be better ways for your site to make money than waiting for Google to send you an AdSense check every month. Seriously, everyone seems to think the Text Ad Train is just going to keep on rolling forever. It’s not. Where is the new innovation to keep things moving? Remember, Google stumbled upon the way to do it right, but someone came up with the Contextual Advertising concept first and his name was Bill Gross. Where is that type of new innovator?

Actually, where are all the personalities, period? Where is the hubris of Jobs? Where is the unrelenting focus of Gates? Where is the arrogance of Ellison? Come on, let’s get some new budding tech-industry stars out there! I want to see someone’s face on the cover of freakin’ Time soon, you know? It’s been at least a year since Larry and Sergey… Come on! Who’s next?

Why not think big? Let's see, there's always fear of failure. And laziness. If we put those hypothetical hindrances aside, strictly for the sake of discussion, I'd say there are some big ideas floating around our realm, the ad realm.

I know for myself, just a few years ago I was still transfixed by the possibility, however distant, of seeing my best work in CA's Advertising Annual. Now, I never think of it.

I think about being a consumer advocate, about having the client's ear when it matters, about building bridges between the camps. I think about blogs helping to reinvent the art of copy, about storytelling being on the rise, about what it all means for brands and my careeer. I think about what's under AdPulp's hood, about where we want to go with it, about how to share all that in measured bursts.

November 2, 2005 by Dan Goldgeier | Permalink | 0 Comments

As part of her "Naked Career" podcasts, Sally Hogshead lands what they call in show bidness a big "get": Nancy Vonk, Co-CD of Ogilvy Toronto, whose comments about Neil French...well, if I have to fill in that part, you must've been in the Kalahari for the last month.

You can download the podcast at Talent Zoo's website or by searching on "Radio Talent Zoo" on The iTunes' Music Store podcast section. It should be up by 9:00 this morning.

November 2, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 3 Comments

Lewis Lazare: He's baaaack! Thomas Kemeny that is, the plucky Columbia College/Chicago valedictorian who graduated last spring with the dream of becoming an ad man. Soon after graduating, Kemeny departed for an internship at the very hot and happening Crispin Porter + Bogusky ad agency in Miami.

Now Kemeny has returned to Chicago, where he continues to learn his craft as a free-lancer at the city's largest agency, Leo Burnett. The Crispin gig, Kemeny told us Tuesday, was a real learning experience.

That's great, but we wanted to know what the vibe was like at Crispin, especially compared to shops he has interned at in Chicago. Very fast-paced, he said, perhaps because a lot of the Crispin staff were East Coasters, with a hefty infusion of Texans for good measure. And the hours were very long. "Twenty-hour days weren't uncommon," Kemeny said.

November 2, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

The New York Times: Wal-Mart Stores came to Manhattan last night for a peak at a movie about itself. But before it got the chance, a Wal-Mart consultant was told to leave the theater after the director accused him of trying to secretly record the film.

Minutes into the premier of the film, "Wal-Mart: The High Cost of Low Price," the director, Robert Greenwald, said he spotted the consultant pointing his open cellphone toward the screen. A confrontation ensued in the lobby. "Get out of here," Mr. Greenwald yelled, according to the director and a Wal-Mart spokeswoman. "This is a disgrace."

The spokeswoman, Mia Masten, said she and two consultants had bought tickets to the screening "to find out what they were saying so we can correct it." Ms. Masten said the consultant who was asked to leave, John Marino, was trying to call her because she was running late.

"Why would we record it?" she said, "We bought tickets."

The incident is the latest chapter in escalating public relations battle between Wal-Mart and its critics. The retailer has set up a rapid response war room in Arkansas to monitor its critics, and sent media specialists to Manhattan as part of the effort.

Rick Jacobs, the chairman of Brave New Films, which is distributing the film, said he was considering filing charges against Wal-Mart and the consultant for attempted piracy. "You can't just go in and record a movie," Mr. Jacobs said. "Wal-Mart should know. They are the largest seller of DVD's in the country."

November 2, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 1 Comments

2005 GRAND PRIZE WINNER
Morning Crave

10 White Castles
2 cups shredded cheddar cheese
10 eggs
1 tbsp. chopped onion
Dash of pepper
1 tsp. salt
1/2 to 1 lb. crumbled bacon or sausage
4 cups milk
1/2 tsp. dried mustard
1 tbsp. parsley flakes

Line bottom of greased 9” x 13” casserole dish with White Castles. Sprinkle cheese over sandwiches. Beat eggs, add milk and all ingredients except bacon or sausage. Pour egg mixture over cheese and sprinkle bacon or sausage on top. Cover with foil and refrigerate overnight. Bake uncovered at 325 degrees for one hour. Let sit before serving.

Submitted by Karen Burke of Ft. Wright, KY. For creating the 2005 Grand Prize recipe, Karen will receive a Crave Case every week for an entire year!

November 2, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 3 Comments

Steve Is Bored contemplates the rise of table tennis.

Now that poker (the new hockey) has become mainstream programming, I recently read that the next big thing in televised sports will either be darts or ping-pong. The latter might have an edge because Killerspin (the 'Nike' of table tennis) is marketing Biljana "Biba" Golic as the 'Anna Kournikova of table tennis' (except that Biba can actually play).

According to Killerspin, Biba is 2-time Yugoslavian Champion in singles and mixed doubles, Balkan Champion in mixed doubles, and the Mediterranean Doubles Champion. Biba is a phenomenal athlete with a very aggressive style.

November 2, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

USA Today: Ford Motor says it will soon offer wireless mobile offices in its F-series pickups, an option aimed at building contractors and others who do business on the road.

Pricing isn't finalized, but it would cost around $3,000 for a wireless-equipped computer, printer and global positioning system, Ford spokesman Alan Hall said. Add-ons like a digital camera and credit card scanner also would be available.

Ford expects to offer the mobile office as a dealer-installed accessory in 2006. The system uses a flat Stargate Mobile computer, powered by the truck's battery and mounted on a stand between the driver's seat and passenger seat.

The computer has a touch-screen option — eliminating the need for a keyboard or mouse — and is designed to be removed from the stand and taken to a work site. It stays connected to the Internet via a broadband wireless cellular card.

The computer in the Ford pickups will be equipped with office software, including Excel spreadsheets and PowerPoint, and also can play music or be used for navigation.

Around 60% of F-series buyers use their trucks for business.

November 2, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 1 Comments

Fortune has named O+M CEO, Shelly Lazarus, one of the most powerful women in business for 2005.

According to Fact Monster, Shelly graduated from Smith College in 1968 and earned an MBA from Columbia University in 1970, where she was one of four women in her class. She started working at Clairol, but within a year switched to Ogilvy & Mather. After a series of promotions, Lazarus was named president of North American operations in 1994. In the early 1990s, Lazarus scored two major coups: she won the American Express account, and made Ogilvy the exclusive agency for IBM, whose advertising had been split between 40 agencies. She took over from Charlotte Beers as CEO in 1996.

November 2, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

We Make Money Not Art points to this AP Photo from Muzaffarabad, Pakistan, where advertising billboards are repurposed to serve as rain covers on the tents of earthquake refugees.

November 2, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

David Pogue has some rules for electronics makers who want some consumer love this holiday season (and beyond).

Worship at the altar of good design and make customer satisfaction your religion. These should be your commandments.

I. Thou shalt not entomb thy product in indestructible plastic.

II. Thou shalt hire native English speakers to translate thine instruction manual.

III. Thou shalt not hype irrelevant specs.

IV. Thou shalt not charge tech-support fees for thine own mistakes.

V. Thou shalt not participate in rebate rip-offs.

VI. Thou shalt not hide from thy customers.

VII. Thou shalt remember the customer's phone number.

VIII. Thou shalt not prevent "zeroing out" of thy phone-mail maze.

IX. Thou shalt not hog the power strip.

X. Thou shalt not plan obsolescence.

Great advise. And applicable well beyond gadgetry.

November 2, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Night Agency interviewed Steve Hall of Adrants last week. Here's an excerpt:

Night Agent: Steve Hall, what did you have in mind when you started Adrants? Were you launching a revolution or were you just bored?

Steve Hall: I wish I were that insightful. Actually, I started it during a period of unemployment in March 2002 as a way to stay in touch with the industry.

NA: Well, looks like you are in touch now!

SH: I seem to be. Or so I’m told

NA: You’re media today, probably on top of any good PR person’s priority list. How does this feel?

SH: Well…. in one way it feels as though I’m just a cog in the big PR machine. In another it feels as though Adrants has been validated as an important medium. And in another, it just makes me feel as though, personally, people respect what I have to say.

November 2, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Reveries: You may call him mellow yellow (quite rightly) but creatives on Madison Avenue are calling pop icon Donovan Leitch and asking him if they can use his tunes in their commercials — and he’s usually happy to make the sale, reports Brian Steinberg in The Wall Street Journal. Lately, you may have heard Donovan’s “Happiness Runs” in an ad for Delta Airlines or “Catch the Wind” for Volvo.

As for Donovan himself, he seems only too happy to answer a series of questions about his new kind of commercial success, as posed by Brian Steinberg, starting with: “…Are you concerned about being accused of selling out?” Donovan: “Embracing the modern world and invading the pop charts is what the bohemian folk singers did … I consider commercials not selling out, but selling in, and of course, attracting many younger fans who have already written to me from the commercials saying they discovered my music or rediscovered it in an ad, and found something special to them that was missing in the artists they were listening to.”

When asked about Bob Dylan’s 2004 appearance in an commercial for Victoria’s Secret, Donovan replies: “… It didn’t bother me … It’s using pop culture as pop art … I didn’t think it was a problem if Bob wants to do lingerie. After all, he wore makeup on many an occasion, you know.” And as to the potential of the rest of his catalog to be used in other ads, Donovan says: “I have amassed an enormous amount of songs about every particular condition of humankind — children’s songs, marriage songs, death songs, love songs, epic songs, mystical songs, songs on leaving, songs of meeting, songs of wonder. I pretty much have got a song for every occasion.” He adds: “… There isn’t three weeks go by … that a film company or TV company or commercial agency doesn’t ask for one of my songs … There is another pile on the table today… “

November 3, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

The New York Times: Sirius Satellite Radio is joining the growing ranks of media outlets that accept liquor advertising, as it begins running musical commercials for Diageo's Tanqueray gin.

Neither Sirius Satellite Radio nor its rival, XM Satellite Radio, carries commercials on any of its scores of music channels. Both carry spots on most of their talk, sports, news and entertainment channels, although there are fewer commercials than during a typical hour on a traditional, or terrestrial, radio station.

XM already accepts liquor advertising, and has run commercials for brands like Jack Daniel's Tennessee whiskey, sold by a unit of Brown-Forman.

The arrival of liquor advertising on Sirius is emblematic of how the relationships between marketers and media companies are being transformed as consumers embrace new options like satellite radio.

"These days, the media are as important as the message," said Chris Parsons, a vice president for marketing at Diageo in New York, particularly in reaching "the leading-edge consumer" who is an early adopter of new technologies.

Diageo turned to Sirius for the campaign, Mr. Parsons said, because it wanted to run the song commercial for two and a half minutes; traditional radio stations and networks generally do not accept spots longer than 60 seconds.

In addition to Sirius, the Tanqueray song used in the spot can be heard on and downloaded from tanqueray.com and getyouriceon.com. About 30,000 copies of the song on CD's are being given away at performances by the comedian Mike Epps on a national tour through January that is being sponsored by Tanqueray.

Grey and Diageo plan to add an additional Web site, tanqueraytracks.com, on Nov. 14, which will offer a series of brand-track songs, including a holiday tune.

November 3, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 7 Comments

I have not heard much about Seattle's Wong Doody, of late. That could be my own fault, or it may have something to do with WD not putting time or energy into press releases (those dinosaur speaking docs have little future). Either way, I was pleased to hear from Mario Schulzke at WD's LA office.

Los Angeles and traffic are inseparable. No matter where you are going, there is always the outside chance that you will be staring at the back of a Pontiac Aztec for the next 2 hours. In an effort to entertain these frustrated motorists and possibly educate them on how to avoid these situations, we created extremely long, handwritten billboards. When you are crawling along at 4mph, you have nothing but time. Each execution takes drivers inside the head of an outspoken and very talkative individual. The kind of person that chats you up on a five-hour airline flight across the country. After you take the time to read this individual’s opinions and observations, you are left with a choice. Stay informed with the KNX 1070 traffic report or continue to read the ramblings of your new traffic buddy.

Normally, an outdoor board should have fewer than five words. I like how the environmental conditions of LA at traffic time allow for this uprising. Here's the copy from the board:

Anyone out there who says they like pina coladas and getting caught in the rain is a liar. Now, I can understand one or the other, but both? I don't think so. Tropical drinks and untimely precipitation go together about as well as corduroy and sea otters. Speaking of, have you ever seen one of those things play with a ball? It is absolutely hysterical. Cross my heart, they look identical to Salvador Dali if Salvador Dali had been blessed with watertight fur and obscenely short arms. If you'd like to hear more of my observations, please continue to ignore the KNX 1070 traffic report.

That's 105 words, and very likely a Guiness World Record for long copy in an out-of-home execution. Nice work.

November 3, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 2 Comments

Adweek: The front row of seats on 15 public transportation buses in Greenville, S.C., bear black ribbons in memory of Rosa Parks, the Alabama cleaning woman who helped spark the civil rights movement by refusing to surrender her bus seat to a white man.

The ribbons carry the message, "Sometimes you have to sit down to stand up for something," and will remain on the bus seats through the end of this week. The work was conceived, created and financed by Erwin-Penland, an Interpublic Group advertising agency in Greenville.

Parks died Oct. 24 at the age of 92. Fifty years ago, she was arrested in Montgomery, Ala., for violating a law that required African Americans to sit in the back of buses. In response, the late Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. led a 381-day boycott of the Montgomery bus system that evolved into the civil rights movement.

Parks also was honored this week by becoming the first woman to lie in state in the Capitol rotunda in Washington, D.C.

November 3, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 3 Comments

Adfreak points to this Design Observer post from Michael Bierut, a partner at Pentagram. Bierut laments the decision by SBC to retire Saul Bass' iconic AT+T logo after the big merger is complete later this year.

Take a long, last look at Saul Bass's finest moment. AT&T will live on, but its logo is about to disappear.

In 1968, Saul Bass was hired to bring order to the system, and created a classic modern identity program. In Nixon-era America, Bass's simplified bell-in-circle logo, rigorous Helvetica-based typographic system and ochre-and-process blue color scheme became as familiar as the Coca-Cola signature. It was the ideal graphic analog for a phone system that was hailed as the best in the world, a virtually indestructable monopoly posing as a public utility: Ma Bell, utterly reliable and as ubiquitous as air.

Now, after 20 years of telecom chaos, SBC Communications, Inc., a descendent of Southwestern Bell, is taking over its former parent company: the child becomes the father to Ma, as it were. Their brand strategy lets them have their cake and eat it too. By retaining the AT&T name, they signal continuity. By replacing the Bass sphere with a "fresh, new logo," they signal vitality and change. Who's going to argue with that?

Graphic design, unlike architecture , leaves no footprint. When one of the best known logos in the world disappears overnight, the only hole created is in our collective consciousness. By New Year's Eve, Saul Bass's sphere will be no more. Will anyone mourn — or protest — its passing?

November 3, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 1 Comments

Holy crap. I've hit The Print Motherload.

Gerber asks that you "Fend For Yourself," in their wonderfully rendered print ads and online.

America, when did we become so soft?

When did we decide campgrounds needed laundromats? When the car stalled,whose bright idea was it to reach for a cell phone instead of a tool?

There was a time when the words "quick" and "fix" were never found together in the same sentence. When our homes needed to be built, we grabbed brothers, fathers and hammers, not a mouse that clicked on Mr. On-line Contractor. Our nation's great accomplishments were a testament to hard work, sweat and ingenuity. After all, we not only put a man on the moon, but built him a rover to drive while he was up there.

What will we achieve today?

Can we turn our cheek to the enemy known as convenience before it makes us helpless? Do we have what it takes to depend solely on ourselves?

As you ponder these questions, we invite you to join us on our mission.

We're Gerber®. We design the tools, knives and outdoor gear that are essential, not only for the task at hand, but for bringing back something lost: our self-reliance.

Gerber. Fend For Yourself.

According to the Kelley Awards, Johnshon Sheen in Portland, OR is the agency behind the work. When you visit the Johnson Sheen web site it now says Johnson Cowan Hanrahan. Which can be explained by this article from Portland Business Journal, wherein the reader discovers that Tim Hanrahan from Wieden + Kennedy joined the firm a year ago as Executive Creative Director.

November 3, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Kurt Vonnegut in Forbes:

What I do, which is becoming more and more impractical I think, is make people respond to idiosyncratic arrangements of 26 phonetic symbols and ten Arabic numbers in horizontal lines on a page. And there was a time when this was a form of home entertainment, and so it was worthwhile for people to learn how to read. But reading it is actually quite difficult--I mean it is as hard as learning to read music, and it’s a remarkable skill. And if you take ink on paper and make people respond to it, they themselves are going to have to be performers. It’s like arriving at a concert hall and being handed a violin, and you’re expected to play. That’s what we expect readers to do, perform themselves, because they’re half of the performance.

November 3, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 1 Comments

The Guardian: Mozart, Brahms and Bach have been enlisted to discourage youths from hanging around shops at seaside towns.

Classical music has been piped into Co-op stores at Seaton and Teignmouth in Devon for just over a week, and already youngsters who used to congregate near the doors have gone elsewhere.

The supermarket plans to experiment with different types of classical music to see if particular styles are more effective.

A Co-op spokeswoman said: "Classical music makes our shops less cool as places for youngsters to hang around. It is early days, but it does appear to be successful."

November 3, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Colin Diver, President of Reed College in Portland, OR has no need, nor love for ranking systems. Writing in The Atlantic, Diver utterly destroys U.S. News & World Report. It's an enjoyable read. And one the bloatosphere--whose members are too often obsessed with their Technorati rank, Google rank or Blogebrity status--might learn from.

For ten years Reed has declined to fill out the annual peer evaluations and statistical surveys that U.S. News uses to compile its rankings. It has three primary reasons for doing so. First, one-size-fits-all ranking schemes undermine the institutional diversity that characterizes American higher education. The urge to improve one's ranking creates an irresistible pressure toward homogeneity, and schools that, like Reed, strive to be different are almost inevitably penalized. Second, the rankings reinforce a view of education as strictly instrumental to extrinsic goals such as prestige or wealth; this is antithetical to Reed's philosophy that higher education should produce intrinsic rewards such as liberation and self-realization. Third, rankings create powerful incentives to manipulate data and distort institutional behavior for the sole or primary purpose of inflating one's score. Because the rankings depend heavily on unaudited, self-reported data, there is no way to ensure either the accuracy of the information or the reliability of the resulting rankings.

November 3, 2005 by Dan Goldgeier | Permalink | 8 Comments

I’ll readily admit that I’ve been waiting for my copy of Hadji Williams’ new book Knock The Hustle: How to Save Your Job and Your Life from Corporate America for 3 months now, since I first heard about it and saw the excerpts on his website.

And now that it’s here and I’ve read it, I can honestly say that this is the most provocative, eye-opening look at the advertising industry that I’ve ever read. Sorry, Luke Sullivan. Sorry, Sally Hogshead. Sorry, Phil Dusenberry. Sorry, David Ogilvy, Jerry Della Famina and Howard Gossage. Hadji’s got you folks beat by a mile.

Hadji Williams spent 13 years as a writer in various Chicago agencies, including BBDO and Uniworld (and if you’re in Chicago, you HAVE to get this book, because Hadji isn’t afraid to name names, or slightly disguise them and call some people out on their actions). By not being from an upper middle-class white neighborhood, the ad industry and how it operates turned out to be a revelation to him, although it was strangely familiar: pimping, whoring, hustling, drug-pushing, gambling—all thrive in corporate America, albeit in unique forms.

What’s really great is that Knock The Hustle isn’t just a rant about minorities in advertising or a personal memoir. It’s a transparent account of how the ad business operates—from creative concepting to client billing, new business presentations to office politics. And Hadji has plenty of concrete ideas on how the ad industry could change its practices, where most people in the business just give lip service to the notion of progress. Actually, there’s a good amount of wisdom that nearly any business in any industry can apply. If that weren't enough, many parts of this book are funny as hell.

It’s 378 pages long, and Hadji stacks it full of personal stories, business history, pop culture references and attributable quotes that range from The Bible to John F. Kennedy to Mya. But he also writes something on nearly every page that’s a nugget of genius (and if you’re not good with slang, keep Urban Dictionary handy). My words can’t do this book justice—you just have to read it and experience it. Much like Matt Beaumont’s e from a few years ago, everyone familiar with advertising will find something in KTH to relate to. Only here, it’s all true.

I think Hadji self-published this book, so you probably won't find it at your local bookstore. But you can order Knock The Hustle through the KTH website and on Amazon. Either way, get it. It’s a must-read for anyone in the advertising industry, particularly the people who want to be in the industry next week, or next year, or next decade.

November 4, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Lewis Lazare contemplates the tagline's place in motivational psychology.

For Two by Four/Chicago, the timing couldn't have been more perfect. The local shop was named ad agency of record for the Chicago White Sox a year ago, just in time to put in place an ad campaign for a season that would prove an unexpectedly historic one for the South Side baseball team.

For last season, Two by Four created the ad campaign tagline "Win or Die Trying," which at the time of its debut sounded rather extreme, even in the intensely competitive realm of professional sports. But who knows? Maybe in some small way, the team was pushed to achieve what it did because that tagline was in place throughout the season to remind them of their goal.

50 Cent's new film has a remarkably similar theme. I wonder if that means his film is bound for glory. Not!

November 4, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 1 Comments

Yahoo News: Julia King, 38, is part of an emerging class of women whom marketers call Yoga Mamas. These middle- and upper-income mothers are more style- and brand-conscious than their parents. No matter their income, they spend like lottery winners on their babies and toddlers. In the process, they're revolutionizing the baby-products market and forcing manufacturers and retailers of all sizes to adjust.

From the start, they are focused on active, fashionable, and fit pregnancies, and then on the fitness and well-being of their offspring. They tend to be more educated and have more disposable income to spend on fewer children than past generations. As a result, the $27 billion infant and preschool products business is growing more than 4% per year, faster than the overall toy, apparel, and furniture industries. "This group is influencing other moms who have money and plenty of moms who don't," says Timothy Dowd, a senior analyst at market research firm Packaged Facts. "Yoga Mama is pumping up sales across the board."

Marketers say the evidence is in the brisk sales of premium-priced products: Burt's Bees Buttermilk lotion is $8.99 and a top seller at drugstore.com; $11.50 buys a 2 oz. jar of popular California Baby Calendula Cream at Whole Foods Market; Italian leather toddler shoes are $129 at Nordstrom; Bugaboo strollers Yoga moms love for ergonomic design and brand cachet are $700 and up. And the appeal is well beyond Rodeo Drive and Manhattan's Upper East Side, where baby-bling-buying includes Gund brand diamond and emerald jewelry for newborns.

November 4, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Wired: In the first U.S. prosecution of its kind, FBI agents arrested a 20-year-old Los Angeles man Thursday on charges that he cracked some 400,000 Windows machines and covertly installed pop-up-generating adware on them, in a scheme that allegedly brought in $60,000 in ill-gotten profits.

Jeanson Ancheta faces a 17-count federal indictment charging him with two counts of conspiracy and various forms of computer intrusion and money laundering. The government is also seeking the seizure of more than $60,000 in cash, a used BMW and some computer equipment from the alleged hacker.

According to prosecutors, Ancheta used a customized form of the "rxbot" Trojan horse program to find and take control of large collections of vulnerable PCs, spinning them into "botnets" capable of being directed as one. He then installed ad-delivery programs from two adware firms: Quebec-based Gammacash and LOUDcash, which was purchased by adware giant 180solutions and renamed ZangoCash earlier this year.

Adware firms officially require their partners to obtain the user's permission first -- a step unscrupulous affiliates have been known to dispense with.

November 4, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Marketing guru Adam Hanft, founder and CEO of Hanft Unlimited queries Richard Florida in a Fast Company web exclusive.

Hanft: Does the importance of the Creative Class in driving innovation fly in face of the notion that technology makes geography insignificant? Are we becoming a world where free-agents work entrepreneurially, as "nowhereians" with a global soul, in Pico Iyer's term -- or a world where geography becomes even more important than it has been?

Florida: Both phenomena are at work, but in the end geography will remain as important as it's ever been. I wrote an article on this very subject in the October issue of the Atlantic Monthly, taking on Tom Friedman's assertions that "The World is Flat" and "you don't have to emigrate to innovate." In fact, the world is "spikier" than it's ever been, with economic growth and especially cutting-edge science and innovation concentrating in major urbanized regions. Between these regions are the valleys of this Spiky World, struggling to keep pace in the global economy.

Now, obviously free-agents are free to hop from peak to peak in this world, but it's a dangerous misconception that just because the world is "flat" for the privileged few (admittedly, an increasing number), it's flat for everyone.

As a creative thought worker who is not located in an urban creative center, I'm apt to take Florida's thinking with a grain of salt. For sure, our industry is organized in well established creative pockets, or ghettos, as the case may be. Yet, some of the best ideas (and work) consistently comes from "out of nowhere". Search for "Agencies in Strange Places" in the AdPulp search bar to see what I mean.

November 4, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

nola.com: Lamar Advertising Co. sustained $14 million in hurricane damage to its billboards in Louisiana and Mississippi, according to the company.

But the company's chief financial officer said new designs will cut future storm repair costs.

CFO Keith Istre said the storms would allow the company "to replace existing inventory with wind-resistant structures that are much more durable and have a much higher wind-resistance rating."

Some of the existing billboards could withstand winds of up to 110 mph, Istre said. The new designs will be able to handle winds as high as 140 mph to 150 mph, he said.

Instead of having a solid face, the new billboards will be like a frame to which vinyl sheets of advertisement copy will be strapped.

"If the copy blows out, that's just an $800 piece of vinyl," Istre said.

The company expects its billboards in Mississippi and Louisiana to be repaired by early 2006, Istre said. But he said the company does not know how long it will be before its business in the hurricane zones returns to normal.

November 4, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Ad Age: Terrestrial broadcasters insist they’re not nervous about satellite radio’s 7 million subscribers, but they’ve successfully stalled Arbitron’s plan to add satellite and online radio listening to its diary measurement system.

Arbitron was originally scheduled to instruct its diary keepers to record their satellite and online radio listening in the fall 2005 book. Instead, Arbitron now plans a 25-market test of the process in February and will delay full implementation until summer 2006, at the earliest.

Arbitron said the change is a response to the concerns of the National Association of Broadcasters’ Local Radio Audience Measurement Committee and the Arbitron Radio Advisory Council.

Radio broadcasters have been wary of the effect audience-measurement changes could have on their ratings and bottom line.

November 4, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Fruitcast is a new service with the aim of commercializing podcasts. Their logo is also strangely reminiscent, but that's another story.

We make it ridiculously easy to put ads on your podcast. All you have to do is sign up for an account, and post the new feed URL we create for you on your website (or redirect it through another service, such as the excellent FeedBurner). Each time a listener downloads an episode from your new podcast feed, we'll check to see if there are any ads that have been assigned to your podcast. If so, we'll automatically add them (at either the beginning or end, or both) into the MP3 file that your listeners download. Each ad takes the form of a brief spoken statement. We approve each ad before it goes live, and we won't hesitate to reject anything that we think would annoy the podcast publishers or their listeners.

No word on what happens when any audio ad in a podcast is found to be offensive.

[Via Adverlab]

November 5, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Through a service called Amazon Pages, Amazon will allow people to "inexpensively" buy chapters from a book and read them online. Customers will get complete online access to the book through another service called Amazon Upgrade. Both services are an extension of Amazon's existing search within a book program.

"Amazon Pages and Amazon Upgrade leverage Amazon's existing Search Inside the Book technology to give customers unusual flexibility in how they buy and read books," said CEO Jeff Bezos. "In collaboration with our publishing partners, we're working hard to make the world's books instantly accessible anytime and anywhere."

[via The Street]

November 6, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 4 Comments

John Warner, a.k.a. The Swamp Fox, is a Greenville, SC-based venture capitalist. On his blog, he writes about the Greenville Chamber's recent visit to Austin, TX--a city that has emerged as an entrepreneurial haven with the third-most venture capital investment in the country. In other words, the money is flowing in Austin. Warner asks why and considers what his own vibrant upstate community can do to share in some of Austin's success.

People really enjoy living in Austin and are dedicated to preserving and celebrating their distinctiveness. Their attitude is captured in a bumper sticker: Keep Austin Weird. The distinctiveness of a city starts with its local, independent businesses, so Austin fosters the growth and development of local companies and doesn't subsidize the mega chains that are making America look homogenized.

Austin nurtures folks -- students, managers with new ideas and immigrants -- who don't fit into the power structures that exist in the community. On the plane ride to Austin, I sat next to a woman who had lived in Greenville only a year and told me how difficult it had been to get plugged into the leadership of our community. Now, if this was the only time I had heard this about Greenville, it would have been easy to write it off as an isolated case. But I hear it frequently, in particular from African Americans trying to become part of the leadership.

Leaders in Greenville don't perceive that it is a tight, closed system. We think of ourselves as enlightened and open to new ideas and people. So where does the disconnect come from? It's not uncommon to find major companies and other organizations in Greenville where almost all of the senior leadership has been in place 20 or 30 years. These leaders have deep relationships going back decades, and like anyone would, they tend to rely on people they have known and trusted for a long time.

Asheville, NC is another city that seeks to remain weird. I know not whether Greenville was ever weird for starters, but I welcome the fact that a Greenville VC with the power to back the weird is interested in doing so.

For more on Austin, see this 2003 report on SXSW. Perhaps, Greenville would like to consider launching SXSE.

November 7, 2005 by Dan Goldgeier | Permalink | 0 Comments

Jay Chiat used to ask "How big can we get before we get bad?" Today, The New York Times asks that question about CB&P.

Some skeptics see Crispin and like-minded agencies as a temporary blip. "The big agencies are saying that being big doesn't mean you can't be creative, and they're going to prove it," said Leslie Winthrop, chief executive at AAR Partners in New York.

So how nervous are Madison Avenue agencies about the Crispin model?

"Not nervous enough," said Richard Roth, the president of the agency search firm Roth Associates.

Crispin executives remain confident, and maintain that their competitors have plenty to fear. "It's hard for firms to transform themselves," Chuck Porter, Crispin's chairman, said of the big agencies. "But they'll either adapt or die."

November 7, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

USA Today: Coca-Cola said Friday it would phase out its Vanilla Coke, Vanilla Diet Coke and Diet Coke With Lemon beverages in the United States by end of this year.

The announcement came a day after the world's largest soft drink maker said it would phase out Vanilla Coke and Vanilla Diet Coke in the United Kingdom early next year. The company said sales have declined.

Coca-Cola added that it plans to introduce Diet Black Cherry Vanilla Coke and Black Cherry Vanilla Coke in the United States in January 2006.

Analysts have said that one of the keys to the company's future is to innovate new products that will help Coca-Cola capture more consumers who have moved away from sugary soft drinks to diet versions, or to healthier low-or no-calorie beverages such as water and orange juices with reduced sugar.

November 7, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 1 Comments

Cockeyed.com is showcasing an innovative (and very serious) use for Silly String. American forces in Iraq and Afghanistan are using the cans of amusement to detect trip wires. The brightly-colored string gets draped over even the finest tripwire, making it easy to spot.

First introduced in 1969 by Julius Samann, Silly String is non-toxic, non-flammable, and free of CFCs. Ergo, this low tech safety device is also safe to use.

[via Lifehacker]

November 7, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 6 Comments

November 7, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 2 Comments

NME: White Stripes singer Jack White has finally confirmed he's done a Coca-Cola ad - and said he's done it to get a message of love out to the world.

Speaking backstage in Paris on their European tour the singer confirmed that he has recorded a brand new, currently untitled track for the advert.

"I've been offered the opportunity to write a song in a way which interests me as a songwriter. I certainly wouldn't want a song that I'd already written to be used on a commercial. That seems strange. I've written a song and I wrote it really quickly and it's an interesting commercial that's been made. I was inspired by the commercial."

November 7, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Always On Network has an interview with JotSpot CEO, Joe Kraus. Kraus is a serial entrepreneur, having been part of the Stanford alumni contigent behind Excite, Inc. Here are a few pearls of wisdom to consider from the Krause man.

I really believe that the world of business software—let's call it enterprise software—is moving toward a model that I'll call the consumer enterprise. This is in many ways, I think, the Microsoft secret: Microsoft delights end-users and appeases IT; it sells from the bottom and empowers. I hate the word empower—hate it, hate it, hate it—but I don't know what other word to use: Microsoft gives end-users the feeling or belief that they can do things they couldn't do before. They addict consumers—and that addiction then sells the enterprise.

I think what's depressing the enterprise software category in general is that when the internet came along, it changed what people did at work. It blended their work behavior with their personal behavior: Suddenly, you could go onto Google Maps and map where you were going to dinner, or to Amazon to buy a book you'd been thinking about—and then switch back again to whatever you were doing at work. So you're exposed to all of these consumer services during the workday. And while you're sitting there using Google Maps for free, a software salesman rolls up and says you should pay a million dollars for what is in essence a glorified database app. Your answer? 'Come on. You can't really expect me to do that.'

I think for a big chunk of software, the internet is totally blurring the line between consumer and business applications. This is an important trend to recognize—and why I think of Google as a threat. Even though our first application is more business oriented, our goal is to make the end-user, not the IT person, our customer. We're sold to end-users, and those are the people we need to addict.

Microsoft fails to delight this end-user, but other than that, Kraus's points are well taken.

November 7, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 5 Comments

Marc E. Babej counters Scott Donaton's rant on Google, and the need for media agencies to "stop complaining and start competing."

Media agency complacency is neither here nor there, and it’s not the issue. Donaton misses the larger point - that Google is out of any media agency’s league, for three reasons. First, as the owner of one of the most comprehensive repositories of behavioral and contextual data in existence, Google enjoys a tremendous competitive advantage when it comes to serving targeted advertising. Second, as Google is about to demonstrate, this advantage can be leveraged beyond the Internet, to other media. Third, a battle for scale and scope is also a battle of resources; and with a market cap of $110 billion (compared to Omnicom’s 15 billion), Google’s resources are larger by several orders of scale than those of any advertising industry competitor.

It remains to be seen whether Google's targeted text-based ads which have served them so well in the online environment will work on TV. Or if that's even what they have planned for TV. Whatever the case, Google is not the enemy. Dogged resistance to change is the enemy.

November 7, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 4 Comments

There's a "How Much Is Your Blog Worth?" meme going around.

Seth Godin doesn't care for it.

I have no idea how much my blog is worth. I also don't try to monetize my blog--that would ruin it. It would ruin it because most of my readers would leave, and it would ruin it because then I'd try to outdo myself and monetize it more and more and more.

Yet, Mr. Godin prominently features all his books for sale on his sidebar. And the brand he's building online gets bigger with each post, leading to paid speaking engagements, more book sales, more consulting, more of whatever it is he is able to monetize.

One of my favorite bloggers, Tom Asakcer, had this to say:

Some bloggers - like Seth and Hugh - feed your dreams with inspirational blog posts. "You too can become a global microbrand phenomenon. And here's how." And because you keep coming back for more, they can eventually monetize your attention. Either with a new business model (squidoo.com), with Google ads, or by selling their blog attention grabbing expertise (e.g. Stormhoek and English Cut).

Personally, I don't see a problem with going for the money, whatever that might mean to a particular blogger. Certainly, I might balk if money was the only reason for a blog, and those examples unfortunately do exist. But for most bloggers I believe their motivation is a healthy mix of having something to share and wanting to raise their profile--an act which can lead to a better job, consulting fees, ad revenue or a decent, if not lucrative, purchase offer.

November 8, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

The New York Times: Grokster, a developer of file-swapping software used to trade copyrighted music and movie files, said Monday that it would halt distribution of the software and cut off support for its associated network as part of a landmark settlement with the recording industry and Hollywood studios.

The pact comes four months after the Supreme Court unanimously ruled that Grokster could be held liable for copyright infringement by users of its software, a decision that delivered a decisive victory for entertainment companies, particularly music labels, which have blamed widespread digital piracy for a worldwide slump in sales.

While Grokster is disappearing in its original form, the underlying case that culminated in the Supreme Court showdown may continue. Grokster's co-defendant in the case, Streamcast Networks, the promoter of a file-sharing network known as Morpheus, has indicated it plans to keep battling the movie studios and record labels in court.

More broadly, the popularity of file-sharing networks shows little sign of waning in the wake of the settlement or the earlier court decision. An estimated 9.2 million people are using various so-called peer-to-peer networks at any one time, according to BigChampagne, a data service. The figure has edged up from 8.8 million in June.

With Monday's settlement, "I don't think, practically speaking, we're expecting to see much impact in the peer-to-peer landscape," said Eric Garland, BigChampagne's chief executive. "People moved on from tools like Grokster some time ago."

Grokster is expected to be absorbed by Mashboxx, a new venture run by Wayne Rosso, a former Grokster president, who has already struck a deal to license music from Sony BMG Music Entertainment, the world's second-biggest music company.

Consumers who have already downloaded the Grokster software can still use it to trade files, though they risk being sued.

[UPDATE] Random Culture has a great piece today on Adobe's attempt to thwart file sharing.

November 8, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 1 Comments

USA Today: CBS and NBC delivered another hammer blow to the traditional TV economic model on Monday by agreeing to let some Comcast and DirecTV customers pay 99 cents to watch certain hit shows on demand and ad-free.

Viacom's CBS struck a deal with Comcast that will make new episodes of CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, NCIS, Survivor and The Amazing Race available to viewers who subscribe to its extra-cost digital service and live in markets served by network-owned CBS stations.

Comcast will offer the programs for 99 cents each shortly after they air on the West Coast. The reality shows, which typically don't do well in repeats, will be available all season. Dramas will be available only until the next new episode airs, but viewers with digital video recorders (DVR) can save copies.

"This is a major breakthrough. It's a precedent," says Comcast CEO Brian Roberts. "We're moving to personalized television. That's the strategy Comcast has bet on."

CBS Chairman Leslie Moonves was equally upbeat. He says the video-on-demand (VOD) showings offer "an additional revenue stream without affecting the mother lode" from advertising.

November 8, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Ad Age has selected R/GA as its interactive agency of the year.

Under CEO-Chief Creative Director Robert Greenberg, the agency is defining advertising in a customer-centric evolving age.

The agency’s big idea is that while today consumers demand to be in control, their interaction with a brand is not always enacted through the Web or any device in particular. Nor is it about even a series of multimedia hits. R/GA homes in on what kind of relationships the consumer has with a brand. And that interaction is entirely about R/GA’s tactical means of building and tending that relationship.

The agency has placed interactivity at the core of its strategy. But Mr. Greenberg is evolving R/GA’s strategy across all channels, just as he nurtured R/GA over the last 30 years from a film production company to an interactive agency.

R/GA is No. 12 in Advertising Age’s ranking of interactive agencies, with revenue in 2004 of $41.6 million, up about 15%. Since 2004, it’s hired 200 staffers.

November 8, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 1 Comments

I must admit I have a weakness for BP's Beyond Petroleum campaign. It's great advertising. Which makes the following criticism all the more interesting.

Energy Bulletin: Time magazine became the most recent mainstream publication to finally give detailed coverage to Peak Oil. Its Oct. 31 twelve-page spread on "The Future of Energy" follows major articles in USA Today, New York Times, Wall Street Journal, San Francisco Chronicle and other big-city dailies in recent months. They finally mention the coming Peak Oil that geologists have been warning us about for years.

Time's spread, in fact, includes two familiar full-page BP ads, where the former British Petroleum corporation has re-positioned itself as "Beyond Petroleum." These ads reveal the interlock of today's mainstream media profiting from its promotion of such corporations. By placing the ads next to its allegedly objective news stories, Time mixes advertising and news, which journalism students are taught should have a "firewall" between them.

One BP ad advocates that "It's Time To Go on a Low-Carbon Diet." This ad advances natural gas, solar, and hydrogen as the appropriate substitutes for oil. The other ad highlights the assertion that "Natural gas is the clean bridge to renewable energy," noting that "Today natural gas accounts for about 40% of BP's global production." One could almost think that BP is earth-friendly, rather than profit-oriented.

Yet various authors concerned with energy decline have documented how the combined energy from the proposed replacements for today's cheap oil will not provide nearly the abundant energy that petroleum offers.

So, are we to believe that BP is a good guy? One of us, constantly on the look out for a working alternative and a brighter future for all? Or must we see through their public face and count them as just another energy producer looking to extract whatever profit they can from whatever source is most available?

November 8, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

The New York Times: After a decade-long hiatus from national advertising, the Jolly Green Giant, an 80-year-old character, returns in a campaign beginning today in print ads and broadcast commercials from General Mills.

Saatchi & Saatchi in New York, a division of the Publicis Groupe, created the campaign, which carries the tagline "For the Love of Vegetables" and will encourage consumers to eat vegetables not simply because of their health value, but also because consumers like them.

The print ads will run in several magazines, including Good Housekeeping and Ladies Home Journal. Also, a billboard bearing the image of the Jolly Green Giant will be installed in Times Square this week.

The Jolly Green Giant has been in the news recently. Len Dresslar, who was recorded saying "ho, ho, ho" as the voice of the giant in a jingle in 1959, died Oct. 16 at the age of 80. And in September, the giant was recognized by the trade publication Advertising Age as the third most recognizable American advertising icon of the 20th century, behind Tony the Tiger and the Marlboro Man.

[via The Spunker]

November 8, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 3 Comments

One can always count on George Parker to tell it like it is.

Chuck my Ass!

What is this shit with the new Charles Schwab campaign. The one with comic book style type balloons featuring the immortal line "Talk to Chuck." I mean, give me a break. I'll bet some dufus at the agency, either a suit with an MBA, or a creative fucking genius with twenty grams of Peruvian marching powder up his nose said "Why don't we humanize Charles and make him Chuck?" Jesus, the high fives must have generated callouses the size of golf balls by the time they finished dancing around the conference room table. Listen guys, it's moronic and stupid and you should be ashamed of yourselves for even suggesting it. On the other hand, maybe it was "Chucks" idea! In which case, by telling him it was the best thing since your last five hundred dollar meal at Balthazar, you saved the account for another three months. Shit... Isn't advertising great?

George lives in Boise, Idaho, where five hundred dollar meals are the exception, not the rule.

November 8, 2005 by Dan Goldgeier | Permalink | 1 Comments

Tom Messner is a partner at Euro RSCG, and apparently he's got a lot of time on his hands. Writing in Adweek this week, he plans to spend the next 2 months "reading and possibly absorbing as many of the available marketing books as inhumanly possible."

Here's his list, divided into the "Old Testament" and "New Testament" of marketing books:

I'm sure Luke Sullivan would be depressed to think that "Hey Whipple, Squeeze This" is now considered Old Testament. And "Harvard Business Review on The Art of Writing Advertising" ought to make for a nice history lesson.

Of course, "Knock the Hustle" isn't on Tom's list, but Hadji Williams has a column of his own, on the opposite facing page from Tom's, in this week's Adweek called "The Big Whitewash." So that's a nice balance.

November 8, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 2 Comments

Lincoln Journal Star: The mass audience in the United States is splintering and dividing into ever more specialized and personalized niches.

In the 1940s, more than half of all Americans went to the movies at least once week. In the ’50s and ’60s, the most popular television shows were seen in more than half the households in the country.

Today, despite unceasing hype and advertising, an average week sees around 10 percent of us going to the movie theaters.

In 1947, the peak of the studio system, 90 million Americans out of a population of 151 million went to the movies each week, according to “The Big Picture,” a book on the changing economics of Hollywood by Edward Jay Epstein. That figure represented 60 percent of the population, who bought a total of 4.7 billion tickets that year.

In an average week in 2003, less than 12 percent of Americans bought movie tickets. The total number of tickets sold in the U.S. in 2003: 1.57 billion.

That downward spiral has become the subject of much media attention. Summer 2005 was a huge box office disappointment. According to box office tracker Exhibitor Relations, this summer’s $3.6 billion total is down 9 percent from 2004. Even worse, attendance slumped by 12 percent.

Home video and other auxiliary sales (per-per-view, pay cable, network TV and basic cable TV) have become the profit center for movie studios.

According to Epstein’s figures, in 2003, the six major studios spent $11.5 billion to produce, publicize and distribute 80 films under their names and spent another $6.7 billion on 105 films from their “independent” subsidiaries, such as Miramax and New Line.

The studios recovered just $6.4 billion from their share of world box office, leaving them $11 billion in the red after their movies had completed their theatrical runs. But they more than made up that $11 billion gap on DVD sales, which totalled $33 billion worldwide in 2003.

November 8, 2005 by Dan Goldgeier | Permalink | 1 Comments

Neil French & Terrell Owens: Both have recently demonstrated that no matter how talented one person is, you can't alienate your co-workers or the company you work for by bad-mouthing them in public.

November 8, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 9 Comments

Ernie Schenck thinks we need some rules to guide us. His latest CA column is dedicated to this effort. He has 31 rules in all, so I'll cherry pick a few for you to consider.

8. Art directors will not be permitted to use Photoshop until an actual concept has been determined.

11. No meaningless taglines that don’t add a damn thing to the campaign other than give the client something to put on coffee mugs and T-shirts at the annual sales meeting.

14. Whining will not be permitted under any circumstances. This includes budget whining. Account executive whining. Client whining. Client’s wife whining. Lack of creative freedom whining. What-do-you-mean-I-can’t-use-Nadav-Kander whining.

15. No goatees.

20. During office hours, no billiards, dart games, Nerf basketball or other distractions masquerading as creative stimulators will be permitted. If you want stimulation, get on a plane for Amsterdam.

25. Copywriters shall glue their laptops shut for a period of one month during which they will reacquaint themselves with a pad of paper and a No. 2 pencil. No, not a pen. Not a Pentel. A pencil.

28. Creative teams shall produce one campaign per year for a nonprofit organization of their choice with no intention of entering said campaign in any awards show anywhere on this or any other planet.

Rule 15 and rule 25 seriously infringe on my style and methodology, but you know what they say about rules...

November 9, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 2 Comments

Let's turn back the pages of time. About a year ago, our section of the bloatosphere was all worked up about a book with a bright red cover. The brouhaha eventually died down, but it may reignite, now that a new book is being pushed on unwitting journalists and conference attendees.

Ad Age: According to Saatchi & Saatchi CEO Kevin Roberts, the advertising business has become a place where "there are no rules, there are no formulae, there is no best practice" and nobody has a clue about how to effectively market products to the masses.

In an Ad:Tech keynote speech heavily laced with buzzwords, Mr. Roberts suggested that the reality of the new age of marketing all boils down to the word he has used for the title of his new book: "sisomo." Reading from a script to an audience at the New York Hilton, he explained that "sisomo" refers to the combination of sight, sound and motion as experienced on digital screens. He handed out copies of his 171-page paperback to all who entered the hall.

Published by PowerHouse Books of New York, the tome was heavy with full-page photos and sprawls of colorful graphics yet light on text.

November 9, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Inc. has 75 reasons why it's a good time to be an entrepreneur. Of course, such a list is much too long for me to read. So, I'll just share one of their reasons near the top of the list.

Number 2

Because the stupidity is over. No one talks about "flipping" companies anymore. No one throws too much money at you just because you put "Web," "eyeballs," and "monetize" in the same sentence. No one expects a miracle. So the real miracle--building a real business--gets respect.

Hmmm. I guess Inc. has never heard of Jason Calacanis, nor his deal with AOL.

November 9, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

VW brand evangelists will enjoy this photo set on Flick.

November 9, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

LA Times: Last week, Audi launched its own television channel in Britain, which, if successful, could be rolled out in other countries too.

The Audi Channel will run 24 hours, seven days a week and is aimed at a mass-market audience: British car owners and car enthusiasts. The launch schedule is split between product-related "infotainment" during the day and more general entertainment-driven material in the evenings and on weekends.

The channel is being broadcast to 7.6 million British homes over the Sky Digital satellite television platform. More viewers will get the service in coming months when Audi UK completes negotiations on terrestrial digital platforms operated by Freeview and cable television operators. The channel also is being made available for broadband Internet users via Audi UK's website.

The channel has cost 2 million pounds (about $3.5 million) to set up, and Audi is committing 1 million to 2 million pounds more a year to cover running costs — equivalent to annual expenditure on the Audi UK website.

The decision to extend from advertiser to broadcaster was born of growing frustration with a fragmenting media marketplace and concern that British viewers were spending less time engaging with the brand's TV advertising, said Gary Savage, Audi UK's marketing director.

[via PSFK]

November 9, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Who says no one reads books anymore? Thanks to Hard Case Crime, pulp-fiction is back with a vengance.

From World War II through the 1960s, paperback crime novels were one of the fastest-selling categories in book publishing. They were paperbacks you could fit in your back pocket, with jaw-dropping cover paintings and bare-knuckled prose that grabbed you by the collar with the first sentence and held you until the last page. No one's published books like that in years.

Until now.

[via Reveries]

November 9, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Not to be left in the dust by Forbes, Ad Age published it's own anti-blog piece a few weeks ago, that I initially scoffed at, then ignored. Here's the lead:

Blog this: U.S. workers in 2005 will waste the equivalent of 551,000 years reading blogs.

I'd ignore this asinine story now, if it wasn't for Dean Gemmell's wicked response to it.

Do you think a lumbering trade journal like Advertising Age, covering a stumbling industry like advertising, just might have a vested interest in smearing blogs as time-wasters? I happen to think 90% of the printed publication is a waste of time, especially the page that features photos of Grey Goose-swilling ad executives getting loaded at another industry cocktail hour.

Interestingly, just days after the article first appeared, Ad Age saw fit to launch their own blog, Small Agency Diary, which is not a blog from Ad Age journalists. It's written by Bart Cleveland, Partner and Creative Director at McKee Wallwork Cleveland in Albuquerque, NM. I have nothing against Mr. Cleveland, but Adweek's Adfreak is a much better waste of my time.

November 10, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

USA Today: The Chicago Mercantile Exchange, a financial marketplace dealing in the value of everything from interest rates and foreign currencies to pork bellies, has committed to offer trading next year in a category many consumers take personally: U.S. home prices.

Housing-price futures, based on the median home price in each of 10 U.S. cities, aren't being tailored for individual homeowners. But they may provide some protection for mortgage companies, home builders and anyone else with a large stake in residential real estate if housing values slide — while giving other investors a way into a lucrative market.

The novel investment product is set to debut in April 2006, based on a final go-ahead given by the Merc earlier this fall after months of exploratory work.

While unusual, it won't be the most exotic contract offered by the world's largest futures exchange. That distinction has been held for six years by weather futures, which are based on regional temperature indexes and enable utilities and others with a lot riding on the weather to hedge their risk.

November 10, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Yesterday, I had lunch with two execs from a startup professional baseball league. We discussed blogs and how well suited the medium is for sports.

Let's hear from the master on the subject, Markos Moulitsas Zuniga, founder of the left-leaning political blog Daily Kos and Sports Blogs, a network of blogs devoted to baseball.

"I realized that blogs were really effective for partisan audiences. One of them is sports. Sports is huge - where you've got your Red Sox and Yankees situation - and religion is another," said Mr. Moulitsas. "But in religion, people kill each other, so I decided I'd rather stay away from religion."

Getting SportsBlogs started took an investment of about $20,000, most of which came from Daily Kos profits. And because each new site has low set-up costs, pressure on the writers to reach specific traffic or revenue milestones is minimal.

Still, SportsBlogs sites such as Minor League Ball, Lookout Landing (for Seattle Mariners fans), McCovey Chronicles (San Francisco Giants), Pinstripe Alley (Yankees) and Amazin' Avenue (Mets) are thriving. Minor League Ball, for example, gets about 3,000 unique visitors daily.

According to Mr. Moulitsas, the SportsBlogs sites are currently bringing in just under $3,000 in revenue a month in total. But the sites are only a couple of months old, and he said that no significant revenue was projected until summer.

"The fact that we have any income right now is shocking to me," he said.

Major League Baseball is in on the blogging act, as well. They run their own network of baseball blogs, written by fans, sports writers, team personnel and anyone else willing to pay $49.95. For instance, White Sox VP of Communications, Scott Reifert, keeps a MLblog called Inside The White Sox.

November 10, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Corporate Design Foundation: Lands' End enjoyed a loyal following and a successful marketing strategy, but after 40 years in business, it saw its brand image looking tired and frayed at the edges. In the process of revitalizing its identity, Lands' End introduced a graphic system that brought order to its catalogs and higher visibility to its brand.

For a fresh perspective, Lands' End looked outside the industry, hiring Lee Eisenberg, long–time editor of Esquire and special projects manager of Time, as executive vice president in charge of creative marketing.

"Without frightening off loyal Lands' End customers, my charge was to update the brand and make it more style–right," explains Eisenberg. "Lands' End is a brand that made its mark in an innovative way by not worrying about all the things that brands worry about. It communicated pretty much verbally in a straightforward and literate way with highly educated and literate customers. It put things in catalogs that had nothing to do with clothes [e.g., editorial contributions by the likes of Garrison Keillor and Tom Brokaw]. That was the glue that connected the readers to the brand."

At the same time, Eisenberg adds, "As the company grew, a lot of different parts, such as the home furnishings and kids catalogs, grew up separate, and there was never much of an attempt to knit them together through brand graphics." For Eisenberg, the challenge was to make the graphics consistent without making them "bloodless and slick."

For design support, he turned to DJ Stout, who had just left his position as art director of Texas Monthly to become a partner at Pentagram in Austin. Years earlier Eisenberg had tried to hire Stout as art director of Esquire, but Stout, a fifth–generation Texan, stayed at Texas Monthly instead. Now Eisenberg asked him to create cover concepts for the core catalog.

"DJ preserved much of what was associated with Lands' End," praises Eisenberg. "A testament to his success is that when the new logo was introduced, we did not get one adverse letter or call. And this is an extremely involved group of customers. Nobody said, 'You took away my Lands' End; you sold out.'" The makeover did increase sales, though.

Lands' End embraced the lighthouse design as its corporate logo and planned to implement it on packaging and product labels, but the program had to be put on hold when Sears purchased the company in 2002. Sears was rightfully concerned that a major change in brand identity at that time might confuse customers and lead them to believe that the products sold in its stores were not authentic Lands' End merchandise.

The company is currently integrating the lighthouse corporate logo across all media.

November 10, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 2 Comments

Joy enjoying at Austin City Limits Festival

Maine Root, maker of hand crafted all natural sodas, knows how to create passionate users of its product. And with the care they put it to their manufacturing process, it's little wonder.

We use Organic Evaporated Cane Juice to sweeten our sodas. This sweetness is made by passing the whole sugar cane through a set of rollers, then drying the extract into crystals, no extra processing and no additives. Organic Evaporated Cane Juice sweeteners are derived from the first carbohydrate of photosynthesis, sucrose. Bottom line is that it tastes better, and since it is Organic, it is better for you, better for the farmers, and better for the ecosystem. By buying this product you are supporting Organic Farming, Organic Farmers, and helping create a demand for non GMO products.

The soft drink company also delivers its product locally in a vegetable powered VW Diesel.

The Jetta “pickup truck” was converted by Matt to run on Recycled fryer oil collected from local restaurants. It’s true, smell the exhaust pipe, it smells like Chinese food or French fries (depending where the oil came from). In fact he first diesel engines (invented by Rudolf Diesel in the late 1800's) were actually designed to run on plant oils. By using “waste” oil as fuel, we are utilizing a product that was destined for a landfill. Even better, the emissions are MUCH, much cleaner! Tests vary, but results show that running on SVO (Straight Vegetable Oil) produces 40% less soot than diesel, and 50 - 75% cleaner overall. Not only is SVO a renewable resource that's better for your engine, but it's eco-friendly as well.

[via Adrants]

November 10, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 2 Comments

Spike Jones at Brains On Fire has some interesting things to say about common courtesy, or the lack thereof in corporate America.

There is a fundamental breakdown in corporate America.

And it has everything to do with giving your word and not keeping it. I’m the Firestarter here and so I’m constantly making appointments to talk to people – whether in person or on the phone or web – about a possible partnership. They’ll call (or I’ll call) and chat for a bit and then, if everything feels right, we’ll schedule something to get more in-depth. But when the time comes to talk, I’m blown away at the number of times when they either don’t show up or pick up the phone when we call. This also happens when it’s time for people to “make a decision.” Decision day comes and goes without as much as an email. And it’s not just the start-ups. It’s the mega-corps as well.

It may be the Texan in me, but I find it incredibly irresponsible, unprofessional and downright disrespectful. It’s the exact opposite of Fascinate, Inspire, Reward and Engage and when it happens, we reconsider whether we would want to do business with someone that treats anybody that way.

November 11, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 1 Comments

Lewis Lazare: A vocal contingent of consumers who believe advertising is too omnipresent won't be pleased to hear it's also about to materialize on the outside doors of elevators at two area shopping malls.

The new elevator door ads for a Zippo multipurpose lighter were created by Blattner Brunner in Pittsburgh, and are believed to be the first of their kind in the world of outdoor advertising.

For the concept developed by Blattner Brunner creative directors Jay Giesen and Dave Kwasnick, the elevator-door format works quite effectively. On the left elevator door in each instance, we will see the Zippo lighter, and on the right side a visual pertaining to ways in which the lighter can be used.

For instance, when the doors close in one execution, the lighter connects with a steak, suggesting the lighter could be used with a charcoal grill.

Another right-door visual is of a tulip, which, in a bit of stretch, is intended to stand in for a dinner-table setting that might include candles.

The elevator-door ads go up Tuesday at the Fox Valley and Hawthorn malls at a cost of $8,000 per mall. Estimated combined mall traffic for December is 3.3 million people.

November 11, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

USA Today: Hong Kong Disneyland's debut was marred by public relations debacles that left Mickey Mouse looking like Cinderella's stepmother in this former British colony.

In the days surrounding the opening this fall of Hong Kong Disneyland, the entertainment giant enraged local pop stars, antagonized labor leaders and earned a rebuke from its own partner in the theme park, the Hong Kong government. Last month, a disgruntled, fired employee climbed atop Space Mountain and threatened to kill himself until he was talked down.

Disney ran into similar troubles when it opened Euro Disney (later renamed Disneyland Resort Paris) in 1992: French critics decried what they saw as U.S. cultural imperialism; theater director Ariane Mnouchkine famously called it a "cultural Chernobyl." Hundreds of Euro Disney workers walked off the job within days, complaining about working conditions.

Labor activists charged Disney is forcing staff to work 11- and 13-hour days, providing inadequate breaks and rewriting daily work schedules without notice. "Their management is very backward," says Elaine Hui of the Hong Kong Confederation of Trade Unions, which is trying to organize Disneyland workers into a union.

November 11, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 9 Comments

Media Week: Toyota has yanked its advertising from FX’s Nip/Tuck after being pressured by a letter-writing campaign directed by the advocacy group Parents Television Council.

Since the show debuted two years ago, the PTC has sent letters to Nip/Tuck advertisers calling for them to pull their ads, including Toyota, GM, Ikea and the Vermont ice cream manufacturer Ben & Jerry’s. Other sponsors that have also decided to suspend advertising on Nip/Tuck include Gateway and Coors, both of which walked away from the show in 2003.

According to the PTC, Toyota was sent regular run downs of the show’s racier elements, along with a DVD featuring specific hot-button scenes. In its letters to sponsors, the advocacy group characterizes Nip/Tuck as being “one of the most sexually explicit, profane and violent television programs in the history of American television.”

John Solberg, senior vp of public relations for FX, said the activities of the PTC aren’t exactly going to keep the network’s executives up at night. Solberg pointed out that the first seven episodes of season three have averaged 2.8 million viewers in FX’s target 18-49, making it the top-rated show in the demo across all of basic cable.

Although FX is a cable network and is thereby not held to any decency standards by the Federal Communications Commission, the network specifically programs fare like Nip/Tuck at 10:00 p.m., a time slot that is generally considered kid-safe. FX has also voluntarily rated the show TV-MA.

November 11, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Here's a story for all the members of the Free Agent Nation among us.

NYT: Millions of Americans operate businesses out of their homes, but the successful ones usually have to move out at some point because they run out of room. As their ranks grow - the number of self-employed people grew to seven million last year from six million in 2001, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics - so does the number of them who are abandoning attics, basements and extra bedrooms for offices, warehouses and even factories.

Not surprisingly, lack of space was the main reason that home-based entrepreneurs gave in Small Business Digest's survey for seeking larger quarters, but several other factors also came into play. For example, 28 percent of those questioned cited the "confusion and noise" in their homes, 26 percent lamented the intrusion on their privacy, 19 percent said they wanted to end conflicts between their business and personal lives, 14 percent mentioned the endless coming and going of delivery trucks and 9 percent invoked their neighbors' unhappiness at all the activity their businesses generated.

Joan Casey moved her firm, Educational Advocates, out of her home last November and projects sales of $40,000 this year, a 33 percent increase from the $30,000 she took in during the last year she was home. And for 2006, she expects revenue to hit $50,000. She made the transition cautiously, she says, subleasing an office for a few hours a week before renting her own. The office, complete with waiting room, has given her business credibility, she says. "I find that people take you more seriously when you have an office because it isn't just some mother working out of her house," she said. "I don't agree with that, but that's how it's perceived."

November 11, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 2 Comments

Microsoft is rolling out something called AdCenter. My guess is the people at VCU AdCenter are less than thrilled.

c|net: Microsoft's grand ambitions for free services rest on one thing: its ability to get to know you better.

The company has outlined a whole host of things it would like to offer as part of its "Live" services effort. But it needs to make more money selling ads to make the push pay off.

To do this, it's betting on personalization as the way to boost its online ad sales. The centerpiece of the strategy is something called AdCenter--a tool that Microsoft has been developing for more than a year as a way to serve up ads tailor made for the user that is receiving them.

The crappy thing is no entity--profit-making or otherwise--has the kind of money necessary to battle the software titans from Redmond in court.

November 11, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Here's some visually provocative work from TBWA/Paris.

According to Humans for Animals (the client here), animal cruelty is a problem that is not going away. Everyday, more and more animals around the globe are falling victim to the most atrocious abuse imaginable. And sadly enough, most governments and people who have the power to help, turn a blind eye to this escalating problem. Animal cruelty is a global problem and it is our aim to provide people with a platform to help animals in need from all around the world.

November 13, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

ABC News: Before Saturday, Chris Bostic was a $10-an-hour landscaper whose favorite football memories were running for touchdowns in Pee Wee football.

But after his perfect 25-yard spiral made it though the tiny hole in a promotional contest, the Army veteran has a new favorite memory and is South Carolina's newest millionaire.

Bostic's pass at the end of the first quarter of the Florida State-Clemson game won him the $1 million in the Bi-Lo Healthy Choice Pigskin Challenge.

The football clipped the bottom of the 20-inch hole, bouncing through as the crowd at Memorial Stadium went wild.

Bostic jumped up and hugged some of the contest sponsors, eventually taking his oversized million-dollar check and pumping it over his head as he ran to the sidelines.

Bostic, who played linebacker at Myrtle Beach High, was selected randomly from people who bought a Healthy Choice product at Bi-Lo during the contest period.

November 13, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Former copywriter, Augusten Burroughs' best-selling book, Running with Scissors, has been made in to a film by Ryan Murphy. Mr. Murphy is the 2005 Golden Globe winning (Best television series, drama) creator, writer, director and executive producer of the hit series, Nip/Tuck.The Sony Miramax film stars Gwyneth Paltrow, Jill Clayburgh, Vanessa Redgrave, Alec Baldwin and Annette Benning and is co-produced by Brad Pitt. It's slated for release this holiday season.

Given the writer's massive commercial success, it is all the more interesting to see how things looked to him a few years ago, at the time of the book's debut.

Bookslut: I was in advertising for years. That was cushy, you know? It's pretty cushy in a lot of ways, but I hated it. Right before Running With Scissors came out, like the month before, we had the galleys, it had the "buzz," people liked it, but I'm just thinking, the chances are so slim that this book is really going to get any attention at all, especially because it's got the gay content, that I thought, I can't do advertising any more, so I was downloading all these PDF applications from community colleges. And I thought, I'll become a paramedic. I'll get a two-year associate degree, if I can get in.

November 14, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 2 Comments

NYT: Most everyone on Madison Avenue waxes rhapsodic about the "partnerships" between agencies and their clients, ignoring the reality that agencies all too often prove about as indispensable as Pez. Now, a boutique agency is hoping to rectify that by actually going into business with a client.

The boutique, Sugartown Creative in New York, is working with Trudie Styler and her husband, the musician Sting, to introduce a line of premium-priced organic food items that are produced on the couple's estate farm in the Tuscany region of Italy.

Sugartown Creative is responsible for the packaging and marketing of the line, named Il Palagio after the villa on the estate, as well as subsequent advertising campaigns for the products.

Rather than being compensated through commissions or fees, Sugartown Creative will earn a percentage of the revenue that the products generate at specialty food stores. The four initial Il Palagio products - an olive oil and three flavors of honey - are scheduled to be introduced today at the Harrods department store in London.

Plans call for Il Palagio products to be brought next year to the United States, where Sugartown Creative will serve as the sales agent.

November 14, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 6 Comments

According to Adweek, Grey Worldwide is responsible for the city of Atlanta's shoddy new logo and tagline.

The new branding effort began earlier this year when Mayor Shirley Franklin formed Brand Atlanta, a partnership between public and private interests to develop an advertising campaign for the city. Franklin wants to attract more tourists and businesses to the city.

The new work replaces the former slogan, "The city too busy to hate," which was popular for decades as Atlanta tried to distance itself from other areas of the South that favored segregation. The Ray Charles song, "Georgia on My Mind," had been the city's anthem for decades and was included on the state's vehicular license plates until last year.

With all the agency talent available in Atlanta, one might justifiably expect a better creative product.

November 14, 2005 by Dan Goldgeier | Permalink | 0 Comments

I suppose when you position yourself as a global branding expert, and the very city you live in spends millions on a new branding campaign without asking you for an opinion, you won't be happy it.

Needless to say, Al Ries is less than impressed with Atlanta's new branding initiative in his new column on AdAge.com:

November 14, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 2 Comments

Business Week's David Kiley is not fond of the new corporate ad campaign from Ford Motor Co. starring chairman and CEO Bill Ford.

In the ads, Bill Ford, the great-grandson of company founder Henry Ford who took control of the company in October 2001, casually sits on a stool in a design studio and talks about the company's commitment to "driving innovation.” In fact, the vanilla theme of the campaign is “Driving American Innovation.” Apparently, some other company had the copyrights to “Driving A New American Paradigm.” The first problem with the ads is that any company selling a product or service could have claimed this line. If the line can relate to any company then why spend hard earned money on it. Paging the copywriters! Who wrote this? Bill’s chauffer?

In a related move, Anheuser-Busch is using Auggie Busch V in new TV spots.

Who is responsible for these brilliant ideas? The agencies? I highly doubt it. Yet, they are culpable, nonetheless. For surely, they did little to resist. Doing so, would take a spine. And with Ford or Bud as your client, only the most cavalier among us would dare to grow a backbone.

Everyone loses here. The generational titans lose, for they do not belong in front of a TV camera, hocking their wares like Fast Eddie. Their companies lose becasue such work diminishes the brand. The agencies lose because they continue to lower their own bar, and the industry's, as well. The consumer loses because there's nothing there for them to latch onto.

November 14, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Most people loathe standing in line, or "on line," as the case may be. Which makes this promotional stunt from Ikea all the more painful to learn about.

According to a report in the Boston Herald, more than 2,000 people lined up by for the opening of the Swedish home furnishings chain’s first Massachusetts store. The first five people in line were rewarded gift certificates ranging in value from $500 to $5000.

First-in-line Mike Rice, an 18-year-old college freshman from Georgia, won the top prize. “Two weeks, $5,000 – that’s pretty good pay,” he said.

But it wasn’t all happy times for the top five prize-winners, who slept overnight in the Ikea garage anywhere from five to 12 days, depending on their spots in line. The close quarters sometimes took their toll on the four men and one woman. Gossiping ensued, and squabbles erupted over issues such as territory and smoking.

All five signed contracts with Ikea that governed their behavior, which was monitored via security camera. They could leave the line-up area for only 10 minutes at any time for restroom and smoking breaks, and were allowed one shower a day inside the store.

[via Adfreak]

November 14, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 17 Comments

The Spunker has turned us on to what appears at first glance to be a great suck-ass new ad blog, Copyranter.

I am an NYC ADVERTISING COPYWRITER. I get paid a ridiculous amount of money to be stupid. And then to change my stupidity to something stupider. And stupider. And so on. Like reading funny stupid stuff? Welcome.

With that kind of honesty up front, you know the contents of the blog are bound to be equally refreshing. Just take a look at some of Copyranter's headlines.

O' STUPID BILLBOARD, O' STUPID BILLBOARD...

DEAD is the new BLACK

The Gays Don't Shop Daffy's, DO THEY?

November 14, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 2 Comments

Tom Asacker makes some cogent points about wide gulph between what marketing experts recommend and what brand managers continue to do.

Consultants and popular marketing bloggers alike (they're often one in the same) increasingly advise brand managers to:

1. Treat customers with respect

2. Do what's in the best interest of potential customers

3. Get rid of the hype and, instead, provide more depth

4. Be authentic

Yet, we all know there's a major disconnect here. For brands that regularly annoy us with spam, unwanted direct mail and telemarketing continue to make their numbers.

If we want corporate marketers to change their ideologies (and thus their approach to us as customers), doesn't the responsibility ultimately fall on us? As long as we help them achieve their goals (by responding to their offerings), shouldn't they continue on their ROI ways; especially in this age of relentless pressure on the bottom line?

Maybe consumers ought to refrain from ignoring these interuption marketers and start a black list.

November 15, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

USA Today: Menswear designer Joseph Abboud is in negotiations to outfit up to 100 NBA players, according to Marty Staff, the fashion company's president and CEO. Joseph Abboud has an endorsement deal with New York Knicks guard Stephon Marbury to provide a new suit for all 82 games this season. In return, Marbury is in Joseph Abboud ads.

Joseph Abboud has forged similar outfitting deals with tight end Jeremy Shockey of the New York Giants and center fielder Johnny Damon of the Boston Red Sox. The men's label has been popular over the years with sportscasters such as Bryant Gumbel and Bob Costas.

November 15, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Business 2.0: “I look at Flickr with envy,” Jerry Yang, co-founder and chief of Yahoo says. “It feels like where the Web is going.”

What Yang envies is the community of 1.5 million rabidly loyal users Flickr has cultivated and the vast amount of content they’ve created. Of the 60 million photos uploaded to the site so far, more than 80 percent are public, meaning that anyone can look at them. More than half have been “tagged” with user-created labels, making them searchable. To use Flickr is to belong to the culture of participation sweeping the Web -- where you write your own blog, produce your own podcast, and post your personal photos for all to see. If this is where the Web is going, Yang wants to make sure Yahoo gets there first.

Indeed, the Flickr purchase helped ignite a larger strategy. Thanks to a new generation of managers like Stewart Butterfield and Caterina Fake, Yahoo is starting to see how user-generated content, or “social media,” is a key weapon in its war against Google. That upstart in neighboring Mountain View may have a better reputation for search, it may dominate online advertising, and it may always win when it comes to machines and math. But Yahoo has 191 million registered users. What would happen if it could form deep, lasting, Flickr-like bonds with them -- and get them to apply tags not just to photos, but to the entire Web?

Many of the champions of social media inside Yahoo -- including Flickr’s Butterfield and Fake, senior technologist Bradley Horowitz, and the head of Yahoo’s developer network, Toni Schneider -- are former startup founders recently acquired or hired. These entrepreneurs are sprinkling their social-media DNA all over the company, in a process some insiders are calling the “Flickrization” of Yahoo.

November 15, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Charles Cooper is the executive editor of commentary at CNET News.com. He has an interesting take on MSM's propensity for head in the sand behavior in the face of their rapidly diminishing market share.

During a panel discussion on Internet versus traditional media that I attended this week in Santa Clara, tech columnist John Markoff of The New York Times and tech columnist Kara Swisher of The Wall Street Journal sounded like Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid as they repeated the mainstream media's general suspicion of the blogosphere: Who are those guys?

Markoff and Swisher are smart cookies who are clued into the technology business. But there's a shift under way in which authority is being transferred to authors with no accountability other than to themselves and their readership. Does it matter? Should it matter? The mainstream media can look down its nose at the blogosphere, but the numbers tell a different story. More people than ever are reading blogs because of shared affinities and it's coming at the expense of print newspapers.

Yahoo Chief Operating Officer Dan Rosensweig, who was also on the panel, put it succinctly to traditional media:

"We don't know who your editors are. All our lives we read stuff written by people we don't know that's edited by people we don't know, who might have an agenda."

November 15, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

According to The New York Times, last weekend outside Phoenix International Raceway, Kurt Busch, the 2004 Nextel Cup champion, received a citation for reckless driving in an incident that involved alcohol. Apparently, Busch behaved in a belligerent manner toward the Maricopa County Sheriff's deputies during the incident. Proof of his intoxication, however, is inconclusive.

Given Nascar's decision to allow liquor advertising late last year, even the possibility of impropriety is enough to tarnish the sport's wholesome image.

So, Busch--who drives the No. 97 Crown Royal car--is out. At least for now.

"We did not want to be in a position where Roush Racing and Diageo and Newell Rubbermaid could be viewed as condoning this behavior," Roush Racing's president, Geoff Smith, said in a telephone interview yesterday. "In the end, we decided the only appropriate thing to do was suspend him."

"Diageo does not condone this type of behavior from anyone affiliated with our brands or our business," the company said in a prepared statement. "We fully support Roush Racing's swift actions in this regard."

[UPDATE] Kurt Busch was not intoxicated, according to this update in the the New York Times. His blood alcohol level was recorded at .017, light years away from the .08 needed in Arizona to prove legal intoxication.

Yet, Roush Racing's president, Geoff Smith, said yesterday that the team had no plans to rescind the suspension despite the latest information from the sheriff's office. "There can't be any activity engaged in by a driver that the general community would believe negatively impacts on the brand or on the team or on the company," Smith said in a telephone interview.

Excuse me, but is this guy a racecar driver or a human billboard? I don't know squat about racing, but it seems to me this champion ought to be out shopping for a new team that wants to support him. He ran a stopsign and talked some smack. BFD.

November 15, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

According to Ad Age, Anheuser-Busch is asking cable networks to not run a rival’s ads claiming Bud Light has changed.

The Miller Brewing Co. ads in question, from MDC Partners’ Crispin Porter & Bogusky use humorous courtroom settings to push Miller’s ongoing claim that Miller Lite has more taste than Bud Light. The ads, one of which features Flavor Flav of Public Enemy, describe Bud Light as having “changed.”

The ads don’t elaborate on what’s different. But Miller claims it has detected changes in bitterness and carbonation.

August Busch IV, president of the U.S. brewery, also decried Miller’s tactics in a memo to wholesalers. Noting the brewer has been losing share in supermarkets amid a pricing war, he said A-B is "seeing the signs of a desperate competitor.”

Miller “has been reckless in their communications and their actions are detrimental to the industry,” Mr. Busch said. “We will consider additional, tightly targeted communications pointing out facts about their brewing, if the situation warrants.”

November 15, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

In a move that can only be described as totally unexpected (or better yet, jaw-dropping), Wal-Mart is looking at a new urbanism proposal in Pass Christian, Mississippi--a town decimated by Hurricane Katrina.

[via Reveries]

November 15, 2005 by Dan Goldgeier | Permalink | 1 Comments

TV advertising isn't dead, but it seems like the ad industry is deliberately helping to kill it off. That's the subject of my new column on Talent Zoo.

After spending an hour watching Fox News' special on global warming last Sunday, I kept a running list of all the ads I saw--all 32 of them. And all I saw was a waste of ad money.

Why was I watching a TV show on global warming and no one tried to sell me a hybrid car or a bicycle? I was in the mood to listen. Whether a product represented a major lifestyle change or a little eco-friendly gesture, any advertiser seeking to appeal to an environmentally conscious audience had their chance—and blew it.

Now, I’m not a media planner. So I couldn’t tell you if there’s a way to always ensure that appropriate messages match the appropriate TV programming. But as TV ratings come under increasing scrutiny, the key to television advertising’s future effectiveness may not come through numbers, but through the relevance and appropriateness of when and where people see that advertising. Of course, you can’t convert that idea into an equation and slap it into an Excel document to justify your 15% commission.

Any media people out there want to jump in on this one?

November 16, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Lewis Lazare shares some worthwhile tidbits today in his Chicago Sun Times advertising column.

• The Joffrey Ballet and Ghirardelli Soda Fountain & Chocolate Shop are teaming up to promote Joffrey's 50th anniversary and Ghirardelli's 10th year in Chicago. Ghirardelli has unveiled a new shop window display with Joffrey costumes, the first time anything but chocolate will have been featured there.

• Dunkin' Brands is rebranding 46 Togo's stores nationwide to a new Dunkin' Deli concept, including 23 Togo's in the Chicago area. The Dunkin' Deli was developed to leverage the brand recognition associated with Dunkin' Donuts. The changeover begins this week.

• Starting today, public relations professionals will have free access to a new daily source of news information, analysis and opinion. Called the "Daily Dog," the service will be published online by the Bulldog Reporter at www.bulldogreporter.com/dailydog.

November 16, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Yahoo News will begin to feature content from Gawker Media. Which means the snarkiness found on Gawker Media sites like Wonkette and Defamer will now share equal footing with stories filed by MSM institutions like Associated Press.

According to MediaPost, Scott Moore, Yahoo!'s head of news and finance, said the idea to add Gawker came up over dinner with its founder and publisher Nick Denton. "It seemed like a natural thing to do."

[via Micropersuasion]

November 16, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

The latest in Publicis New York's "It's all about the beer" campaign.

[via Adhunt]

November 16, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 1 Comments

Douglas Rushkoff, the brainiac who brought the world "The Merchants of Cool" and "The Persuaders" on PBS' Frontline, has written his first business book, Get Back In The Box, in which he "contextualizes the open source ethos as part of a bigger renaissance: the emergence of an authorship society."

This renaissance ethos of authorship isn't limited to some isolated group of “cultural creatives” in New York, San Francisco, and Cambridge. No, it's a mainstream "red state" American trend, as well, emerging as crafts fairs, a NASCAR culture of car modification, gun kits, backyard farming, and even home schooling.

This is the spirit of authorship presaged by the Internet and now extending to every area of our lives. The hacker mentality is all around us, evidenced in everything from the hubris to learn the entire genetic code and attempt human cloning to a growing stack of new translations of the Bible.

It is the real legacy of the open source movement—misunderstood even by many of its participants as solely a way to develop computer operating systems, and underestimated in its potential impact by even its staunchest opponents.

[via Random Culture]

November 16, 2005 by Dan Goldgeier | Permalink | 13 Comments

A new movie called “Wal-Mart: The High-Cost of Low Price” is making the rounds at screenings primarily in churches and community centers across America. In a review that's chock full of hyperbole, the movie gets a clear 'thumbs-down' from Ad Age:

Whether the movie gains the traction of a “Supersize Me” or Michael Moore’s “Roger & Me,” it will do so despite its untraditional distribution formula and its decidedly humorless tone, punctuated only by a few clips from "The Daily Show With Jon Stewart" ruthlessly poking fun at Wal-Mart.

Mr. Greenwald’s film lobs many charges -– including many that have been contested and already reformed or legally settled by the retailer -- but offers little in the way of new information.

I suppose the Ad Age reviewer was expecting a Mel Brooks-style romp through the world of big box domination, outsourcing and low wages. Kind of like "Springtime For Hitler" but with everyone in blue vests.

That there's no new information in the film is hardly a surprise, but by screening the film in community centers and churches, what you have is a new way to get the message out and stimulate community discussion. A lot of big brands could learn that lesson.

November 16, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 3 Comments

PSFK points to an innovative new organizer from Mr. Smith Inc., "a provider of consumer products that serve an existing function better or do something wholly new."

Here's the whimsical product description from the manufacturer:

Compact, splash-proof, and colorful, Jimi™ is the wallet re-born. Jimi™ is a real pocket wallet - as in one that fits in your pocket. Is it a travel wallet? A take-out-at-night wallet? Cycling wallet? Snowboard wallet? Eco wallet? Sure. All of the above, but it's also been called the anti-wallet, so go figure. What we know is that with Jimi™ you carry less crap, are more successful at work and have more fulfilling relationships. Actually we have no evidence for the second two; it's just a feeling.

I'm ordering mine now. It's only $14.95. And no, this is not a paid advert.

November 16, 2005 by Shawn Hartley | Permalink | 2 Comments

After facilitating the spread of computer viruses through a CD copy protection scheme, Sony has caved in to the consumer backlash and class action lawsuits.

Sony BMG, yielding to consumer concern, said on Wednesday it was recalling music CDs containing copy-protection software that acts like virus software and hides deep inside a computer.

Sony BMG has used the XCP copy-protection software on 49 titles from artists such as Celine Dion and Sarah McLachlan and produced an estimated 4.7 million music CDs. Around 2.1 million units have been sold on to consumers.

The software, developed by a British firm, First4Internet, installs itself on a personal computer used to play the CD in order to guard against copying, but it leaves the back door open for malicious hackers.

"We share the concerns of consumers regarding discs with XCP content-protected software, and, for this reason, we are instituting a consumer exchange program and removing all unsold CDs with this software from retail outlets," Sony BMG said in an statement.

November 17, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Steve Rubel suggests that marketers may begin chasing the long tail and begin placing ads on more and more blogs, given that inventory at the big portals is presently booked out months in advance.

I agree that it's a logical step, but it seems to me brands and their media buying partners will need help navigating the bloatosphere. Hence, for those actively creating the blogvertising business model, media buying could become a larger slice of the income pie than creative development.

Certainly, blog networks are well positioned to capitalize. But there are plenty of places to advertise outside these networks, as well.

November 17, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Greenville-based Erwin-Penland (a division of Hill Holiday) was recently charged with creating a new identity for the city's baseball team, a Boston Red Sox affiliate in the Class A South Atlantic League. They landed on the Greenville Drive, after Major League Baseball rejected their first choice, the Greenville Joes—as in hometown hero Shoeless Joe Jackson.

Greenville Online: "We ran it up the flagpole, and professional baseball turned us down," said Craig Smith, team president and one of the franchise's three co-owners. "We even appealed, and it was denied again."

The Joes name was "off the charts" in its popularity, according to Smith, being preferred by a 2-to-1 margin over Drive, which was the second-most popular moniker.

"The gap between one and two was large, and then the gap between two and the rest of the names was large," said Joe Erwin, president of Erwin-Penland, the marketing firm that helped create the team's new name and logo.

Erwin said his firm, along with team representatives, "evaluated a list of potential names gathered from community sources" before making the final decision. Other finalists included the Grits, the Greensox, the Fireflies, the Fire Ants, the Copperheads and the Flying Squirrels.

"We were devastated when 'Joes' was rejected," Erwin said. "We all loved that name and loved the connection to Shoeless Joe. The 'Joes' really resonated with a lot of folks."

Greg Cordell of Brains On Fire, a Greenville identity firm, is not pleased with this compromise.

Since when did baseball become more about regional economic development than about fans and players? (Michelin, BMW and ICAR are all in our backyard.) I’m no dummy. I know professional baseball is a business, but a business isn’t baseball. Players, fans, hot dogs, peanuts, cold beer on sunny afternoons, the dreams of little boys and girls, relaxed smiles and good clean fun on warm summer nights – those are the things that make up baseball.

Who wants to be reminded of big corporations at a baseball game? Is nothing sacred anymore? It’s bad enough they have to ugly up the outfield with ads. And what nine year-old aspires to be a “Drive?” Is anyone really thinking about this? There isn’t even a hint of competitive spirit or passion in the word.

November 17, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

We live in interesting times.

Ad Age reports third-quarter ad revenue plunged 21.5% at the big three broadcast networks, according to the Broadcast Cable Financial Management Association, which releases figures for ABC, CBS and NBC that are compiled by auditor Ernst & Young.

The New York Times reports today that The Los Angeles Times plans to cut jobs throughout the newspaper, including about 85 of its 1,032 newsroom jobs.

Hollywood is hurting. The recording industry is suffering. Book sales are down.

I could continue with this laundry list, but there's no need. The evidence of shift is all around us. What I find interesting is the various responses to these sea changes. AOL, a company I have never cared for, made a smart move earlier in the week by announcing they will offer classic TV shows like "Welcome Back Kotter" for viewers to download at their convenience. Take that TiVo!

Yet sadly, too many mainstream media execs continue to flounder. Even NPR has shown signs of head-in-the-sand behavior, for which there is simply no excuse.

November 17, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

In June 2005, Jeffrey Miron, a Visiting Professor of Economics at Harvard University, wrote a report, “Budgetary Implications of Marijuana Prohibition in the United States” arguing for the regulation and taxation of marijuana and sent it to President Bush. It included the sweeping endorsements of over 530 of the world’s most respected economists, including that of Milton Friedman, the Nobel Memorial Prize recipient and member of President Ronald Reagan’s Economic Policy Advisory Board.

Now, ANIMAL magazine features the Professor on the cover of its latest issue. The zine also recruited one of the "hottest advertising agencies in the world" (on condition of anonymity) to create a fully integrated ad campaign that includes a stencil, a tear our letter to the president, and will soon include an interactive component.

Great. But what's up with the agency in question demanding anonymity? Would they demand the same if their client was pushing alcohol or tobacco?

November 17, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Business Week: My research department doesn't know it, but I'm killing all our focus groups." So spoke Cammie Dunaway, chief marketing officer at Yahoo! Inc., at a Silicon Valley conference in September. Dunaway doesn't plan to harm the groups of innocents that marketers have long assembled in beige conference rooms to observe behind two-way mirrors, like zoo animals, as they hold forth about coffee and shampoo preferences. But she does want to put the two-way-mirror manufacturers out of business.

Exasperation with focus groups, while not universal, is growing as companies look for better ways to get inside consumers' heads, often assisted by new technology and the Internet. The dissatisfaction and the proliferation of new research approaches has been escalating so rapidly that the ad industry's main trade group has been spurred to conduct the first widespread study of testing methods since the 1950s.

Perhaps the most common complaint about focus groups is that consumers are not honest in front of other people. America Online Inc. in 2003 saw a disconnect between what men revealed in groups and the complaints about spam it received by e-mail. It turned out that men, in a room with strangers, were not keen to admit they didn't have full command of their laptops. But in e-mails, they conceded that they were tortured by underperforming spam blockers.

Looking for better methods of predicting consumer acceptance, Pepsi recently turned to Wellesley (Mass.)-based Invoke Solutions, which conducted several instant-message-style online panels of 80 to 100 people collected by its affiliated online survey firm, Greenfield Online. Pepsi delved into attitudes among Gen Xers toward drinking mineral water. In just a few hours, the beverage marketer was able to gather and process detailed feedback from hundreds of consumers. Getting a comparable result from focus groups would have taken several weeks.

November 18, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 1 Comments

Lewis Lazare is curious about the promotion of one of Chicago's top creatives.

Marshall Ross, longtime executive creative director at Cramer-Krasselt/Chicago, has been upped to chief creative officer overseeing creative units in C-K's Chicago, Milwaukee, Phoenix and Orlando, Fla., offices, but, oddly enough, not C-K's New York office, headed by Dean Stefanides and Larry Hampel. At least one source questioned whether Ross' promotion was indeed that, or an attempt to move him up and out of control of the agency's flagship Chicago office. "Good creative directors are there on the job day in and day out," the source said. "They're giving Ross an impossible job, and then they'll have an excuse to kick him out when it doesn't go well." C-K CEO Peter Krivkovich said the promotion "represents the complete confidence I have in Marshall's talent, ability and leadership."

Don't you just love anonymous sources?

November 18, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Doc Searls is concerned about the future of the net. In Linux Journal, he outlines his reasons for concern. Here's but a snippet:

With the purchase and re-animation of AT&T's remains, the collection of former Baby Bells called SBC will become the largest communications company in the US--the new Ma Bell. Verizon, comprised of the old GTE plus MCI and the Baby Bells SBC didn't grab, is the new Pa Bell. That's one side of the battlefield, called The Regulatory Environment. Across the battlefield from Ma and Pa Bell are the cable and entertainment giants: Comcast, Cox, TimeWarner and so on. Covering the battle are the business and tech media, which love a good fight.

The problem is that all of these battling companies--plus the regulators--hate the Net.

Maybe hate is too strong of a word. The thing is, they're hostile to it, because they don't get it. Worse, they only get it in one very literal way. See, to the carriers and their regulators, the Net isn't a world, a frontier, a marketplace or a commons. To them, the Net is a collection of pipes. Their goal is to beat the other pipe-owners. To do that, they want to sell access and charge for traffic.

There's nothing wrong with being in the bandwidth business, of course. But some of these big boys want to go farther with it. They don't see themselves as a public utility selling a pure base-level service, such as water or electricity (which is what they are, by the way, in respect to the Net). They see themselves as a source of many additional value-adds, inside the pipes. They see opportunities to sell solutions to industries that rely on the Net--especially their natural partner, the content industry.

[via Gaping Void]

November 18, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

I think many of us would agree that advertising is home to an inordinant number of troublesome employees. Why this business attracts so many jerk offs remains something of a mystery (at least to me). Perhaps the recent Terrell Owens debacle in Philadpelpha can shed some light.

Wharton: Faculty members at Wharton and other experts say Owens is a classic case of a star employee who, because of his immense talent, was given wide latitude even though he engaged in eccentric (at best) and abusive (at worst) behavior. But even Owens' ability to catch passes and score touchdowns could not save his job because his behavior reached the point that it was deemed detrimental to the successful functioning of the organization.

"Managing stars is difficult duty for even the most skilled managers," says Katherine A. Nelson, a suburban Philadelphia-based ethics consultant who teaches in executive education programs at Wharton. "It's challenging enough when you are managing a high performer who has good interpersonal skills. However, if you are managing a high performer with poor interpersonal skills, your job goes from challenging to nightmarish. Almost nothing can disrupt a workplace faster than a star performer who is arrogant or abusive or who demands special treatment. Not addressing the star's bad behavior is tantamount to lobbing a grenade into a conference room because resentment will ferment among other members of your team and it will eventually -- sometimes very quickly -- undermine the performance of the entire team. The Eagles are a perfect example of this."

T.O. really has no good reason to act out. Every football fan knows he is an outstanding performer. One would think that woud satisfy him.

In our business, no matter how high you reach, the reality is you're still an unknown, for we make products famous, not ad people. Sure, some of us achieve a certain notoreity within the industry, but that's where it stops. So what's the deal? Why do some talented ad people regularly cause disturbances? Is it their need for recognition, however limited? Or is it just human nature, with no connection at all to the business of advertising?

November 18, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

NYT: American products are struggling these days in the Chinese market, where they have trouble measuring up to European brands and even some Chinese brands.

Abby Chan, a 23-year-old advertising copywriter, took a break from shopping for Levi's jeans at a mall here (Guangzhou, China) on Wednesday evening and relaxed at a table in a Starbucks restaurant.

Aside from coffee and denim, there were not many American brand products that interested her. She covets Chanel clothing and Louis Vuitton bags, dreams of owning a BMW or Mercedes-Benz someday, and struggles to think of an American brand that appeals to her.

"There are more choices for European brands, more styles, so they are more interesting," she said.

November 18, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 1 Comments

Thanks to The Spunker for the image.

November 18, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

USA Today reports that cash-strapped cities across the nation are looking for ways to boost revenue. Their answers increasingly include selling ad space on municpal property.

Government Acquisitions LLC of Charlotte, NC wants to help police departments defray the cost of new vehicles, by arranging for national and local advertisers to buy media on said cars. An executive with the firm claims 20 cities have signed contracts for police cars that will carry NASCAR-style adverts, and more than 200 others are interested.

In realted news, San Diego is considering letting General Motors put ads on lifeguard towers in exchange for 35 free cars. And the city of St. Charles, Mo. voted in September to rent ad space on its trash-collection trucks.

November 18, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

[via J-Walk]

November 18, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Bloggers Blog features a comprehensive list of blog networks. Several of the networks in their list are MSM properties with a handful of so-called blogs. I don't believe such "blogs" a network makes. But I digress. I'm interested in what the independent networks are doing, especially after Jason Calacanis showed the bloatoshpere the proverbial money last month with his sale of Weblogs, Inc. to AOL.

Here are some of the premier indie blog networks (at this moment in time):

9 Rules

B5 Media

Corante

Duct Tape Marketing

Fine Fools

Gawker Media

Gothamist LLC

Sports Blog Nation

My list is far from exhaustive. I'm sure there are other networks doing a great job of delivering content and landing ad revenue deals--one of the obvious reasons for the collectives in the first place.

A less obvious reason for putting a network together might have to do with empowering citizens to make media. I know I've thought a lot about how to bring blogs to corporate America, and I'm convinced the blogvertising business model will take off. What I'm not convinced of is how committed I am to that path long term. Whereas helping individuals deliver their stories to the world, that's something I can get excited about, and stay excited about.

November 19, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 1 Comments

Hugh MacLeod has produced some doodles for his friends at Cravens Advertising in Newcastle, England. While snooping around their site, these etymological gems surfaced.

I've been reading "Which Lie Did I Tell" by William Goldman (the guy who wrote Butch Cassidy & Sundance Kid). A fantastic book about his experiences as a screenwriter in Hollywood.

He also gives some tips and observations about the screenwriter's art. (Essential reading for all copywriters).

One thing he talks about is pitching movie ideas. The stress and heartache of selling an idea you care passionately about.

Goldman says that to understand the pain of the pitch you have to consider its origin.

Back to a time of medieval religious persecution and the actions of one of its chief inquisitors.

Pitch: This originated during the Spanish Inquisition. Torquemada, one of its leaders would tell imprisoned playwrights that if they could interest him in an idea, he would let them live long enough to write it. If not, they were dropped into a large vat (or pitch) of boiling tar, hence the term 'pitch'

This also got me thinking about the origin of 'deadline', another everyday agency word

Deadline: Originating during the American Civil War: prisoners in that war were seldom held in purpose-built jails. More often, they were herded at gunpoint inside a makeshift boundary. The boundary had two lines, and a prisoner who stepped outside the inner boundary was ordered back, but one who over-stepped the outer boundary was shot. Thus it was called the deadline.

Tough job this agency gig.

November 19, 2005 by Dan Goldgeier | Permalink | 0 Comments

Otherwise known as "Black Friday," the day after Thanksgiving is the busiest shopping day of the year. And it's notorious for early bird "doorbuster" specials and one-day sales.

Now this website will show you what's on sale at various stores during Black Friday, in many instances with actual PDF's of sale inserts.

Happy Chanukah, Merry Christmas, Happy Kwanzaa, Happy Festvius--don't forget, this is America. Shopping is the reason for the season.

November 19, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Life Site: A Catholic civil rights group is calling for a boycott of Wal-Mart stores after learning the retailer has replaced all reference to “Merry Christmas” with “Happy Holidays” in its advertising and in-store greetings.

The Catholic League has historically highlighted incidents of anti-Christmas shenanigans at businesses throughout the nation. Commenting on the hostility to the celebration of the birth of the Christ Child last year, Catholic League president William Donohue said, “What bothers these cultural fascists is traditional morality.”

[via Metafiler]

November 20, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 2 Comments

I saw Walk The Line today, the film about Johnny Cash and June Carter. There was one poignant scene early in the film that I'd like to discuss. After happening upon a session with Elvis at Sun Records in Memphis, Cash came back around and asked Sam Phillips for an audition. At the audition, Cash and his two cohorts--Marshall Grant on bass and Luther Perkins on electric guitar--offered Phillips their best gospel song, but Phillips was underwhelmed. Cash asked Phillips what was the matter. Phillips said, "I don't believe you."

He then challenged Cash to offer something real, something truly original. He asked Cash what he would sing if he were hit by a bus and had but one song to sing before he died. Cash responded with a song he'd written in the Air Force, Folsom Prison Blues. The rest is, as they say, history.

Cash came in to his audition with a sound he thought would sell. That's what ad people do everyday. We're conditioned to bring to the table what we think the client (not the customer) will buy. Over and over and over again, we willingly dumb ourselves down. In order to sell. Unless there's a Sam Phillips in the room, these half-hearted efforts go forward and weak communications result.

There is only one way advertising is ever going to improve and truly reach people. We need to care more about pleasing the customer and ourselves than pleasing the client. Kirshenbaum and Bond talk all about this approach to the work in their seminal book, Under the Radar. A few visionary (and ballsy) people practice this art. Everyone else tries to please the client, for clients pay the bills. The great majority, therefore, are driven not by the desire to connect, but by fear of rejection. I, for one, am disgusted by this formula. Yet there seems to be no way out. Unless you're entire team is on board with pleasing the customer first and the client second, business as usual takes the day.

November 21, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 5 Comments

I was going to say something positive about Banana Republic's current story-based campaign, where the print work teases and then directs one to HolidayStory.com, but no. BR's site does not support Safari.

We're sorry, but we do not support the version of the browser you are using.

We're working on supporting Safari. Please check back soon.

Check back soon? I don't think so.

Once a brand loses the opportunity to connect, that's it. Game over.

November 21, 2005 by Dan Goldgeier | Permalink | 0 Comments

I always have Yahoo as the home page on my browser, so I couldn't help notice this little juxtoposition:

There are any number of reasons for GM's new job cuts, but creating the types of cars that rely on price-based promotions to sell can't be helping much.

November 21, 2005 by Dan Goldgeier | Permalink | 5 Comments

The New York Times serves up this big scoop today.

Actually, the NYT story summarizes a new report from Salz Consulting in New York.

"This has not been a great year," said Nancy L. Salz, president of Nancy L. Salz Consulting in New York, which has sponsored the Salz Survey of Advertiser-Agency Relations since 1986.

"A lot of the major indicators are down and it's a struggle to get them to improve," she said.

The results "are a real reflection that the industry is in a huge state of flux," Ms. Salz said, as advertisers and agencies scramble to keep up with the seemingly continuous changes in consumer behavior, media choices and categories ranging from automobiles to packaged foods to telecommunications.

Even so, "as different as things are becoming," Ms. Salz said, "this is still about an old-fashioned concept, people communicating with people." And "there's still a huge opportunity to improve sales just by working better together," she said.

It's probably an interesting report, but from the Times' summary, it seems laden with statistics that you'd have to take with a grain of salt. Here's what the report probably doesn't mention:

Most agencies don't trust their clients and vice versa. Agencies (and their creatives) are always angling for ways to do high-visibility, self-serving, award-winning work to get the attention of the ad industry. Clients always try to get the most out of their agency for as little money as possible. Most clients have no idea who's doing the day-to-day work on their account. Most agencies generally loathe the idea of presenting work over and over again up the client's chain of command to get approval. Most agencies don't undertand their client's business or industry. Most clients don't understand the subjective nature of creativity.

There. I just gave you that analysis for free. What do y'all think? Feel free to add your own state-of-the-relationship tidbits.

November 21, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

NYT: Beginning in 2006, TiVo owners will be able to watch recorded television shows on Apple's video iPods and on Sony's handheld PSP game machine.

The announcement builds on TiVo's release in February of an update to its video recorders that allows its users to transfer programs to personal computers and DVD's, as well as to portable video players that support Microsoft's mobile video format. When the company releases new software in the first quarter of next year, it will extend that capability to the video iPod, released last month, and the Sony PSP.

"This is another thing we can do to add value for our subscribers," said Jim Denney, TiVo's vice president of product marketing. "We've seen reasonable demand and interest from people to bring their videos with them."

Owners of the Apple or Sony devices will need to pay TiVo to unlock the portion of the new software that converts videos to the MPEG-4 format used by those players.

November 21, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 4 Comments

Ad Age: Controversial creative Neil French was the most talked-about speaker on the first day of Asian regional advertising conference AdAsia -- even though his appearance was abruptly canceled at WPP Group’s insistence.

More than 1,000 delegates are attending the Nov. 21-23 AdAsia conference in Singapore, and many were eager to hear Mr. French, who created a worldwide furor at a talk in Canada when he called women creatives “crap” and said they don’t work hard enough to be successful because of the time they spend raising children.

Mr. French’s non-appearance was the lead story in a local trade publication’s AdAsia show daily, which quoted an e-mail from a WPP executive to AdAsia organizers apologizing “that you are in this situation, but I do not think we can change our position on Neil.”

In Asia, where Mr. French has spent much of his career based in Singapore, not everyone understands what the fuss is about. At a private dinner on Monday night, one Australian creative said Mr. French is simply “cheeky” and had a good record on encouraging and promoting women. Another creative said, “You have to look at [his remarks] through a cultural filter. In Singapore, it’s still legal to beat your wife.”

November 21, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Reuters: Match.com is accused in a federal lawsuit of goading members into renewing their subscriptions through bogus romantic e-mails sent out by company employees.

The Match lawsuit was filed earlier this month in U.S. District Court in Los Angeles by plaintiff Matthew Evans, who contends he went out with a woman he met through the site who turned out to be nothing more than "date bait" working for the company.

"This is a grossly fraudulent practice that Match.com is engaged in," said H. Scott Leviant, a lawyer at Los Angeles law firm Arias, Ozzello & Gignac LLP, which brought the suit.

Leviant said his client found out about the alleged scam after the woman he dated confessed she was employed by Match. The lawsuit also claims the company violated the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organization Act, a law best known for being used in prosecuting organized crime.

The company said it does not comment on pending litigation. But Match spokeswoman Kristin Kelly said the company "absolutely does not" employ people to go on dates with subscribers or to send members misleading e-mails professing romantic interest.

U.S. consumers spent $245.2 million on online personals and dating services in the first half of 2005, up 7.6 percent from a year earlier, according to the Online Publishers Association. That's a slower growth rate compared with several years ago.

November 21, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Brandweek is reporting on Johnson & Johnson's request that major media outlets compete to deliver creative concepts.

In a move that has consequences for its ad agencies, media sales execs, and individual brand managers, Johnson & Johnson has commissioned an image campaign by staging a creative jump ball among at least three media conglomerates.

Creative for the campaign—three new TV spots in the ongoing “Having a baby changes everything” effort—was initially proposed by Time Warner, which beat out Viacom and NBC Universal in a “bake-off,” TW said. The spots feature three TW celebrities, actor Stephen Collins from The WB's 7th Heaven, actress Holly Robinson Peete from UPN's Love Inc., and writer Nicholas Sparks from publisher Warner Books.

The unusual route of their development illustrates J&J's ongoing interest in going beyond its traditional ad agencies to do unique deals with media providers.

Brian Perkins, J&J's vp-corporate affairs said he expects J&J's individual brand managers to start looking at more cross-media creative deals with media giants. “I think this is more the model of the future. We're encouraging this from our agencies and our media partners,” he said.

“I don't think Madison Avenue should feel threatened. I think Madison Avenue should feel we're looking for more creative solutions,” Perkins said.

So, let me get this straight...leveraging TV stars from Time Warner's own shows to appear in J&J spots is a big idea? I think Lowe (J&J's lead agency) could have come up with that one.

November 22, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 7 Comments

NYT: Among the 33 top agencies, as ranked by the trade publication Adweek, only 4 have flagship offices with female creative directors. Ogilvy & Mather and Young & Rubicam - both owned by WPP - have women as chief executives.

Linda Kaplan Thaler

"Thirty years ago we were nowhere," said Carol Evans, the chief executive of Working Mother Media and president of the Advertising Women of New York, an organization with more than 1,200 women members. "There were no agency C.E.O.'s, and it was a very bad business for women. But the Neil French incident shows how much work still needs to be done."

The dominance of men on the creative side of the business is even more striking, considering that women commonly make up to 80 percent of household purchasing decisions, according to the Polling Company in Washington.

Women are rarely acclaimed for creative work. Last month, the One Club inducted Diane Rothschild to its Creative Hall of Fame, the first woman chosen since 1974. In remarks at the Metropolitan Club, she called Mr. French a "bombastic, insecure throwback to the 1970's," and said his attitude was emblematic of his generation.

"Based on the world according to uninspired, rigid, time-warped and aging advertising men, I should be home right now in a little apron," Ms. Rothschild said. "Where I shouldn't be is here being inducted into the Creative Hall of Fame."

November 22, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Internet News is running an article about the greening of HP. The piece draws attention to HP's efforts to recycle approximately 140 million pounds of hardware and HP print cartridges globally, an increase of over 17 percent from the prior year. It also highlights the difficulty HP has historically had in claiming PR wins around this issue.

"If HP invented sushi they would have called it 'cold, dead fish,' " said Amy Wohl, an analyst and founder of tech consultancy Wohl & Associates. "They don't get PR as an art. It's always been more of an engineering culture."

Apparently, Sun Microsystems has no such difficulty taking credit for their environmental sensitivity, even when their efforts lack substance.

"I don't want to name names, but yes, it does tick me off when, let's say, a competitor puts out one product and calls themselves 'green,' said David Lear HP's vice-president for corporate, social and environmental responsibility. "You dig into it and find out it's not going to be available worldwide, it's not lead free and it will ship in small quantities."

November 22, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

[via Adverblog]

November 22, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Room 116 points to a great article in New York Magazine about Sidney Frank, CEO of the Sidney Frank Importing Co. The piece describes Frank's Gatsbyesque rise, and how he created Grey Goose vodka from thin air.

In this story, the name came first—as it so often does when image is the paramount concern. Frank recalled he’d once sold a Liebfraumilch named Grey Goose back in the seventies. These were German white wines that were briefly hip but faded into oblivion. “I remember there was always something in the name that had magic with the consumer,” says Frank. (It may also be that Frank liked the name because he already owned the worldwide rights to it.) Frank gathered his lieutenants at the company’s New Rochelle headquarters. “Go to France and come back with a vodka,” he said. So they met with cognac distillers, whose business had slowed. The stills were switched to vodka, and at last there was an actual product.

But why France? Doesn’t vodka come from Russia, or perhaps, in a pinch, Scandinavia? “People are always looking for something new,” says Frank. It’s all about brand differentiation. If you’re going to charge twice as much for a vodka, you need to give people a reason.

Frank could see that there was a product missing from the shelves. Here were all these vodkas, in the $15-to-$17 range, vying to be the premium brand (with Absolut mostly winning). Frank just sidestepped the fray altogether and charged an unheard-of $30 a bottle. The markup amount was pure profit. “He was the first person to see,” says an executive at rival Bacardi, “that there was a superpremium category above Absolut, if you had a good product story.”

By the way, Frank recently sold Grey Goose to Bacardi for $2,000,000,000 in cash. According to Forbes, the sale--the largest in liquor-business history for a single brand--solidified his spot in the booze business pantheon. It also landed him on The Forbes 400. His personal proceeds from the deal, plus a 75% stake in Sidney Frank Importing, make him worth at least $1.6 billion.

Uh hum...I think I'll have a Smirnoff and Cran.

November 22, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Ken Magill writing in Direct joins the chorus of blog naysayers from MSM.

(blogs are) The media phenomenon responsible for the publication of more self-indulgent nonsense than any other in the history of the world.

Outside politics, 99.9% of blog entries are, well, horseblit with links to more horseblit.

His word "horseblit" is meant to be a blog-friendly way of saying horseshit. Funny guy.

So, who is this Mr. Magill? According to Direct, Magill edited iMarketing News, a newspaper devoted to online marketing, from its inception in 1999 until 2002. It was rolled into DM News in the wake of the dot-com crash. After that he served as an editor and columnist at DM News, leaving in 2003 to become business editor of The New York Sun.

Let's recap. A guy who once wrote a newsletter devoted to online marketing thinks blogs are horseshit. Brilliant.

[via Bly.com]

November 22, 2005 by Dan Goldgeier | Permalink | 2 Comments

I confess that when I got my first real job a number of years ago, I drove 9 hours to the nearest Ikea to stock up on all the bric-a-brac I needed for my first apartment.

So I'm a little curious as to why Ikea keeps changing ad agencies, as Adweek reports.

They just split with LA's Secret Weapon Marketing (known for its hysterical Jack-In-The Box spots). Before that, Ikea used Crispin who won some big awards for their work. Before that, it was Carmichael Lynch, very briefly. And before that, it was Deutsch--who I think did some really interesting work for them a number of years ago. I can't imagine who'll be next or what type of work they'll present to win this pitch.

People love Ikea. They'll line up for days when a new store opens. They'll drive hours to get to one (like I did). Ikea is a great brand, but it seems like a very fickle client. Does Ikea really need another advertising agency to tell them how to improve their brand?

November 23, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 2 Comments

According to several reports, Gawker Media will shut down its gambling site Oddjack on Friday, December 2. Editor A.J. Daulerio was fired yesterday afternoon by Gakwer Media managing editor Lockhart Steele. Yanking Oddjack is the first such setback for Gawker Media, which has launched 13 other blogs since its inception in 2002.

In response to several questions by mediabistro, Gawker Media founder Nick Denton posted a comment on his own site this afternoon:

Blog titles are like new TV shows. Some make it; some don't. Oddjack, Gawker Media's gambling site, was one of the ones that didn't. And it's best to cancel the show sooner rather than later.

A.J. Daulerio, the editor, is a trooper, and an amusing writer, but the audience was never there. Gawker traffic stats are public, so that's been pretty obvious to anyone who checks the numbers. Gamblers want to gamble; it seems they don't particularly want to read about gambling, however.

So we're closing down Oddjack by the end of the month. We'd rather concentrate our energies on sites such as Deadspin, which have buzz and a growing audience, and new launches, which have equal potential. The moral of the story: it's easy to launch sites; much harder to make them popular.

According to Gawker traffic statistics, also posted on Denton's own site, Oddjack had 420,000 pageviews and about 180,000 visitors during its peak traffic month of September.

Susan Mernit disputes those numbers.

Lock says my stats were wrong, plain wrong--the real data suggests that OddJack actually got fewer visitors than a Fire Department pancake breakfast.

[via Micropersuasion]

November 23, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Positive Fanatics is a new blog about Ikea.

Armand B. Frasco, the site's author, writes:

Welcome to Positive Fanatics - The Unofficial IKEA Web Journal. For most of us it starts with the catalog. Or a word overheard. The anticipation builds. Then the inevitable pilgrimage to the yellow-and-blue building. Wherever we heard it first, IKEA intrigues, excite the senses and incites people into action. This web journal will document how the world perceives IKEA, the brand and the lifestyle. This is a site for us to share the latest product news, our musings and photos. It is intended to be fun so put down that Allen wrench for a while and commune with us.

Frasco also operates www.moleskinerie.com, "the world's premier fan site for Moleskine notebooks."

November 23, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 2 Comments

Adweek: Red Wing Shoe Company has tapped independent agency Young & Laramore to handle the launch of its first line of casual footwear, according to the agency.

As part of the assignment, the Indianapolis agency will create an advertising campaign for the company's first casual shoe line. The Red Wing, Minn., client is mostly known for its work boots.

The assignment does not affect Red Wing's relationship with its lead agency, MDC Partners' Colle + McVoy in Minneapolis.

November 23, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Many MSM properties are stumbling their way towards Web 2.0. The Washington Post is not one of them. The Post is laying it down.

Welcome to washingtonpost.com's Post Remix site, affectionately known as mashingtonpost.com.

This site has two goals:

To spotlight the work of outside Web developers who've made cool and interesting projects ("mashups") using Post content.

To provide information about washingtonpost.com's various data offerings (APIs and RSS feeds).

Why are we doing this? Because we want to foster innovation, and because we want to see your ideas about new ways of displaying news and information on the Web. Here are a few examples of what people have made with washingtonpost.com content:

-Frank Wiles made News Cloud, which is a tag cloud of Post stories that lets you browse stories by keyword.

-Jacob Kaplan-Moss made Ripped from the Headlines!, a daily news quiz that's created automatically from our headline feeds.

-Adam DuVander made a world map interface to Post stories, plus a thumbnail quiz of Arts & Entertainment stories.

-Bryan Fordham made washingtonpost.com search results via RSS, which provides RSS feeds for search terms on our site.

These are the kinds of projects we'll be spotlighting on Post Remix.

If you've created something using washingtonpost.com content, or if you have an idea for somebody else to implement, let us know, and we'll include your project or idea here. Contact us by e-mailing Adrian Holovaty at adrian.holovaty (at) wpni.com.

Random Culture says, "the reader created applications aren't really that impressive right now. But the impressive part is that The Washington Post sees value in opening up their content to users."

November 23, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 2 Comments

Guardian Unlimited: Craig Newmark has already revolutionised classified advertising in the US with his hugely successful website, craigslist.comorg. Now he is planning to shake up journalism, which he says has "lost the trust" of the public.

The founder of the free classifieds site - the seventh most popular website in the US in terms of page views - is to launch a major online journalism project within three months that will copy his "wisdom of the masses" approach to advertising and apply it to journalism.

"Things do need to change," Mr Newmark said. "The big issue in the US is that newspapers are afraid to talk truth to power. The White House press corps don't speak the truth to power - they are frightened to lose access they don't have anyway."

Craigslist, which began in 1994 in the San Francisco Bay area as an information service, decides its business strategy almost entirely by following up on the complaints and suggestions of its users.

November 23, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Cybergolf: Since exploding onto the national golf scene three years ago, Natalie Gulbis has captured the attention of both avid and casual golf fans alike.

This month, Gulbis will begin giving Golf Channel viewers a rare look at her day-to-day life both on and off the course. The cable network’s cameras will capture Gulbis live and unscripted in “The Natalie Gulbis Show,” a four-part reality series.

A new episode of The Natalie Gulbis Show airs each Tuesday night at 10 p.m. ET, starting Tuesday, November 15 and continuing through Tuesday, December 6.

The 22-year-old is one of the LPGA Tour’s rising stars. The Sacramento native has proven her worth on the golf course, racking up 11 top-10 finishes in 2005, tied for third-most top-10s in 2005. She currently sits in sixth place on the LPGA Tour’s ADT Money List.

The rise in Gulbis’ on-course game has paralleled her soaring popularity. She has been featured in her own swimsuit calendars; photo shoots in national magazines; and is the face for six sponsorship companies, including adidas and TaylorMade.

November 23, 2005 by Dan Goldgeier | Permalink | 0 Comments

You know, the other day I wrote about the news of GM layoffs unfortunately coinciding with their Red Tag Sale. But this is worse timing for a brand.

From the AP wire:

Ruth M. Siems, a home economist who helped create Stove Top stuffing, a Thanksgiving favorite that will be on dinner tables across the country this year, has died at 74.

Siems, who worked for General Foods for more than 30 years, died Nov. 13 in Newburgh, Ind., after suffering a heart attack in her home.

Siems helped develop Stove Top in 1971 while working at General Foods' technical center in White Plains, N.Y..

Poor woman died a week ago. So how come this story hits the news on Thanksgiving Eve? And she died of a heart attack, no less. Reading this takes the fun out of stuffing yourself with, uh, stuffing. And it makes me wanna stick to an organic green beans-only menu tomorrow night.

Have a Happy Thanksgiving, AdPulpers. I'm off to New York City to witness the mass hysteria that is the chaos of Black Friday in the retail center of the Universe.

November 24, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

According to this New York Times report, Christian broadcasting groups are threatening high school and college radio stations with petitions to the Federal Communications Commission asking that they be denied their renewal licensing.

"I thought, 'Is this fiction?' " Steve George, faculty advisor to WRFT in Indianapolis recalled. "Who could do this?"

He has since learned the answer. Hoosier Public Radio is largely the enterprise of one man, Martin Hensley, a former radio engineer who now describes his occupation as "serving God." And the effort by Mr. Hensley to take the F.C.C. license from WRFT, or at least force it to share broadcast time with him, offers but one example of a series of similar conflicts involving student radio stations. At least 20 high school stations, and a handful of college ones, have been fending off challenges to their licenses by Christian broadcasters in the last year.

This flurry of action, which seemed so inexplicable to Mr. George, actually has a fierce logic to it. A loophole in commission regulations makes educational stations unusually vulnerable to takeover attempts.

Moreover, their frequencies are a lucrative commodity, a bargain-basement way to get onto the air. The commission rarely auctions new frequencies on the crowded radio dial, and existing ones sell for $200,000 or so for a 50-watt operation like WRFT's to more than $10 million for a major commercial station.

Thus far, the commission has not upheld any of the challenges. Which is not to say the high schools have been left unscathed. Franklin Central has already paid more than $16,000 in fees to a Washington lawyer who specializes in F.C.C. law, Kathryn Schmeltzer.

Seventeen of the stations that ultimately were granted renewals in 2004 and 2005, including WRFT, still face appeals by Hoosier Public Radio and R B Schools (another Christian crusader spreading its efforts from Colorado to Michigan).

Isn't this a heartwarming story? Happy Thanksgiving!

November 24, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Chicago Sun Times: Harrah's Joliet Casino and Hotel started making good on thousands of misprinted cash coupons Saturday after the Illinois Gaming Board ordered the company to honor its botched promotion.

The casino said a mailing error by a third-party vendor resulted in approximately 11,000 coupons being sent out earlier this week. The coupons were good for $525 in cash, a sum much higher than intended. If all the coupons are redeemed, the payout would by nearly $5.8 million.

When recipients of the coupons tried to redeem them, most left empty-handed, prompting several complaints Friday to the Gaming Board, which regulates Illinois casinos.

A similar mishap occurred at Joliet's Empress casino in 1988. The casino sent $125 coupons to 33,000 customers, but had intended the value to be just $5. The casino honored the coupons.

November 25, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

The above drawing by Hugh MacLeod jumped out at me this morning when I logged on to The New York Times. It's part of Buget's blogvertising campaign.

Bloggers sure are moving up in the world. A couple weeks ago Steve Hall of Adrants gets mentioned in the Wall Street Journal. Now, Hugh (who is not actually mentioned in the piece) and B.L. Ochman are in the Gray Lady. Pretty good exposure for pajama-clad diary keepers.

November 25, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 1 Comments

American consumers spend 42 minutes, on average, talking to machines and pushing buttons to nowheresville on customer service calls. Actually, I just made that up. In all likelihood, the number is much higher.

Now, thanks to the kindness of one netizen, Paul English, you can get right through to that call center on the outskirts of Bombay. Happy dialing!

[via Micropersuasion]

November 25, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

KC Business Journal: Lawrence advertising agency Callahan Creek has acquired Kansas City-based CHRW Advertising Inc., the two agencies confirmed Monday.

Financial terms were not disclosed. Through the agreement, CHRW principals Steve Ward and Jeremy Ragonese and three other staffers will begin working at Callahan Creek's Lawrence office by the end of the month. Another CHRW partner, Dave Cacioppo, will remain head of emfluence, the interactive arm of CHRW that will be an independent company.

CHRW clients that will become part of Callahan Creek's roster include Boulevard Brewing Co., Indigo Wild, American Century Investments, The Roasterie and LaserCycle. Callahan Creek's clients include Hill's Pet Nutrition, Sprint Nextel Corp., Payless ShoeSource Inc., Children's Mercy Hospitals and Clinics, and the Kansas Department of Commerce.

The acquisition will bring Callahan Creek's head count to 41 employees. The 23-year-old company has $32 million in annual capitalized billings.

November 25, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

PR Newswire: Martina Butler may soon be the envy of her peers. This cutting-edge 15 year-old has secured corporate sponsorship of a weekly podcast where she discusses her favorite music and interviews celebrities.

In the first partnership of its kind, MobileCast Media, Inc., a planning, production and mobile media buying organization, has arranged for Nature's Cure, a top brand of innovative acne treatments, to sponsor Emo Girl Talk, a podcast hosted by Martina Butler.

"I hope that my success paves the way for more teens to have their voices heard and that more companies will recognize us as an important consumer force," says Martina Butler. The podcast features the life and times of a 15 year-old Emo girl. Emo music has a large teen following and is used to describe a genre of alternative rock with emotionally-charged lyrics. The podcast is downloadable at Emo Girl Talk.

November 27, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Louise Story, writing in The New York Times Saturday said:

After beginning as a vehicle for anti-establishment, noncommercial writers, many Web logs have laid out welcome mats for corporate America in the last couple of years.

I question her first assertion, but not the last.

November 28, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Adweek: Almighty has unveiled its first ad campaign for Vermont's Jay Peak Resort. Creative stresses the "kinship" between serious skiers who view winter sports as an avocation rather than a pastime.

The theme of the effort is "Move up," and the work—which features portraits of average people not immediately recognizable as avid skiers—will run mainly in winter-sports publications. Spending will be in the mid-six figures.

"Jay Peak is a serious mountain for serious skiers, like myself," said Christopher Smith, a partner at the independent shop.

A quartet of former Euro RSCG 4D employees founded Almighty in March. It has handled projects for SportsMax, Audi, Puma, Staples and Boston-based Walden Media.

November 28, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Ad Age: Bartle Bogle Hegarty’s response to the rapidly evolving ways consumers are using media is a newfangled discipline dubbed “engagement planning.”

Kevin Brown, 43, who worked at BBH from 1990 to 1995, now leads the recently launched unit as director. Mr. Brown said engagement planning brings knowledge, insights and ideas about consumers’ media usage to the creative process.

Engagement planning, as he sees it, overlaps in some ways “communications planning” and “channel planning,” both of which aim to connect a brand message and consumers at a time when consumers are most receptive. The difference, Mr. Brown said, is that engagement planning is part of the creative process.

“We believe you have to make it part of the [agency] culture,” he said. “It is about ideas that spring from people who come from different disciplines working together.”

November 28, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Digital Spy: Ofcom has upheld 23 complaints over the frequency of ad breaks during Channel 4's Lost.

Viewers had complained that the breaks were too close together and lasted too long, and that the programme often began early and finished late.

Channel 4 said that "in order to compete commercially with other terrestrial channels it was necessary to maximise the number of breaks in popular programmes, and also to take the maximum allowed amount of advertising".

The first part of the programme consisted of a reprise of key events from the last episode and credits often lasting up to 5 minutes before the programme proper began, reducing the amount of new editorial material for each episode to only around 36 minutes.

November 28, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Sullivan Higdon & Sink (the "We Hate Sheep" people from K.C.) got into this year's CA Design Annual for their Shatto Milk Co. package design.

We at Shatto Milk Company have decided to provide our milk primarily in glass bottles. The reasons for this decision are very simple. First, the glass bottle tends to keep milk colder, and colder milk is more desirable. Second, glass bottles are much more environmentally friendly than plastic or paper. Our glass bottles can be washed and reused as many times as they are returned. Thus, recycling and reusing our bottles lowers the amount of material dumped in area landfills on a daily basis. Third, unlike paper cartons or plastic, glass imparts no foreign odor or flavor. Glass is not porous, and does not breathe like plastic and paper. Unlike plastic, glass is not made from petrochemicals (ethylene glycol, polyvinyl chloride, styrene and linear low-density polyethylene). Fourth, glass bottles are most notable in history for containing farm fresh milk from the local family farm and that is exactly what you are getting from us. We want there to be no confusion - our product is different. It is handled with the utmost care and packaged in the best container available, glass.

It's interesting to note that Shatto can't currently meet the demand for their product in the K.C. market. Also, customers have started to collect the dairy's bottles, throwing a bit of a monkeywrech in the "reduce, reuse, recycle" argument, but a good sign, nevertheless.

Bottom line, people are starved for quality, and Shatto skillfully taps that nerve.

November 28, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

The New York Times is reporting on the prepoderance of beautiful people in pharmy sales. Even if it's all true, it seems like a strange, but revealing, topic.

Anyone who has seen the parade of sales representatives through a doctor's waiting room has probably noticed that they are frequently female and invariably good looking. Less recognized is the fact that a good many are recruited from the cheerleading ranks.

Known for their athleticism, postage-stamp skirts and persuasive enthusiasm, cheerleaders have many qualities the drug industry looks for in its sales force. Some keep their pompoms active, like Onya, a sculptured former college cheerleader. On Sundays she works the sidelines for the Washington Redskins. But weekdays find her urging gynecologists to prescribe a treatment for vaginal yeast infection.

Some industry critics view wholesomely sexy drug representatives as a variation on the seductive inducements like dinners, golf outings and speaking fees that pharmaceutical companies have dangled to sway doctors to their brands.

"There's a saying that you'll never meet an ugly drug rep," said Dr. Thomas Carli of the University of Michigan. He led efforts to limit access to the representatives who once trolled hospital hallways. But Dr. Carli, who notes that even male drug representatives are athletic and handsome.

But pharmaceutical companies deny that sex appeal has any bearing on hiring. "Obviously, people hired for the work have to be extroverts, a good conversationalist, a pleasant person to talk to; but that has nothing to do with looks, it's the personality," said Lamberto Andreotti, the president of worldwide pharmaceuticals for Bristol-Myers Squibb.

November 28, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

The New York Sun: As newspapers across America race to shrink the size of their news staffs, a prominent liberal blogger is doing something virtually unheard of these days: hiring new reporters.

Over the weekend, the proprietor of TalkingPointsMemo.com, Joshua Marshall, announced that he is seeking two journalists to work for a new blog that will offer "wall-to-wall coverage of corruption, self-dealing, and betrayals of the public trust in today's Washington."

In an interview, the blogger said he does not aspire to be an Internet mogul, but simply seeks to fill a niche he sees in the journalistic marketplace.

"It's exciting to me as a journalist," Mr. Marshall said. "There's this very broad movement out of paper publication to electronic media and particularly the Web. And we're lucky enough to be on the right side of the divide."

November 28, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 1 Comments

The Times: The Thanksgiving holiday is over and the frenzied Christmas shopping season has begun. This is bonanza time for the tribe of rummaging Americans known as “freegans”.

The anti-capitalist freegans — the name combines “free” and “vegan” — are so appalled by the waste of the consumer society that they try to live on the leftovers, scavenging for food in supermarket dustbins.

“It’s fun. It’s a thrill. It’s more fun and more satisfying than just going to the store and saying, ‘I wanted some bread and I got it’. It’s the surprise — and the prize,” said Janet Kalish, a New York high school teacher who describes herself as “60 per cent freegan”.

A 1997 study by the US Department of Agriculture estimated that the US wastes about 43 billion kilograms of food a year. That is about 27 per cent of US production, but the true figure is as much as 50 per cent, according to ten years of research by Timothy Jones at the University of Arizona.

Adam Weissman, a freegan activist and sometime security guard in New Jersey, says freeganism grew out of the radical 1960s “yippie” movement but also has affinities with the hobos of the Great Depression who travelled around the country by stealing rides on the railways.

“I have pity for people who have not figured out this lifestyle,” he said. “I am able to take long vacations from work, I have all kinds of consumer goods, and I eat a really healthy diet of really wonderful food: white asparagus and cactus fruit, three different kinds of mushrooms and four different kinds of pre-cut salad. And I’m just thinking of what is in my refrigerator right now.

“Essentially, the sky’s the limit. We found flat-screen TVs, working boom-boxes and stereos. I have put together most of my wardrobe. Last year’s designer clothing in perfect shape is discarded because it’s no longer fashionable, so I wear a lot of designer labels.”

November 28, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Odeo CEO (and Nebraska native), Evan Williams has some great advice for web-based startups. And he ought to know, having co-founded Blogger, which is now part of Google.

#1: Be Narrow

#2: Be Different

#3: Be Casual

#4: Be Picky

#5: Be User-Centric

#6: Be Self-Centered

#7: Be Greedy

#8: Be Tiny

#9: Be Agile

#10: Be Balanced

#11 (bonus!): Be Wary

#12 Be Thorough (by reading Evan's post for the full run down on each point).

November 29, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 2 Comments

Lewis Lazare picked up on this Starbucks press release:

As much as the coffee itself, the employees who serve it are what make the Starbucks experience unique. In an attempt to help customers better understand the real people who wear the Starbucks aprons, the company installed an elaborate multiscreen video wall at its 932 N. Rush store.

The multiple screens will feature changing videos of local Starbucks baristas talking about their lives away from Starbucks, and in some cases, how those lives intersect with their work for the coffee giant. Many of the baristas profiled in the permanent video installation are artists, and they are not shy about expressing both the joys and difficulties of trying to make it as an artist. But all seem convinced Starbucks is there to help them reach their artistic goals.

One demonstration of that commitment is the third annual Starbucks Avant-Grande Partner Art Exhibit, scheduled for Friday at Resolution Digital Studios, 2226 W. Walnut. The exhibit will feature art by Starbucks baristas from the Chicago area.

November 29, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 3 Comments

Chris Weil and Jeff Weiss of Momentum Worldwide

The New York Times has an article on why these guys are stoked, but I found it hard to get past the photo.

November 29, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

There's a new product blog on the block, and it's not consumer-driven. It's brand-driven.

Nokia Nseries N90 Blogger Relations Blog site

Welcome to the Nokia Nseries N90 Blogger Relations Blog site. Here you will find blogger and media information that you can repurpose and utilize in your blog postings about the N90.

[via Micropersuasion]

November 29, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

USA Today: Critics say a popular website — the Pontiac Game Changing Performance poll — puts the NCAA dangerously close to violating its own rules, as well as the rights of athletes for use of their image and name for commercial purposes.

"This is a line they have never crossed before," said Peter Rush, a Chicago lawyer who unsuccessfully battled the NCAA last year over whether former Colorado football player and U.S. Olympic skier Jeremy Bloom could receive ski-related endorsement money and maintain his college eligibility. "The real question is what right do they have to use players' images to sell Pontiacs?"

"I would disagree that players are being used to bring people to a commercial promotion," said Wendy Walters, an NCAA spokeswoman. "The promotion is an NCAA Football promotion so coming to the website gets you involved in NCAA Football. I will concede that it is sponsored by Pontiac. But it is not a commercial promotion."

B. David Ridpath, a former Marshall compliance officer and now a Mississippi State sports management professor, characterized the promotion as the continuing erosion of amateurism in college athletics. Ridpath also contends this illustrates how the NCAA will interpret or change rules to serve its own purposes.

"Amateurism is dead — that train left a long time ago," Ridpath said. "But if we are going to continue to stretch the amateurism principle and rationalize using college athletes as unpaid endorsers of commercial products and cheap labor, then we need to decide to either pay them or let them participate as professionals who can accept endorsement money."

November 29, 2005 by Dan Goldgeier | Permalink | 0 Comments

In an attempt to counter Boratian misperceptions about its country, Kazakhstan has taken out a 4-page ad in today's New York Times.

The section, titled, "Kazakhstan in the 21st Century," carried testimonials to its oil production, its democracy, education system, and purported "power and influence" of women.

The feud has been simmering for the past year, after Borat and his frank depictions of life in his homeland (where, he claims, gypsies are still hunted for sport and women rank somewhere below farm animals in the pecking order) gained wide popularity in both the U.S. and the U.K. He also wrote the popular folk song, “Throw the Jew Down the Well.” A feature length film, “Borat: The Movie,” is currently in production.

Borat is otherwise known as Sasha Baron Cohen, who is otherwise known as "Ali G." All 3 of them are probably lovin' this. Oh yeah, and people were calling me Danny G. long before Ali G. ever came along.

November 29, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

by Mortierbrigade, Brussels

[via AdHunt]

November 29, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Boston.com: It's downtown Augusta's latest attraction: three young women clad in lingerie who wave to passersby from a store window.

The attention-grabbing models were hired by Spellbound, a lingerie store that recently opened on Water Street and is trying to establish its name.

Spellbound's owner, former Cony High School teacher Felicia Stockford, said she came up with the idea while brainstorming for an inexpensive marketing idea. "I thought, 'You know, that's a big window, and if I put girls in there to wave at traffic, it would draw a lot of attention.'"

Paid only in lingerie, the women said they volunteer because they love being seen.

"I enjoy it," said Tara Manns, 20. "I enjoy the looks I get."

"It's good to get attention once and a while," said Amanda Richards, 21.

"They're exhibitionists," said Stockford, noting that's she's had no trouble finding models for the window.

November 29, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 5 Comments

[via Socialite Life]

November 29, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Promiscuity claim lands LYNXjet Mostess in hot water.

Allegations of flirtatiousness and promiscuity with a male passenger are just some of the accusations being levelled at LYNXjet “Mostess” Lola Allegra.

It is alleged that in September of this year, Miss Allegra had invited a male passenger, Mr. Michael Williams into the on board spa bath with her and a co-worker. Mr. Williams, after accepting the young lady’s proposition, then experienced a mild heart attack and is now suing the airline.

We managed to track down the embattled airline staff member who seemed in surprisingly good spirits and was dealing with the situation with “a broad grin”.

“Look, I was just doing my job. It’s no different from any other flight,” she said. ”I liked Mr. Williams and I think, if he hadn’t got sick, he would have enjoyed the fullness of our in-flight hospitality.“

Miss Allegra lists her hobbies as clubbing, boogie boarding and the study of Victorian poetry between the years 1863 and 1895.

[via Adrants]

November 29, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

According to this Washington Post story, Rev. Al Sharpton is helping to promote car title loans, a practice some legislators want to abolish, due to predatroy interest rates that can rise to over 300 percent.

In commercials airing locally, the ever-colorful Al Sharpton stands on a stage with an American flag and happily declares, "Finally, there's someone in Virginia who will loan money to people the big guys won't loan to."

"These are predatory small loans," said Jean Ann Fox of the Consumer Federation of America.

"If I felt this is in any way abusive, I would stop doing the ads," Sharpton said yesterday. He filmed three commercials for LoanMax, a Georgia-based company with 150 offices across the country, and said he considers these loans different from predatory ones because the borrowers have assets (the car) but not the credit rating to get bank loans.

"The ads are working very well," said LoanMax President Rod Aycox, who declined to say what Sharpton was paid. The spots began airing last week in Virginia, Iowa and New Mexico, states where legislators have proposed capping interest rates, and Aycox plans to continue them for another few weeks. "People just love Reverend Sharpton."

November 29, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 2 Comments

Grateful Dead, or what's left of it, just made a terrible move. By demanding that their live and unreleased music be taken off sites like Archive.org and Nugs.net, they discarded their principles and turned on their fans, or "brand evangelists" as we like to call them in Adlandia.

Cory Doctorow on Boing Boing:

This is pretty disappointing. Deadheads made the Grateful Dead some pretty substantial fortunes over the years by acting as unpaid, volunteer evangelists for their commercial offerings. This is a genuine betrayal of the audience from a couple of greedy people who would line their pockets at the expense of the memory of the generous, mutually beneficial relationship between the band and its supporters.

And what timing (something musicians are supposed to be good at). We're in the age of mainstream media meltdown. A time of citizen empowerment--particularly in the media shpere--inspired by the very ethos Grateful Dead embodied in their taper-friendly policy, which allowed for tapers to capture live shows and then distribute them to fellow freaks for no financial gain. So it's all the stranger that an enlightened group of people would fight against this current.

To think that the band's live music will now be contained in a store seems as far-fetched as it is wrongheaded and mean-spirited.

November 29, 2005 by Dan Goldgeier | Permalink | 5 Comments

In an Adweek article last week, prominent ad people were asked, “It’s Thanksgiving this week. What are you thankful for?”

Among the pithy comments were these, which caught my eye because they were both in the same article:

Court Crandall of Ground Zero who said, among other things, “I’m thankful this will be George Bush’s last term.”

Neil Powell of Margeotes Fertitta Powell who said, “I’m thankful the American people finally seem to be waking up to the fact that the war was a horrible mistake. Hopefully, many of our soldiers will be home next year to have Thanksgiving with their families.”

While to some those aren’t exactly controversial opinions, it’s interesting to see prominent ad people take political positions. Now, I’ve worked with all sorts of people, including an admittedly Republican Creative Director (whose design skills were stuck in the Reagan administration). In general, though, creative people rarely cop to having conservative values, because we tend to seek progressive ideas and influences to stay “cutting-edge,” or simply because it sounds uncool.

But working in advertising means we do the bidding of large corporations, whose interests lie squarely in a more laissez-faire business environment, which would favor Republicans. Right? So how do you justify those contradictions to yourself? Do you ever get into those sorts of discussions with fellow ad people?

November 30, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

According to Lewis Lazare, Draft/Chicago is looking to add 50 new jobs across all disciplines, including creative, account services, interactive, multicultural and health care.

The hiring spurt comes in the wake of several new business wins in 2005, including the Los Angeles Times, Johnson & Johnson, the American Marketing Association and S.C. Johnson.

"With clients shifting their advertising budgets from traditional media to more measurable marketing services, we've experienced incredible opportunity and growth," said Yvonne Furth, president and COO of Draft/Chicago.

November 30, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 2 Comments

We tend to think of outdoor as a mass media tool, but that's not always the case. With specific location buys, outdoor can be highly niched and speak only to Ivy-educated, squash playing, Town Car riding, number running adrenaline junkies.

[via The Spunker]

November 30, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Edward Jay Epstein for Slate: Once upon a time—two generations ago—the movie business was about making movies. Nowadays, it is about creating intellectual property that can be licensed in a raft of different markets. The Hollywood studios still make movies, of course, but by 2005, only 14.2 percent of their revenues came from movie ticket sales, while 85.8 percent came from licensing or selling their products for use in the home.

Until 2005, the studio's principal access to the home market came through pay TV, free television, video rentals, and DVD sales. But now, with products such as Apple's video iPod and TiVo-type digital recorders becoming widely available, Hollywood is inching toward an even more lucrative way of exploiting the home market.

Disney's ABC network has already made a deal with Apple that will allow iPod users to download and watch shows, such as Desperate Housewives, for $1.99 an episode. The company has also been talking to Comcast about a similar pay-per-view arrangement for Comcast's 23 million cable subscribers. CBS, which and NBC have announced plans to release their programs for 99 cents a viewing whenever a customer wants to see them, through linkups with cable and satellite providers. A cost of 99 cents a pop is hardly trivial when multiplied by an audience of 23 million Comcast subscribers.

November 30, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 2 Comments

Blogebrity: As the end of another year arrives, personal bloggers take stock in their lives. Unlike professional bloggers, their blogs are a labor of love. Sometimes, they begin to realize that that they have neglected their real lives in order to satisfy their blogging obsession. Their real friendships have disappeared, their marriages have broken up, they were fired from their job for blogging during work hours.

Some just need to take a break, like South Florida's beloved Babbling Brooke.

"Today it became clear to me how much I am neglecting other aspects of my life. I have not been working out or taking care of myself. I have been staying up too late and waking up too early in order to spend more time on my computer. I have ignored phone calls from friends to write comments or posts, or even just to IM. But most of all, I have personal aspects of my life that need to be dealt with, and unfortunately I can't deal with them here."

Should we feel sympathy for these stressed-out bloggers?

No!

I call these personal bloggers just plain selfish. When they take a break, it makes every other blogger insecure about all the time THEY are spending doing this crazy thing that doesn't earn them one penny.

November 30, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

W+K London team on a shoot in New Zealand

November 30, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Corante has pulled out the big guns--including our friends Johnnie Moore and Tom Asacker--for its new Marketing Hub blog. Here's a random sampling of what some of the contributors are saying.

Shel Holtz:

When I first became aware of RSS, Corante was one of the first sites I found employing the technology. I was immediately hooked; Corante provided me with literally the first feed to which I ever subscribed. You can’t imagine how honored I am to be among the nearly two dozen marketing/PR bloggers invited to provide content to the Corante Marketing Hub, particularly considering the company I’m keeping.

Mike Manuel:

The Corante Network is undergoing some major changes with the rollout today of several new content “hubs,” including most notably one focused on PR and Marketing that syndicates the blogs and brains of a crazy-impressive list of contributors like Shel Holtz, Neville Hobson, Elizabeth Albrycht, Andy Lark, Evelyn Rodriguez, and yours truly, among many, many others. This should be interesting. More to come...

November 30, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

[via PSFK]

November 30, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 1 Comments

According to this Ad Age report, the entertainment industry isn’t doing enough to combat indecent programming on TV and government limits may be the answer.

“My impression is the cable industry is compliant in promoting sexually explicit content and pornography in the home,” said Sen. Mark Pryor, D-Ark. “What you are doing may be legal, but it may not be best for the country and it may not be right.” He added: “I have an 11-year-old boy and my wife and I are scared to death to turn on TV because of what he might see on cable.”

Super Bowl viewers will recall GoDaddy's memorable spoof of these type of government proceedings from last February.

November 30, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

CBS4 Denver: A Colorado-based company has been buying left-over Coors beer to create a fuel alternative.

Merrick, based in Aurora, uses the extra beer from Coors to produce ethanol. Ethanol is mixed with gasoline in Colorado during winter months to cut down on pollution.

"There's a whole bunch of wasted beer that's being dropped on the floor," Steve Wagner with Coors Brewing said.

A plant at Coors turns the extra beer into ethanol. Wagner said the company is planning to start running a second plant in two weeks to turn more beer into ethanol.

The second plant will allow Merrick to make up to three-million gallons of ethanol a year.

Diamond Shamrock stores in Colorado are selling the ethanol-from-beer fuel at their pumps now.

November 30, 2005 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Vinography: A Wine Blog provides a handy list of wineries that maintain blogs. See the site for the complete list. Here are a few I've pulled for you to peruse at once (over a bold Cab, perhaps):

Pinotblogger

Mia's Harvest Blog

Stormhoek

Anne Amie Vineyards

Atelier Winery

Match Vineyards

Beer and Pizza

Sokol Blosser

Many of us may be familiar with Stormhoek via High MacLeod's gallant efforts on their behalf.

It's nice to see others join the fray, especially since wine is a product rich with story.