Change Agents

Blogging phenom, Jason Calacanis, is reinventing Netscape on AOL’s behalf. According to New York Times: The new Netscape site, which is scheduled to be introduced in a preview version today, is modeled on Digg, a rapidly growing site focused on technology news. Digg users find items that interest them on news sites, blogs or anywhere […]

An Ad Age reporter heard some severe criticism of the white bread industry she covers. The president-CEO of Black Enterprise magazine yesterday called for consumer and political activism aimed at increasing the number of marketing dollars spent with black-owned media. Earl “Butch” Graves Jr. said agencies that specialize in targeting blacks often are not responsible […]

Mark Fletcher spoke about his experience starting ONElist and Bloglines at this month’s SDForum in Palo Alto. I like his advise about doing it on the cheap. I am a cheap bastard when it comes to startups. With ONElist I was, you know, $55,000 got us through a million users. With Bloglines it was $200,000 […]

It seems those crazy kids in Coconut Grove are inventing new ways to sell VWs on a daily basis. The new tool in the automaker’s belt is a co-creation site called Ego Index, where consumers rate cars and everyday items for the ego they emit. For instance, anchovies, came in at 50, which is a […]

According to their website, Make Mine a $Million Business™ has one goal: to help women-owned businesses surpass the million-dollar revenue mark. Founded by Count Me In for Women’s Economic Independence with OPEN from American Express, the program provides a combination of money, mentoring and marketing tools that women entrepreneurs need to help grow their businesses […]

Diablogue is offering up a saucy bit from Jonathan Kneebone of the Glue Society. When someone with vague creative aspirations could do anything with their time and energy, why the hell work in advertising? After all, you could be writing a novel or movie, a TV drama or comedy show. You could be directing a […]

Sustainability and advertising don’t exactly fit together like peas in a pod. Yet, after hearing industrialist-turned-environmentalist, Ray Anderson, CEO of Interface, speak in Savannah two weeks ago, I know there is a place for green practices in the ad biz, just like there is at home, at school, at the gym, etc. Inspired chiefly by […]

Edelman account exec, Jeffrey Treem, left a thought-provoking comment on Amy Gahran’s Right Conversation. While I agree with your analysis about the value of strategic commenting, I wish you would have used a different phrase other than “target audiences.” Audiences, are a passive, static group subject to the traditional linear sender-receiver model. I think we […]

Grant McCracken is sure there is an “anthropology of decline” that documents the symptomatology of regime transition. In fact, he keeps a simple typology on cardboard in his wallet….to make it easier to identity institutions in their last days. Stage 1. Benign neglect In the early days of regime transition, the incumbent (aka New York […]

Do you like to raise hell against retail stupidity and injustice? Good. Here’s one for you. According to Consumerist, stores that ask for a minimum purchase to swipe your credit card, are most likely violating their merchant agreement.