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January 2, 2010

Blockbusters aren’t just for theaters any more, but maybe they should be.

The tools of simulation have become very refined over the years. Using animation software and detailed data capture and environment maps, it’s possible to produce accurate and compelling recreations of events like the collapse of the World Trade Center or the assassination of JFK or to produce over the top cataclysms for a movie like 2012.  Erring on the side of accuracy would lead to a very boring Summer blockbuster; and turning the knob to 11 when trying to inform the public about a real world problem, leads to disinformation and deception. 

Case in point, The Washington State Department of Transportation’s simulation of what would happen to Seattle’s antiquated Viaduct and beautiful waterfront during an earthquake. The animation shows a scene of total destruction of the area. The problem is that they state that the simulation was based upon a “similar” earthquake. The truth is that they used data for a quake that is much closer and two levels of magnitude stronger. It’s certainly possible that such an event could happen. It’s far more likely that the area will have a smaller quake that will cause plenty of damage but nothing that will have the biblical punch of what they produced. Their goal was to soften up the public, not to inform it. Credibility is exchanged for the necessity to make a slam dunk.  Why let the truth get in the way of your agenda.

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December 10, 2009

Crowd sourced videos: Cultivated Creativity?

I'm seeing more and more "spontaneous" displays of grass roots virals, of course spontaneity requires planning. It’s clear that these examples weren’t truly improvised, but they do show how creativity can be sparked to encourage folks to do great work. The first example was produced by the staff at Gap Store 1604, Roseville, MN. It’s a really clever, car crash of a music video. It’s a hot tranny mess that was instigated by a contest promoted by CP+B and Cheer Factory. It’s quirky, weird and entertaining; and it show’s a very human side to the Gap brand. From an execution standpoint it’s probably twice as long as it should be, but it’s still a lot of fun to watch.

On the other hand the video of a spontaneous group dance routine (is such a thing possible?) at a Micrsoft store felt staged and a bit stagnant. In fairness to the Microsoft folks, the Gap has a much larger collection of stores. This increased the chance that at least one of the routines could break out of the mold of predictable line dances . I’m also glad that they allowed comments and responses (including a fun video produced by a kid in an Apple Store) Good viral crowd-sourced experiences require planning and an understanding of human psychology. They also require a Johnny Appleseed like approach to cultivating great content. Create frameworks for inspiration, resources (The Gap sent cameras to stores as part of their contest) and encourage as many people as possible to participate. For every 100 (or perhaps 1000) attempts you may only find a single truly brilliant result, but the relatively low cost for these efforts should be leveraged to generate multiple attempts. While I don’t necessarily believe in the one million monkeys with typewriters producing Shakespeare approach, but perhaps it's possible produce a Steven King novel this way.

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November 26, 2009

Using twitter lists to determine top influencers

As a follower of Jeff Clark’s Neoformix blog, I always discover something new and interesting about data visualization and analysis. Recently, he’s been looking at how twitter’s new lists function can be used to define and categorize topical relevancy and influence. Using this process he’s created a twitter profile dedicated to aggregating the top 100 in a series of topics. This is a far more powerful approach than the uber influencer ranking used in TweetLevel. Influence varies widely via topic, and the one size fits all approach is scattershot at best.  Follow @Top100in to stay up to date.

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November 20, 2009

More thoughts from the WOMMA FTC panel

From Jory Des Jardin, Co-Founder and President, Strategic Alliances at BlogHer  and Sean Corcoran, Interactive Marketing Analyst at Forrester Research

(download)

(download)

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November 20, 2009

Social Media as a regulated industry, The view from WOMMA's Tony DiResta

WOMMA counsel, Anthony DiResta, talks about some of the fine points of the FTC guidelines that will take effect on 12/1/2009. Key points:

  • Recognition that the days of the “Wild West” are over, this is now a regulated industry
  • Social Media requires a culture of compliance
  • Clarity on what constitutes an endorsement
  • Companies require up to date social media policies that enable engagement while minimizing risk
This was part of a larger panel discussion on Friday 11/20/09


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November 20, 2009

Clarification of FTC Digital / Social Media Guidelines

Chuck Harwood, the Assistant Deputy Director – Bureau of Consumer Protection for the FTC spoke about how the agency’s guidelines will affect social media and word of mouth marketing efforts.

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November 19, 2009

Clear is the new clever, telling the story of the Patagonia tribe

Rob BonDurant was the keynote speaker today at the WOMMA Summit. He’s the VP of Marketing at Patagonia, and he helps to tell their story across multiple channels (largely avoiding traditional advertising). His methods are social, digital and customer enabled. In fact, Patagonia’s customers provide the company with the lion’s share of the photos, videos and reviews published on their website.  Rob’s job is to give folks something to talk about, and he gives great insight into how he does it.

Of course, Patagonia is a truly aspirational brand, so I assume that some of his advice might be harder to implement at a waste treatment company (a coffee table book on effluent tidal flow?), but that doesn’t mean that it’s not possible.

Brains on Fire has a great recap, but here's a bit of the video.

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November 13, 2009

Is TweetLevel the new Flim-Flam-A-Scope?

I was recently thinking about the Flim-Flam-A-Scope. Not familiar with the FFAS? That's understandable, it’s a term that my old boss Rich coined to describe a product we were producing a video for. It was a device that, through the use of ultraviolet light and mirrors, allowed people to see every wrinkle, sunspot, freckle and pockmark.  This sounds like a medical device, right? Well it wasn’t. It was used in skin care salons to encourage customers to buy deep cleansing facials and other premium treatments. Of course those treatments didn’t fix any skin conditions. The Flim-Flam-A-Scope's sole purpose was to surprise or shock people. Then soften their resistance to unnecessary (yet soothing) spa sessions.
Recently Edelman released a new social media tool called Tweet Level. I won’t go so far as to call it a next generation flim-flam-a-scope, but it does have some remarkable similarities. Like the original FFAS, it reveals something generally invisible, In this case a ranking of twitter users. They do this by analyzing influence, popularity,engagement and trust to produce a numerical value to define a score. So far so good, those may not have been the exact factors I would have chosen but they are certainly a fair set of variables to work with. The problem is that the system produces results that are questionable. When an entertainment blogger who paints semen on the mouths of celebrities, Demi Moore’s boy toy and the most trusted name in news are all in the top five, I think something is seriously askew.  It looks random or at least less than rigorous. I assume that Edelman was expecting (hoping for) debate on the products and its results. The more conversation, the better.

 

OK, so where’s the flim-flam? If the FFAS was designed to convince you that your skin was a mess so that you would voluntarily pay money for a useless facial, TweetLevel’s goal is to get people to turn over information to Edelman so they can build a database that allows them to better target their outreach efforts. In exchange for a mostly meaningless score, users provide information about their jobs and industry focus. Is that a fair exchange? That’s hard to say. People pay for palm readings. Companies spend money on Myer’s-Briggs and other pseudo psychological employee evaluations. So where’s the harm? I think when asking people for information there should be disclosure about how that information may be used. It doesn’t matter if that information is being used to derive a more accurate score or if it will be used to help micro-target a future social media campaign. By not disclosing that information Edelman negates one of its ranking measures, trust. And, that’s not something easily regained.


PS

Here’s my Tweet Level Score. Not that really means anything.

tweetlevel3.png

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November 12, 2009

The Inappropriate Larry King

I'm sure Larry King has been inappropriate many times in his life, but recently disgraced beauty queen, Carrie Prejean accused the talk master of just that after he asked a simple question. In the 21st Century it's inappropriate to ask questions that people don't want to answer. As the news media devolves into advocacy media, expect to see more behavior like this.

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November 12, 2009

My recent favorites from NPR's On The Media

I always enjoy NPR's / WNYC's On the Media. They always provide fresh perspectives about what's happening in chaotic world of media. Recently they've had some great stories about how DVRs actually increase commercial viewership, the good the bad and the ugly of paid vs free content and an interesting episode devoted to the death spirals of the music industry. 

Here are a few of my favorite stories:

TV's Unlikely Ally

As the DVR became more and more popular, many in the TV industry feared that commercial-skipping would destroy the medium. But it turns out many DVR-users still watch commercials. Bill Carter of the New York Times says the numbers are startling and the DVR actually helps ratings.

 

 

Is Paid Content Nigh?

News Corp and The New York Timeshave suggested they might start charging for web content. Last weekNewsday did start charging for access to its website. Does this mean the days of completely free news websites are over? Steven Brill is founder ofJournalism Online, a company that works with over a thousand news organizations to help monetize online content. He says the moment has come to pay up.

 

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They Say That I Stole This

Twenty years ago a series of lawsuits criminalized the hip-hop sampling of artists like Hank Shocklee and Public Enemy. And yet, two decades later, artists like Girl Talk have found success breaking those same sampling laws. OTM producer Jamie York talks to Girl Talk, Shocklee and Duke Law professor James Boyle about two decades of sampling - on both sides of the law.

 

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Charting the Charts

The music charts have traditionally relied on album sales and radio plays to rank songs and albums. So what do the charts mean today when there are so many other ways to listen to music? OTM producer Mark Phillips reports that charts as well as the very notion of popularity are changing.

 

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