Archive for May, 2009
May 26, 2009 No comments

Quote of the Day

Folks who have followed the JuiceBar know that I’ve a love/hate relationship with social media.

I love it. It is wild, dynamic, open, refreshing, democratic, transparent, exciting … and just plain fun.

nothing-blackI hate it. It is elusive, confounding, over-hyped, out-of-control and overwhelming.

So here’s my quote of the day from Brian Mazzaferri, the lead singer of I Fight Dragons from a great story by Walin Wong of the Chicago Tribune.

“There’s so many things you can do online that make you feel you’re doing something, when in reality you’re doing nothing.”

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve thought the same.

Then something happens.  You get curious.

And you say to yourself … log on one more time!
May 22, 2009 No comments

Democracy and Social Media

I’m trying to connect the dots on a couple of stories that appeared today in the Washington Post.

jokerThe first was about the wolf shirt phenomenon on Amazon. Mike Musgrove writes about how CollegeHumor.com and bloggers gamed the system to make an otherwise hideous t-shirt one of the top purchases on Amazon.

This type of online rabble-rousing appears to be catching on more than ever over the past year, said Tim Hwang, the organizer of ROFLCon, a convention dedicated to celebrating Internet memes. After all, another Web-based prank crossed over into the real world just last month when a 21-year-old college student, known by the online moniker “m00t,” sailed to the top of Time’s “most influential person” list in an online poll, beating out the likes of President Obama and Oprah Winfrey. Gathering nearly 17 million votes, the world’s “most influential” person is the founder of another jokey Web culture site, 4chan.org, whose proprietor is known offline by the name Christopher Poole.

So we know that the social media stuff can be gamed.  No big deal.  Just like in the old days!  Back then it was Hearst and yellow journalism.  Now it is some folks getting a good laugh.

Parenthetically, I’ll take the latter over the former.

Then – later in the A section – which is pretty much the entire serious news part of the Washington Post these days — there’s a story about how the Obama Administration is remaking the U.S. government’s online presence.

US.gov meet Amazon.com.

Don’t tell the CollegeHumor.com folks.  We all might be trading tax dollars for wolf t-shirts.

Government meets social media.  This is a good thing, right?
May 18, 2009 2 Comments

Buddy can you spare a Viagra?

First we had the Hyundai ads.

Buy the car and if you lose your job they’ll take the car back.

They used to call that “reposession”.  I guess they now call that marketing.

Then Ford followed suit.  They did one better.  Buy the truck and they’ll let you hold off on payments for awhile (then they’ll take the truck back!).

Mortgage companies, banks, and insurance companies have also gotten into the act.  “If you’re in trouble, call us,” they say and we’ll work out a deal.  The not-so-subtle marketing message is one of empathy.  We feel your pain.

viagraNow comes Pfizer.

According to reports, if you’re a guy and you lose your job they’ll float you a year’s worth of Viagra.  Yup.  Sound both salacious and stupid?  I thought so.

Wait!  It gets worse.  For the cars, trucks, banks, etc., this recession marketing effort was all about getting people to do something they otherwise wouldn’t do.

Warren Holstein notes that part of the strategy appears to be an effort to keep folks from switching brands or going to god-forsaken generics.  Better to give something away for a little while to maintain brand loyalty in tough times than risk people wandering off and looking for some alternative.

Because hard times shouldn’t mean the end to hard times.

At least there’s no chance of repossession.
May 15, 2009 No comments

Happy (Belated) Mother’s Day

I spent Mother’s Day day with my mother in Arkansas.

She is 86-years-young and lives there just five minutes from my brother’s house.

ggparoushmomdaleMy brother and I spent the day with her rummaging through boxes of pictures.  The bulk were on modern Kodak paper.

But there was a box or two of thick, hard and very brownish ones.  Then there were these clear and shiny black and white ones about the size of a postage stamp.

We made it a project.  My bother manned the computer.  I sorted through the photos and cycled them through the scanner.  And while they were being moved from decades old sepia and paper to digits and pixels we’d have them up on a big plasma screen while Mom would look and explain the story behind each.

[The one here was one of her favorites.  That’s her in the middle with her brother.  Grandpa Rousch just got finished reading her “Peter Rabbit.”]

All mothers are saints.

Not!

The “all mothers are saints” thing is a myth.  I have heard enough stories from my social worker wife to know that is not true.  Some people are lucky and have mothers that teach them how to encourage, nurture, support, cherish, and love.  Others do not.

I am one of the lucky ones.

Born of humble mid-western farming stock, my mother combines a rock-hard work ethic with purity of love and caring that is all to hard to find in a modern life.  She is a reminder that old-fashioned is a compliment.  That simplicity and virtue is not only attainable, but something that can and should guide your life.  Most of all, she reminds me of what it means to be a parent and care for family.

And funny thing is.  She never told me any of this.  She just did it.

Thanks, Mom.

Happy Mother’s Day.