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Date unknown, playing Clarke’s seminal classic – “School Days.”

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As quoted on Haaretz.com today, NYT Publisher Arthur Sulzberger had this tidbit: 

“I really don’t know whether we’ll be printing the Times in five years, and you know what? I don’t care either,” he says.

That’s the strongest statement I’ve heard yet from newspaper publishers about the changing topography of their market.  Could it be the Gray Lady will transform to the “Ones and Zeros Lady?” 

Great way to tell the story…give it the 4 minutes…thanks Jay Cody for the pointer.

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Apologies, ranked 

A great bit that everyone should read, especially if they’re in customer support.

There are many incorrect ways to formulate an apology, but only a few correct ones.

On a scale of 1 to 10, where 10 is best:

• “You can always take your business elsewhere.” (1): Thank you, I will, and so will all of my friends.

My first article for ExpertsBusinessSource.com is up – on “Keeping Your Web Strategy On Track” – it’s got some good tips for anyone managing a web strategy or project.

Regardless of whether you have a CIO, a Web manager or you wear the IT hat yourself, there is one immutable rule about technology projects: At some point, they’re bound to veer off track. Specifically for small and medium-sized businesses that are building (or expanding) their presence on the Internet, it’s easy to venture down a path that quickly becomes littered with overly complex technologies, conflicting agendas and unclear objectives.

I love YouTube…but as a reader of this blog, you already have figured that out.  I’ve been allowing video on the Reel-Time forum for about 4 years now, and each video is generally one of the highest thread views for the day.  In short, everyone stops to check out the videos.

It’s natural; reading about fishing is one thing, but watching someone tie a knot makes it much easier to learn how to do it properly.  The difference between someone writing about an epic battle with a big fish pales in comparison to actually watching them fight the fish on video.

The community has figured this out, and is contributing video at a huge rate.  The problem is that we’ve always had a huge problem policing our “no ads from non-sponsors” policy on the forum.  Let’s face it, good content is good content and I’ll try as hard as I can to bend the rules to keep some content that breaks the rules if I feel it’s something the community needs to see. 

Some of our non-sponsoring contributors are good about how they do it, others are always pushing the envelope.  Some get warnings on a fairly regular basis.  Others have had their heads stuck on pikes as a warning for those who might transgress.

The video revolution has created a huge quandry though:  what do we do with great video content that’s essentially an advertisement for a non-sponsor? Here are my general rules:

1. I don’t edit video – if it has a link and violates policy, either the user edits it, or it goes elsewhere.
2. Make sure the community at large is made very aware of the video policy.  Put up a sticky post, and add it to your FAQ, then whenever an offending video is posted, link to it.  Also provide that link in the email notice to the user.
3. Send an email to the user right away explaining the policy, and noting that adherence to policy is what has made your forum success. Firm but cordial would be the key to good violation notices.
4. Repeat offenders eventually get voted off the island.  Life is too short to have to tell adults the same thing over and over again.  If I want to explain rules to someone over and over again, I’ll talk with my children.
5. Provide an easy, immediate and inexpensive means to sponsor your forum.  I have in the past used a special sponsors forum, which uses the vBulletin PayPal integration.  Sponsors purchase a subscription, and it automatically upgrades their user group, giving them the right to add a banner to their signature, a hyperlink, and to have their site url in their video.

The next phase of the Video revolution will see us dealing with the ramifications of YouTube’s revenue sharing model.  I don’t know where that will go, but at some point we’re going to see our top content producers realizing that their content provides great value to our sites, and they will indeed begin to push back, if not entering into direct competition with us.  Check out Pete Blackshaw’s excellent reveiw of the YouTube revenue sharing plan on ConsumerGeneratedMedia.com.

There may indeed be a content revolution underway – call it “Content 2.0” – take a look at http://www.helium.com – they’re set to rock very foundation of how content is generated for sites by applying social networking and ungameable community ratings.  Publishers should be taking a long hard look…and you might also want to have a look at the video of their presentation at Demo 2007 which is available here – five minutes will give you the full gist.

(Disclosure: I have worked with (and consider him a great friend) Jay Cody of Helium in the past, and Paul Kerstein of Helium is close friend of several of my friends.  I was not solicited by Helium for this post.)

I remember the first time I saw my wife (v2.0) read the Sunday newspaper. Much as I would read the paper, she separated out the advertisement inserts. Then she did something I never even considered possible. She set the paper aside and began to read the inserts…first. The concept was so foriegn to me that I had trouble finding a handle on how to process it.

Such a fundamental difference also occurs with one of the few non-proprietary brands we see in marketing as well – “As seen on TV.” It’s like licorice, evoking strong feelings in almost everyone who sees it, either positive or negative. There really isn’t a middle ground.

When I see the brand applied, I think of shoddy goods that aren’t bought on their own merits, but must be sold. Sort of like a plastic version of term life insurance. On the other hand, my wife (v2.0) will (I surmise) think of a product conceived in revolutionary brilliance that promises innovative solutions to the everyday problems that confront her, the type of solution that mythical “They” don’t want you to know about.

As with many things, the truth lies somewhat more in the middle. The art of the infomercial is that it allows time to actually sell the product, and some products really need to be sold in order to make the value proposition known. Personally, I think back to when I owned Markets Unlimited, Inc., who manufactured scarf tubes under the brand “The Ann Cahill Collection.” This was a product which had to be sold, because the public had to be instructed on its use to see the benefit, and the value of the product. To that end, we sold the product with brochures explaining its use, offered instructive videos for use in department stores, and a display case that showed how the product could be used.

I can’t take credit for the idea, it was actually a product found in a cut out bin by my ex-wife Nancy (wife v1.0), who immediately saw that it was being marketed improperly. Over the next year, we set about pulling all the bits together needed to take the product to market correctly. Within that year, we secured our first contract with QVC Network, which was assembled in my ex-Mother In Law’s living room. That order sold out on QVC in 20 minutes, and set us on our way. During the next couple years, the Ex appeared on QVC with Kathy Levine many times, selling the product out almost always. They outsold the department stores (all of them) by about 2 to 1. However, we’d have never considered using the “As seen on TV” logo on any of our products.

Today we’ve come to the point that the informercial has become completely formulaic. You’ve got your salesman, a jovial chap almost always with a British or Australian accent to add a bit of spice and the rube, who plays straight man. “Gee Nigel, can it really do all that?”

Of course it can, that and more. If you ever need to be able to pick a bowling ball up with a vacuum, you’re all set. Want to grind cinder blocks in the blender, we gotcha covered.

On the other side, there are products that have entered into general acceptance, like OXIClean which even a jaded cynic like myself will probably agree do the job as described. Or perhaps the George Foreman Grille, which has become standard equipment in the US kitchen.

So I noticed recently that a lot of new devices are showing up around the house. The wife (v 2.0) has been shopping and we’re now prepared for those nasty bowling ball related events (I guess I may have to break down and buy a bowling ball then). It amazes me how she can see the “As seen on TV” as a positive brand promising a solution to her problems, where as I see my dollars spent on a pig in a poke. But then the products she’s buying aren’t meant to appeal to me.

It’s licorice – no middle ground – you either love it or hate it and that’s it. But “As seen on TV” is a strong, if tarnished, brand, and it’s open for use by anyone.

(Postscript: for laughs, I did a search on “Ann Cahill Collection” – apparently our products are now considered collectibles…check out this ebay listing. Perhaps some more on the story is needed, like where the name “The Ann Cahill Collection” comes from; hint: she’s sitting next to me and just coughed up a hairball…)

Who say’s Google’s algorithm needs tweaking? After many month’s of hard work, we’ve clawed our way up to the first page of Google results for “small farm animals.”

I tried to post this a couple of minutes ago, but our database decided to check out for a little while. In the mean time, I recieved this well timed article from MediaPost asking the question “Are User-Generated Web Sites Breaking The Search Engines’ Algorithms?”

Tim Daly’s on the money here – the content of the web is changing due to consumer generated content; to my mind it’s possibly becoming more frivilous and definitely becoming worse spelled. Sites like Wikipedia are great, but they lack the fact checking you often need if you’re going to expect work you do citing them to stand up to scrutiny.

For the record, Vario Creative does not comment on, nor offer advice about “large farm animals.” If you need help there, you’ll have to go elsewhere…Vario Creative – the choice of small farm animals everywhere…watch for our upcoming “Tin Can Tuesday” segment…;-)

(Update: Google recalculation is apparently in full swing – we’ve dropped to #12. 2/4/08)

Turner Broadcasting said the words…a carefully worded apology, read ad infinitum on the nightly news and in oh so many venues.  “Let me start with what is most important — an apology, for the confusion and inconvenience caused in your community on Wednesday by an unconventional marketing tactic.(more)”

The problem is, they obviously aren’t sorry.  In yesterday’s press conference with the two kids that were arrested for placing the led guerilla ads for Aqua Teen Hunger Force featuring the “Err” character giving everyone the finger, they proceeded to use the venue to continue the marketing blitz for their Adult Swim cartoons.

The two kids refused to take anything but “hair’ related questions – and that is a direct reference to another Adult Swim cartoon – “Perfect Hair Forever“.  The truth is that Turner, and their guerilla marketing firm, Interference Inc., (who have gone completely underground at this point to avoid arrest) just don’t get it.

Turner has offered the city $850,000 to compensate for the damages caused by the escapade.  They’d have gladly paid for this level of exposure and it they’d bought a super bowl ad, it would have cost more, and gotten less exposure.  If the state doesn’t come down hard on them, we will see others doing it.  Think of the new thing as “terrorist marketing” or “traffic spam.”  These people need to be slammed hard right now, or we’ll have this stuff happening every couple weeks.

(Note: I hadn’t read the Boston Herald’s coverage of this story when I wrote this in the a.m.  – they’ve definitely got the right story, as opposed to the Boston Globe who have totally missed this angle.)

The Revolution Will Not Be Televised

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