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We wrote about Giovanni Rodriguez’s new blog in this week’s issue (page 5, sub req’d). Here’s some more information for those of you who are interested. Giovanni says.
A lot more stuff to write about, but the week has already begun, and we’ve got work to do, and promises to keep, and miles to go before we sleep.
The DoD is suddenly MySpace and that digital junk. Frankly, if there’s a US federal agency that needs to get new media, it’s them.
I can see it now: huddled in the comments section, amidst the solicitation for money-producing surveys and laments from old high school buddies about the paucity of options on a cold, New Jersey Saturday night, could be a sustainable recruitment drive. The government, in all fairness, has done well to target blogs (sub req’d) in pushing policy and recruiting soldiers. But the online environment moves quickly, so they need to stay abreast of those changes.
You would think that working in journalism for a long time would temper columnists against looking to the hugely rich for salvation, but this is not always so. David Pauly of Bloomberg News (named for a hugely rich man, natch) penned a column this week floating the idea of investor extraordinaire Warren Buffett buying up the New York Times Company, Dow Jones, the Tribune Company, and the Washington Post Co. All of them! All at once!
For about $20 billion, Pauly says, Buffett could grab all these desperate companies in one fell swoop. That would give him ownership of, essentially, every important paper in America.
I’m sure Warren Buffett is a nice, honest guy. But that proposal is the scariest thing I’ve heard in a long time. Nobody, whether conservative, liberal, or otherwise, should be able to control what amounts to the entire news agenda for the US and much of the rest of the world. I know newspaper companies are in trouble, but dang.
Newspaper circulation figures showing steep . The New York Times reports Jack Welch, having made his millions already, probably wouldn’t mind a loss-making operation like the Boston Globe to play with. Like politics, publishing may become a rich person’s game after all.
Consumers this year will spend an estimated $4.96 billion on bite-size candy, fake blood and fangs, orange-and-black decorations, and other Halloween goodies, per the National Retail Federation.
And along with the tricks and treats, much of that spend will go toward movie character-branded costumes, for kids and adults alike, from Disney princesses to Pirates of the Caribbean scalliwags.
According to online Halloween resource sites such as Extreme Halloween, 2006’s most popular costume is Disney/Buena Vista’s Captain Jack Sparrow; competing movie studios need not worry, though.
Other hot selections include Sony’s Spiderman, Warner Bros.’ Superman, Hanna Barbara’s Fred and Wilma Flintstone, Fox Searchlight’s Napoleon Dynamite, New Line’s Freddie Krueger, and George Clooney.
Pets, too, are part of Halloween’s branded-marketing machine: One of this year’s hottest get-ups for pups is Lucasfilm’s Yoda Dog. Who can resist filling this one’s goodie bag with bones? Happily for partiers and marketers both, it doesn’t seems to affect anyone badly if a branded-costume reveler is found passed out on the sidewalk after a too-spirited evening — it’s all part of the Halloween fun. Still, this lack of costume creativity does give some folks the creeps.
So while this truly organic trend toward branded costumes is a great financial and promotional turn for the film industry, some of us will always appreciate a painstakingly crafted vampire, or a good ol’ fashioned galley wench. Whatever your costume of choice, have a good time wearing it. And please, go easy on the Silly String.
Here are some blog gems from recent times (I’ve been cleaning out my reader)
Andy Lark explicates how a mention in a micro-targeted publication affects LogLogic’s Web site (Andy Lark)
Trevor Jones, of Bite Communications, mourns the death of his preferred RSS reader (bitemarks)
A tech firm’s honest discussion re: SecondLife (Horn Group Weblog) (ed. note - more agencies should do this)
Though I did not see the newscast, this Public Eye description of Katie Couric’s handling of a segment on Parkinson’s was quite good (via Jim Romenesko).
After her interview with Fox, Couric said the following: “By the way, in the spirit of full disclosure, I think it’s important to mention that my dad has Parkinson’s disease. He told me today it’s okay to tell you that. And in the past, I’ve made contributions for Parkinson’s research through Michael J. Fox’s foundation.”
While I’ve become prone to eye rolling at the inane “Disclosure: Johnny saved me from sunstroke by helping me off my back when I was a turtle” nonsense, but this is exactly how it should be done. Bravo, CBS. Bravo, broadcast news.
America’s two favorite pastimes, politics and baseball, collided during the World Series as ads for and against a Missouri stem-cell proposition aired in local markets. Actor and Parkinson’s sufferer Michael J. Fox touted the value of stem-cell research in his backing of US Senate candidate Claire McCaskill (D-MO), while St. Louis Cardinals pitcher Jeff Suppan starred in an opposition ad created by Missourians Against Human Cloning, slated to run during his Game Four start. Suppan’s turn prompted a sports media discussion regarding athletes endorsing causes, giving the issue additional legs.
If Drudge and LA Weekly’s Deadline Hollywood are to be believed, NBC is refusing to accept ads for Weinstein Company’s Shut Up and Sing, a biopic about the Dixie Chicks. Of course, the irony slogs thickly through this one - the Dixie Chicks’ movie is likely about how a comment about President Bush made affected their ability to entertain.
This trend of refusing advertising for movies that the news divisions will likely cover is something our editorial (gratis!) focused on this week. I’ll let the editorial speak for itself, but wanted to end with this salient comment from HuffPost (and echoed by us).
Oh, and one last thing - before NBC execs erect their statutes on the altar of advertising integrity, ETP couldn’t help but notice that the network’s new meta-sitcom, “30 Rock,” contained a plot point in the pilot s pegged on an actual GE three-way convection oven - then followed up with a commercial for the oven during the second episode. Funny how a GE-owned network manages to plug GE goods and still tout its ethical approach to endorsement of commercial products.
Should you wish to see the ads, you should go here.
As I mentioned before, we’re having issues with our feeds (fix forthcoming). Some of you polite readers have pointed out that the feeds are showing HTML code in your readers. One such person was from a large agency, who cited a reader previously unknown to me. She mentioned that most people in her office came to use this particular reader, an interesting development. Like browsers (specifically Firefox), it seems RSS readers are also adopted through word-of-mouth. Though, this person admitted the agency was likely to move to IE7’s reader.
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