Steve Jobs Made me Pay for Content

So Steve Jobs’ recent statement on flash was dubbed “the rant heard across the web” and apparently, a bunch of premium content publishers (according to James McQuivey of Forrester) scrambled to take Apple’s stance against Flash as a reason to charge for their content (read: Paid Apps), bandwagoning and claiming it’d give both publishers and advertisers a cleaner, richer venue for “premium advertising” (read: iAd).

FORRESTER LINK JUMP HERE

To use the old italian-canadian saying: Meeeeeeeeeeeeeee! This all makes sense now – I download a free app and have advertisers pay Steve Jobs through iAd revenue (which is massively premium costs), or pay do I give the money to my fav. publisher for a non-ad-supported app. I’m not biting into that first Apple (look at what happened to Snow White). If i didn't already have an iPhone with work, I'd start to think about other platforms like Android for my mobile needs. Tks for the iPad Stevie - but I'm not going to help you amortize the development of it.

But questions that are really grinding my gears:

Is Apple really that powerful?
Should publishers concede to Apple?
Are Blue-Chip advertisers going to get on-board at such a high cost to reach that specific of an audience?

Get yo' geek on - cuz the ad world's gone wild.

-P

You mean it's not about using 2 iPhones?

iPhone's new OS 4 Multitasking functionality has been getting some pretty decent reviews so far. 

I wonder how much it'll help change how consumers leverage their mobile utilities (read: iPhone habits).

Perhaps more importantly for me: how it'll change how advertisers are able to reach out to consumers with their brand messages. Time to rope-in Apple's new tablet advertising platform iAd...

OR - if you've had the misfortune of getting caught with me while I'm uninterested: how it'll affect my iPhone addiction....

Ahh technology - how i love/hate you.

Why foodies love Nigella Lawson

Enough Said. 

Nigella, I love you. 

Props go out to Barone for the video. 

-P

Nu Pied

Hey everyone – some of my friends and I are participating in this today (albeit they’re a lil more hardcore with it – running around Montreal) – so I thought I’d share the idea with you all.

If you can, I’d encourage you to try it out, even if it’s just within the offices – definitely not recommending it for your sales calls tho…It’s amazing to see how difficult it is to continuously be aware of the ground in front of you.

Some info on today and the cause ripped from the website: http://www.onedaywithoutshoes.com

One Day Without Shoes is the day to spread awareness about the impact a simple pair of shoes can have on a child’s life. On April 8th, we ask people to go the day, part of the day or even just a few minutes, barefoot, to experience a life without shoes first-hand, and inspire others at the same time.

Cheers,
p2

Heidi Montag Ain't no Beyonce: Social Media Fail / Updated

Launching a brand or product is never an easy task: you must carefully craft a strategy that will allow consumers to discover it, learn about it, engage with it, live it and (hopefully) spend money around it. It requires careful thought, analysis and investment.

Sometimes however, things don't just get off the ground the way you planned. That's when you adapt and enhance your plan.

So what happens when everyones "favorite" reality-star Heidi Montag launches an album that can barely break the 1000 copies sold mark?

Well, if all else (and plastic surgery) fails, why not drop the USER GENERATED CONTEST bomb?



In this case, a contest allows fans to create their own music video to one of the tracks on her album's songs.


Yes, you have read correctly. Heidi wants her "millions of fans" to spend time making a video to win. I'm guessing all of them were just waiting for the perfect occasion to embrace her talent by breaking out their own moves. To reward said fans, she's decided to award the winner with the mother of all prizes: an iPod shuffle. Yes you heard right - you can win a whole iPod shuffle!

Why didn't we think of this before: social media is the superhero we've all been waiting for. And now it's even better because it's a contest AND it's with video (insert loud crowd gasping in awe here).

Sorry Heidi, this just doesn't fly.

Users' content generation or more plainly put, participation is a social behaviour which cannot be created for them. Lady Gaga or Beyonce didn't ask anyone to film themselves dancing to their songs to win anything.
Fans did it for two reasons:
- to engage and live through the brands that they admired,
- to be funny.

Social media initiatives are effective when they are based on existing social interactions and behaviours. Not on poorly-executed ideas that will result in sad parodies of a talentless young woman. If you are attempting to effectively drive sales or even positive brand awareness, a bunch of parodies is not in my opinion what you are looking for.

If you're product sucks, social media is not going to fix it.
If you have no fans, it will work even less.

UPDATE:
The contest ended 2 days ago and here are the results:
10 videos submitted and 148 votes cast.
Heidi and Spencer are both now following me on Twitter.
I do not follow them.
The prize went from an iPod Shuffle to $50.

I must say I'm rather impressed that they broke the 100 vote mark.
(Although you would think that for someone with 1M+ twitter followers could generate a bit more attention to themselves. Again: bad products = bad social influence.)

Check out the winning video here


Oh and PS:

God help us all.