MURKETING

Linkpile (via Delicious)

• General Mills Recruits Bloggers: “MyBlogSpark has recruited more than 900 bloggers — over 80 percent are moms — to register to be eligible for everything from sampling campaigns to product coupons to news of a new ad campaign. General Mills plans to use the network to promote its wide portfolio of products in the food and beverage, beauty, home, electronics, health and automotive categories.”
• Thrifty and bitter?: “56 percent of survey respondents said the recession has caused them to make significant changes in the way they are living. A quarter said they are ‘angry’ or ‘upset’ about having to do so .” Via Recessionwire.com
• Never Mind What It Costs. Can I Get 70 % Off?: The interesting notion that this story suggests but never confronts is whether consumers might actually pay more for something that appears to be more heavily discounted. As in: A widget is on sale for $10, by a sign that says it is 50% off. An identical widget sells for $11, but with a sign that says 80% off. Does the latter sell better because of the advertised markdown percentage? My understanding is that a lot of merchandise is being “discounted” the moment it hits the selling floor now. So could the “original price” be arbitrary in that scenario? (Arbitrary within limits of course.)
• Some Thoughts on Seeing the Film ‘Objectified’: “We had no idea that Rob Walker looked like that.” WTF is that supposed to mean? Like *what*, exactly? Actually I don’t care. I was under the impression that the way I “looked” to UnBeige is invisible. Thought maybe this would be my chance to finally see this site mentioned there — and it didn’t happen. Sad.

Gallery of default anonymity: A work in progress

EBay

Facebook

Flickr

Hotmail

Twitter

YouTube

Friendfeed

Just a few that occurred to me. More ideas? Let me know.

Or has someone already gathered these up somewhere? It wouldn’t surprise me*, but if it’s out there I couldn’t find it.

UPDATE: I opened the comments, they were closed by mistake. Plus: Adding some more examples after the jump, and will keep adding as they come in or otherwise come to my attention. *2nd UPDATE: On 10.1.09, some has brought to my attention this other collection from 2006. Read more

Flickr Interlude

shopping baskets, originally uploaded by Samm Bennett.

“Seen in Inagi, Japan.”

Linkpile (via Delicious)

• Blaming advertising: “Two-thirds of Americans (66%) believe advertising agencies have at least some responsibility for the current economic crisis because they caused people to buy things they couldn’t afford. In fact, one-third (33%) believe they have complete or a great deal of responsibility.” Interestingly they tend NOT to blame peers. Which is interesting given years of claims by consumers and gurus alike that advertising doesn’t affect us and we only listen to our friends. But you knew that wasn’t true all along. Didn’t you?
• Ed Hardy wines?: “Perhaps no brand hookup makes less sense. Yet there it was at my local Whole Foods, stacked in orderly end-cap pyramids.” Interesting how Ed Hardy has soldiered on in general. When it debuted, every coolmaking tastemonger I know predicted it would fail immediately. The problem was supposed to be lack of authenticity. Moving into wine wouldn’t seem to help that problem — but maybe it wasn’t a problem after all?
• The fickle Twitterer: “According to a study out today from Nielsen, at least three out of every five people who sign up for a Twitter account bail within a few weeks.” But maybe they come back? I don’t know. Anyway, Nicholas Carr’s take.
• Your Facebook Profile Makes Marketers’ Dreams Come True: Overall not much new here, but an interesting example or two.
• Idiotic lawsuit of the moment: Oprah v. Mutual of Omaha, regarding rights to phrase “aha moment.”
• Obama’s Call to Create, Not Just Consume: “I want us all to think about new and creative ways to engage young people in science and engineering, whether it’s science festivals, robotics competitions, fairs that encourage young people to create and build and invent — to be makers of things, not just consumers of things.”

The “Best Painting Ever”

This is via BB and that makes it “old,” but I can’t take the chance that you may have missed it. Please enjoy, from the auction of Michael Jackson’s … stuff … this painting.

It is, really, some kind of achievement. It is the bad painting to end all bad paintings — and I want it. Thus it is one of the most American things I have ever seen. It is beyond description. It should be turned into a poster and given for free to every household. It speaks for itself.

More MJ acution items, many of which are almost this sublime, here.

Linkpile (via Delicious)

• Jobless Tap Power of Merchandising: Someone selling ‘Laid Off Need A Job’ wristbands. Fascinating.
• Autoworkers Compete to Keep Jobs, Livelihoods on New Reality Show: Onion video. Amazingly well-executed.
• Bud Light Product Placement on Facebook: “The beer maker recently released a Bud Light page that features an application that lets users send digital gifts as a part of the company’s ‘Drinkability’ campaign.” Whenever a user sends a virtual Bud Light gift, it appears on the user’s Wall and will be seen by all the recipient’s friends.
• Phantom portraits: Fascinating project “used digital photo manipulation to illustrate the phantom limbs of post-amputation patients.”
• Claim: Affluent Consumers Regain A Bit Of Confidence: “Unity Marketing’s Luxury Consumption Index reports a modest uptick of 1.5 points in their latest survey of affluents (average income of $207,000). While luxury consumers are still cutting back on spending they do feel more optimistic about the future of both their personal finances and the country’s economic recovery. Many of the 1,034 people surveyed said they see a recovery coming within the next twelve months.”
• How Susan Boyle Spread and What It Means: “While she originated on British broadcast television, her entry into the American market was shaped more by the conscious decisions of 87 plus million people who choose to pass her video along … than by any decision by network executives to put her on the airwaves in the first place.” Well, sort of. How many people actually had this video “passed along” to them, as opposed to heard about it from a media source — a category that I would say includes prominent/popular blogs — and then either Googled it up, or clicked through? I would guess a LOT of the views came from the latter scenario, especially as this became such a prominent media story. I certainly think that X million views does NOT equal X million people “choosing to pass [the video] along” to someone else. The distinction matters in this context because of the argument being made about spreadability.

Flickr Interlude

The pied piper that goes by the name of Mr. Greedy, originally uploaded by crookhaven.

“Mind that child! I suggest to watch it big.”

Linkpile (via Delicious)

• Stereotypes and exceptions: “When people don’t fit our preconceived notions, we tend to ignore the contradictions, until they are too dramatic to overlook. In those cases, said John F. Dovidio, a psychology professor at Yale, we focus on the contradiction — Ms. Boyle’s voice, for example. While that makes us see her as more of an individual, we also ‘find a way to make the world make sense again, even if the way we do it is to say, ‘This is an exceptional situation.’ It’s easier for me to keep the same categories in my mind and come up with an explanation for the things that are discrepant.’”
• Winterhouse Awards for Design Writing & Criticism: Deadline is June 1. $10k top prize; $1k top prize for students.
• Aaaar-ticle of the day: “These are confusing times for pirate enthusiasts.”
• TV aims to embrace the recession: “A candidate for the ABC schedule is ‘Canned,’ about a group of friends who all get laid off the same day. ‘Little Piggy,’ another comedy in development for ABC, is about a husband who becomes financially ruined and returns to the home in which he grew up.” Via Recessionwire.

Flickr Interlude

Bumblebee Transformer – Highway 41, California, originally uploaded by Vintage Roadside.

“The incredible Bumble Bee Transformer outside of Lemoore, California along Highway 41. Made from a Volkswagon Beetle. His feet are the front fenders.”

Linkpile (via Delicious)

• In a digital age, vinyl albums are making a comeback: Story has been written repeatedly. But: “1.88 million sales of new LPs last year, an 89% increase over 2007.”
• America’s most frugal dad…: … lacks a basic understanding of math: “Almost 60 percent of what people put in their carts is impulse buys,” he says, “so if you go to the store for 10 items, you may end up with 16.” Um, no. And it’s odd that the editors of American Profile decided to make this innumerate comment a pullquote. But big ups on your thrifty ways just the same.
• Speaking in Code: Documentary about electronic music.