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« May 2007 | Main | July 2007 »
FCC and Jay Rockefeller Want To Control Your TV Remote
(FYI - READERS COMING OVER FROM ALL THINGS DIGITAL SHOULD SCROLL DOWN TO THE PREVIOUS POST)
The FCC and Senator Jay Rockefeller (Democrat from West Virginia) have nothing better on their mind than to continue to try and figure out how to control what gets piped into your television set. I've wrote about this quite a few times including, The FCC Thinks Your Parenting Skills Suck and Really The FCC and Senator Jay Rockefeller Think Your Parenting Skills Suck. I just don't get why the Senate continues to try and waste their time with this cooked up scheme by the FCC's Kevin Martin.
What got me fired up on my train ride back from DC was when I read this article by Amy Schatz from the WSJ called Television Violence gains Focus in Congress. Amy wrote a good article, but what surprised me the most was that it was buried on page B4 in the bottom left almost like the Journal didn't think it was very important. What kills me the most about this crappy Kevin Martin idea is what they think should be censored or not. If this Rockefeller Censorship Bill would pass it would give new Censorship Czar Kevin Martin the ability to enforce rules on airing violent programming between 6 am and 10 PM when children could be watching. It would exempt sports, news, and documentaries.
- IF THE FCC WANTS TO PROTECT KIDS IT SHOULD NOT EXEMPT ANY PROGRAMS. I
wonder why they decided it? It couldn't have anything to with a lobbyist or two could it? - NEWS IS THE MOST VIOLENT SHOW ON TV. Check out this link and picture from Channel 7 in NY for tonight. What's there? Beatings, Iraq war, kids dead in a car crash, police dog kills another dog. All great headlines for your pre-schooler right?
- AND DON'T GET ME STARTED ON DOCUMENTARIES. THEY ARE VIOLENT TOO. WHY DID YOU THINK DAVID CHASE USED THEM IN THE SOPRANOS?
That's the problem with bills like this. The Government should not be intervening and deciding what is violent or not. They should set guidelines and ratings that inform parents about what they can expect. When the Government decides that News and Sports are exempt it is their attempt to control what you should see. Let me repeat this. NEWS IS THE MOST VIOLENT SHOW ON TV BECAUSE IT IS REAL.
As the folks over at televisionwatch.org have written 92% of parents believe they should be the ones who control the TV not the Government. There is a ton of information on their site including polls and tools for parents. Get involved. Do something other than lay on the couch and let Rockefeller and Martin control your TV. How about something simple as write your Senator? You can find the list and contact information at the NRSC.org website.
PardonMyFrench,
Eric
A Few Reasons Why AT&T/iPhone Won't Live Up to The Hype
On the eve regarding AT&T's big launch, I thought I'd give you my opinion why the iPhone can't possibly live up to the hype for AT&T. However, before I do, let me give you readers a little background on my favorite subject me, so you don't think I'm some blithering idiot blogger who doesn't know anything about wireless. If you already know, feel free to skip the next paragraph.
From 1995 through 1999, I was part AT&T's Wireless Bundling Marketing team that was charged with marketing AT&T Wireless Service to AT&T's Long Distance customer base. My group was charged with running the direct marketing (yes Direct Mail and Telemarketing)
, working with AT&T Wireless to generate wireless offers, developing bundled offers (free phones, 30 free minutes of LD minutes per month, bundling the bills), and other marketing functions. Back in Basking Ridge NJ people among other less flattering names, used to call me Bundle Boy and my marketing plans dropped millions of millions of direct mail per year and made millions and millions of outbound telemarketing calls. It was quite an operation until AT&T Wireless built their own capabilities and we all moved on. I signed (not my real signature) almost every direct mail piece that was dropped and you can see the picture on the right from the original mailing in 1995.
My Top Reasons Why AT&T/iPhone Can't Live Up to The Hype:
- $499 price point: That's a non-starter for a tremendous amount of people (consumers). 18 months ago I shelled out $500 for the Treo 700W because I could expense otherwise, I never would have paid that much for it.
- Monthly Fees: You need to get a voice and data monthly plan and that costs more money per month.
- It's The Network Stupid: No matter how great the hardware, it has to connect to the wireless and data network. I dropped AT&T Wireless about 6 years ago because it couldn't hold my signal on Route 78 while I drove past Newark NJ.
- The other wireless companies aren't going to sit around watching their customer fly out the door. See this article from Walter Mossberg at the WSJ. They have a smaller window of opportunity than past years.
- Wireless is a complicated business to switch carriers. You have contracts, phones, calling plans, data plans, call quality, and etc. Back in the day, AT&T Wireless thought that "antenna chasing" was too difficult a process and it still is. Besides, it isn't like a large % of these 1 million inquiries that AT&T is promoting will turn into customers; it doesn't work that way off of requests for more information.
- Apple is almost in a no-lose scenario, but AT&T looks like it can
be the big loser here. Apple is entering a market it isn't in
today so even if it doesn't live up to the hype it can still boost its
earnings. Meanwhile, AT&T can take it on the chin because they are:
- Paying for the TV commercials (it appears that way)
- Has customers in place that will migrate
- Gets stuck servicing them because you have to figure out is it a network problem or a phone problem
- The customer migration issue is a problem because in the wireless business you need NEW customers to help pay for the price of the phone; re-upping existing customers on plans, while good for customer service, has less of an impact on the income statement
- I thought the world has moved away from one hit wonders into more of a Long Tail of Marketing? I believe in the Long Tail and with all of the reasons above, I think they have an uphill battle to please an enormous base of customers.
- How many IT departments out there will allow them on their platform?
Anyway, my prediction goes like this. The iPhone is an absolute home run, heck a grand slam for Apple. They get into the market and provide a great product; so they are starting virtually from scratch and have nowhere to go but up. Demand too large, they say "oh sorry" and the hype builds more. Meanwhile, AT&T takes it on the chin for building too much demand with TV ads, internet ads, radio ads, stores, direct mail, print, heck anything else they can stick a message on. Plus, too much of the base migrates which adds pressure to their numbers or worse yet, the base gets pissed off because they can't get a phone.
In the end, Apple WINS BIG and AT&T BARELY SURVIVES until a cheaper phone shows up.
PardonMyFrench,
Eric
These Mini-Episodes Are A Brilliant Idea
Yes, I'm about 5 days behind making this post, but other things caught my attention and I do have one full time jobs and a couple of side things that keeps me busy (BTW - that's why I don't consider myself a full-time blogger). Anyway, the NYTimes had an article called MySpace Mini-Episodes, Courtesy of Honda and I went through the entire article and test drove the TJ Hooker episode and I think this is an absolutely wonderful idea. Here's the basic idea:
- Take a bunch of 70s/80s reruns like Charlie Angels, TJ Hooker, etc and edit them down to 4-6 minutes to be shown on the screen.
- Each episode is carefully edited to keep the plot together all while making sure you get the general gist of the show
- Stick an 8 second pre-roll commercial in front of the episode solely sponsored by Honda
- And, bingo you have webified TV shows built for today's attention deficit disorder crowd of the internet
Seriously, it is brilliant. I can't really see it hurting DVD sales and to be blunt it may e
ven help. How many of you are going to run out and buy the Facts of Life in DVD? (Did anyone else have a crush on Nancy McKeon besides myself while in school?) Plus it introduces these shows to a generation that will never see them because they've probably outlived
their TV syndication usefulness .
I watched the TJ Hooker episode and you could definitely get a feel for the show and the plot. That is, bad guy on the loose, James T Kirk chases him but fails at first, Heather Locklear make it look easy being sexy, and then Kirk fights the villain and wins in the end rescuing his partner. It was enjoyable, fast watching, virtually commercial free, and looked great on the little screen.
The only concerns I might have is limiting it to MySpace only for now and how Honda will judge success. The sponsorship for now is 6 figures and as the article mentions, Honda is trying to sell the Honda Fit. Also found in the NY Times article is this "Lauren Mehl, associate media director at RPA in Santa Monica, Calif., said the agency would evaluate the subsequent sponsorship opportunities based on how the commercials perform their run on MySpace."
I wonder what Honda will deem success. It fits in with their positioning of their car, but other than boosting awareness and visits to the site, I think they'll have a hard time proving car sales are being generated from these ads, but maybe they have some other measurements.
This is clearly a homerun product and besides being available on the web, you can bet the format will find a home on your cell phone in the future as well as other online properties. Hopefully, more studios will follow the lead.
PardonMyFrench,
Eric
Don't Fly Continental Airlines from Newark to Norfolk
This is a true story, I don't exaggerate at all. On Tuesday I had a two hour meeting in Norfolk Virginia, so instead of taking the train from Edison NJ to DC and hitching a ride with a co-worker, I thought it would be faster and cheaper to fly round trip. Little did I know that Norfolk has a pact with Continental Airlines to cause people to stay over night there. So here's my tale of woe....
My meeting in Norfolk ended early and I was dropped after at the airport. I put myself on the 5:30 flight instead of my original 7PM flight and by the time I got through security and walked to the gate, they canceled BOTH flights. Good old Continental couldn't have warned me before I rebooked myself? <sigh>.
So I turned around and walked back to the ticket counter and stood in line with a bunch of angry New Jerseyans and angry people trying to get to Seattle. I couldn't go the eTicket route and of course good old Continental only HAD 2 PEOPLE working the counter. So, after standing in line for 25 minutes behind a bunch of sweaty angry Jersey guys, I was able to rebook my flight to 1PM on Wednesday. You see, I couldn't fly anywhere else BECAUSE CONTINENTAL ONLY FLIES TO CLEVELAND, NEWARK, AND HOUSTON FROM NORFOLK (reason #1 to never do this again).
I then got a room in the Norfolk Airport Hilton for $169+taxes but to my surprise, the restaurant in this Hilton was an upscale version of Ruby Tuesdays (yuck). I also was without any clothes or toiletries and unfortunately I can't walk anywhere around the hotel because there are NO sidewalks (reason #2 to never stay here again). So, I grabbed a $20 cab ride to Virginia Beach for a great meal on the bay at a place called Lynnhaven Fish House. I had their she-crab soup, baked scallops with crab and some cheese, salad, dessert and of course a few cocktails. My waitress also was from a town close to Long Valley NJ so the company was welcoming. I then hopped back in a $20 cab ride but this time to stop at the ONLY clothing store in the area, Walmart (reason #3 to never do this again).
I ran into Walmart and bought a $10 pair of brown leather sandals, a $10 black Spider-Man tshirt, a pair of boxer shorts, and what I thought was a $14 pair of size 36 denim wrangler shorts. When I got back to my hotel room and tried everything on, the shorts were so big that I pulled them up to my neck. Always useless Walmart had a pair of size 48s on a size 36 hangar. Sigh, I had to wear the same pair of black dress pants with my brown sandals and Spider-Man tshirt for a second day in a row (YUCK and boy did I look special).
On Wednesday, I checked my flight which was on time for the moment and worked in the hotel all morning. By the time I got to the airport at 11:15, I was told that Continental had canceled both earlier flights and both later flights so that there was only 2 out of the original 6 flights running. Why is that? Well a nice Continental employee told me that Continental picks on Norfolk because it is a) small and b) it is in the flight path coming from the south into Newark so that if other flights got priority they CANCEL THE FLIGHTS FROM NORFOLK (reason #4 to never do this again). To save my fingers, here's the rest of my story in bullet form:
Reasons #5 to #12 to never do this again
- My flight was delayed because "they needed a plane". Yeah right they were just staggering the flight.
- Norfolk only had one security lane open so I stood on line FOREVER
- We finally boarded but that was after people got bumped from the flight because it was over booked.
- I heard the same complaint about Norfolk's bad luck in getting bumped from numerous stranded people
- We waited 30 minutes on the tarmac but were first in line adding to my staggering point
- I was sandwiched in this small plane between the curve of the window and a very large woman who's left thigh I ended up getting intimate with because the plane was so small
- We circled for 30 minutes because - well they never gave a good reason
- When we finally landed it took another 30 minutes at our gate because our gate was changed and we had to wait for the other plane to move out
I got home at 5PM with what was supposed to be an hour and 15 minutes in the air. It was terrible. Oh and if you think I was the only one, check out the line at Continental's customer service counter when I walked by. Morale of this story is to:
NEVER FLY CONTINENTAL AIRLINES INTO NORFOLK VIRGINIA FROM NEWARK, EVER.
PardonMyFrench,
Eric
2008 Presidential Candidates Do Use PPC Search A Lot
A saw this article today over at Time called The Politics of Search and then a blog post by the author Bill Tancer from Hitwise called Election 2008 and I was surprised at the following written conclusion from Bill regarding pay per click advertising:
It appears that at this early stage in the campaign candidates are relying solely on organic search results — in other words, they aren't buying any significant search-term advertising to boost their traffic from search engines. Watching the latest round of political debates, I've become a little skeptical of both side's commitment to their political platform. If candidates feel so strongly about the top issues of the day, then perhaps they should purchase keywords on those issues to stake out their positions. If a candidate wants to broadcast a position on abortion, why not purchase the term "abortion," "pro-life" or "pro-choice?"
The bolded statements surprised me a bit because they are really inaccurate and I'm a little surprised that a MSM company like Time didn't fact check it properly. Case in point and NOT using my personal blog posts yet to prove these are inaccurate:
- Hotline on Call showed that Barack Obama spent $72K in the first quarter on Google AdWords.
- Donna Bogatin when she was with ZDNet published the following results on my search campaign for John McCain.
- There are plenty of campaigns buying each other's words - see these two posts
- ClickZ details my McCain display ad buy and shows Google as one of the networks...hmm
- Finally, just checking for yourself in Google will show a candidate bidding on a pro-life word plus other issue words
I think political campaigns are very committed to search marketing. I personally see ALL of the ads multiple times per day. I've written before that PPC advertising is a very dynamic marketplace. There are many reasons why a candidate buys or does not buy words and even when they are buying a certain word, there are valid reasons why their ad may not appear the exact moment when someone decides to write an article. Come on Bill, you just need to spend more time searching for political ads.
I'm really tired of people not fact checking PPC advertising and just making assumptions when they search a few times and don't see anything. Remember even when a campaign is buying a word, they may have hit their daily spend and that's why the ads doesn't show. Simple answer. There were plenty of clues (as shown above) that the 2008 candidates are committed to search advertising; some more than others but enough data is out there.
PardonMyFrench,
Eric
Go Run Google's Content Placement Report ASAP
Did you ever want to know where Google ran your text ads when you opted into Content? Were you unwilling to pay for a bid manager or tracking device that could provide it for you? Well, have no fear search true believers, Google has answered your prayers for more visibility. If you've been reading this blog or have known me for a long time, you know that I urge you to tread carefully when it comes to content.
Quick lesson: when you run a search campaign with Google you have three options; Google only, search results from websites in Google's network, and content targeting where Google serves your ads based on keyword targeting. Oh coincidentally, content is currently the only place within Google where you can run image and video ads. Ok, back to our show.
Back a few years ago, I almost always turned content off. However, these days I'm becoming more at ease with content, especially now with Google's content placement report. As the press release and Inside AdWords blog writes, you can now see where you ads ran (by domain and URL level) as well as impressions, clicks, CTR, conversions, and CPA performance metrics. This gives you almost complete visibility into your content media buys. Why is this so important?
- It helps with your Whack-A-Mole problem where your ads mysteriously
appear on sites that you don't want. Now you can get ahead of the curve and exclude them using the site exclusion tool. - You can get an idea where Google places your ads based on their targeting engine which can get you more comfortable with running content.
- Once you find a website that performs well, you can use Google's site targeting to heavy up on a spend there.
- As I wrote above, content is the only place Google lets you run image and video ads so if that is a course you want to pursue, you had best start mastering it.
- I've always believed that the majority of click fraud came from content, so now you have better control. The site exclusion tool will become your best friend.
So besides having the report available, I'd like to see Google make improvements to their targeting engine and give you the ability to opt out of sites based on a minimum monthly impression level. Once you run it, you'll see the Long Tail of search marketing at its best and realize that if you only want your brand on a few sites, you'll end up just opting out of 100s of smaller ones. Anyway, I love the fact that Google provides this visibility and once you have it activated you should run the report ASAP. Now, if only Yahoo will figure out this report too, than we might have a better picture of content.
PardonMyFrench,
Eric
Sopranos Ending - Are You Friggin Kidding Me?
I am too angry to write sentences here...
- I'm dropping HBO as planned tomorrow morning
- During the last (I can't even call it a show), I thought about buying the disc sets, but not now.
- I didn't mind Tony making peace with people including helping Bobby's kids, seeing Uncle Junior, Little Steven, Anthony Jr because I expected that
- However, besides Phil getting whacked the rest of the episode was pretty boring
- Heck, I wouldn't have minded the ending IF THE REST OF THE EPISODE WAS DECENT
But that ending was terrible. Leave it up to the viewer to decide? Come on. That was lame. I paused the show about 53 minutes into it and said to my wife, nothing can happen because he doesn't have enough time. 10 or so minutes of a setup for nothing...what a waste.
I have a much more detailed thought to describe what this ending was like but I can't go into it because some day my kids will read this blog. However, let's just say it involves something ending WAY before you planned it to while in the bedroom...
Look David Chase, we didn't need you to leave it up to us to figure out our own ending. That's not what we pay you for (yes via HBO). We want to be entertained by a professional. Probably the only thing good about this is The Sopranos can now live forever in user generated content and video. BA DA BING.
Sure some people will say it is brilliant and say he got what he wanted, people talking about it. (BTW - you can read Sepinwall's column and at 12AM 17 out of the top 20 Hottest Trends on Google were for The Sopranos) And, they'll also tell you, that's what David Chase does. Perhaps now that Chase and Company have left it up to the viewer, it can spawn all sorts of endings from Sopranos fans. Good luck HBO you were a good thing, but now we're........(see PS Below)
PardonMyFrench,
Eric
BTW: I dropped HBO this morning via DirecTV. It was fast and painless and completely automated. I wonder how many other people dropped it today?
PS: More updates from the Sopranos message board over at NJO.com. Besides angry people like myself, there seems to be three schools of thought on the end scene:
- Tony Gets Shot: Here's the theory. Perception changes to Tony. The restaurant is loaded with enemies of Tony. Meadow's face when she walks in is upsetting because she sees Tony getting whacked by Phil's loyalists in the restaurant . Final proof is Tony and Bobby talking on the boat and Bobby says you never see it coming.
- Tony Lives but in Fear: The guys in the room are representative of Tony being nervous the rest of his always looking for the hit that may come.
- DVD Sales: DVD allows you to fill in the blank for one of four endings. If this happens this is the ultimate example of David Chase selling out!!
Anyway, still upset with anything but #2 above. I don't go with #1 because there seems to be WAY TOO MANY enemies in the NJ restaurant to coordinate that hit and Tony made peace with NY. Sure Phil's relatives would be upset, but who are they working for? Finally, this from a post from NJFan26:
This morning I heard an interview with Frank Vincent, the guy who plays Phil. He said that the last scene was meant to symbolize that Tony would have to live the rest of his life being paranoid about who is walking in the door whether it is the FBI, a hit, or just anyone coming to take him away our take him out. That is his ultimate punishment. He can never relax without having to look over his shoulder.
Is David Chase brilliant and was the show over all these seasons brilliant? Yes and Yes. I still don't like the ending unless it was #2. Oh well.
Some more final thoughts for you folks that subscribe to #1. I replayed the ending on TiVo:
- You don't see Meadow's face near the door. The last time you see her is running from her car with a very normal reaction
- The Man in Member's Only Jacket as he is credited is Paolo Colandrea who was just picked for this episode and he's not saying what his role was
- And finally that is NOT Janice who walks into the restaurant
Google Pursues a Product Bundling Strategy?
My blog friend Bill Tancer from Hitwise provides a great snapshot of the use of Google products both before and after the new Google Universal Search changes. You can read Bill's post on the big winners and losers, but what I find completely fascinating is the dominance of just a few of Google's products plus how that product usage has a changed over the last year. On May 22, 2006, I wrote the following post called Behind Google's Numbers which talked about Google's product extension and that the top 4 Google products at the time made up almost 97% of its traffic (search: 80%, image: 10%, gmail: 5.5%, news: 1.5%).
Now, a little over a year later according to Bill showed that the top 4 now
composed only 93% of the traffic (search: 69%, YouTube 11.5%, image 7.5%, gmail: 5%) and if you wanted to get to the same 97% level you now need to add it video 1.4%, maps 1.4%, news 1%, blogger 0.5%. The mix is a little different with the YouTube acquisition and even with the new Universal Search process you can see that one of their plans is to spread out a user's product usage. That's your classic bundling strategy.
Now what Google's "competitors" had as an advantage over them was trying to monopolize a user's time by keeping them in their family of websites for as long as possible. Google in the beginning had a simple search page and they tried very hard to avoid making it cluttered with a bunch of links (and still do). So, while Google's product team continues its product line extension it also knows that they need to gather a larger share of a user's internet activity. Google probably thinks that while having a ton of search activity does wonderful things for your income statement in the short term, they need to continue to be relevant in the long term by increasing usage beyond search.
The new Universal Search strategy goes a long way to putting more Google products right at your fingertips. Now, relevant results whether it is news, video, books, etc can be found in the search results and if you want to drill down in a certain area (ex - blogs) you can hit a link at the top of the results. Besides improving search, it has the added benefit of putting more of Google's products easily within reach.
Take this search results link on John McCain over at Yahoo. Do you see the Yahoo Answers Senator McCain had a few months back? No. No link at the top or within the search results. Not even by the Also Try link. Yahoo could also cross sell you (delicately) into the special elections page they set up for all of the 2008 candidates, but they don't. Is this altering your results? Yes, but as I pointed out above, they already have a spot for Also Try so what's the harm?
How about over at MSN? Well, let's just say they have a lot of work to do starting with traffic.
This just illustrates again that Google continues to outmaneuver their competitors. It reminds me of a quote from my friend Jim W when we were in college at Rutgers. Back then the Men's basketball team had two transfers named Duncan and Hughes and when I asked Jim what they were like in practice, Jim replied "Men, playing with boys Eric. Just like men playing basketball against boys."
PardonMyFrench,
Eric
AdAge's Brand Origin Poll
Yesterday morning I got this very thought provoking (at least in my mind) question from AdAge which I reprinted below:
A beer that hailed from Germany once had a certain cachet -- as did chocolate from Belgium or an electronic device from Japan. But recent research from Anderson Analytics has found that when it comes to college-age consumers, a brand's country of origin is unimportant. In a world where the internet is a great leveler, geographic boundaries -- and heritage -- are a lot less relevant, at least among campus-age consumers. And in fact, many of those surveyed incorrectly identified where certain brands came from. All of which begs the question whether the days of jingoism and flag-waving are numbered -- and whether marketing tactics such as the "Heartbeat of America" are flat-lining. Is the time for evoking a brand's country of origin in its marketing over?
Now before I jump into the question, I Googled the survey mentioned in the question and after I read the results, I had a different spin on it. You can find the link to the summary of the survey from Anderson Analytics here and you can actually download their results from this link. The conclusion in the summary is this: For the most part, this next generation of educated American consumers either have no clue where the brands they use come from or simply assume everything comes from the United States, Japan, or Germany said Tom H. C. Anderson, Managing Partner, Anderson Analytics,
While I have no doubt that conclusion is true, what I didn't see in the report was how clueless these college students really were versus the general population. Now that would have been interesting to see if college students really don't care or are they just as clueless as the rest of us. To test your knowledge, take the three question poll below. Anyway, back to the AdAge poll.
While I do agree that the internet is breaking down time and distance boundaries, however country of origin still should matter. Fine wine from Napa, CA or video games from Japan do help a brand with instilling certain values into the product. Are you more likely to buy a wine made in NJ or from a certain region in France? I sometimes drink a Texas hand made vodka called Tito's and it tastes great, but people turn their nose up when they hear it is from Texas instead of France or Russia.
If college students can't identify a product's country of origin maybe it is up to the marketer to figure out a better way of reaching out to them rather than using the same old marketing techniques that don't work any more. Maybe the reason people are so confused is that the battle for our attention is so complex these days that they can't figure out a way to break through. The marketer needs to maximize every opportunity to push their key product attributes and for certain products that means country of origin. Sure the internet is awesome for making the world a lot smaller, but that doesn't mean the world at large wants the same boring homogenized products. (take the poll below and see post continuation for answers to see how you did)
PardonMyFrench,
Eric
Alan Sepinwall's Sopranos Rewind Will Be Missed Monday Morning
Yes, by now you know that The Sopranos is wrapping up this coming Sunday, but one of the
unsung heroes associated with the show has been The Star Ledger's Alan Sepinwall Monday morning column called Sopranos Rewind. Well up until recently it was printed in the paper edition of the Ledger every Monday, but now if you need need your Sepinwall fix on Monday you had to go online to his column. More on that in a second, first let me sing Sepinwall's praises.
The wrap up was essential reading for any real fan of the show. He gave honest reviews that told it like it was, unlike other reviewers that shilled for the show. Sepinwall broke down the plot, filled in blanks on the show, unraveled some of the show's quirks (ex, when a character gets killed they almost always wear white shoes, except for Paulie who always wears white), pointed out where characters have been or the last time you saw them, and most importantly tied recent events with shows from years past. Truly a must read every Monday morning.
That was until a few weeks ago. It seems Sepinwall was missing the deadlines when he wrote his review forcing diehard readers like myself to go to the website to get the scoop from the previous day's show. And, like most news stories it is better online. Besides the excellent summary, you got great feedback from the fans in the comment section; not the message boards which are unfiltered and as typical message boards go, filled mostly with arguments and the occasional curse. Comments like this can be found at the end of Sepinwall's story which adds a tremendous amount to the fanbase:
- mediatext: "Paulie has already defected to Phil, Tony will find that out and will kill him. Tony, desperate, alone and hunted by Phil, will reach to the FBI guys --or they will reach him"
- grappa: but I am starting to think the flip is coming from Tony. Agent Harris has been in almost every episode the lap top screen in AJ's room featuring a story on terrorism
- seapointer: The difference with Tony is that he sought treatment voluntarily for personal problems, and never hid the fact that his criminal activities were continuing.
- fordmail: I for one wanted to see Sil pay a price for the way he killed Ade like a dog, instead we saw him meet his end fumbling for his gun "Fredo Style". On the other hand, we saw one of the most likeable characters (Bobby) taken out "Sonny Style".
- jamcpa: The greatest impact that Chase could possibly make in the show's last episode is for Tony to live on, without his Family or his family, with the guilt of the loss of a loved one, ie. Meadow or AJ - similar to Godfather III.
- NJkenn: for those talking of the possibility of an eventual Sopranos movie, I heard Frank Vincent (Phil Leotardo) interviewed this morning, and he said that the rumor he keeps hearing is that, if a movie is to be made, it will be a prequel.....Tony, though, having likely already begun changing his patterns as soon as Harris told him about the possible hit, would be hardest one to find, especially in a timely, coordinated fashion since he would be specifically avoiding places like the Bing or Satriales
- sonnysighed: But in the scene between T and Sil in T's garage, it becomes clear that Phil may have known about the planned hit ahead of time, and cleared out in advance. Which means it's likely that either Paulie or Patsi are also "playing both sides of the fence" (get well, Sil! or RIP).
You get the idea. This is a pure example of social marketing at its best with the Sopranos community adding to the discussion. However, The Star Ledger could have "forced" readers earlier to the website instead of waiting until close to the end of the show. I'm sure they were trying to balance out paper sales with online sales, only demonstrating that local newspapers still have a ways to go in figuring out how to monetize their online traffic. Its time for the Ledger to push more and more content to the web only - they might as well start now because once someone figures out how to put a newspaper in a large, but light handheld that's convenient to read in the Men's room, their paper sales will be toast.
My final words on the show (who can resist) which I've been saying since the second episode of this season. Tony Soprano rides off into the sunset. He doesn't die and doesn't turn to the feds to protection. The last scene will be Tony and his family sitting at Bobby's lake house somewhere in upstate NY looking at Canada.
Alan Sepinwall's column will be the second most missed part of the long running HBO show. Thanks Alan for making your NJ reader's Monday morning extra special by making the show last just a little longer for all of us.
PardonMyFrench,
Eric
My Baby Sitter Brittany Clued Me Into FunnyorDie.com
So, our baby sitter Brittany Holloway clued me into FunnyorDie.com a few days ago.
She was pretty proud of showing me something that I had not seen yet. The site is only 7 weeks old and it includes professionally made video shorts from Will Ferrell and others as well as consumer generated comedy shorts. You can read a nice synopsis from the New York Times called Comedy Business Turns to the Web. The immortal landlord video that's posted on Funny or Die has like 3.2 million views which should make anyone jealous, plus there are a ton of other videos with serious amounts of views (see screen shot). When I looked for them over at YouTube all I found were grainy versions with a mere fraction of the views.
Hmmm, this got me thinking. If a big time comedian like Will Ferrell can quickly pump out videos that produce millions of views in a short amount of time than what does it say about the future of YouTube or any other video aggregator site for that matter? According to the NY Times article, Ferrell started with a $5K budget and then Sequoia Capital increased its investment to several million dollars. So, it is really peanuts for other professionals to follow his lead, right? Add in say, Sports announcers for their own Sports shows (think Yankeeography) and other genres and then what happens to YouTube? What happens if all of these professionals want to only post it on their website like Comedy Central?
Some folks will tell you, well they will be missing out on the YouTube community. Me, I'll tell you that people won't care. No matter how great the community aspect is in YouTube they will follow the content. See what made YouTube cool was the ability to have your videos hosted for free where you can engage the community for free. People get that now because the model is so simple.
Take for example the current group of Presidential candidates. It makes sense for them to be on YouTube because they can have their own channel there and that makes it easy for people to engage with the campaigns. Sure the RNC or DNC could make their own channel, but then it would have to pull the audience over with political messages. This is a lot harder than going where the people are. Comedy shorts is another issue altogether.
Now back to my title. I was tipped off by a 19 year old college student. Britt is well connected and has a large following on Facebook and MySpace so she is exactly the Web 2.0 social user. Did she care (or her friends) that she wasn't on YouTube but on FunnyorDie.com? Heck no. Why should she? She can leave comments, vote, and interact with other users and whether that is on YouTube or elsewhere it doesn't matter.
My take? If I was Yahoo, AOL, MSN, or Google I'd take a good look at what is happening at FunnyorDie and start thinking about channels rather than community. The community is a tool that makes video viewing on the internet 2-way, not the driving force behind why there is traffic there; that's what the content is for. If they wait too long to build channels behind the content, they'll get outfoxed by Joost where the community aspect is just a tool and the content, organized like TV channels, is king.
PardonMyFrench,
Eric
Stuff
- Eric Is AdWords Qualified
