Viva Chu, a colleague at my last startup, has finally launched Handipoints, his chore tracker/virtual world for kids. He also snagged a nice review in TechCrunch. Handipoints is a site where parents can create printable chore charts and setup an allowance program that is tied to teaching responsible habits. Kids earn points from doing their […]
And then We’ll Teach the Saudis How to Farm
While the rest of us are trying to figure out how to make internet brand ads ($5 CPMs, if you’re lucky) as engaging as TV ads ($50 CPMs), TechCrunch is trying to figure out how to bring internet style ads to TV. I’m sort of at a loss for words on this one.
‘Pimp’ is an Uglier Word
Henrik Torstensson points out an article on BubbleGeneration called Companies Are Not Pimps. Their beef? LBS was holding a conference called Monetizing Social Networks. Here’s BubbleGeneration’s take: MBAs come to B-school wanting to do cool things – and they get crushed into thinking business is about “product” and “monetization”… It was, at least a little […]
The Feed Kludge
I’m not a huge fan of blog comments. Sure, I appreciate the friendly “Amen, brother”, but if you’ve really got something to say then start your own blog and start saying it. And, of course, link it to my blog. Comments are inherently a speaker-audience metaphor: the blogger is up on the stage talking and […]
Don’t Do Me Any Favors
Louise Story had a decent article in the NY Times on Monday about internet ad targeting. But the article, like every article on ad targeting ever written in a publication dependent on placating their obviously non-objective sources, said this: …executives from the largest Web companies say … the data is a boon to consumers, because […]
A Dollar’s Worth of Wine, and Three Dollars’ Worth of Bubbles
I had this New Yorker cartoon on my desk in 2002. I felt for that guy. Wait, I was that guy. I totally missed out on the real estate bubble. Well, I bought a house in 2003, so I guess I played a bit role. Eric Janszen has a great article in Harper’s about the […]
Shoemaker’s Child
I should be using this blog as a marketing vehicle, not for the money, but for the learning. This company, YouCast, is doing something pretty interesting around branding on the internet. Can’t say too much, but this Snapple widget is part of it.
The Sky is Falling! Onto the Moon!
Paul Kedrosky, whose blog I love to read, lends credence to a misleading MSNBC article “Mortgage Application Volume Plummets” by pointing to it. See below, a graph of the stat that “plummeted,” through 2/15/2008. I mean, there’s something wacky going on with that volatility, but it’s not a disappearance of mortgage applications. Looks to me […]
Advertising in a Downturn: Case Study
The common wisdom, the man on the street, the wiseacre in the crowd and their various ilk at the major media outlets say: in a recession, advertising spend goes down. I’ve been arguing for six months that certain sectors of the advertising market won’t, even though their industries are troubled: mortgages and cars have been […]
The Google: Inflection Point
Google continued growing rapidly, albeit a tad less rapidly, and said they saw no weakness in the online advertising market from the oft-predicted recession. But they also said that they were going to focus more on display advertising to diversify away from their core CPC business. That’s exactly what I said to expect. This will […]