The Wall Street Journal has a story about the Olympics organizing committee’s efforts to hide any logos that are not those of the sponsors:

To ensure that only the companies that pay millions of dollars to be official Olympic sponsors enjoy the benefits of exposure in Olympic venues, organizers have covered the trademarks of nonsponsors with thousands of little swatches of tape.

In years past, many companies tried “guerilla marketing” attempts to grab some ‘un-paid’ media attention, so I can understand the organizers’ efforts. And in China, I’m sure it’s a bit more easy for the organizers to control such things than in, say, a country with civil liberties that is not ruled by a totalitarian government.

Despite their best laid plans, I can think of at least four brands (or, in one case, issues) that have received significant exposure (for U.S. TV viewers, at least) from the Olympics for little (or no) media-dollars or “paid” sponsorship.

1. Kinesio: Kinesio, as blogged yesterday at NYTimes.com, has gotten hours of airtime in return for providing 50,000 rolls of its all-cotton, colorful athletic tape that has been displayed on beach volleyball player Kerri Walsh.

2. Microsoft: From the “as long as they spell your name right” department, the guest appearance at the opening ceremonies by the Blue Screen of Death (BSOD) at least let the world know what operating system was used by the producers to put on the $300 million production.

3. Facebook: Facebook received major mojo from Michael Phelps as Bob Costas kept referring to how many fans he had on the site. The “number of fans” meme has been picked up by bloggers and main-stream news media. Had Phelps been a more savvy marketer, he would have cut-off Costas and said, “Swimroom.com is where people can find me.” (Swimroom is a “social network for swimmers” that Phelps endorses.)

4. Protesters: Attempts by Chinese officials to quiet Free Tibet protesters have gained their cause significant exposure in the west. Barring Joey Cheek from entering the country to protest China’s Darfur policies provided him an even better platform.

Can you think of others? Comment below if you can.

Sidenote: I haven’t been to the Masters Golf Tournament in several years, but the times I did, it was the most sponsor logo-free sporting event I have ever attended. The Masters logo is displayed tastefully throughout the course, but sponsor logos (I think Cadillac and Travellers Insurance were the only sponsors) were limited to a display area near the club house. While the organizers couldn’t prevent the players from displaying brands on their clothing and bags, they went as far as requiring that Cokes be served in green cups and at the vendor stands, the Coca-Colo logos on the drink dispensing machines were masked.

Sometimes I feel the need to remove Seth Godin’s Blog feed from my newsreader because the items he shares are so compelling, I fear my blog would soon drift into a series of “what he said” posts from what in some churches is called the “A-men corner.” For example, he posts today on how incredibly rapid certain tactics work on the web while strategy takes forever. Strategy is the hard part, not the tactics. (Can I hear an Amen?).

Explains, Seth: “You can outlast the other guys if you try. If you stick at stuff that bores them, it accrues. Drip, drip, drip you win. It still takes ten years to become a success, web or no web. The frustrating part is that you see your tactics fail right away. The good news is that over time, you get the satisfaction of watching those tactics succeed right away. (That’s me with an Amen from the corner.)

And that is the end of my Sunday morning sermon post.

Now turn in your hymnals to that favorite old gospel song, “Shall we gather at Seth’s Weblog.”

I’ve buried the lede in this post — Somewhere down below, I’m going to have the audacity to suggest the demigods of marketing and advertising at Apple and their agency, Chiat-Day, are the reasons that the Apple TV is merely “a hobby” and not a successful product. But first, the set-up.

I have an Apple TV (okay, I have just about an Apple Everything) but frankly, I often forget about it. I don’t watch TV passively (it’s not ever on in the background), so when I actually watch TV, it’s with intent. Whenever it’s time to watch TV, I usually have several movies or recorded episodes of shows queued up on my Cable-box’s DVR.

Recently, however, I was messing with my Apple TV to see how the iPhone “Remote” app works (it’s rather clever). Out of curiousity, I surfed around the features of the slightly updated software version of the Apple TV and discovered there is now a much larger selection of movies and TV shows than when I last checked in. I was also impressed by the growth of video podcasts being provided from sources big and small. Long story short — I downloaded the first season of Mad Men and my wife and I ended up being engrossed in the program over the next four or five nights.

However, downloading TV shows and movies is not what makes the Apple TV special. (More later, on what is special about it.) Access to TV shows and movies better not be, because I can get movies and TV shows about a dozen other ways. But accessing TV shows and Movies is what consumers first think about when they hear Apple TV described because that’s the way Apple has marketed it. So it’s not surprising that during the quarterly financial conference last week, Apple executives told analysts the AppleTV was still “a hobby” — a reference to what Steve Jobs called it in January when admitting its sales had not been robust.

For most tech bloggers, reporters and financial analysts, the “solution” to Apple TV’s lack of sales success can be solved the way they believe any technology product problem can be solved: by adding features or making it “more open.” “More features and openess” is to techies what “better branding” is to marketers — the solution to everything. For example, here’s a link to a recent post on Weomatica where Jason Kaneshiro has a wish list of features that could improve Apple TV. And today, Dan Frommer says it’s time Apple gets serious about Apple TV and calls for them to, drum-roll please, add a Blu-Ray drive.

I don’t believe the problem with the Apple TV is with technology. It’s a (you can’t believe how amazed I am to be writing the next few words) failure by Apple to successfully market a product. I believe the marketers at Apple and Chiat Day — the ones who regularly are mythologized for their unique brilliance in branding and advertising — have blown it with the Apple TV. They’ve done a terrible job articulating any unique benefits of the Apple TV and have, in a rookie-blunder way, done nothing to explain to consumers why it is different from getting movies or TV shows via cable or from Netflix or Blockbuster. These marketers, who have created the most effective campaign ever conceived to explain product features, the iPhone, have done nothing even good, much less brilliant, to explain why anyone with a Tivo or Cablebox would ever need an Apple TV. The only advertising support they’ve given the product was a lame TV ad (did anyone actually see it on TV?) telling us how we can watch TV shows and movies on our TV.

Additionally, Apple has not given the product the “paid-media” support that typically accompanies the launch of an entirely new genre of consumer product. Think about it. Apple has spent (and continues to spend) hundreds of millions of dollars each year on incredibly effective product advertising and astoundingly powerful promotional pushes for iPods, iPhones and Macs. What kind of media buy schedule did that Jack Black ad receive — compared to, say, a week’s schedule of iPhone ads? Where is the outdoor? Where is the magazine advertising? If you answered, “nowhere,” I think you’d be close to correct. (Please, tell me if I’m wrong.)

So what should Apple do?

While I’m not an advertising expert, I know one: Don Draper, the creative director at Sterling Cooper. I asked him about the Apple TV and he said the one thing consumers can do with an Apple TV that they can’t do with NetFlix or Tivo or their Cable Box is to tap into photos and videos of their family — even family members in far-away places who can stream photos and video from anywhere in the world. It’s like having another channel on a grandparent’s TV that says, “The Grandson Channel” and grandparents can tune in to see his latest soccer game — without a computer. Again, it’s not about technology — you don’t need a computer to watch the Grandson Channel. All you need is an Apple TV hooked into your TV (Don left out the part about needing Internet access).

So what should Apple do, I asked.

“They should stop talking about the Apple TV just accessing movies and TV shows,” Don told me, “The Apple TV is about the ability to travel over time and space to experience the most special moments in the lives of those you love most. It takes us to a place we ache to go. It lets us travel the way a child travels. Around the world and back home again. A place where we know we are loved.”

Wow, Don, I said. If Chiat Day was smart, they’d hire you away from Sterling Cooper to develop a campaign to save the Apple TV.

So Apple, listen to Don. He’d tell you the Apple TV is not about downloading more TV and movies. It’s about connecting with those you love.

He’d tell you, it’s not a wheel. It’s a carousel.

ABOVE: This morning, the New York Times devoted an entire page to a news article suggesting the possibility of Estee Lauder’s influence on editorial decisions at Harper’s Bazaar Magazine. The news article was preceded by Estee Lauder interstitial “pre-roll” advertising and two Estee Lauder ads appear adjacent to the article.

Today the New York Times Style section includes an article (sheepish clarification: it showed up on my RSS feed of “magazine-related” news) that, in a tone of righteous indignation, reported that Harper’s Bazzar was devoting 40 pages of an issue to glamorous fashion photos modeled by four super-models/actresses who regularly appear in and on the cover of the magazine. Except this time, they will be identified as the “stars” of a new fragrance from Estee Lauder instead of, say, the stars of a re-make of Charlie’s Angels.

In the San Francisco Chronicle today, a story appears about the possibility of the FCC tightening the “product placement” rules related to, say, a Coca-cola cup appearing on the table in front of the judges of American Idol.*

As I’ve written before — many, many time — I’m a advocate for transparency in the relationships marketers have with media. I think marketers and media companies should disclose the relationships they have with one another and let the audience decide what is, and is not, ethical. Indeed, I think they should be proud of the relationships.

That said, I must ask: Among the readers of Harper’s Bazaar, are there any who really care where the ads stop and the edit begins? Have you flipped through the September issue of any of fashion magazine? I think most readers would be shocked to learn there is anything in them other than advertising. More than any genre of magazines, fashion magazine advertising is the reason they are purchased.

As for reality programs like American Idol, is the “franchise” of American Idol not a product, itself? Do viewers care that watching the whole show is like watching a commercial for the brand American Idol and all of the performers appearing are also brands?:

When Ryan Seacrest tells viewers they should go download recordings of the evening’s performances on iTunes, are viewers really duped into thinking that was an editorial decision on the part of Ryan rather than a business relationship between the Fox Network and Apple? Do viewers think the Ford music video advertisement is something the contestants do to relax during the week? Do viewers think Coca-Cola is what’s in that cup in front of Paula Abdul?

Are readers and viewers that stupid?

Okay, some are. So perhaps they need some type of explanation or disclaimer below that NYTimes.com advertisement for the product being written about in article next to it. Perhaps they need a big box that includes a warning that, “this article about Estee Lauder’s Senuous is sponsored by Estee Lauder’s Senuous.”

Bottomline: When you attempt to apply the same journalistic and ethical guidelines to entertainment (i.e., fashion magazines and “commercially-sponsored” network reality shows) that you do to news journalism (general or business), you start heading down a slippery slope to school marm silliness that soon makes serious ethical issues seem trite.

*I wrote about American Idol’s creative product placement practices earlier this year.

Four years ago, an article in the Wall Street Journal suggested Internet advertising would match magazine advertising by 2007 and blow past it in 2008. What happened?

The very short version: During 2007, almost $60 billion was spent on advertising that appeared in print while $11.31 billion was spent on advertising that appeared on the Internet.

The very long version: I don’t expect any readers of this weblog to remember a four-year-old rant I wrote (and here) about a Wall Street Journal article appearing in July, 2004. Screen grabbed on the left, the WSJ story carried the headline “Online Ad Dollars Set to Match, Then Go Ahead of Magazines (sub. required).” The article was based on a Jupiter Research report predicting that in 2007, Internet advertising spending would grow to $13.8 billion which, claimed the Wall Street Journal, “would match magazine advertising.”

My rant, which later became an article appearing in Folio: Magazine, was directed more at the Wall Street Journal reporter’s mis-interpretation of the research than it was at the Jupiter Research report. Their prediction was not really a comparison of Internet advertising to magazine advertising, merely their estimate of online advertising spending through 2007 and beyond. It was the Journal reporter who decided to mashup a comparison of future Internet advertising (based on Jupiter’s numbers) and its magazine number estimate.

However — and this was a major focus of my rant — the reporter (and Jupiter) failed to recognize that the Internet advertising prediction included all online advertising while the magazine advertising prediction excluded all business-to-business magazine advertising.

In my response to the article, I suggested that a better prediction of 2007 magazine ad spending would be the 2004 estimate by Veronis Suhler that $28.3 billion would be spent on magazine advertising (consumer and B-to-B) in 2007.

Fast-forward four years. Today, Advertising Age issued a report that included the actual ad spending (split by media) in 2007. As you can see in the Advertising Age pie chart below, $11.31 billion was spent on Internet advertising and $30.33 billion was spent on magazine advertising. Throw in the $28.22 billion spent on newspaper advertising and there was nearly $60 billion spent on print advertising last year.

Let’s break this down a bit. Let’s look at a comparison of the 2004 predictions vs. actual performance from Jupiter Research and Veronis Suhler regarding Internet and magazine advertising. As you can see on my comparison below, Jupiter over-shot their Internet advertising prediction while Veronis-Suhler undershot their magazine advertising prediction.

(Granted, Jupiter Research’s prediction during the most recent four-year span was dramatically better than their 1999-2003 prediction. In 1999, they predicted that online advertising in 2003 would total $11.5 billion compared to the $6.6 billion it actually hit.)

What does this mean? First, it means, (to quote a wonderful headline I saw this morning) “90% of all statistics can be made to say anything 50% of the time.” No doubt, the statistics in today’s report can be spun any way you want. I’ve spun them one way. Most bloggers would spin them in a way that suggests they are another nail in the coffin of the print medium. Frankly, the way headlines and intro paragraphs will be written can make most any statistics imply whatever you want — at least 50% of the time.

As for me, personally: I love Internet advertising. Without a doubt, it’s growing faster than any other form of advertising and I, personally, am benefiting from that. In 15 years, it has grown from zero to $11.3 billion, an amazing feat. However, my complaint is with the misuse of numbers by reporters and tech-oriented analysts — and, to be honest, just about everybody I know — to support a narrative that can be summed up in three words: Print is dead. As much as I love the Internet and all things digital, that narrative is probably not going to be true in the lifetime of anyone making that prediction.

Today’s narrative — as it was back in 2004 and 1999 and 1954 when TV was going to kill print and radio and movies — is that the Internet is going to bury all other forms of media one day. Today’s narrative is that Internet advertising is growing at a far larger percentage (which even a middle-schooler should understand is easier to do when you have a lower base on which to grow). Today’s narrative is that newspapers are going to be dead in, what, a year of so? Certainly, they won’t last for an entire decade, goes the narrative. According to Steve Ballmer, “…there will be no media consumption left in 10 years that is not delivered over an IP network. There will be no newspapers, no magazines that are delivered in paper form. Everything gets delivered in an electronic form.” (He later said he could be off on the number of years, claiming, “…If it’s 14 or if it’s 8, it’s immaterial to my fundamental point . . . “

Of course, he also said the iPhone would flop.

Personally, I am doubtful about the longterm viability of the kind of print product the national chains of newspapers produce. Outside the sports section, I find little of value or interest to me in my hometown daily churned out by one of those national chains. And as I’ve said many times on this blog, I think many business-to-business print publications that focus merely on the transactions of their industries will be replaced by online properties that can provide a better, more timely flow of such information.

So, yes, I do think print will constrict while the Internet grows — over time. But die? Not likely.

According to an article in Thursday’s Wall Street Journal, I, along with thousands more, have been “hyped” into buying and reading the just-published book, The Story of Edgar Sawtelle, the debut novel by David Wroblewski. According to the Wall Street Journal “marketing” story, “Driving (the book’s) unexpectedly heavy demand has been strong reviews and promotional support from Amazon.com.”

I confess, I didn’t know I was being caught up in some promotional scheme when I purchased the book. Despite their reported promotional support, Amazon.com didn’t even recommend it to me. And I didn’t read about the book on any blogs, nor have I been targeted by anything remotely viral or word-of-mouth. (And I get targeted by those often — and I rarely blog about anything that I discover that way.)

This book hit my radar the good old fashioned way: I purchased it because of last Sunday’s Janet Maslin New York Times review that is filled with love-notes like this: “Pick up this book and expect to feel very, very reluctant to put it down.” When I read that review a week ago, I did a Google search and clicked over to WashingtonPost.com and read something similar: “The dog days of summer are nigh, and here is a big-hearted novel you can fall into, get lost in and finally emerge from reluctantly, a little surprised that the real world went on spinning while you were absorbed.”

I will note this, however. Despite me not being “hyped” into purchasing the book, technology played a role in my purchase. Had I not had a Kindle next to me when I read the review, I would have probably forgotten about the book until next time I was in a book store — and by then, I likely would have forgotten the title. And with a Kindle, it was a $10 item, not a $16-$25 item.

As for the novel itself, I am hesitant to provide a review of a book I’m only half-way through, but this is my half-time report: I’m very, very reluctant to put it down and I have found it to be a big-hearted novel that I have fallen into, got lost in and will be reluctant to finally emerge from.*

So far, it is wonderful. Especially if you’re a dog person. (When I finish the book, I will note it on this post.)

*Yes, that is plagiarism.

I know, I know. It seems like all I ever do is hang out on the Internet.

But there’s this guilty pleasure I’ll now admit. I’m hooked on American Idol. Last night, David Cook won this year’s competition. He’s the first winner who I think may go on to be a hugely successful recording artist who I may actually enjoy listening to later. While others have certainly gone on to big success, I’m not really a fan of their music. For example, Carrie Underwood is nice looking and a megastar, but I’m not really into that commercial Nashville sound, if you know what I mean.

Anyway, since I know some people are going through AI withdrawal this morning, I thought I’d say goodbye to this season with a confessional list of six reasons why I like watching American Idol:

1. It’s perfect content for watching with a DVR like TiVo: I can honestly say, I’ve never watched an episode of American Idol “real-time” (while it is being broadcast). Even last night, my wife and I didn’t start watching the season finals until it had been on over an hour. I probably only watch about 20 minutes per hour of American Idol. I don’t like the host, the judges, most contestants or almost any of the features. I love being my own editor of the show. If you can figure out how to program your DVR remote to jump-ahead 30 seconds, you can watch the only segments I think have  any value: (a) the ‘up-close-and-personal back-story features about the contestants; (b) the performances of the really talented ones. The Fast-Forward control is the key to watching American Idol.

2. The show displays how advertisers must react to DVRs/TiVo: It is with amazement that I have discovered that while I Fast-Forward through a lot of the content of the program, I find myself stopping and reviewing some of the commercials and “sponsored” content. I’ll admit, some of this may come from my professional curiosity of what is taking place. Over the years, the show has gone from rudimentary “product placement” marketing (Coca-Cola cups on the judges table) to sophisticated and non-offensive “branded content” marketing that shows what “post-advertising” can be. Apple has become a major sponsor this year and, as typical, has displayed how “content” can be the most effective form of marketing. I may do a separate post on everything Apple has done this season, but, let’s just say: what Apple did this season on American Idol is the most brilliant display ever of network TV marketing. I doubt more than 1% of viewers recognized the array of brand-marketing, product marketing and (and this is the amazing part) direct marketing they were being bombarded with throughout each program. While Ford and Coca-Cola used the program effectively, Apple used it masterfully and in a way that proves once more their understanding of media is on a higher plane than we mere mortals.

3. The program has universal (omni-demographic) appeal: Over the years, I’ve discovered my love of NFL football means I have a topic I can strike up a conversation with people everywhere I travel in the U.S. Unlike politics or religion, a conversation about the hometown team is typically a “safe” place to start a conversation. American Idol is the same deal, except better. If you watch American Idol, you can have a bubble-gum conversation with waiters and waitresses, flight attendants, teenagers, retired couples from Florida. “What’s the deal with that Justin dude?” is good for a five minute conversation in a Southwest Airline boarding line.

4. I love story-driven competition: Next year, even if you think it would be the last sports thing you’d ever be interested in, watch the coverage of the Ironman Triathalon — the one in Hawaii. Typically, it’s a 90 minute documentary shown weeks after the event. It is mesmerizing because they focus on the stories of just a few of the participants who represent the different reasons why someone would get involved in such a sport. If American Idol was just a talent competition, I would have tuned out after a week or so — I don’t watch any other such program. However, the producers of the show find contestants who are both talented and have something about themselves that is compelling. Indeed, it can be argued that the final decision of this year’s winner came down to whose story the viewers preferred, as both of the contestants were very talented singers.

5. It makes me appreciate how very unique star-quality talent is: Living in Nashville and going to places like the Blue Bird has enabled me to be blown away by extremely talented people who will never be stars. Watching American Idol over a few months will amaze you when someone you think can’t lose ends up breaking under the pressure — or blossoming. It’s fascinating to watch who gets better and who peaks at the right time. Carrie Underwood went from being okay into super stardom during her year. I think David Cook did the same this year. Others prove that many people have a lot of talent and have worked hard and have not given up on their dream and have been lucky — but still don’t connect with the only folks who matter: the people.

6. It’s user-created content: Think about that one long and hard. While the program is perhaps one of the most over-produced and packaged programs in history, at its essence is this: People who aren’t stars and are on no-body’s A-List get a shot at getting to perform in front of a bigger audience. In the end, millions of people get to decide if they have what it takes to make it to the big-leagues, fame and fortune. There are lots of analogies there for what is taking place across all forms of media.

Everything I believe about marketing can be summed up in one sentence: “Successful marketing is a great story shared well.”

If you’ve ever visited the website of the place I work, you know that.

So, when I point to this New York Times piece about the books written by Barack Obama, “A Career Forged by Telling His Story,” it’s not a political statement, but it is an endorsement of the idea that great stories well told are the key to any cause worth joining, any product or service worth buying or any candidate worth electing.

Quote:

“Senator Obama understands as well as any politician the power of a well-told story. He has risen in politics less on his track record than on his telling of his life story — a tale he has packaged into two hugely successful books that have made him a mega-best-selling, two-time Grammy-winning millionaire front-runner for the Democratic presidential nomination at age 46. According to his publisher, there are more than three million copies of his books in print — and two more on the way.

More, later.

My friend Steve Rubel does some “back of the envelop math” that he believes suggests $1 billion of Internet advertising is wasted.

His post reminded me of some universal advertising truths — and a century-old quote that addresses the dilemma. I wrote the following as a comment on Steve’s post, but thought I’d also mirror it here:

All advertising uses metrics that don’t account for the people who may not flip to the exact page in a publication, or may not be looking at a billboard while driving down the highway or who use commercial time to get up and go to the restroom.

This trainwreck in the making was noted 100 years ago by John Wanamaker, the turn-of-the-century New York department store entrepreneur, who is credited with the famous advertising line: “Half the money I spend on advertising is wasted; the trouble is I don’t know which half.”

Pay per click is an attempt to overcome the “wasted” impressions dilemma, as are TV infomercials that share revenue with broadcasters or direct-marketing ads in publications that do the same type of revenue share.

However, if “branding” is your goal with advertising, “placing” the ad anywhere is not what ensures success. “Impressions” are not results, they are mere audit metrics. Increased revenues (or votes or other actions) are the only metrics that matter in the end.

Great advertising generates reactions and results.

The advertising that does not do that is wasted — and that’s a lot more than 50% of what is produced and placed.

Over on the Custom Media Craft blog on Hammock.com, I just posted some highlights from the annual survey conducted by the Custom Publishing Council called “Characteristics Study: A Look at the Volume and Type of Custom Publications in America”. (Note: Hammock Inc. was one of the founding members of the Custom Publishing Council). According to the survey, in 2007 a record number of marketers used custom media to promote their products and brands. Personally, I believe the numbers are still conservative as there are lots of online “content marketing” activities taking place that fall through the cracks of this research. For instance, most of the digital startups that have content creation for marketers (i.e., video distributed online) as part of their business model should probably be covered in this research — but aren’t.

One thing this survey underscores is a statistic that doesn’t click with many of my friends in the magazine and media industry who think of the magazine format as being, exclusively, a business model (i.e., consumer of B2B magazines). The magazine format is not just a business-model, it supports and serves other business models. I typically use university alumni or association magazines as examples here, but think of all the institutions and, now, companies, who use magazines and other media they create as platforms for fostering long term relationships with their constituencies (customers, alumni, members, supporters, etc.). While there are probably (and I’m guessing here) less than 20,000 magazines that have advertising and circulation-revenue as the focus of their business models, this survey indicates there are 143,173 magazines in America. Even if my number is low and their’s is high, the truth of magazine publishing is this: Most magazines in America “support” a business model — they aren’t a business model.

This is an important fact to consider when thinking about the “business model” of another media: blogging. Today — and forevermore — there will be only a small fraction of blogs that are, themselves, a business. The vast majority — as in 99% or more — of business-related blogs will support a business model (or a cause or institution or campaign), not be a business model.

Another thing: I confess: As much as I enjoy publishing — indeed everything about — magazines, I’m also very-much a new-media guy. I believe content-marketing, custom media, social media, conversational media — whatever you want to call it — should be front and center in any company or institution’s marketing effort (our company works with clients in doing just that). I see no “competition” or “conflict” or “irony” in me advocating new media while still championing the magazine format as the most compelling engagement media available.

At Hammock.com, view statistics and highlights from the Custom Publications in America survey.

No one asked, but here are the primary ways I’m currently expressing myself online.:

rexblog.com: Professional and business-related focus (media, technology, conversational & new media, marketing, magazines). Once each day, my blog includes a posting that aggregates all of the links I’ve bookmared on del.icio.us/rexblog that are related to those topics.

Hammock.com/rexhammock: My official Hammock Inc. “people page.”

RexHammock.com: Personal passions and random-topic tumble-log.

Twitter.com/r: Stream-of-life commentary in < 140 character posts, and where I "hang-out" online.

Flickr.com/rexblog: Where I post photos.

YouTube.com/rexhammock: Where I post videos.

Last.fm/user/rexhammock: Music I’m listening to.

Facebook, Linkedin, etc.: I don’t really “express myself” on these and other “social networking” sites, but on most of them, you can find me if you search for my name or the username “rexhammock.”

FriendFeed.com/rexhammock: A “lifestream” of everything I post anywhere.

Recently, I re-booted RexHammock.com, a URL on which I’ve been experimenting with Tumblr.com for several months. I had determined that I was under-utilizing it as merely a “lifestream” catcher — a place that collects all the different RSS feeds generated by my various online-expressions on Twitter.com/r, Flickr.com/photos/rexblog, etc. And, with services like FriendFeed.com and even MyBlogLog getting more into being pure-play lifestream platforms, I decided to go back and figure out how to better utilize the very cool features of Tumblr.

As you can see from RexHammock.com, one of the smart things they did was make it drop-dead-simple for me to use my own URL instead of some long / this-and-that account name. And, despite my design-free look on the site, the Tumblr platform has some attractive templates and is very CSS-friendly for those who want to (and can) be creative. I’m trying to master the functions and ethos of the platform and its community, before putting any time into determining what it should look like however. So, in my experiment, you can consider it now in a wire-frame state.

What I have determined is this: I’ll be writing about and pointing to mostly non-work or non-professional-related topics on RexHammock.com. For example, this week, I started off with my review of the Punch Brothers new release and have followed that up with posting quotes from the New York Times and the long piece yesterday on NPR’s All Things Considered. (I’m happy to note that if you had read my review on Tuesday, and had listened to a YouTube video I pointed to, you would have been better prepared to understand why such a “different” kind of recording is receiving such attention.)

So, to summarize: On rexblog.com, I’m gradually shifting to focused commentary and links related to magazines, new media (specifically, what I call “conversational media,”) marketing, corporate and association communication. Some of this is cross-posted on Hammock.com and elsewhere. My non-professional interests (stuff my wife & kids & pets do, the world, my hometown, travel, music, photography, books, movies, table saws, humor, tomatoes, Tennessee Titans, Vanderbilt basketball, etc.) are slowly showing up on RexHammock.com.

If you want to be out in front of the next Chris Anderson book every marketing consultant — and worse, your boss — will be quoting in a few months, go ahead and read this Wired magazine article from the March issue that was posted this morning: Free! Why $0.00 Is the Future of Business. Those of us who read Chris’s Long Tail blog have been following along the book’s (and article’s) development (at least mentions of it) for quite a while, but this article is the first step in its public roll-out. And it’s a clever one.

For example, if you are one of the first 10,000 who sign up, Wired will send you a copy of its March issue for free. And not as a part of a subscription offer (but you’ll be trading them you e-mail address for it). In one of those weird magazine things, however, it will probably be April before you receive the copy of the magazine, according to the fine print.

And then, there is the How to Make Money Around Free Content wiki entry on Wired’s How-to Wiki that features a Hugh MacLeod cartoon and a Fred Wilson headline quote (what, no Robert Scoble?)

The topic may seem a bit dated for those among us who are online community, marketing and media obsessed — those who, for example, check in with Seth Godin on an hourly basis. Seth has provided us (beautifully) for years with the parable version of the value of free phenomena. Seth is the Mother Goose of marketing gurus — he explains things in ways even a marketing director can grasp them. And on the other end of the spectrum, a few brilliant academics have explored in deep, scholarly ways, other avenues in the village of the Economics of Free: for example, anything written by Yochai Benkler.

However, I predict that Anderson’s article — and subsequent book — will get the topic out of the marketing department and academia into the hands of finance and executive types. I’m hoping the book will — like The Long Tail — get into the hands of people who can not only get it, but do something about it.

Quote:

“But free is not quite as simple — or as stupid — as it sounds. Just because products are free doesn’t mean that someone, somewhere, isn’t making huge gobs of money. Google is the prime example of this. The monetary benefits of craigslist are enormous as well, but they’re distributed among its tens of thousands of users rather than funneled straight to Craig Newmark Inc. To follow the money, you have to shift from a basic view of a market as a matching of two parties — buyers and sellers — to a broader sense of an ecosystem with many parties, only some of which exchange cash.”

No matter, you have several months before you have to read the book. (I’m sure there will be a free downloadable version.) And even a few more months after that before its title becomes a square on buzzword bingo cards. In the meantime, I suggest you read the free article and write down some notes on a 3X5 card.

[Note: This post is an observation and opinion piece about political advertising and is not any sort of endorsement. Disclosure: I have not stated anywhere publicly who I will vote (actually, "voted" as I did so early) for in the Tuesday presidential primary in Tennessee. And while I voted for a candidate, I have not made any contributions to any campaign and will remain undecided about November until the parties have selected their candidates. Note: See update at the end of this post.]

When I was a kid in the 1960s, every candidate for office had a campaign jingle. JFK’s campaign had one and, well, while it was a little before my time, perhaps the most famous early TV political campaign jingle was the one called, I Like Ike. Like commercial jingles for consumer products, the campaign jingle has been replaced with theme songs borrowed from pop or country repertoires of “classic hits.” But every campaign still has a song. And music is a part of every campaign stop of every candidate.

It’s rare, however, to witness the birth of a new genre of presidential political campaign advertising music. (And by “advertising,” I’m not referring to the narrow interpretation of advertising that would limit it to :30 or :60 second spots.) But that’s what we’re getting this weekend. With this video below, I think we’re witnessing a new genre of campaign song: One that blends the passion and striped down message and cadance of sixties protest-movement grassroots folk songs with “cause-jingles” of the 70’s (”Look for the Union Label”) and the slickly-produced commercial anthems that accompanied such 1980s events as “Live-aid.”

The result is this anthem which is perhaps some of the most brilliant use of music in a presidential campaign I’ve ever heard or seen (see embedded video.)

I can understand why a Clinton-supporter like my friend, Jeff Jarvis would want to dismiss this video as “only (underscoring) the notion that Obama’s campaign is the most rhetorical of the bunch: speeches and slogans so neat they can fit in 4/4 time.” That’s the equivalent of when your parents told you that rock music would turn your brain into mush. To me, it only underscores how remarkably rare it is to witness a break-through idea in the use of new media in politics. This is not “user-generated” or “amateur” media — the people who conceived, created, produced and appear on it are all pros at the top of their game. However, I predict that within the next 24 hours, you’ll see the beginnings of a flood of mashup versions in which college students and singer-songwriters and others will produce their own versions. And that’s when we’ll start to understand what this music is really about.

Another “break-through” aspect of this music video must also be its financing. While the producers claim not to know whether or not the Obama campaign even knows about it, the value it brings to the campaign will sky-rocket. It’s a little like the off-books value of “an endorsement,” except in this case, the endorsement is in the form of something that has the value of those Mastercard ads: Priceless.

More about the video: ABC News: Stars Come Out for Obama Music Video.

Update: I have seen some blog posts saying the ad is from Moveon.org. The video does not have any information on it regarding that organization as a source — which it must disclose. Obviously, the financing of the production — if by Moveon.org — would be covered under the laws pertaining to 527 Groups. I’ve looked on the Moveon.org site and they, indeed, have endorsed Obama and are promoting the video — but there’s nothing there about them creating the video. While I’m no fan of Moveon.org, I still think this ad is amazing — sorta like when I enjoy an Oliver Stone movie.

Update II: S-town Mike (thanks) provided in a comment below, an e-mail from Moveon.org that promotes the video, but indicates it was neither funded or produced by the organization. Rather it echos what the ABC News piece above reports: it was conceived and produced will.i.am of the Black Eyed Peas and film director Jesse Dylan, son of Bob Dylan.

Update III: When I said, “within the next 24 hours, you’ll see the beginnings of a flood of mashup versions in which college students and singer-songwriters and others will produce their own versions. And that’s when we’ll start to understand what this music is really about,” this is what I meant. I’m sure we’ll see it done a lot better — and a lot worse. And after seeing this, I can also predict it will be subject to some really hilarious parodies, as well.

Technorati Tags: music, obama, politics, video

Last week, I wrote that while I believed it was brilliant, the animated Apple advertisement that appeared on the front page of NYTimes.com and, especially, the Wall Street Journal website, may have crossed some as-yet-determined line of what is okay — or not okay — with online advertising on news-media websites. In that post, I wrote: “The ad’s headline is in a little ruled box, but it’s in a font that is extremely similar to the actual headlines on the page…it’s obvious to you and me and probably 99% of the WSJ.com and NYTimes.com readers that this is an ad, but if this had appeared in a magazine, well, let’s just say it would have at least needed some clarification or a major ASME bruhaha would be taking place today.” Later, David Kaplan of PaidContent.org noted that the folks at NYTimes.com had decided to limit the giant ads to “once a month.”

I thought by displaying the current news-screaming front page of WSJ.com with last week’s “ad giant” front page may demonstrate why it’s a challenge to experiment with editorial real-estate and conventions that you have trained readers to believe are reserved for only the most major news story. In this case, I think the experiment — despite its brilliance as advertising — needs some re-thinking.

On a new blog at Hammock.com called “Custom Media Craft,” I’ve just posted a “think piece” called 2008: The Year of Mediacasting, along with a sidebar post called 8 Mediacasting Ideas for 2008.

Excerpt:

“The goal of most corporate and association marketers should be to use digital and online content to generate actions, not to attract eyeballs. The content doesn’t need to be on your website — the content needs to be in the hands, and ears, and eyes, and heads of your members or customers. Unless your business model is advertising, page views are not the correct metric to measure your online strategy. Action, engagement, sales, enrollment, loyalty, retention, increased contributions, advocacy and education are business goals that require you to get your message (”content”) to your audience — in any way they want to receive it. In 2008, let your content extend beyond your website. Cast it out in any way you can.”

Read the rest: here.