10.26.00
Message Muddle
-- OR --
Call for Advertorium
A couple of weeks ago, while scanning a virtual stack of email newsletters, Looney Tune-like smoke literally began to flood from my ears. Almost unconsciously, my keyboard-hopping fingers went on auto-pilot, and the next thing I knew, a passionate rant had come to fruition. It was the ad integration that brought on this trance-like scripting state. From what I could see, there was practically no difference between the presentation of the ads and the content. And from the looks of things, I'd better get used to it.

Slowly but steadily, slack ethics and incestuous business practices seem to be replacing integrity in all forms of content, be they print, online, television, radio, or film. You may recall last year's shady Los Angeles Times/Staples Center scandal, spurred by the paper's devotion of a Sunday magazine issue to the convention center. In a slimy move, the Times had neglected to alert its readers to its business affiliation with the Staples Center. Well, according to a 10/18 Wall Street Journal article (Miami Herald's Business Deal Sparks a Local Ethics Debate, by Patricia Callahan), it appears that the East coast is catching on, too. The story discusses a recent "tentative deal" between The Miami Herald Publishing Co. and the Broward County convention center "to rename the facility the 'Herald Center at Greater Fort Lauderdale'...."

Potent Quotables
-- OR --
The Kmart Catechism
A look into the current state of "e-victions" in Silicon Valley (Junior Leaguers Join Nuns in Effort To Thwart Silicon Valley Landlord, by Jonathan Kaufman) was featured in the 10/20 issue of The Wall Street Journal. According to the report, 62-year-old Sister Trinitas Hernandez teaches English to Latino children living in East Palo Alto, CA's Carriage Manor apartment building.

A typical classroom scenario, as illustrated in the article, goes something like this: "They giggle and begin reading from their notebooks: 'Yesterday, I went shopping at Kmart. On Sunday, we went to church and then had breakfast at McDonald's.' "

Perhaps when the kids move on to learning sentence structure and other writing skills, they can edit that sentence down to its essence: "On Sunday we had breakfast at the church of Ronald McDonald."

Talkin' Business Wire Bear Market Blues Massacre
-- OR --
Larry Kramer Wants Another 15 Minutes
Call it Larry Kramer's Lament. You see, the founder of CBSMarketWatch is really gonna miss the days when stacks of press releases were strewn about his desk. Even he admits that they made for great Diet Coke can coasters. So, why the weeping? Well, according to his 10/19 editorial on CBSMarketWatch.com, it appears that Kramer is disappointed with the fact that recently, the "major wires that release company statements to the press -- PR Newswire and Business Wire -- ended a nearly 50-year-old tradition of giving those releases to the press 15 minutes before releasing them directly to the public."

OK, he doesn't "object to leveling the playing field and giving all information to the public in real time." He's just a little worried about us naïve release readers. He's concerned that without that 15 minute press filter, guileless gluttons for spin will fall for the phony PR flack facade.

"Never mind that they may be deceived or unable to comprehend or decipher the truth in a corporate announcement ... they will have it faster," warns Kramer. "And, you can bet, they will react faster."

By "they," our intrepid hero is referring to what he calls, "the wolves -- the 'active traders' who play the market with their hard-earned savings." C'mon, Kramer, let's be serious. An additional 15 minute buffer zone won't affect the hastiness of decisions made by easily influenced, capricious capitalists. After all, these fools are duped by 13-year-old chat room shysters on a daily basis.

Hell, so-called swing voters have had months to ponder presidential candidates; yet, they continue to base their waffling stances on whether or not Gore huffed the wrong way or Bush's comments on Letterman were funny enough.

I confess; I was in diapers, roaming the rug for dust bunnies when this Kramer guy was awarded his B.S. in journalism. However, I've got just one word for Mr. Kramer in response to his worrisome claims: Emulex.

All Harrys Eve
-- OR --
Those Time Warner Muggles Are Big Meanies
If you want to drive, you need a license. If you want to sell liquor, you need a license. Hell, as Buck Owens croons, even if you want to fish, "ya gotta have a license." Surely anyone who's ever dealt with popular characters is well aware, those licenses are hot commodities. Hey, to this day I have nightmares starring characters from The Land Before Time; let's just say working at a graphics studio creating designs for baby bottles and drippy bibs featuring the cute dinosaurs made a permanent impact on my psyche.

It's a good thing that Time Warner Entertainment Co. doesn't own The Land Before Time license; otherwise, the greedy behemoth might sue me for dream rights infringement. Just in time for Allhallows Eve, the company has filed suit against costume-makers, Disguise Inc., for "'shamelessly trading upon the goodwill embodied in the plaintiff's valuable trademarks' by marketing [Harry] Potter-based costumes on the Internet." Essentially, Disguise requested permission to sell a Harry Potter-inspired get-up, but Time Warner awarded an exclusive license to another lucky firm.

As noted in a 10/16 Yahoo! News story, "Time Warner officials say they discovered that typing the words 'Harry Potter' into a search window on Disguise's Web site -- www.disguise.com -- produced a photograph of the same costume pitched to them last year." Doh!

How would you like to be the lackey whose duties include grueling tasks like searching online for Harry Potter costume knock-offs? That's enough to make anyone wanna practice a little Potter voodoo on his boss!

Disguise categorized the Harry Potter search phrase as "a mistake, but it denied that the costume was based on the book," according to the report. And, in a stunning display of sorcery, entering those keywords in the costume-crafter's site search no longer results in a page displaying the "Crimson Wizard" costume.

Ya know, the fact that Time Warner could be so cold and cash-driven during this sacred holiday season is simply appalling. Don't they have any respect for the selfless message of goodwill that inspired Halloween in the first place? Man, now it'll take all the strength I can muster to uphold the spirit of Halloween and don my new cannibal stew costume with pride.

Independence Is Futile
-- OR --
The Lemming Connection
Infiltrating the minds and pockets of today's kids has become a pre-occupation of the advertising and marketing world lately. Actually, you could call it an obsession. Branding ambushes in the forms of text book lessons and sponsored TV shows have proliferated like so many land mines. The question is, do marketers, mainly Baby Boomers and Gen-Xers, really know their audience? If they're relying upon their own childhoods and teenage experiences for guidance, they may not have a clue.

On an engaging and provocative 10/19 edition of syndicated radio talk show, The Connection, host Christopher Lydon discussed the phenomenon that is the "Millenial" generation, with his guest, Neil Howe. Howe, a demographer, economist, historian and co-author of Millenials Rising: The Next Great Generation, concedes that today's teens, those born after 1982 and specifically the high school graduating class of 2000, have been raised to complement the qualities of their parents' boomer generation. In fact, if his analysis is truly representative of this group, they've become the ultimate foils to the their individualistic Boomer and Gen-X elders.

Throughout this intriguing hour of radio, terms such as team-playing, conventional, kinder, gentler, cohesive and cooperative, are employed regularly to classify our future leaders. References to huge increases in structured activity as opposed to free time, the rising adoption of uniforms in schools, as well as a willingness to embrace community-building volunteer work, are all cited as direct causes of the Millenials' herd mentality.

Howe also notes that kids of today have taken on this unified mindset as a reaction to the individualism and cynicism of kids who came of age in the 90s. Certainly, the idea that massive flocks of long-haired, patchouli-dousin' hippies and flannel shirt-wearin,' goatee-strokin' slackers could be considered individualistic is ironic. However, the fact remains that these past few generations grew up embracing uniqueness, whether they all embraced it in the same generic forms or not.

"This is a generation of kids who are attracted to big brands," Howe states. "[T]hey aren't as attracted to niche marketing which became so popular with Generation X. We're going to see a certain uniformity among the look of kids that we haven't seen or expected of kids in a long time." Speaking of a Microsoft ad featuring a "group of kids hovering around a computer screen", Howe alludes to the "increasing use of 'teamwork' in ads."

Well, if this is any indication, it looks as though we can look forward to a continuation of the homogenization of "culture" and "ideas." On the flipside, maybe this will stifle all that bemoaning of increasing isolation as technology pervades our lives. Howe prognosticates that Millenials "are going to shape the technology for much more group-oriented purposes" than did 1984-fearing Gen-Xers.

Hmmm...and you thought the Borg was just a sci-fi fantasy....

Reebok Makes No Bones or Thugs About It
-- OR --
If the Scoundrel Shoe Fits
The life of a company spokesperson is rough. Just ask Jeeves. I mean think about it; making a good impression is paramount to the profession. No matter where they are, they've got to be on their best behavior, realizing that those big dollars come with a string of directives like "be nice and say good things about our company" attached.

That is, unless you're Reebok spokesman/Philadelphia 76er Allen Iverson. Not only is this 25-year-old single father of two a hoops aficionado, he's an up-and-coming rap-star and an ex-con! He likes to drop lyrics about folks with "f*gg*t tendencies" "sleeping with the maggots."

And, as reported on 10/16 by BrandNEWS (previously known as BrandEra Times) "At the age of eighteen, [Iverson] was found guilty on three counts of maiming by mob in connection with a vicious and racially motivated attack on four white victims." He only served three months of a five year prison sentence, thanks to an opportunistic guvnah.

Hmmm...that's odd. According to its website, Reebok has "dedicated its corporate resources to further" human rights protection "across all national, geographic, and ethnic boundaries." Me no understand....

OK, Iverson can't be all bad, right? For one thing, he really digs the book The Color Purple, as is noted on several of his fan sites. And his fans are avid readers too, as is apparent in this copy found on one of the numerous online Iverson shrines, Allen Iverson World: "I added some Wallpapers their our now 22 in their I am also working on a screen saver!!!"

Be afraid. Be very afraid.

So, what's Reebok's take on Iverson's transgressions? Well, according to the BrandNEWS coverage, not much besides this: "the company plan[s] to 'aggressively leverage the marketability of this extraordinary player and consumer icon.'" Considering that, one wonders why Reebok doesn't team Iverson up with another athlete of strong moral fiber, like Daryl Strawberry or Roger Clemens for instance. Anyway, isn't that what Avis said about O.J.?