9.14.00
Brand Your Children Well
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The School of Hard Sells
Parents struggle everyday to instill values in their offspring, but it's a rough road. Picture this common scenario: It's 6:42 pm and Mom stumbles in through the kitchen door in a frazzled state. Li'l Carson, her Ritalin-riddled second-grade son, and Kingsley, her 22-month-old daughter, stare placidly into space, plopped before the blaring boob tube.

"Ahh…peace and quiet.... It's a friggin' miracle," marvels Mom. Yet, suddenly, Mommy's pleasant visage evaporates into a mask of horror. "Nooooooo!" she cries, directing an accusatory finger towards her unwitting nanny. "I told you never to serve them RC Cola! And what are these?" An infinite moment of dread and despair culminates as Dearest Mommy chucks a half-filled bowl of Cheesy Poofs across the living room. "This is a respectable Doritos and Pepsi home! How dare you undermine my authority!"

Hey, who could blame her? Mom only wants to do right by her moldable munchkins. It's just too bad that her kids don't attend one of the 43,000 US branding institutions (a.k.a. public schools) in which Cover Concepts distributes its free book covers. If they did, she could be assured in the knowledge that her children would be inculcated with brand morality lessons that'd stick for life. Fine, upstanding logos and promotions from reputable companies like Proctor & Gamble Co., Estee Lauder and Ralph Lauren Kids would be used to gently cleanse her rug-rats' brains of brand impurities.

Of course, she would have to remain on the lookout for stray rotten ad apples. Take Philip Morris' recent collaboration with Cover Concepts, as reported in a 9/4 Advertising Age article (Philip Morris coverup: No-smoke ads hit books, by Bonnie Tsui). Cover Concepts, owned by the good folks at Primedia who bring healthy doses of marketing messages into classrooms through Channel One television broadcasts, has produced a controversial anti-smoking book cover for the evil-doers at PM. "Reflect Confidence. Think Don't Smoke," directs the PM cover.

"From the number of schools accepting the covers it's obvious many don't mind this form of marketing," reassures Ad Age. Some anti-tobacco activists, however, do mind the Philip Morris PSA style covers. PM is "acting like a 'wolf in sheep's clothing,' " opines Matt Myers, president of Campaign for Tobacco Free Kids. Imagine the gall those dastardly puff promoters at PM must have to pitch the very message for which Campaign for Tobacco Free Kids lobbied in the first place!

Apparently, according to the story, schools that normally "welcome advertisers who are willing to provide necessary services," are also somewhat skeptical of Philip Morris's intentions; and therefore have opted not to accept the anti-smoking covers. But, hell, when it comes to book covers advertising nutrition-free, high-calorie, sugar-laden slop like Hershey Foods Co.'s Jolly Rancher and Twizzlers, or Kellogg's Frosted Flakes and Froot Loops, bring 'em on!

Don't you feel warm and fuzzy inside knowing you can rely upon our country's educators to teach tomorrow's brand slaves right from wrong? Man, I could use a smoke right now....

Potent Quotables
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Cola Coercion
A young girl in cornrow braids stands in the parking lot of a Church's Chicken, RC Cola can in hand.

"I want to see you pour it out," demands the leader of Coca-Cola's "urban marketing group," Team Classic, Robert "Biz" Watson. "What do you like to drink?" prods the marketing man as he towers over the child. A growing crowd of onlookers waits impatiently for free cans of "the real thing." Finally, the nascent-minded youngster does as she's been prodded to by blurting out the obligatory response, "Coke."

As illustrated in this scene, recapped from a 9/4 Advertising Age feature on city-street based guerrilla marketing known as "Urban Marketing," (Urban Warfare, by Kate MacArthur and Hillary Chura) another child of the projects has been shown the way, the truth, and the light that is Coca-Cola. Now, she can go forth to deliver her message to mom and dad, no doubt via temper tantrum, whenever they stray from the fizzy flock by buying equally-tasty, more affordable Coke-imposter products. May she sow her soda seeds of knowledge far and wide....

Pop-up Politicos
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Privacy Peeping-Aristotles
What could Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott possibly have in common with the 'it-takes-a-village-in-New York-to-win-the-Presidency' Senate candidate, Hillary Rodham Clinton? Well, besides the fact that both of them secretly stash a cross-haired portrait of Bill Clinton in their wallets, they've both shelled out phat cash to target fat cats. In fact, according to a 9/9 New York Times report (Voter Profiles Selling Briskly As Privacy Issues Are Raised, by Leslie Wayne), "Party bosses and seasoned politicians who think they 'have seen it all' can't get enough of Fat Cats." Well, really, who could? The aptly titled database, one of political consulting firm Aristotle International's numerous privacy-poking offerings, includes the personal information of wealthy donors, and "can turn 'your personal computer into a proven fund-raising machine."

The deep-diggers have managed to delve out data on over 150 million registered voters. So, what's the big deal? It is, after all, public information, although somewhat difficult to obtain. Well, you see, Aristotle combines its voter data with supplemental information purchased from other data vendors. The result is an Orwellian blend of personal profiles that would make the savviest of marketers blush. Data fields include the typical name, age, gender stuff, along with not-so-typical info on car makes and models owned, estimated income, party affiliation and voting history, employer and occupation, home ownership status, and whether or not the individual has an "ethnic surname." But that's simply not suitable for the insatiable folks at Aristotle. Now they're panning for real gold: data that's been garnered through cookies online.

According the NY Times piece, "In the last year, Microsoft and America Online backed away from proposals by Aristotle to mesh its voter data with information Internet users give to Microsoft and America Online when registering to go online." These Aristotle guys are dead set on improving their online targeting capabilities, especially when it comes to aiming pop-up political ads. Earlier this year, the company charged John McCain's campaign about $5,000.00 to target banners to registered Virginia Republicans. Evidently, Mr. Campaign Finance Reform has dropped about $30,000.00 on Aristotle data. He's not the only fine, upstanding politician (pardon the oxymoron) who's purchased Aristotle lists. Even the hypocritical anti-Hollywood/entertainment industry supported, Vice Presidential candidate running for a Connecticut Senate seat, Joe Lieberman, is an Aristotle customer.

It all sounds so slimy, kind of like running for Senate and VP at the same time, you know? Well, not only is all this data matching questionable, the sale of Federal Election Commission data is also illegal when used for commercial purposes. And if this dollar-driven political system isn't commercial, I don't know what is. On the other hand, Aristotle International is going public soon, and since when do people consider best practices as litmus tests for stock purchases, anyway?

Correction:
Please note that, although the NYT story gave the impression that Aristotle International enables the distribution of pop-up ads, it in fact, does not. Also, according to Aristotle's Michael Colopy, opt-in policies are among the privacy protections the company does have in place.

MyHead.Hurts
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A Long March to La La Land
"We believe that the Internet experience shouldn't be confusing," opines the Mysmart.com website. "So we developed a simple and secure way to access, surf and shop the Internet." The company's tagline claims to enable addle-headed folks to "outsmart the net" through use of its "Mysmart.pad," the multi-buttoned mousepad's answer to affiliate-sponsored keyboard products like the RocketBoard.

First of all, isn't it time to retire the "My" prefix? Its condescension is enough to make anyone with any semblance of reality cringe! I mean c'mon, advertisements that employ the "just for you" phrase are less pandering. And anyway, is it really necessary for computer equipment to inspire independence and confidence?

The overall Mysmart.pad marketing approach is also a complete affront to any self-respecting individual. Potential customers are pitched with the "outsmart the net" message, only to be offered an array of pre-set buttons leading to advertisers' sites. Even the five presets that can be determined by the user must be chosen from among a list of affiliate sites, according to The Industry Standard's 9/11 print coverage (Gadget review, by David Pescovitz).

In other words, you can't be bothered to recall endless URL's, and we certainly can't trust you to explore the Web on your own, so we'll dumb the choices down for you! MyQuestion: How can one outsmart anything if not provided sufficient access to information? Somehow I'm reminded of the Communist Revolution, or better yet, Catholic school.

Sure, this product is obviously intended for Internet novices. The thing is, my teensy weensy brain can't figure out which pretty button to push first! Plus, Mysmart.pad requires software installation; doesn't that necessitate some technological know-how? The pad for dummies also employs a "smartcard" that stores MyInformation; that way, I can keep it in MyPocket in the hopes of discovering another poor sap who's paid the low, low price of $19.95 for a Mysmart.pad. Most likely, it'll just get lost between the cushions of MyCouch.

Fun with Fraud!
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Have Code Will Swindle
Last week's Lowbrow Lowdown featured the tale of a consumer email site whose pay-for-referral incentive had fallen prey to unscrupulous hackers. Apparently, pay-to-surf sites have become easy targets for scrappy coders, as well, according to Wired's October Print piece (Get Paid Not to Surf, by Y. Peter Kang).

The not-so-sweet sixteen-year-old Moony1234 claims to have finagled anywhere from $300 to $3,000 per month by running cheat code on "PTS" sites. As featured in the story, "in a matter of seconds, cheaters can install a program that, via simple mouse-movers and auto-scrollers, allows them to bypass view bars and make it appear as if they're actively surfing."

It truly warms the heart to see so much initiative and diligence among today's youth, doesn't it? However, the little weasels will have to watch those slippery backs of theirs, if Paid For Surf has anything to say about it. The company is currently constructing a database of names, email and street addresses of cheaters whose accounts have been deactivated. And then, look out, 'cause the FBI will soon be on their tails. That is, right after they're through browsing online for good Wen Ho Lee jokes.

Could this pay-to-surf concept have been flawed from the get-go? It seems to me that the paid site visitor is essentially a click-cog, part of a traffic-driving/affiliate-appeasing machine. Mindless exposure to advertising and marketing promotions won't necessarily result in a qualified audience or actual sales. Chances are, affiliate advertisers that expect to attract actual customers, rather than site-browsing barnacles, would be better off devoting marketing budgets to more efficient strategies. If anything, PTS site, AllAdvantage.com's stalled IPO and $100 million loss, as noted in the Wired article, is an indication that a business model relying upon paying people to do what they willingly do for free elsewhere is doomed from the start. Come to think of it, maybe the suckers deserved to be scammed after all!

Hot-air Popped Prophecies
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Buttered Plotkin Just Ain't As Catchy
By now, many of you have perused, or at least heard of Faith Popcorn's latest foray into marketing punditry, EVEolution. In the book, Popcorn provides insight into the female mindset (there's only one, you know), in order to advise marketers on how to better attract us silly girls.

A 9/9 Knowledge@Wharton commentary article questions whether Popcorn's success stories are churned from real cream, or so much slickly-worded greasy topping slop. Apparently, a number of female-targeting endeavors on which the futurist consultant has embarked, for firms like Jiffy Lube and Nabisco, are featured in EVEolution. However, the Knowledge@Wharton article decries that without the provision of any real evidence, like profit margin boosts or response from the targeted demographic, Popcorn's truth kernels are stale. Ironic though it is, even Popcorn warns in her website's sentimental tale about her name, "Don't believe everything you read."

"You may not mind," suggests the Knowledge@Wharton article's author, whose name is sadly nowhere to be found, "that, in serving up her latest message, Popcorn includes a pitch for a line of home office furniture she helped develop, drops in a plug for a company her co-author owns on the side, offers kudos to her clients, lavishly praises her own company, and uses one cutesy catch phrase after the other."

This shameless self-promotion should come as no surprise, considering that this self-named hot-air popper (she changed her name from Plotkin back in the summer of love, according to the Knowledge@Wharton story) is a chosen one of self-brander, tompeters!. Plus, Popcorn fancies herself a "futurist," which has got to be one of the biggest scams going these days. Hey, Faith, here's a prediction for ya: even in the distant future, intelligent women won't appreciate being dumped into demographic ditches based on the apparent desires of the lowest common denominator.