How Prescient Was Infinite Jest?

In David Foster Wallace’s epic, multinational corporations can choose to “sponsor” years - which are then identified as Year of the Trial-Size Dove Bar, Year of the Depend Adult Undergarment, Year of the Whopper, and so on. Now comes the news that US treasury is actually issuing sponsored currency: Silver Surfer quarters. Does anybody else find this a little scary?

The Death of Branded Destination Sites?

This MediaPost article on the future of branded content is yet another in a long line of “If one thing happens to one company, then it suggests an industry-wide trend” pieces. Basically, the article suggests that the demise of Bud.TV means the end of the branded destination site. That’s ridiculous. Fortunately,the end of the article features a few industry insiders who aren’t yet bereaving the loss of the BDS - one of them, Big Spaceship friend Chad Stoller:

Because of Bud.TV’s age verification restrictions, its success or failure has little bearing on the future of branded content, according to Chad Stoller, executive director of emerging platforms for Organic.

Another vital issue is the actual content. Did any of these people ever use Bud.TV? In my (granted, limited) experience of the site, I found the videos boring and way too long. Also, it just seemed like it was -trying- too hard. It’s obviously hard to come up with an entire site’s worth of watchable material. But that doesn’t mean the basic model itself is defunct.

I am outraged…

…that somebody could deface an image of Harvey Dent with such impunity!

Has Facebook’s Ship Sailed?

Online Media Daily has an article today suggesting that Facebook’s “ship has sailed” - that social media wunderkind Mark Zuckerberg’s shot at a billion dollar payout vanished as soon as the Yahoo suits walked away from the negotiating table.

I think the article goes a bit too far. Granted, the cultural heat that social networks were feeling about a year ago has cooled. It seems like the big companies are more conscious of actual strategies for making money, not just unique views. But if Yahoo is willing to pay $1 billion for Bebo, would they really not be willing to spend the same or more for Facebook? MySpace has been a cash cow for Fox, and Facebook seems even stickier. It targets a niche demographic with ubiquitous internet connections and an infamous love of procrastination; and it’s become a rite of passage for college kids, who - terrified of social ostracism - are almost forced to join. How can you not love that kind of recruitment strategy?

Mmmmm…donuts.

Adweek has a great article today about digital agencies spinning off tools and applications into new revenue streams. It’s a great idea, and something we’ve explored over here. The fact is, we’re not just in the idea business. We’re in the idea and making stuff business - we take our ideas and create functional tools and applications to instantiate them. Personally, I think IPG’s Brad Breen, the voice of “caution” in the article, is confusing his analogy when he warns:

“Just because you make pizzas doesn’t mean you should go into the doughnut business because you work with dough.”

It’s more like, we’re making pizzas and also selling the pizza dough - i.e. the very raw materials that go into creating our final product. Donuts, which use an entirely different dough, hardly enter into the equation. Although granted, donuts are delicious.