This was social media at its best. A fan interested in a product takes up the mantel of that product on behalf of the brand and evangelizes for it in their own communities. Even I had to second guess my Zune bashing, if a seemingly sane man was willing to permanently brand himself with its logo for no money or other consideration.
Fast forward two years and the flip side of social media shows how quickly a brand can be torn down. The Zune tattoo guy is back and he is not happy. In a video posted to YouTube mszunefan (aka Zune Tattoo guy) outlines why he is unhappy with Microsoft. In a fairly damning and somewhat compelling video he highlights why he thinks the product has failed and its lack of future prospects. Clearly indicating the the 50 thousand people who have watchde it so far that they should avoid the Zune.
From fan to foe in a Web 2.0 minute. Social media giveth and social media taketh away.
I thought this was a joke at first but apparently its real. Google is now officially in the health market. Read the full release after the jump but the following line baffled me.
“Partnership Allows Patients the Ability to Share their Prescription History”
Why exactly would I want to share my Valtrex, Vicodin and Viagra prescriptions with everyone in the pharmacy back office?
South Park creators, Trey Parker and Matt Stone, have done what no other content creators have been able to do online, until now. They launched a site where fans of South Park can legally watch every episode of the show, so long as they are in the US. International fans will have to wait a few months, according the the press release put out earlier today by Comedy Central.
What’s really amazing about this, besides the great content, is that Trey and Matt (we are that close) were able to get all the complex legal and business model issues worked out with Viacom and put the show online. No other content creator has even come close to getting their full catalouge on the web, especially not for content that remains current and popular. Of course fans can watch any content they want online using various web and P2P sites, but this is the first time creators have launched a site that really competes with the free alternatives.
I hate using canned quotes but this one, direct from the press release, is on the money:
When asked about the launch of the new site, Stone and Parker said, “We got really sick of having to download our own show illegally all the time so we gave ourselves a legal alternative.”
To date, the web’s premier, and only, source of full length episodes of South Park has been AllSP.com, which mysteriously went dark earlier this week. A message posted on the site says
We are currently changing hosts, we will be back soon.
The US law no longer allows us to link to South Park episodes,
therefore we are moving our servers to our home city.
Good News, we have aquired a server in Malaysia, we should be up and running again in a day!
The administrator for AllSP.com did not respond to numerous emails but I’m going to go ahead and assume that the reason they are down is because some savvy lawyers over at Comedy Central got in touch with AllSP.com’s host and started causing trouble. Be sure to check out the similarities between AllSP.com and SouthParkStudios.com, it cant be a coincidence.
PETA, towards which I have no strong feelings (positive or negative), has taken its online activism to new heights with its Trollsen Twins campaign. The campaign is named for the fur loving waifs, Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen, best known for being human cash machines as children. According to PETA, they decided to provide the web with the above hilarity when to the Olsen twins’ refused to remove fur from their personal wardrobes and retail fashion collections. Of course, PETA might also want to address the “Pro-ana“, drug addled, self-destructive behaviors of the duo. I mean as long as they are throwing stones…
As someone who watches for trends in technology one of the many sites I frequent is Trendwatching.com. They offer a bevy of free research reports on global Trends with pithy insightful commentary and links. If your not getting their free reports or buying the paid stuff, then your missing out. Their most recent Trend Briefing is by far the best I’ve read so far. They pulled out all the stops for this, their 5th anniversary issue, covering 5 of the hottest trends that are happening right now.
I should have known by the tepid headline that there really was no story here but I got sucked in nonetheless. The headline screamed “Scientific tests reveal iPhone contains hazardous chemicals and materials“. Not exactly what I want to hear about such a beautiful product, but I bet the phones radiation kills me before its toxins. The release, put out yesterday by Greenpeace, is accompanied by a PDF report which actually has a slightly different conclusion then the release.
Here is the conclusion from the report: “Of the 18 different internal and external components and materials tested from an Apple iPhone purchased in the USA in June 2007, all would appear to be compliant with the requirements of the EU’s Directive on use of certain hazardous substances in electronics and electrical goods (the RoHS Directive).”
Here is the opener from the release: “An independent scientific laboratory tested 18 internal and external components of the iPhone and confirmed the presence of brominated compounds in half the samples, including in the phone’s antenna, in which they (1) made up 10 per cent of the total weight of the flexible circuit board. A mixture of toxic phthalate esters (2) was found to make up 1.5 per cent of the plastic (PVC) coating of the headphone cables.”
While I agree with Greenpeace on the need for Steve and his team at Apple, to make their products more earth friendly this release was the wrong way to do it. First, it assumes that no one will bother to read the full report and note that the emphasis in the release is a bit over-reaching. There is a time for the carrot and a time for the stick, this was an opportunity to use the carrot with Apple and the good folks at Greenpeace blew it.
Back in April, Michael Robertson launched his latest Internet venture called AnywhereCD, which was supposed to sell CD’s with MP3 tracks that could be downloaded immediately. No sooner had the companies press release hit the Blogosphere then Warner Music pulled its music from the site. The lawsuits started to fly and the AnywhereCD was reduced to eMusic.com circa 1999.
This amazing bit of news was forwarded by Fred Benenson of Free Culture @ NYU. It’s amazing news and a critical development for the online music space. You can get more information at the RARA site and I’ve duplicated their message in full below without commentary:
MAJOR RECORD LABELS WITHDRAW FROM RIAA
Apple and Microsoft Help Launch RARA: Respect Artist, Respect Audience
April 1, 2007 (Hollywood, CA) – In a major break from the litigious and often alienating strategy pursued by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) against everyone from preteens to college students and grandmothers, the four major record labels have decided to drop all pending lawsuits and instead join with Apple and Microsoft to eliminate Digital Rights Management (DRM) from music sales. The companies are joining other personal electronics manufacturers and independent labels in a new organization, Respect the Artist, Respect the Audience (RARA).
What would you rather do, pay a few bucks to watch a hot independent sex worker play with her naughty parts? Or would you rather pay $15 but to hear a manufactured sex worker sing about playing with hers? Well, according to a two reports that came out last week, many Americans frequently indulge in the former and are increasingly foregoing the later.
Yes that’s right folks the porn industry, at just under $13 billion, is officially bigger then the music industry which according to the RIAA’s most optimistic estimates is probably closer to a mere $11 billion dollars. Variety delivered the bad news to the music industry and AVN gave the good tidings to the folks in adult entertainment last week.
Adult entertainment is an industry faced with rampant copyright infringement, innovative competition in every area of its business, tremendous public pressure and fierce governmental oversight. Despite all this, porn continues to embraced the Internet, experiement with new products, focus on serving paying customers (while outpacing the rippers), and so they have thrived… Perhaps there is an obvious lesson in this that the music industry can hire a bunch of really smart consultants to analyze into obscurity.
I came across this YouTube clip on Spicy Gadget Roll of a Zune review on CNN. All I can say is OUCH! Its supposed to be one of those normal softball reviews TV networks are famous for and it starts off well enough but by the end Soledad has her iPod Shuffle out and they are debating the problems with MS design. Its too funny, you gotta watch it:
Posted by changesgood 
Change Is Good 
