DOUG SCHUMACHER

experience designer + writer

youtube

Creativing :: Tweet of the Week, the iPhone sandwich, and Facebook vs. Google

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What’s going on in new media marketing, pulled from social bookmarking site Creativing.com:

Tweet of the Week

PEW SURVEY: By 2012, every object in America will have its own Facebook page and an unnecessary laser pointer.

YouTube – iSandwich 4G

Found this pretty funny. Not sure I’d want to taste it, but it’s a visual treat. Wait until the end for the CG gag.

MediaShift . Best Online Resources for Following 2010 Winter Olympics | PBS

This list is an interesting scan simply because of the range of content around the Olympics. No really unexpected, but a good overview at the numerous angles from which online content can approach a subject.

30 APIs Used in 7 Days: Bing, Facebook, Flickr, Google, Netflix, Salesforce.com, Twitter, YouTube

Despite mashups having been around for a while, I feel there’s enormous untapped potential. Especially as social networking and mobile are going to generate treasure troves of data previously unavailable in any form. This list is heavily concentrated on data and web tending apps, which is no doubt a big topic right now.

Foursquare Responds To Please Rob Me: Please Shut Up

Contrasting the closed, symmetric network of Foursquare with the open, asymmetric network of Twitter.

Ajaxian » I Can’t Believe It’s Not Flash

A Flash trashing, followed by a lot of rebuking in the comments.

The Future of Flash, on FarukAt.eş

Faruk’s been writing about Flash, and it’s pending demise. But here he reconsiders the value of Flash, with a possibility of it becoming a big potential mobile play. Flash does offer development speed, but there’s always been that nagging stability thing. And I don’t think consumers will tolerate phones crashing to any degree that they’ve dealt with it on computers.

Pre-Roll Video Ads Still Hated, Here to Stay – Advertising Age

A nice overview from someone who both dislikes the pre-roll but also derives revenue from it. I agree with his assessment that branded sponsorships are going to be the real value for content developers — essentially creating a brand experience with less up front risk for the sponsor.

Farmville About To Cruise Past 80 Million Users

Some interesting findings in the numbers. When looking at active users, the shorter the time of reference (daily, weekly, monthly), the lower the growth rate. That should indicate a lot of people are trying it out out of curiosity, but not hanging with it for long. Consider that active daily users is 31m, only up from 27m a year ago. So it would seem they’re drafting Facebook’s continuing rocket trajectory of new users. Granted, 31m is still a lot of people. But I think it’s indicative of how these social games will play out. Friends pulling friends in, everyone dabbling for a bit, and then on to the next new thing.

Is Facebook Becoming More Important Than Google?

There’s been a lot of recent talk about Facebook’s growing search influence. And no doubt that searching Facebook is going to increase in both frequency and intent. But as this article points out, a lot of the behavior isn’t understood at the moment, so it’s difficult to say what’s correlation and what’s causation.

Creativing :: Tweet of the Week, Museum’s engage in trash talk, and the 10 greatest YouTube mashups

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What’s going on in new media marketing, pulled from social bookmarking site Creativing.com:

Tweet of the Week

Today’s my last day at Sun. I’ll miss it. Seems only fitting to end on a #haiku. Financial crisis/Stalled too many customers/CEO no more

Ahead Of Super Bowl, Museum Heads Trash-Talk : NPR

If you want to breath some fresh air into the brand personality of your museum, you probably couldn’t do much better than this. There’s both a transcript and the audio version. How often do you get to hear museum directors talking smack to each other (in jest, of course).

Augmented reality mirror picks makeup for the ladies (video) — Engadget

The first line says it all on this. “Ladies and rockers alike”. You could also add kids, Halloween celebrants, Mardi Gras, etc etc. While practical, this could have a lot of pure entertainment potential.

Facebook Could Eat the Web – The Steve Rubel Lifestream

With everyone talking about Google and Apple, Facebook continues to advance in ways that make a much deeper connection between our personal and commercial relationships. For a lot of people, Facebook is quickly becoming the most convenient place to do almost anything online. And that’s always been the best way to increase sales. The thing they’ll need to be concerned about? Losing consumer’s trust, in the form of scams. As we’ve already seen, it’s much easier to social-hack someone when you have them on a trusted platform where they’re sharing a lot of personal information.

AppSlappy 32: “The iPad Episode” « AppSlappy

These guys do a good job countering most of the iPad objections I’ve come across. I do think there’s still a big issue in it not having Flash, as so much rich online content is Flash based, and this device is about absorbing media more than anything.

Facebook Trends: Goodbye Doppelganger, Hello Urban Dictionary Week

Maybe we need a new category here, Facebook Trend of the Week.

So Long, And Thanks For All The Flash — FarukAt.eş

A compelling argument for the end of Flash, more from a business sense than whether or not Flash is a better experience. I have to agree where he talks about development times and universal access … two major factors for any marketing project. And IMO, it’s the marketers that made Flash, with their expansive microsites and ubiquitous Flash ads. But the key factor for Flash has always been ubiquity and impact. If those are gone, the marketers will be too.

Leaked “Lost” episode spurs surprising fan reaction – Yahoo! News

When the season premier was leaked to YouTube, the reaction was often ‘don’t ruin it for me’. While this will give the networks a sigh of relief, it’s also important to realize that Lost is one of only a couple of shows that could garner this type of reaction.

Top 10 YouTube Mashups of All Time

Because of its simple user experience, popularity, and open API structure, YouTube has always been a good way to showcase mashup capabilities. What’s interesting here is the scope of the mashups. From simplifying an already simple UX, to tracking videos like you might a stock on the NYSE.

Twitter / eMarketer: Stat of the day: 68% of on …

It’s been reported that email marketing is falling by the wayside for many heavy social media users. This stat certainly supports that idea.

Creativing :: Twitter for event marketing, Foursquare is serious gaming, and Minority Report here we come

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What’s going on in new media marketing, pulled from social bookmarking site Creativing.com:
Tweet of the Week
As CNN demonstrated it’s impact during the Gulf War, it’s tragic events like the Hattian earthquake that perhaps most demonstrate the power of Twitter. And it’s not Twitter per se, but rather the direct form of simple, unfiltered, and most importantly, immediate information that feels like we’re getting a personal view of the writer’s experience.
NYT: Following Venture Capital for Signs of Technology to ComeThe underlying thread here is simplicity and speed. No surprises there. Of course, whether that’s an iPhone app or a Facebook app, that’s easier said than done.
Tracking hands, Camera & Projection // The thrilling potential of SixthSense technology –Video | Digital Acting
At TEDIndia, Pranav Mistry demos several tools that help the physical world interact with the world of data. Minority Report, here we come. But what’s best about this IMO is that it simply looks fun. And what better way to sell a new technology? Note that he’s making his technology Open Source to accelerate innovation. Also note the great stage set.
Amtrak to Add Free Wi-Fi on High-Speed Trains
I’ve long been jealous of the east coast’s ability to take trains between cities. Especially with the declining experience of air travel. An extra hour or two on a 3 hour trip is, IMO, entirely bearable if you have full access to productive technology. And, can cut out an hour of getting into and out of the downtowns of cities. I’m only surprised Amtrak didn’t do this earlier.
Real Time Ads Coming to Google Street View?
This is one of those unfortunately rare times when a new ad platform actually adds relevance and value to a user experience. When you’re using Google Street View and see a billboard for a movie that hasn’t been in theaters for 12 months? Imagine that instead it’s for a movie now playing just around the corner.
NYT: Typeface Designers Wrestle With the World of Pixels
An amusing account of the challenges of designing fonts for the web, and other difficult environments. Reading this, I was reminded of Steve Jobs’ story about sitting in on typography classes for the fun of it — after dropping out of his main curiculum. This article taps into that duality of creativity mixed with intellectual problem solving.
The Wittery: Killer Content from Witty Freelance Writers
There are a lot of bland companies out there in need of good writers. The Wittery is a sort of online matchmaker for just that situation. This seems like an obvious (in a good way) idea that I hope takes off. The writing on the site is in full support of their brand promise of adding personality to your company.
Foursquare Changes the Game … Literally
If there’s an intersection of mobile, gaming, and emerging platforms, it seems to be located very close to Foursquare. I can’t think of any other app that’s been consistently getting as much buzz as these guys. These upgrades won’t impact anyone but the hardcores, but I do think the new borderless structure will only increase Foursquare’s popularity and growth. As I’ve previously reported, it’s being used as a promotional device by various bars and coffee shops. And what better to identify your most vocal brand advocates in your area?
Is This KFC Ad Racist? [YOUTUBE VIDEO]
There are a couple of interesting things happening here. There’s the issue of globalization of media, and ads from one culture being viewed and judged in another culture. And then there’s the online debate forum, played out in video, from around the world.
#MFU10 – twazzup
This is a marketing event that, everytime someone signs up, they Tweet the person’s company and title as attending. Interesting tactic for generating buzz in search due to what are probably relatively popular search topics, although possibly revealing public info the indviduals might not want to send out?

What’s going on in new media marketing, pulled from social bookmarking site Creativing.com:

Tweet of the Week

As CNN demonstrated it’s impact during the Gulf War, it’s tragic events like the Hattian earthquake that perhaps most demonstrate the power of Twitter. And it’s not Twitter per se, but rather the direct form of simple, unfiltered, and most importantly, immediate information that feels like we’re getting a personal view of the writer’s experience.

NYT: Following Venture Capital for Signs of Technology to Come

The underlying thread here is simplicity and speed. No surprises there. Of course, whether that’s an iPhone app or a Facebook app, that’s easier said than done.

Tracking hands, Camera & Projection // The thrilling potential of SixthSense technology –Video | Digital Acting

At TEDIndia, Pranav Mistry demos several tools that help the physical world interact with the world of data. Minority Report, here we come. But what’s best about this IMO is that it simply looks fun. And what better way to sell a new technology? Note that he’s making his technology Open Source to accelerate innovation. Also note the great stage set.

Amtrak to Add Free Wi-Fi on High-Speed Trains

I’ve long been jealous of the east coast’s ability to take trains between cities. Especially with the declining experience of air travel. An extra hour or two on a 3 hour trip is, IMO, entirely bearable if you have full access to productive technology. And, can cut out an hour of getting into and out of the downtowns of cities. I’m only surprised Amtrak didn’t do this earlier.

Real Time Ads Coming to Google Street View?

This is one of those unfortunately rare times when a new ad platform actually adds relevance and value to a user experience. When you’re using Google Street View and see a billboard for a movie that hasn’t been in theaters for 12 months? Imagine that instead it’s for a movie now playing just around the corner.

NYT: Typeface Designers Wrestle With the World of Pixels

An amusing account of the challenges of designing fonts for the web, and other difficult environments. Reading this, I was reminded of Steve Jobs’ story about sitting in on typography classes for the fun of it — after dropping out of his main curiculum. This article taps into that duality of creativity mixed with intellectual problem solving.

The Wittery: Killer Content from Witty Freelance Writers

There are a lot of bland companies out there in need of good writers. The Wittery is a sort of online matchmaker for just that situation. This seems like an obvious (in a good way) idea that I hope takes off. The writing on the site is in full support of their brand promise of adding personality to your company.

Foursquare Changes the Game … Literally

If there’s an intersection of mobile, gaming, and emerging platforms, it seems to be located very close to Foursquare. I can’t think of any other app that’s been consistently getting as much buzz as these guys. These upgrades won’t impact anyone but the hardcores, but I do think the new borderless structure will only increase Foursquare’s popularity and growth. As I’ve previously reported, it’s being used as a promotional device by various bars and coffee shops. And what better to identify your most vocal brand advocates in your area?

Is This KFC Ad Racist? [YOUTUBE VIDEO]

There are a couple of interesting things happening here. There’s the issue of globalization of media, and ads from one culture being viewed and judged in another culture. And then there’s the online debate forum, played out in video, from around the world.

#MFU10 – twazzup

This is a marketing event that, everytime someone signs up, they Tweet the person’s company and title as attending. Interesting tactic for generating buzz in search due to what are probably relatively popular search topics, although possibly revealing public info the indviduals might not want to send out?

Creativing :: Holiday shopping madness video, social media gains advocates, and iPhone news

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What’s going on in new media marketing, pulled from social bookmarking site Creativing.com:

Chaos inside Walmart during Black Friday 2009 [VIDEO]

Absurd chaos going on here. You’d think a gun was fired. People in some parts of the world must see this and think this entire country is insane.

Frosty the Inappropriate Snowman Mashup Creates Controversey

The video this references to has been pulled. What I like here is that the mashup was done by CBS. That means that CBS was mashing up artwork they didn’t have the rights to? And the networks are trying to put a stop to YouTube? At least for a brief moment it seems they stopped acting like legal bots and started acting like real human beings.

AT&T CEO Wants iPhone Users to Limit Usage

This is little short of mind-boggling. Just as the mobile industry a really taking off, AT&T’s De la Vega steps in and tries to threaten everyone with tiered pricing. He should read his history. The Web tried this very unsuccessfully in it’s early days. Consumers heavily restricted their use out of concern for unexpected high monthly charges. More than anything, I’m surprised that he can’t see how anyone in the mobile space should benefit from increased usage. That data they point to is interesting though: Their 3% smart phone users consume 40% of the data. I just don’t like their solution of punishing their best customers. What other industry does that (besides the music industry)?

Chrome Extensions for Mac Coming Soon

I just installed Chrome on my MacBook Pro, and am very impressed with the speed over Firefox. Extremely noticeable. But I do miss the ability to have plugins — something I used a lot on Firefrox. So this is good news to me. If you haven’t tried Chrome for Mac, though, i’d definitely give it a spin

Twitter Bombs and the Real Time Tweets on Google Results Page

I, like many others, have noticed a lot more Google Alerts search traffic. And much of it is from Twitter activity. This report could certainly explain why that’s happening. It could also be pushing up posters who happen to use a common Google search term. I can’t imagine this will last long. Way to easy for brands to drop the Twitter bomb. And you know they will. In fact, I’m sure the marketer behind the shaking belly ads is at work on that right now.

It’s Official: Auto Ads are Shifting Online

Some pretty convincing data on the increasing use of social media by the auto industry. What I find most interesting is that it’s the dealers, at the local level, that are really taking advantage of this. Here’s a great stat from a Nielsen report: “Auto dealerships dropped their overall ad budgets 27%, but increased internet ad spends 45% in the first three quarters of 2009, compared to the same time period in 2008.”

Social Media Influencing 28% of Shoppers

An early indicator of the influence of social media on consumer shopping behavior. And while I agree this is real, I’m surprised that the gap between those who say they check product reviews and those who say they are affected by social media activity is as narrow as it is. Really, I thought the majority of people would be regularly checking product reviews on sites like Amazon. Interesting that only 13% of people claim to make use of that information to inform their purchasing decision. Maybe it’s the lower price point merchandise they’re not so concerned with.

Seth’s Blog: The reason social media is so difficult for most organizations

Social media is a process, not an event. This is a big distinction, and actually something I addressed earlier this week at the iMedia Summit. So I couldn’t agree more. And company’s that want to treat social media and branding like an event, or a product, are in for an unpleasant surprise.

Top 10 Internet Marketing Strategies of 2009

What I like in this article is how they emphasize the mediums that establish credibility. This is a principle concept that’s coming up a lot in branding. And whether they refer to it as credibility, authenticity, or being genuine, it’s the same principle. You can’t just shout messages at people the way you once could. They mention these trends were big in 2009, and should be for 2010 as well. I’d say they can extend it out a lot longer than that for many of these mediums.

iPhone App Lets You IMDb on the Go

A good review of the iPhone app on Mashable. This is probably one of the most logical apps you could want, as especially among young people, a lot of movie-going decisions are out-of-home.

Creativing :: Futbal Hero video, Facebook’s latest marketing strategy, and Sony goes hunting for game spammers

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What’s going on in new media marketing, pulled from social bookmarking site Creativing.com:

YouTube – Kasabian Football Hero

It’s always great when a cool video is accompanied by a good song. While more documentary than music video, this is a fun riff on the Guitar Hero user interface, despite actually using open source version Frets on Fire.

Map View from AirSage

Mobile-based location and motion data. They use mobile phone data from individual handsets to predict things like traffic and general movement patters of people throughout the US. They have agreements with both carriers and manufacturers, and are a sort of white label for traffic information. They claim to be able to provide this coverage for 127 markets that cover 85% of the population. There are a lot of campaign applications for this data.

Beastman

Fun, simple street art style from an Australian artist.

Kill Your Idols

Skate culture art style with a rock and roll theme. Can’t go wrong with that.

5 Must Read Social Media Marketing Studies

Some good research and projections on social media. Highlights include a report that American’s spend 17% of their online time on social media sites, and businesses reporting that blogs have the highest social media ROI.

Tobold’s MMORPG Blog: Facebook games: Scam or useful tool?

Good assessment of the four critical components for how Facebook games hook people and pull them in to a deeper experience. Definitely reinforces why so many Facebook games feel so formulaic.

The Myth of Usability Testing

Usability testing isn’t the most exciting subject I’ve ever written on, but I’ll certainly concede it’s value, when used correctly. And that’s what this article delves into. Pitfalls and solutions for good testing methods. One interesting note is how many usability tests are given to existing users of a bad interface, and they compare those results to the same group using a new interface. Of course, given their familiarity with the bad interface, they find that one easier to use. A self-fulfilling prophecy.

Facebook’s ‘Reconnect’ Strategy is Brilliant

You’ve probably seen random people popping up on the right column on Facebook, under the title ‘Suggestions’. These are friends of yours Facebook has identified as relatively inactive on Facebook. And they’re encouraging you to reach out and get them participating. Facebook’s explosive growth is starting to flatten out. And now they need to figure out other ways to grow their business. Typically, companies tackle this by increasing usage among current users. Facebook’s approach to that — getting users to connect amongst themselves — is both genuine and cost effective. And while the term CRM isn’t mentioned anywhere in this article, it’s a blend of that, permission marketing, and user generated marketing. Pretty savvy.

Sony creates online detectives targeting ingame spammers

According to this article, Sony’s 9-member detective team has already shut down 295,000 spammer subscription accounts. And I thought my inbox got a lot of spam.

5 Fresh & Innovative Collaboration Platforms For The Creative Community

Looking to reach out and connect with other creatives? Here are some good places to do so.

Creativing :: Great Google mashups, Craigslist postings as artworks, and fans ‘recreate’ Star Wars

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My weekly update of what’s going on in new media marketing, pulled from social bookmarking site Creativing.com:

87 Things from Google’s API’s

Eye and mind-opening overview of things you can do with Google’s API. This ranges from YouTube to Maps. Some of these you’ve seen, but overall a great span of mashup capabilities. This was presented at AdWeek in NYC last week.

Nightmare on Elm Street Remake Trailer Goes Viral on MySpace

MySpace’s EKG is showing some movement again. Their reposition as an entertainment portal may not be clearly defined or understood yet, but they’re showing progress where it counts — good content and visitors. Now, the “Nightmare” trailer is pulling a lot of viewership. The movie looks good, too.

Car Insurance: Comparethemarket.com’s Meerkat Is Brit Star

If they had award shows for strategies — well, at least exciting award shows for strategies — this would take home the gold whatever. The marketer is a car insurance comparison shopping site. Historically, a rather creatively bland category. Their challenge (besides a boring product) is that the keyword for ‘market’ cost $8 a click. Hard to get a good ROI at that level. So in comes a ‘meerkat’, which sounds close enough to ‘market’, and costs 8 cents a click. See where this is going? Now they just need TV spots to help people remember the term “meerkat”, associate it with “car insurance”, and voila, you’ve got visitors for 8 cents a click (and of course whatever millions you’ve spent on the TV spots). You can judge the TV spot for yourself, but this campaign has not only gained entry into pop culture in England, it has some very impressive brand awareness metrics behind it.

The NHL’s Latest Social Media Push: A Twitter Contest

Another great strategy, this time from thugs who ice skate and favor bad haircuts. While the NFL (No Fun League) is shutting down Twitterer’s, the NFL pulls a contrarian play and hosts a Twitter contest among it’s fans. Guess the winning teams each weekend, and win prizes. Simple game plan, smart strategy.

XPACS Dream Job Challenge

We’ve seen the ‘hiring via social media’ angle before, but this is definitely a new wrinkle. Like previous efforts, it’s focused on how well contestants can drum up buzz as qualification for the position. What I like here is, they’re quantifying the participant’s efforts much more thoroughly and more in line with what the real job will be like. And they’re also paying people who participate but don’t get hired, based on the impact they generated while competing. This not only seems like a smarter screening process for hiring, but is also fairer to the participants. Which only reflects back on the credibility of the brand.

Full Coverage: Apps for Brands Conference

Mobile’s hot. And probably getting hotter. And this is a good outline of how some brands are using mobile effectively.

Xtranormal | Text-to-Movie

If you can type, you can create an animated movie. The technology and interface is impressive — you’ll get the idea immediately in the 2 minute video. I think the application for this in terms of UGC contests, whether it’s for shows or commercials, is readily apparent. Right now a show like Family Guy could upload backgrounds, characters, and voice types, and have a UGC contest for show creation. Or at least a funny scene.

Internet Art: Craigslist Missed Connections Become Gorgeous Visuals

These are fantastic. If you’re not familiar with the “missed connections” concept, it’s people posting notes in hopes of connecting with someone they had a brief encounter with. These are public on Craigslist, so a children’s storybook illustrator has taken the text of the listings and created illustrations of the situation they describe. The artworks are beautiful — and the storybook style feels perfect for these missives of hope and fantasy. As a side note, the fact that people who want to randomly connect with someone out there turn to Craigslist is perhaps the single biggest testament to that website’s pervasive presence.

Star Wars: Uncut

Different groups of people joining together to recreate Star Wars, one scene at a time. The power of strong entertainment brands and User Generated Content.

Human Tetris

A crew of freeborders take over an SF street to create a real life version of Tetris. Simply fun.

Creativing :: Video content with amazing range, and a UGC site making fun of Wal-Mart

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My weekly update of what’s going on in new media marketing, pulled from social bookmarking site Creativing.com:

The Myth of “Great Content” Marketing Itself

One of the common misconceptions of good content is that it drives itself via social media. Successful social media marketing needs two things. Good content, and a significant sized audience to launch that content with. If either of those are missing, you’ve got to do some work, spend some money, or both.

Twitter is Now Bigger than MySpace in the UK

This is pretty amazing. Of course, MySpace isn’t exactly on the rise, but none-the-less, a good example of how fast things change in technology. 140 characters taking over MySpace. Murdoch has to be stewing.

22 Facebook Funded Startups to Watch

A good glimpse of where Facebook is headed. Or at least where the money thinks it’s headed.

Twitter Search Queries

An example of some of the more interesting search queries in Twitter’s advanced search. As Gary V said, the most interesting thing about Twitter is the Search. I tend to agree with him. To see this live and test your own, just enter anything into Twitter’s advanced search.

Coca-Cola Zero Face Profiler game

Love this idea. Using photo-matching technology, they’ll use Facebook Connect to find other people on Facebook who look like you. But they’re only doing this with people who’ve opted in. So they first need to compile the database of images, which seems to be taking a while. I’m not sure how long ago this went live, but the database is still only 15% full, and hasn’t changed much in the last few days.

Video from Red Bull Soapbox Derby Atlanta 2009

This is just great content for a lifestyle brand. Humorous event, good music bed, and fun slide show commentary about what’s taking place in the video. What’s also great for the brand is that it was done by a 3rd party. More authenticity combined with zip for cost.

IKEA Heights [VIDEO]

A 5 minute short film shot in the IKEA in Burbank, during work hours, and presumably without authorization from IKEA. It’s hysterical watching them act out the various scenes, in the appropriate settings around the store, while random shoppers are walking by in the background. I’m sure somewhere an IKEA lawyer is cringing, but this is fun and creates a positive association with the brand in a highly-memorable way.

People of Walmart: Viral Blog Showcases Retailer’s Clientele

And now, the underside of UGC for a brand. Like the previous two cases, something completely uninitiated by the brand. In this case though, it pokes fun at the brand’s clientele. Which is arguably worse than making fun of their products. Like other popsites such as fmylife.com and latfh.com, I’d guess this will have a short life, and won’t warrant a response from the brand.

Stunning time lapse footage of the LA fires

Amazing footage of a tragic event.

Brazilian Graphic Artist and Illustrator

Another example of a cool mix of photography and illustration.