I wrote about the possibility of this happening back in December. I said it would happen, and it is happening.
Antigua, because of the US's pressure on the WTO to make online poker illegal, is threatening to legalize piracy if a swift decision to end the dispute isn't reached.
Read more about it here and here.
This is the beginning of a veritable you-know-what-storm if Antigua goes ahead with their threat.
Sure. Online advertising spending is going up, up, up. But I want to ensure that if we're going to continue to ascend, that we excel as well.
I'll no longer be writing for ClickZ -- hey, I'm a busy guy -- but I will ALWAYS be passionately blogging right here, and chances are, you'll be hearing from me occasionally in some other publications here and there. Taking my spot at ClickZ will be someone I know and love, so stay tuned for his musings...
In the meantime, here's an excerpt and a link to my final column on ClickZ:
This is my last column for ClickZ, and it's been a great couple of years.A lot has happened since my first column in June 2005. Video advertising continues to blossom, and rich media is a standard part of nearly every media plan. Online advertising spending continues its ascent, with nary a sign of letting up. Consumer habits are evolving, and social media is a daily part of their lives.
A rosy picture, isn't it?
Not so fast.
This industry, including publishers, agencies, and marketers, is stunting its growth and limiting its potential. You wouldn't know it by all the M&A activity surrounding these captains of industry, but, trust me, it's a big problem. It's like the interactive industry is an advanced second grader the school doesn't know how to handle, so he's placed in third grade for half the day. The student may be recognized as intelligent, but he'll have a difficult time being socially accepted.
If we are to advance on our own merits, we must make some fundamental changes to the way we strategize, sell, buy, and provide online advertising. The following are but a few items we must address before we can be officially labeled "mature"...
As reported by ClickZ, according to report published by TNS/Cymfony (who just bought Compete.com, BTW), nearly 50% of all marketers believe that there should be an executive-level position at their companies to oversee social media.
"The names were all over the place, but it was clear in those names that the companies are really starting to think, 'How do we do it in an organization or structure... and how do we turn it into something that can be part of the mainstream [marketing] mix?'" said Jim Nail, chief strategy and marketing officer of TNS Media Intelligence and Cymphony.
While this sounds great, the report comes littered with expectation management.
"Clients, particularly the slower-moving clients, want best practices," he said. "They want proven models."That's not always realistic. Whether it's video sharing, social networking sites, or micro-blogging, "clients want to get into it, but want guarantees, want the cookie cutter approach," he said. "That's not going to happen."
So basically, this report says that marketers know they are years behind consumer behavior, but are not necessarily willing to make any marketing changes unless they can get proven results. This, again, is a function of too many marketers looking at social media as a 'campaign' instead of an 'initiative'. If properly executed over a long period of time, a solid social media initiative will yield a bumper crop of results, I can assure you. Agencies have to teach themselves to think outside the campaign as well.
There are a handful of agencies and consultants that DO have the right experience and best practices. Marketers just have to accept the fact that it might just not be their existing media and creative agencies. As a matter of fact, if the agency doesn't have a full media/creative/public relations offering, they probably won't be able to have the right (and unbiased) experience and best practices to succeed in social media.
In my latest column on ClickZ, I discuss the results of a Burst Media study, and come to my own conclusions.
No one can deny the strong revenue potential for online video. However, there are many schools of thought on how that revenue potential can be realized. Publishers and advertisers alike hope that realization happens soon.Most consumers probably feel differently.
A new study from Burst Media says that consumers are turned off by in-stream ads, such as pre-roll. While advertisers and publishers don't want to hear this, the study raises many issues that might make you question the study's validity, second-guess its naysayers, and even determine whether or not you should take action to address its findings.
Read the rest by clicking here.
My first thoughts from CES are now live up at ClickZ.
A more thorough analysis will follow, so stay tuned!
My latest column on ClickZ is brief, but important. It basically outlines a ruling that would be flying completely under the radar if it wasn't flying in the face of a hundred years of copyright law.
Check it out by clicking here.
Excerpt below:
"The New York Times" reports the WTO on December 21 imposed a $21 million sanction against the U.S. in response to a complaint made by Antigua, the home of many online casinos. After WTO ruled in 2005 that a U.S. law prohibiting online gambling was illegal, Antigua and Barbuda claimed $3.4 billion in annual damages as a result of the U.S. prohibition.As part of the WTO ruling, the tiny island nation of Antigua was awarded compensation up to $21 million -- but not in cash. Under the WTO ruling, Antigua basically gets a free to violate up to $21 million in copyright and trademark protections from the United States.
This is going to get very interesting.
As 2008 approaches, my latest column over at ClickZ, explores what you might want to be looking for out of online video in the next year.
Here's an excerpt:
The year 2007 was a watershed year for online video. The market matured a bit more, and clear leaders in the space emerged. We got a new ad format, the video overlay, and media buyers and creatives became just a little savvier with how they utilize online video.
But what will 2008 bring? How will you be able to take advantage of it?
It's possible, even likely, that next year people will have finally made sense of this medium and will fight for control over it because of its effectiveness, efficiency, and numerous advertising options.
Certain things must happen for all that to blossom, however. But here are some things to look out for and for you to make happen in 2008 that can help.
I'm such a tease. Read the rest by clicking here.
So with all the hoopla and bombast surrounding Facebook's Beacon, and its obvious mishandling with users, Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook's CEO has issued an official "my bad".
We've made a lot of mistakes building this feature, but we've made even more with how we've handled them. We simply did a bad job with this release, and I apologize for it...
The problem with our initial approach of making it an opt-out system instead of opt-in was that if someone forgot to decline to share something, Beacon still went ahead and shared it with their friends. It took us too long after people started contacting us to change the product so that users had to explicitly approve what they wanted to share.
As I told Zach Rodgers at ClickZ about Facebook's previous experience with their News Feed feature,
Schafer added he believes it's in Facebook's nature to introduce features aggressively and on a large scale, then to gauge user reaction before introducing changes.
"What they learned was that if you put something out there, people complain about it, you fix it and then people embrace it," he said. "You listen to your audience. If you solve or address their issues, people will know you're listening. That's what's going on here, and I don't think that's a bad thing.
Zach blogs about it here.
Check out my latest article on ClickZ: Are Social Networks the New Networks?
Here's a brief excerpt:
I vividly remember the first time I saw the boys from "South Park." It wasn't online. It wasn't even on Comedy Central. It was on a VHS tape that a friend of a friend of a friend had given to me.I also remember the first time I saw the crew now featured in the "Jackass" movies and TV series. They, too, were also on a VHS tape that eventually made it to me.
Since the VCR disappeared into irrelevancy, numerous new things have become part of our daily lives. One includes the emergence of social networking Web sites. Whether it's MySpace, Facebook, Bebo, LinkedIn, Plaxo, or any of hundreds of others, these sites have become major forces in the battle for consumer attention spans and are changing the ways we communicate and connect.
Advertisers have taken notice, as they must. Any property that can boast over 50 million active users has to be taken seriously -- and any property with a business model built on advertising revenue needs to take advertisers seriously. So both sides are rapidly trying to create and monetize ad inventory to reach those engaged consumers.
Read the rest by clicking here.
Check out my latest ClickZ Column here.
Here's a brief excerpt:
Lately, it seems every production company in Hollywood has launched an online content division. Talent agencies are even getting involved.Is it any wonder? There's something sexy about having the hottest new piece of content everyone's talking about. Plus, online you can actually watch the comments -- and views -- add up in real time.
Unlike the content that winds up at your local theater, you're not supposed to pay to see online video content. Instead, someone else is supposed to pay the content producer to make it available for free.
All these producers looking to make sexy content are forgetting one thing: advertisers don't shell out money to be associated with just any content. They do so to be associated with the right content and to reach as many of those right people as possible.
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