It's All About That Brand LoyalTV

As we have learned in our books Citizen Marketers, and The New Influencers word of mouth is usually the most powerful type of advertising out there. A good or bad review to a friend can sometimes make or break a company. We have seen the influence of things like Dell Hell, or the Comcast commercial, which simply involves one user speaking their mind about a product or service that they liked or didn't like.

With all the power being placed into the hands of the user/consumer I couldn't help but think companies, must be really scared right now. The idea of brand loyalty really means something now, because the importance of keeping your customers happy could mean whether or not you keep your job. So a lot of companies have offered outlets for users and consumers to voice their opinion. The problem with this is usually these outlets are only available on the companies websites, and don't allow users to really voice their opinions in an open forum environment.

So when my boss at Undercurrent told me to checkout the website LoyalTV because we were going to be working with them, I was pretty intrigued. Much like youtube, it is a video social network where people can review products, services, websites, or companies, and interact with other users who may or may not feel the same way. The cool thing is most of the time the reviews are posted by people who just simply love a product or a service and are speaking genuinely. So, even though I'm getting paid in an indirect way for the promotion of the website, I think its a pretty smart idea, and definitely shows the power of the new influencer in the social media world that we live in.

The Internet is Now Officially For Everyone...Even Ghosts

Do you believe in ghosts? Do you believe in aliens? Do you think that Elvis never really died, and simply went back to his home planet? Well I have some great news for you, that will be a lot easier to believe than all three of those questions.

It is rumored, so who knows if it will happen, that a certain notable Hollywood director, is about to launch a very interesting social network in the upcoming future. Now, this director/producer/genius is known for several films including, Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977), Poltergeist (1982), E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial (1982), Casper (1995), Men in Black (1997), The Haunting (1999), War of the Worlds (2005). If you don't know who I'm talking about yet, you probably should give up on life right now. Just kidding!

Of course I'm talking about the esteemed and amazing director Steven Spielberg! For one reason or another it seems Spielberg has been drawn to supernatural stories his whole career, so in some odd fashion it seems like a logical idea to create a social network, called Ghost Town, for people who are as intrigued as him. What is interesting to me is his choice of actually making it a social network. This will be an amazing site to watch if not just to laugh at some of the people that live in the mountains of Northwest Arkansas (I have a right to laugh at them, I lived there!) who will finally upgrade their 56k so they can connect with others who've also been 'ducted by a spaceship! One can only imagine the features that will exists but I'm hoping for video uploads, and a few other features I think will work nicely:

1) Instead of a "poke" function, how about we get a "Haunt" function, so you can see all the people that are haunting you, ooooooh scary!

2) A google map interface where people can drop a little pin showing where you have been abducted around the world! If you hover your mouse over a pin, we also get a neat little story about what happened on their trip. For some reason I can only see pins being dropped on very, very rural areas....

3) Usually social networks allow users within a certain region to sign up, i.e. Myspace Australia, Myspace Latino. But, for this one we got to go all out, we need to open this up for users from other DIMENSIONS! I'm talking outer space, black holes, heaven, hell, Hades, Limbo, and any other place we might find ghouls, goblins, ghosts, aliens, or space creatures. Come ON let's do this right!

In conclusion, this most likely will be one of the greatest experiments in social media. It also shows that there is a network for practically anyone in the world these days, and if there isn't one now, just wait, it's probably coming. So I'm going to pop some popcorn and start counting down the days to Ghost Town's arrival. Well I probably won't pop it yet, because it would get stale probably before the site came up, but yeah you get the picture, I'm excited!

Check Yes or No...For Your Candidate

Remember in 5th grade when you really liked that one girl? She was really awesome and had like five Tamagotchis and like boys who wore JNCO's. You really liked her a lot, but you weren't quite sure if she was ready to "go out" with you (by "going out" we of course mean sit by each other at the lunch table). Well eventually you probably mustered up the courage to send her a note that simply said, "Will you go out with me?" with a box for YES and a box for NO.

Well the website I'm about to show you is much like that letter I wrote.......MANY of us wrote back in the day. Except this time, imagine it as a note from three people. Those people being of course Hillary Clinton, John McCain, and Barack Obama. And instead of asking you to hold their hand during recess, they are asking you about issues that REALLY matter such as healthcare, the war, nuclear weapons, immigration, and tax cuts. Well if you like that idea, then you will love a survey put together by Minnesota Public Radio.

The survey is designed to help people decide on which candidates they should vote for, on the basis of what really matters: the issues. The survey features about twenty questions featuring different aspects of politics one might have concerns about, especially in the upcoming election. After one punches in all their 'yes's and 'no's they are then able to see the results. I believe it is an intelligent way of pushing past all the rhetoric, all the hype, all the nonsense and getting down to what someone really cares about.

The site also features results from everyone's survey combined. It will be interesting to see if any campaigns or media outlets uses this social media information from the results. While Minnesota Public Radio may not be a large impact player in the media world, it just shows us once again the large role user generated social media is playing in this election.

TAKE THE SURVEY
http://minnesota.publicradio.org/projects/ongoing/select_a_candidate/president.shtml

In My Day We Didn't Have Social Media!

Unless you have truly been living under a rock (which is impossible) there is no reason for you to not understand this year's election is crucial. For a variety of reasons I will not divulge into, the interest and excitement surrounding this election is something that hasn't been seen in many years. This is largely due to the fact of the role technology has played in the electoral process. Speeches are now posted to youtube within moments, candidates are virtually campaigning on virtual soap boxes in Second Life, and users are engaging in open dialogue by posting to a variety of social media sites such as YouBama.com and moveon.org

This is not to say that people have never voiced their opinions in politics before but for the first time a platform for every Tom, Dick, and Harry exists where users can speak, listen, and connect.

One of the more interesting applications to this approach is a recent contests put on by the aforementioned Moveon.org. Now, youtube contests are a dime a dozen these days. Anything from music video competitions to commercial contests are available for practically anybody with a camera to make a film composition and win cool prizes. The name of this contest is Obama in 30 Seconds, and it is as obvious as it sounds. It is simply a contests where users can make anytype of video (i.e. animated, still frames, comedy short) that shows why Obama should be the next president in exactly 30 seconds. It is being judged by a plethora of Hollywood stars who may or may not warrant some second guessing relevancy in their selections (Moby...seriously, Moby?????). Regardless, it is a really sweet contest that offers a plethora of pleasant prizes and is open to anyone.

What is interesting is the recognition of the power of grass roots persuasion in this upcoming election. Never before have we seen candidates recognize and acknowledge individuals who would normally would be outcast to the proverbial water-cooler. I think the more interaction and dialogue that takes place, the better off we are as a nation. So go out there and start shooting! Well not with bullets of course, that would be bad...really bad.

On an interesting side note, a similar contest was put on in 2004 by Moveon.org on why George Bush shouldn't be re-elected in 2004. And...while the winning video was extremely powerful, well we all know what happened. But history doesn't always repeat itself, so don't lose faith just yet. Here's the video:

Podcast Podcast Podcast

Check out our podcast on file sharing, entitled File Sharing Now. Enjoy!
*Click here to listen to it.

Quite Possibly the Dumbest Idea Ever

Ok, so I can be a little critical of everything in this blog, but hey that's my job. I am after all a New Influencer right? Well as I will milling about the internet I checked my RSS to Tech Crunch's blog. And the story that caught my eye first, turned out to be the dumbest thing I believe I have ever seen.

Apparently, in this world there is a website called Juicy Campus. If you are wondering what this website is, well look no further than the title. In essence it is a blog for individual universities. But instead of a blog that talks about say... interesting classes or opportunities it is a place to post gossip and rumors. That's right. A virtual water cooler. Most of the posts range from who is the biggest "whore" on campus, or who is the hottest professor. It is truly one of the lamest things I have ever seen, and trust me I've seen a lot of lame things. I'm all for the idea of social medias that bring people together and help us connect in ways that have never existed before, but do we really need this?

It seems the creator of the website is starting to feel some heat about the whole issue. People who feel that have been slandered or defamed on the website are threatening legal action against him and the site. The interesting part is the whole concept of transparency. The site is very insistent on maintaining 100% anonymity for anyone who posts or replies. It is part of the whole appeal of the site that you literally can say anything about everything and never have to be responsible for it.

In a recent blog post the creator of the site posted this statement: "Some of the things that have been posted have been mean-spirited, and we have received emails from people claiming to have been defamed on the site,” and adds “We want you to make JuicyCampus juicy, not hateful.” Yes, indeed, to be juicy is always a much better alternative to being mean-spirited.

As social media ingrains itself deeper and deeper into our daily lives it is more and more often that we are losing a lot of our anonymity and transparency. A site like Juicy Campus has an interesting concept by offering and securing these attributes, but at what expense, defamation of other individuals? I think I'm going to monitor how long this site sticks around, because I don't think that will be very long. Oh and it's probably time for that creator to get a lawyer.

The Point of Innovation is to Make Real Money

I have midterms, a part-time job, a dog, and something that resembles a social life. I'm not the busiest person in the world, but 9 times out of ten I have something I at least SHOULD be doing. I assume this is very much the same case for most college students. Between clubs, sports, friends, and classes we are a very active age group. So I think I can say with fair measure that we don't have too much free time. Which leads me to a recent topic we discussed in class. This concept of a "Second Life".

I will admit, I am one of the biggest geeks you will probably ever meet. I am an adamant Star Wars fan (not just the movies, I've read every single book written about it). I am on a computer or on the internet probably two-thirds of the time I'm awake. I love technology, dinosaurs, and most video games. But I honestly have to admit, the idea of Second Life just does NOT appeal to me.

I was very skeptical of the whole idea. A world where we can virtual money, virtual clothing, go to virtual concerts! Sounds like heaven right? Well...as Dr. Weisberger went on about this magical mystery land, I couldn't help but think this was the dumbest thing I've ever heard. Now don't get me wrong, I played the Sims back in the day. I remember building a virtual house and listening to a virtual radio, it was tight. But I was like 12 years old back then. Not that I am much more mature now (I'm not), but I just could not find the appeal in a world where everything is virtual and nothing is real, and I love the Lord of the Rings.

So I decided to jump the shark and join in this cyber fantasy land. I created a character named Dagger Weatherwax. It took me about 6 hours and countless times of trying to log in before I actually could sign in. Soon after that I had to download three large updates and re-install Second Life three times because within that time frame that's how often they are updating the program. FINALLY, after much "virtual" frustration, my virtual character landed in a place where no one spoke English and there were cartoons on the walls, in Portuguese no less. After trying to "teleport" for nearly 20 minutes I decided to just start flying. I'm not joking, you can fly in Second Life, well virtually fly that is. I ended up flying out over the ocean for what seemed an eternity, when I realized I was no longer flying and the program was frozen. Not virtually frozen, just frozen. I immediately force quit the program and canceled my account at that moment.

I understand from a public relations standpoint that Second Life can be used for a variety of purposes. Several political candidates have virtual offices where the give speeches and what not. Companies build offices where users can ask questions, inquire about products, and meet other fellow customers. Yet, does all of this virtual interaction equate into real profit, real customer service, real life progress? If we all get stuck flying over the ocean, should we ever try getting our feet off the ground? Perhaps, that is up to real life programmers to create a better Second Life. In conclusion, I feel this video pretty much sums up the way I feel about the whole second life deal.