“Free” Pandora Has Hidden Limits

A funny thing happened the other day.  We were listening to Pandora online, as usual, and the music stopped.  We were not asked if we were “still listening” nor had we skipped too many songs.

Instead, we found out that the “free” Pandora that already hits you with both ads and a need to keep telling it you are still, in fact, listening, has a 40-hour-per-month listening limit.  Once you reach 40 hours in a month you have to upgrade to a premium account to keep listening.

While 40 hours of music seems like a lot, that wouldn’t cover more than one full work-week a month.  I can’t imagine this problem strikes many users but, considering all the other limitations already imposed on their “free” account, this new limitation is disheartening.

It also led to us moving on to use Slacker.com and Last.FM as an alternative.  Now that a new month is upon us we are reluctant to return to Pandora.

Not sound business, Pandora.

Star Wars Gives Crafters a Free Copyright Pass?

I am going to have to accept that it is simply not possible for an average guy like myself to understand what is kosher and what is treif when it comes to copyright and fair use.

I just wrote about Pez going after a guy with a Pez “museum” for, I guess, making money off of the Pez brand and not sharing that money with Pez.  Although, seriously, how much money could this guy be making?

Now, just a few minutes later I come across an announcement for a Star Wars themed craft fair called Stitch Wars.  Cute, right.  Well, not only are hundreds of crafters showing up with their own, handmade Star Wars puppets, plushies and pillows, but many of these people are selling those items.  Obviously, they are only able to sell these items thanks to their Star Wars connection but it doesn’t look like LucasArts et. al. have let loose the lawyers on this band of pirate knitters, crocheters and stitchers.

On the one hand, this feels so reasonable and right and on the other hand, considering the way corporations sling around copyright infringement suits like their a dime-a-dozen, a part of me is shocked that Stitch Wars is allowed to exist.

That makes me sad.

Coke Calls Foul on Blowjob Ad for Sprite

As pointed out by Gawker, there is now a somewhat rich history of so-called “spec” ads that get released online and quickly disowned by whatever product was being shilled in such an unspeakable manner:

A spec ad—at least the ones you hear about—is basically an unofficial ad that will never get officially sanctioned by the brand represented. Often because of too much sexiness! For example, that JC Penney pro-teen sex ad that caused such a ruckus last year, on the blogs, turned out to be a spec ad. Ad people make spec ads for many reasons: to audition their work in hopes of winning an account, for ad competitions, or just because they are bored and horny.

The most recent example of this trend is a spec ad for Sprite featuring a popular sexual act.  Perhaps unsurprisingly, the spec ad was very popular and was generating plenty of views and mentions online.  While somewhat inappropriate, it certainly did a good job selling the product.

I’d love to show you the ad but Coca Cola Company, in their great wisdom, had the spot pulled from YouTube for violating copyright on the Sprite logo.

Who cares if the ad was popular are likely to put the word “Sprite” back in the minds of many a horny teen?

This approach of squashing what amounts to free publicity in the form of true fan dedication baffles me and makes it clear that old business models and practices have completely failed to take advantage of the opportunities presented in the digital age.

AdWeek Likes My Beer and Porn Concept via Twitter

Wow, I am so honored to have been plucked from the sea of tweets by the excellent people at AdWeek.

They have selected my tweet regarding the seemingly obvious benefits of beer companies buying up ad space around internet porn videos as a “TweetFreak: Tweets of the Day.”

In all seriousness, considering just how much time men 14-84 spend online looking at some kind of pornography it is surprising that not even an edgy outsider brand has made a play for that ad space.

If I were to launch a new, independent beer brand today, I might just market it exclusively through porn sites.  Sure, there would be all sorts of backlash and public debate but in most circles that is just called free publicity.

Imagine, there is your key demo constantly connecting naked people and sex to your beer.  It’s what beer commercials try to do in a PG-13 sort of way in their TV commercials so it’s not like this is crossing a major line.

I can’t imagine it would cost all that much to, say, place a 15-second pre-roll or overlay ad on every single video at a top free porn site like YouPorn.com, thus immediately exposing (pun intended) said product to literally millions of men who are pretty focused on the screen.

Ok, it isn’t the most morally lovely idea ever, but selling booze isn’t exactly saint’s work.

Gillette Gets Ripped Off By Ad Agency for New YouTube Videos

I shudder to think what some big ad agency charged Gillette for the videos on their YouTube channel.

Purportedly aimed at teaching men how to shave various body parts, the animated how-to’s are really just a platform for the Gillette products which would be fine if, instead of getting legitimately useful information we were given a touch of authentic humor.

Sadly, neither is on offer.  The advice is minimal and redundant and the attempts at humor result in more cringing than grinning.  Adding insult to injury, only the link-bait‘y “How to Shave Your Groin” has attracted over 10,000 views, with the other videos languishing under 2,000.

Since the videos are neither entertaining or helpful, it is unlikely they will ever find much of a viewership.  Gillette surely isn’t going to be satisfied by these sorts of numbers but I’m sure their ad agency will convince them it had nothing to do with the crappy value of the content itself.

UPDATE: Well, thanks in large part to lots of blog mockery, the Gillette YouTube spots have “exploded” with Groin shooting up to over 140,000 views.  Still, the other videos are failing to reach 10,000.  A combined total of less that 250,000 still can’t impress Gillette.

See for yourself:

Kindle DX a Poor Newspaper Replacement

Yesterday, I wrote about why I thought the Kindle DX was a terrible choice as a replacement for the traditional textbook.  I also suspected the Kindle DX would be a terrible choice as a newspaper replacement.

Early word from CNet begins to confirm these suspicions:

Since most of us can’t simply increase the amount of time we spend reading the paper each day, I’m afraid that the Kindle approach to e-news will actually reduce the amount of news we read.

The issue is that neither the format nor interface of the Kindle DX makes the process of skimming feasible.  With a dead-tree newspaper, it is a quick process to flip through all the content and dig deeper when you catch an article that interests you.  The way the Kindle DX handles the content forces a constant “flipping” from screen to screen at a rate that is slower than physically turning a page.  On top of that, each “page” only holds a fraction of the content one can capture on a page of the newspaper.

And what about the Kindle DX as compared to the iPhone or a laptop?  Not good:

These devices have active displays with fast update rates, greatly reducing the page-turning delays. I use The New York Times application on my iPhone pretty regularly (once or twice a week, at least), and it’s really quite easy to flick through the day’s top stories, which appear on the iPhone with the headline, a thumbnail photo, and usually about half of the lede…At home, on my laptop, The New York Times Web site is even faster. It’s easy to skim the titles and ledes of about a dozen stories on the main page for each “section,” and loading a story takes no more than a second or two. Once loaded, again, there are no further delays.

So, not only isn’t the Kindle DX superior to a real newspaper, it is a far less capable newsreader than either the iPhone or a laptop.

Did I mention it costs $500 and only displays in greyscale?

Ashton, Snoop and Other Stars Hot on Live Webcasting. Why?

This has been a big year for live webcasts and especially for UStream, a site that seems to have a dominant position at the moment.

Live webcast’s big moment came late last year with the sensation that was the Shiba Inu Puppy Cam.  Tens of thousands of people were tuned in at any given moment to the six little puppies and it is thought that the total number of viewers was over 20 million.  Not bad for some puppies.

Now, it seems, live webcasting is moving beyond puppies and live camgirls to include a growing number of celebrities.  I’ve already discussed Snoop Dogg’s “Wake-n-Bake” show and Kevin Pollack’s chatter and now comes word that web-happy celeb Ashton “1 Million Followers” Kutcher has plans to do a live version of his chestnut “Punk’d” for UStream.

The question is, why this new interest in live webcasting?  It is hard enough to drum up an audience for an original webseries without the added pressure of forcing people to tune in at a specific time.  Even network TV is finding a drop in appointment viewing.

My minimal research (checking out each show a couple of times) indicates that only a few hundred people are interested in either Snoop or Pollack when they are live.  It will be interesting to see if Ashton has the kind of pull needed to make a live show a true hit on UStream or if the only thing we really want is more puppies.

Branded Content a Hit on YouTube

According to PaidContent:

12 percent of the top 100 videos, including ones featuring Mercedes-Benz and Microsoft’s Halo, were branded promotional videos.

This is a good sign for those hoping to use branded content as a advertising delivery vehicle though one has to wonder how much of the success of these videos was due to YouTube either deciding to or being paid to feature those ads on their frontpage.

As I have personally experienced, a frontpage feature on YouTube is good for at least 500,000 views in a week.

However, it does look like audiences are perfectly content to watch branded content as long as the entertainment value is authentic.  Where most brands fail is when they sacrifice entertainment in the name of message.

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Will TV MicroSeries be the Solution for Web Video?

First it was “Blank Slate” sponsored by Audi and now it looks like TNT is setting up another “microseries” this time with Dodge:

“Debuting July 22 and spread across 20 installments over a two-week window, “Lucky Chance” is a criminal tale of deception and betrayal through the eyes of undercover Drug Enforcement Agency agent, Lucky Chance. Presented by Dodge and AT&T, the microseries is supported by an exclusive national commercial pod schedule. The episodes will live online at TNT.tv following the on-air premiere, with both AT&T and Dodge sponsoring the broadband episodes featured at the attendant microsite.” (via MultiChannel News)

I definitely don’t think an episodic story that plays out over the course of a completely different episodic story is going to be very successful finding it’s audience but it will be interesting to see whether or not it drives up awareness enough to boost the viewcount when it moves online.

The Golden Age of the Entrepreneur

I’m constantly impressed and inspired by the varied ways people have devised to make money through clever use of the internet as a nearly free distribution and communication device.  Beyond the bloggers out there able to build up enough of a following to live off the ad sales (no such luck here) there are all sorts of other methods being tried..

I really like the growing number of people mentioned in this CNet post who camp out on a famous stretch of road and take pictures of the passing motorcycles:

“At first, as I drove along this stretch of highway as part of Road Trip 2008, I was confused as to what was going on. But after seeing two such vehicles at corners, each of which had a URL emblazoned on the side, I figured it out: The photographers were taking pictures of the riders and drivers, and then later posting them online, hoping that people will visit their sites, see pictures of themselves on the famous road, and decide to fork over a few bucks for a high-res image.”

Is this easy money or a get-rich-quick plan?  I doubt it but it is another person finding a way to work for themselves and probably have some fun doing it.