Wacky Asics Sports Shoe Ad From Japan

This ad plays on Japan's love of crazy TV game shows. So much for those boring details like what the shoes are made of. :>)

via Japan Sugoi Blog

A Future Entrepreneur's View of Google?

I voted for What if a Fish Swallowed Google, the Doodle 4 Google Contest entry by West Virginia elementary school student Sean Staats. Surely he's related to Jason Calacanis who dreams of having Mahalo overtake Google?

A Blog That's Scary on So Many Levels, Heh

The snarky Things Younger Than John McCain blog is hilarious, yet scary on many levels. Too bad the author has elected to remain anonymous.

Younger than McCain: Kodachrome, Alaska, Plutonium, McDonald's, Bugs Bunny, the polio vaccine, and both of Barak Obama's parents. Got a suggestion? Send em in.

Says the blog's masthead:

"Am I being “age-ist”? Probably. But the world is a pretty complicated place right now and I’m thinking that it’s not such a great time to elect our oldest President ever. So sue me."

BusinessWeek Forays Into Social Media Signal Publishing's Future

I've cancelled most of my print subscriptions because I so rarely read anything in them that I haven't already read online. One sub I've continued is BusinessWeek because they tend to have deep coverage of stories I care about, and they're trying harder than Fortune, Forbes, etc. to truly involve readers in co-creation of content.

This week, for example, Steve Baker sourced his upcoming story about Why Twitter Matters on Twitter in 140 word questions and answers which you can track here

Among Baker's tweets :

#bwstory Going to have a race. Will Twit to 5 or 6 customer service Twits and see which ones respond fast. No @ yet. Shudn't alert them

Mama Bear and Cubs Greet Lake Tahoe Resident

Sent by a friend in Tahoe City, California:

Yesterday I went around the corner of the deck to see why the dog was barking to find a very big mama bear (400 lbs++) staring me in the face.

We both ran off in our respective directions, I grabbed my camera, she climbed 35' up a tree.

She finally came down but wouldn't leave when I discovered her three tiny (15 lbs??) cubs had climbed to the very top of the 65' tree.

They finally made their way down and wandered off to see what else they could scavenge down the way.

Still Got the Flu Bronchitis, No Blogging Today

It came on like a ton of bricks on Monday, between 8 and 9 p.m.

Tuesday: Being a stubborn sort, I worked until about 4 and then slept for 14 hours, with intermittent Twitter breaks to whine about how sick I am and get sympathy tweets.

Wednesday, a lost day spent watching videos. Which videos? Dunno. Grandma sore throat remedy of the day: cold washcloth, wrapped in saran wrap. wrap that in a wool scarf. change the washcloth when it gets hot.

Result: it feels nice to have my throat wrapped, but I still have a sore throat.

Thursday: Feel like I've been run hard and put away wet. Can't pick up my head.

Grandma sore throat remedy of the day: juice of a lemon, honey, cayenne pepper. My sister remembered it as "canine pepper." Result: still have a terrible sore throat, but it tasted nice.

Got a sore throat remedy for me to try?

Friday: turns out i have bronchitis. $7 a pill antibiotics yet to kick in. Cancelled everything for today and tomorrow too. Sigh.

Online Trend Demands: Say More With Less - Or Else

By B.L. Ochman
Information overload, data deluge, inbox overflow, the attention crash: call it what you like, we are all drowning in inputs. The answer? A rising tide says learn to say it in less words -- a lot less words -- or lose your place on stage.

Stowe Boyd wrote last week that from now on twitter is the sole medium for companies to pitch him and Drue Kataoka at ValleyZen discusses the merits of expressing ideas in 10 words or less.

Can it be done? You bet. Part of my fascination with Twitter, besides the sheer delight in hanging out with a few thousand of the smartest people in the world, is that complex ideas are expressed in 140 characters or less, or they're not published. Here are just a few examples:

@AdamBoettiger ARTICLE: "How to turn your iPod Touch into an iPhone and make voip calls from it"

@CathleenRitt Who wants to call my father to tell him I'm leaving my job because a. it no longer exists, b. to pursue entrepreneurial projects? Not me!

Jim Long @AnnBernard CEO of http://whygosolo.com/ gives us an important entrepreneurial gut-check this morning

@Pistachio social media is not just a layer between the company and the stakeholders, it is the business itself. and it is NOT new, it's just different

@gapingvoid Note to random PR folk: I'm busy. I don't care about you or your product. Your overt and uninspired solicitations are annoying.

@stoweboyd @steverubel It's the transition to a web of flow from a web of pages. The conversation moves to where the velocity is,away from async to sync

Ryan Karpeles. Twitter is like a giant petri dish of ideas. They develop, grow, mutate, etc. And we get to watch it all under our micro(blogging)scopes.

@karenswim only on twitter can techies, bloggers, marketers, writers, twenty somethings and work at home moms happily gather in one great conversation

@BarbaraKB Twitter is twitter: Simple. Discipline. Chatter. Information. Giggles. Relationships. Links. Opinions. People. Feed. Oy.

Follow me on Twitter http://twitter.com/whatsnext

Dear Bank of America: I Don't Want a Funny Bank

Bank of America has enlisted comedian Mo Rocca to host a series of videos about banking. Do you want a comedian involved with your money? I don't. I also don't want sexual innuendo in my bank's advertising. Or a lame pitch from their PR firm.

I want adults in suits to take my money seriously. They should be polite and friendly, but they sure don't need to be funny. I want my bank open late and on weekends, and I want free checking and quick access to my deposits. Dog biscuits for Benny Bix are a nice touch too, but skip the clowns and comedians.

In the rush to join social media marketing, Bank of America is far from the only company to miss the mark. The key is to think about what your customers want from you, and give it to them. You don't need a comedian to make your message entertaining or engaging. Dear Bank of America: While I'm a big proponent of using humor in marketing, there are situations where it's appropriate. Banking is one of them. Unless you're giving away money.

Your marketing needs a master plan on how to engage customers on a strategic level. Think about: What are they interested in? What needs do they have? What service can you perform for them? How can you build a relationship with them?

And skip the lame email pitch to bloggers:

Obama Should Have Ignored Mainstream Media and Gone Right to YouTube

By B.L. Ochman

Perhaps too little, too late, but Barak Obama has definitively and formally denounced and distanced himself from the explosive Rev. Wrong. But Obama blew it. He's been Swiftboated by both Rev. Wrong and mainstream media. And he should have fought back - weeks ago, actually - where he's strongest, on YouTube.

Instead of fueling the media feeding frenzy, Obama should have made his case on his site, uploaded the video to YouTube, and let MSM get the story from there.

Because in this election, that's where the story is - online, where young people are. Where the new influencers are.

Do I Have to Keep Doing This Forever?

I've been thinking a lot about what the next phase of my career will be, since I've been doing Internet marketing strategy for more than 10 years.

Lately, I feel like one of my very first clients who earnestly asked me "Now that this is successful, will I have to keep doing this forever?" God no! I told him. You need to move on to next year's ideas. And so do I. But it's not clear yet whether my next career will be evolutionary or revolutionary. Right now, I just know it will be soon.

I'm not sad about this. I'm actually elated, almost giddy. I know the right idea will come to me, at the right moment, and I find that thrilling. You might need to be an entrepreneur to understand that. :>)

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