Brindle Media

Last Sunday night, I have to admit to feeling uncomfortable watching the spontaneous celebrations outside of the White House following President Obama’s announcement that Osama bin Laden was dead.

My friend, Joe Templin, author of FINANCIAL MISTAKES OF NEW COLLEGE GRADS, provided some perspective. Joe reminded me that most of the people we saw celebrating were either in elementary school or middle school ten years ago. In their minds, they’ve lived most of their lives under an impending threat of terrorism. For them, it’s similar to the threat that we Baby Boomers felt about the potential for nuclear annihilation during the Cold War. Joe’s explanation helped me to better understand the students’ reaction. To them, it probably feels like an ending. I suspect that isn’t so.

Don’t get me wrong. A person with bin Laden’s list of crimes against humanity deserved a death sentence. However, as I watched the student’s celebrations and listened to their joyful shouts of “USA! USA!” the word tawdry came to mind. Perhaps the word I was really looking for was inappropriate. Probably, it’s my primarily English heritage and New England background but It seemed to me that a more reserved reaction would have been more dignified. We know we’re #1. The world knows that America’s #1. Why rub their noses in it. Isn’t our tendency to do so a major reason why they hate us?

I remember watching an old movie, “Saratoga Trunk” in which the character played by Ingrid Bergman is told that she’s beautiful. She responds: “Yes. Isn’t it lucky?” I’ve always admired that response and the sentiment behind it. Bergman’s character acknowledges that her natural beauty is a blessing which has been bestowed upon her rather than an attribute for which she is responsible.

It’s the same for us Americans. We take so many of our privileges and liberties for granted. We believe that it’s our right to vote even though we make little effort to actually be informed about what we’re voting for or against. As one friend defined that attitude, who needs facts when I can have an opinion!?!

I have faith that the core American values of fairness, equality, justice, industry and integrity will eventually win out against fear, evil and ruthlessness. When we triumph, I hope the primary image that history remembers won’t be of a Styrofoam index finger pointed skyward bearing the words “We’re #1!”.

Photos courtesy of DoctorMacro and CBS News

It happens to everybody. You run into someone at the store, on the subway, while on vacation. You recognize their face but can’t for the life of you remember their name. To the rescue: a facial recognition AR app on your smartphone!

And that’s not all. Watch this courtesy of Augmented Reality guru, John C. Havens:
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Can you see how Augmented Reality might become a useful tool for you?

OK, I admit it. I’m living in prehistoric times with my old Blackberry Curve.

But my wife bought me an Apple Store gift card for my birthday and she’s been bugging me to get an iPhone. It’s obvious that technology is changing rapidly. Both our daughters have iPhones. But I’ve got a couple of dilemmas.

First, our AT&T contract. Now, of course, all the Apple people sneer at AT&T and we don’t get good reception at our home because we live near an airport where new construction for cell towers is prohibited.
But Verizon doesn’t work very well at our house either.

Our oldest daughter switched back to AT&T from Verizon because she wasn’t happy with the Verizon’s coverage. So, that complicates matters. Which carrier to choose?

Then, there’s the matter of which iPhone. The 5G is coming out in August but I’ll leave that one to the early adopters. The real question for me is whether to go for the 4G or the 3G.

In Shelly Palmer’s review of 3G vs. 4G devices, he points out that AT&T 4G is only available at full speed in Northern CA, Greater LA, Greater Dallas, Houston, Chicago, Charlotte, Baltimore, Buffalo, Boston, Providence & Puerto Rico. Meanwhile, Verizon’s 4G is only available to 1/3rd of the US right now and won’t cover most of the country for almost 3 years!

Plus, if you own a 4G phone but a 4G network isn’t available, your phone is actually running at 3G anyway. But, if you don’t turn off the 4G radio, the phone keeps searching for a network and eats up your battery.

You can read Shelly’s complete review here:
http://www.shellypalmer.com/2011/04/3g-or-4g-battery-life-vs-bandwidth/

So, it sounds like I’ll be going with an iPhone 3G. But which carrier:
Verizon or AT&T?

This is too much work for a phone!

The social media agency, Ignite has created an infographic which you might find useful. Do you know which social networking site has the most members with graduate degrees? It’s well-known that women like Facebook. Which SN sites do men prefer? Which SN sites do you perceive as “up & coming” and which do you perceive as “over”? Compare your perceptions with the results on this infographic.
(To enlarge it, click on the picture below. You’ll see a lot of white space and a picture to the far left on the next screen. Click on that picture)

What do you think? Anything here surprise you?

Thanks to http://www.ignitesocialmedia.com/

Have you transitioned to a smartphone yet? Traded in your Blackberry for an Android. Finally bought that iPhone? By 2020, it’s predicted that the primary source for accessing the internet will be via mobile technology.

Mobile technology is changing the way we do things every day. The folks at MobiTV created this graphic to provide some perspective and I thought that you’d like to see it. Click on it to see the full infographic.
(Hint: After clicking on the graphic, if you see a slim picture to the left of the screen and a lot of white space. Click on the picture and the whole piece should appear.)

Created by MobiTV,  Inc. a Mobile Technology Platform

Thanks to Jacobs Media for making me aware of this graphic.

Successful advertising is designed to reflect that values and attitudes of the advertiser’s intended audience. It’s interesting to realize that it really wasn’t so long ago that the sentiments expressed in these ads were considered to be appropriate and true. (If you’re having a hard time reading an ad, click on it to enlarge.)

Think about the print, radio and video ads that we see and hear today. How will they look and sound to someone a few decades from now?

Thanks to Dale Brooks for sharing these ads with me.

Alzheimer’s disease is an affliction which we tend to think of as an old person’s disease.

But beginning this year, Baby Boomers will be turning 65 at the rate of 10,000 every day. Now, compared to 65 year olds of previous generations, the Boomer group tends to be much more active, agile and adventurous.

Nevertheless, it’s estimated that one out of every 8 Baby Boomers will develop Alzheimer’s disease and right now doctors don’t have any way to prevent it, cure it or slow down its progression. Today, someone in America develops Alzheimer’s every 69 seconds. By 2050, that rate is expected to increase to one every 33 seconds. Those are sobering stats especially considering the conversations that are going on in Washington, DC right now about the future of health care in America.

The Alzheimer’s Association has just released a study dealing with this issue. You can read and download “Generation Alzheimer’s: The Defining Disease of the Baby Boomers” by clicking on www.alz.org/boomers

Last week, Fareed Zakara interviewed Sony Chairman Howard Stringer on CNN. During their discussion about the impact on Japan’s economy of the recent disaster, Stringer also discussed SONY’s mistakes in creating products for vertical vs horizontal platforms. The conversation offers some useful perspective about platform thinking in the 21st century.

The internet has certainly made researching a topic, company or individual easier but, if you’re like me, you still encounter a lot of stumbling blocks. Ann Smarty offers some very useful advice in this blog about Advanced Social Media Search
http://mashable.com/2011/03/25/advanced-social-media-search/

I’ve never used Google Adwords and, to be honest, feel a bit daunted by the process. Here’s a good primer from Matt Silverman:
http://mashable.com/2011/03/27/google-adwords-tips/

I’m not a member of Rotary but my wife was once president of a local chapter and I have a lot of respect for the work that its members do. One of the missions of the International Rotary organization is to help eradicate polio. Here’s their latest :60 PSA

In a recent article in The Sunday Times Magazine, Jon Bon Jovi is quoted as saying: “Kids today have missed the whole experience of putting the headphones on, turning it up to 10, holding the jacket, closing their eyes and getting lost in an album; and the beauty of taking your allowance money and making a decision based on the jacket, not knowing what the record sounded like, and looking at a couple of still pictures and imagining it. God, it was a magical, magical time. I hate to sound like an old man now, but I am, and you mark my words, in a generation from now people are going to say: ‘What happened?’. Steve Jobs is personally responsible for killing the music business.”

Former record label promotion executive and music industry blogger responded in his weekly blog to Bon Jovi’s comments with an open letter. Here are some excerpts from Steve’s letter:

“Dear Jon:
You’ve been making records a long time. In fact, when you had your first Billboard chart hit in 1984 (“Runaway,” which peaked at #39) CDs had already been in the retail music market two years.

Funny thing about CDs, I don’t ever remember any artists I worked with at the time complaining about the hefty royalty checks they were receiving as their catalog(s) were released in the new format and sold millions all over again. Not a one. Nope. It was a good time for the labels and all their artists as billions were generated in revenues just from re-releasing older albums on CD.”

You can read Steve’s entire letter at http://stevemeyer.webs.com/

So, what do you think? Do you agree with Bon Jovi or with Steve Meyer’s assessment of this situation?

In a recent blog, radio consultant Fred Jacobs notes that advertising agencies may finally be readjusting their thinking about the value of consumers aged 55-64 year old.

“The demographic targets may finally be reacting to the Baby Boom generation. If that sounds totally counter-intuitive, the fact is that agencies essentially stopped thinking once they cemented the 25-54 target in place more than two decades ago.

The Boomer train continues to move, and those over 55 are abundant and a whole lot different than fiftysomethings of just a generation or two ago.

As David Poltrack, head research maven for CBS, points out in a recent Hollywood Reporter article, “The fact is an affluent 58-year-old is certainly more valuable than a 22-year-old who is just getting by.”
As TV demos age – the primetime average is now 51 – there’s a certain logic to advertising targets aging with them. As the Hollywood Reporter notes,Tom Selleck and Kathy Bates are winning in prime, while Classic Rocker Steven Tyler is reinventing American Idol.”

Duh!!

I remember having conversations with agencies about older consumers back in the early 1980s. Historically, the agencies used young adults in their early 20s to make decisions about the value of older consumers and there was a tendency to attribute irrelevant information about the buying habits of previous generations to modern consumers. Thirty years later, now that those 20-somethings are now 50-somethings, it’s nice to see that agency thinking is starting to change.

You can read Fred Jacobs excellent blogs at www.JacobsMedia.com