Strategy | Hot Tub Crime Machine

Why Anti-Facebooks Won’t Work.

November 21, 2011 1 Comment

A couple years ago now, when Facebook was at the height of it’s privacy issues, a few young kids decided they needed to do something about it. They came up with an idea they called Diaspora. It was exactly what we needed at the time, a Facebook where you owned all your own data. They posted this video:

And the web went nuts. Kickstarter was new, relatively untested, unsure of what it would become and who would want to participate. But then these kids, and they were (still are) kids, completely blew the doors off their fundraising plan netting over $200K from over 6,000 ~~investors~~ donors.

People were hungry for a site that would deal with the privacy issues that they didn’t understand, that they media was over-hyping.

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Filed under social media, Technology, Trends Tagged with crowd-sourcing, Diaspora, facebook, Ilya Zhitomirskiy, Join Diaspora, kickstarter, MySpace, privacy, social media, Social network, Strategy, techcrunch, technology, trends, Unthink

McDonald’s Monopoly Game and the Prisoner’s Dilemma

September 28, 2011 2 Comments

One of my first blog posts on Hot Tub Crime Machine was about the similarities between the McDonald’s Monopoly game and classic Prisoner’s Dilemma. Judging by the amount of search traffic this post drives to the blog, it has consistently been one of the most popular posts, even though it’s almost a year old. So with the latest incarnation of the Monopoly game now at McDonald’s, and several new TV ads promoting it (featuring LeBron and Michelle Wie), I felt it was a good time to re-post the classic.

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Filed under advertising, Blogging, brands Tagged with Ad Age, advertising, brands, Gambling, LeBron, LeBron James, McDonald's, Michelle Wie, Monopoly, Pricing, Prisoner's Dilemma, Strategy

Don’t Steal My Cereal.

September 21, 2011 Leave a comment

I was recently talking with a co-worker about advertising to kids and after the requisite discussion about the original Ronald McDonald commercial we started talking about kids cereal commercials. And there was one common thread that kept coming up. Stealing. Someone was trying to steal the cereal from the kids, or the kids were trying to steal the cereal from the character, or one character was stealing from another.

Here’s some proof:

–

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Filed under advertising Tagged with Account Planning, advertising, Cereal, Chuck, Cookie Crisp, NBC, planning, Ronald McDonald, Strategy, Trix

How to Become a Planner – Part II

September 8, 2011 8 Comments

A few months back I wrote a post about how I became a planner. I included a post from Andrew Hovell with his thoughts on becoming a planner. And here’s part two. In which my new manager describes the questions that he asks when he interviews planners. It’s a few years old, but still very relevant.

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Filed under Account Planning, advertising Tagged with Account Planning, advertising, Andrew Hovell, Interview, Northern Planner, planning, Russell Davies, Scott Karambis, Strategy, TED

When did PR firms become digital marketing firms?

July 27, 2011 2 Comments

The other day I was hanging out with a friend of mine who oversees all video production for a large public relations firm. He was telling me about new project that involved creating dozens of videos and photos and weaving them together into a mosaic on a microsite. It all sounded pretty cool and not unlike ideas I have pitched to my clients before. So I asked him “Who’s building the site for you guys?” and he replied “We are. We build everything in-house for our clients.”

And that’s when it dawned on me. The line between what his PR firm and my digital marketing agency are doing is blurring. In fact it’s getting so blurry you can only see trace remnants of it.

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Filed under advertising, social media, Trends Tagged with Account Planning, advertising, Advertising and Marketing, blogs, brands, facebook, Marketing, Public relations, social media, Strategy, trends, Twitter

Twitter and the Rebirth of Appointment TV.

July 13, 2011 Leave a comment

SPOILER ALERT!! No, I’m not about to reveal the ending of Lost or who may or may not have killed someone on True Blood last week. But if you are online, and using anything social, you are probably familiar with that term. Just the other day I had the ending of an episode of a show I watch ruined because someone on Twitter forgot to put that in front of their tweet. But it’s not really their fault. It’s Twitter’s.

The times they are a-changin’. Again.

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Filed under advertising, apps, brands, Mobile-Social, social media, Technology, Trends, TV, videos Tagged with advertising, apps, brands, Digital video recorder, games, GetGlue, IntoNow, Lost, Mashable, mobile-social, social media, Strategy, Super Bowl, technology, Television, trends, True Blood, TV, Twitter, video

PSFK 2011 Conference Wrap-Up.

May 26, 2011 2 Comments

I finally presented my deck from the PSFK conference to the Planning department at work, so here it is for mass consumption:

I need to give a BIG thanks to Vanessa Carney and Avin Narasimhan for sharing notes with me (I lost my notebook after the conference). Without your notes and subsequent blogs posts I definitely wouldn’t have remembered half this stuff. And of course, a big thank you to all the speakers, presenters, and the staff at PSFK who made this all possible.

PSFK Conference 2011 (hottubcrimemachine.com)
Two of my Favorites from the PSFK Conference. (hottubcrimemachine.com)

Filed under Account Planning, advertising, Conferences, Mobile-Social, Presentations, Technology Tagged with Aaron Dignan, advertising, brands, conferences, creativity, culture, Joe Gebbia, justin gignac, kickstarter, Microsoft Tag, mobile tagging, planning, psfk, qr code, roomba, Strategy, technology, trends

[UPDATED] THREE of my Favorites from the PSFK Conference.

May 5, 2011 1 Comment

I know that I promised you my presentation from the PSFK conference but it hasn’t been shown to my department yet, so you have to wait. But I do want to share the videos of my ~~two~~ THREE favorite sessions of the day.

The first is Joe Gebbia, co-founder of Airbnb.com. His story of creativity, ingenuity and determination (to not become homeless) is truly inspiring.

The second is from Aaron Dignan, founding partner at Undercurrent. His presentation, entitled “Why the future of work is play” is a great breakdown of the future of how we learn and improve our skills, as well as a critique of other so-called “games.”

The third was just released the other day, hence the update. Justin Gignac, a recovering art director, entrepreneur, innovator and all around awesome guy talks about his creative process and includes great advice like “Don’t be an asshole.”

I’ll share my takeaways from the conference soon, I promise.

PSFK Conference 2011 (hottubcrimemachine.com)

Filed under Account Planning, advertising, brands, Conferences, Games, Presentations, Trends, videos Tagged with Aaron Dignan, Account Planning, advertising, AirBnB, brands, Game mechanics, games, Joe Gebbia, psfk, social media, Strategy, technology, Undercurrent, video

Why You Shouldn’t “Friend” Your Patients.

May 2, 2011 2 Comments

I recently received two LinkedIn requests. From my dentists. These came right on the heels of a notification that the dental practice was following me on Twitter.

I’ve left these LinkedIn requests in “limbo” while I try to figure out whether or not to accept them. While they are people I have a relationship with, why would they want to connect with me on LinkedIn? Or maybe the better question is, why would I want to be connected with THEM?

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Filed under advertising, social media Tagged with advertising, Business, Dentistry, facebook, LinkedIn, social media, Strategy, Twitter

PSFK Conference 2011

April 6, 2011 2 Comments

This Friday I’ll be at the 2011 PSFK conference in NYC. As you may recall, I love conferences. But this one has especially won me over. Aside from the amazing line-up of speakers and topics, check out the agenda below:

FINAL AGENDA

9am Doors Open, Breakfast Served
9.30 Opening Remarks – With host and PSFK founder Piers Fawkes
9.40 Yancey Strickler, Kickstarter – Funding Creativity with Kickstarter
10.10 What’s Next? A Panel On The Future – Ayesha Khanna, Hybrid Reality Institute; Greg Lindsay, Journalist; Allison Mooney, Google; Katherine Moriwaki; Parsons The New School For Design; Moderated by Scott Lachut, PSFK
10.50 Coffee & More Coffee
11.20 Ben Lerer, Thrillist – Bridging Content + Commerce… In Style
11.50 Joe Gebbia, Airbnb.com – From Moleskine to Marketplace
12.10 Aaron Dignan, Undercurrent – Why The Future Of Work Is Play
12.30 Lunch & Conversation – A Conversation At Lunch Sponsored by Microsoft Tag
1.00 John Puterbaugh, Nellymoser – Adventures In Mobile Tagging
1.15 Future of Mobile Tagging Panel – Patrick Donnelly, QR Arts; Roger Marquis, 2D Barcode Strategy; Carlos Lamadrid, Woman’s Day Magazine; Robin Lanahan, Microsoft Tag. Moderated by Piers Fawkes, PSFK
1.45 Afternoon Talks Begin
1.50 Daniel Cherry III & Theresa Tran, The New York Cosmos – The New York Cosmos: Doing It Our Way
2.10 Eoin Billings & Duncan Jackson, Billings Jackson Design – Industrial Design: ID For The City
2.30 Rachel Sterne, City of New York – City As A Platform
2.50 Coffee & Cookies
3.10. Post-Good? A Panel On Responsible Creativity & Culture – Jill Fehrenbacher, Inhabitat; John Gerzema, Young & Rubicam; Phil Patton, Author; Timo Rissanen, Parsons The New School For Design. Moderated by Scott Lachut, PSFK
3.40 Justin Gignac – Doin’ It and Doin’ It and Doin’ It Well
4.00 John Bielenberg, COMMON – What Happens Next?
4.30 Closing Remarks – By PSFK founder Piers Fawkes
4.45 Screening of ‘Senna’ – Introduced by director Asif Kapadia
6.30 PSFK CONFERENCE NYC Afterparty Sponsored by Land Rover – At the Manhattan Classic Car Club, 250 Hudson Street (just north of Canal)

Do you see what I see? Almost every presentation is only 30 minutes long. Perfect for my ADD and also ensuring that I maximize my information intake. I only wish that Mitch Polatin could be there to experience it with me.

I’ll create a presentation on all the awesomeness of the conference and post it here sometime in the next week.

PSFK’s Future of Mobile Tagging (core77.com)

Filed under Account Planning, advertising, brands, Conferences, Mobile-Social, Presentations, social media, Technology, Trends Tagged with Account Planning, advertising, apps, Asif Kapadia, Ben Lerer, brands, ecommerce, facebook, foursquare, Greg Lindsay, John Puterbaugh, kickstarter, location-based, Microsoft Tag, mobile-social, Parsons The New School For Design, Piers Fawkes, psfk, PSFK conference, Senna, social media, Strategy, technology, Twitter, video

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