Could Chris Bosh save the music industry?

Ok maybe that’s a bold statement, but the Toronto Raptors face of the franchise and Warner Music Canada announced today that they’re teaming up on an incredibly unique venture that shines light on another creative way the music industry may bust out of its slump. I’ve written about the music industry’s need to adapt in this space before, but we’re not going to re-hash that today. As a matter of fact, I didn’t think I’d be writing about the music industry today at all. However, I had set my calendar as Bosh had let his fans...

Why the mobile industry is like real estate

Let’s take a moment today to focus on mobile.  It’s a medium that we all use every day to the point that we don’t really even think about it anymore.  And in spite of its pervasiveness and its massive global reach, the mobile phone is really the weapon in your technology arsenal that’s the most intimate – I know people who sleep with their phones and wake up to them chiming! Yes, Twitter is getting all the buzz these days, but you’re kidding yourself if you think it’s ever going to have even a fraction of the impact of the...

Apparently Canada loves online video – but do we really know why?

On a glorious spring Friday in Toronto, it seems particularly relevant to take a look at some numbers for online video viewing that were released last week by ComScore for February 2009.  Remember February?  When it was cold and we were all curled up in our blankets with our laptops watching videos… apparently? Well according to the stats from a new ComScore report tracking February viewing figures, Canada is the world’s top online video viewing country by percentage. The average online video viewer in the Great White North watched 10 hours of video online...

Taking viral for a loop

If you haven’t read the article on DIY social network site, Ning, and its “tech hottie” co-founder Gina Bianchini in the May 2008 edition of Fast Company, don’t. It’s an advantage to the rest of us who have aspirations of becoming Web 2.0 millionaires. Bianchini and techgod business partner Mark Andreessen (Netscape and Opsware founder, Digg investor) have taken a mathematical model and turned it into a predictably expansive jackpot. Of course, at first glance, it’s not hard to overlook the brilliance of what they’ve...

Is your niche niche enough?

Tommy Thompson, President of Inspire!, a marketing firm focusing on work with the Hispanic American market made a great point in AdAge today that i needed to pass along as it applies far beyond the Hispanic community. In the article, Thompson reminds marketers that a niche is a lot more specific than a sub-section of culture like “Hispanics” or even “Male Hispanics 18-35″. Says Thompson: The reality is that the Hispanic consumer is not a homogeneous group and therefore these types of broad statements won’t work for most brands in...

Technology just isn’t for everyone

Wow. That was tough to write, but in order to be the objective faux-journalist that I loosely claim to be, it had to be said. Anyways, let’s move on. Last night as I was dozing off on the couch watching high quality US Network television that is not currently in re-runs, I came across a commercial for one of the network’s local affiliates 11 o’clock news. Since my post about online video viewers and traditional TV watchers, I’ve thought a lot about the fact that not everyone uses media in the same way. In fact, we may be at a point in history...

Writer’s strike = online boon? How do they figure?

There’s been a considerable amount written, first as a prediction and now as a factual report about the “impact” that the Hollywood writer’s strike will/is having on the online video world. And while I’m all for manufacturing stories (hence the blog), I’m saddened that in all my reading on the subject, nobody seemed to be predicting what actually happened – that TV reruns have no direct correlation to online video audiences. I mean, why would they? Think about it… television has long been built for mass audiences. Not 30...

“Freakout” success not that surprising, really

Hopefully everyone’s had the chance to see Burger King’s latest campaign – The Whopper Freakout.  The King put on his sneaky hat some time back and tried to convince patrons at “a regular Burger King” that the Whopper had been taken off the menu.  Permanently.  While this is essentially a high school prank being executed (with hidden cameras of course) by a multinational corporation, the results are giving the folks at Crispin Porter + Bogusky another chance to pat themselves on the back and giving consumers some of the highest ad recall...

Could Web 2.0 be Bust 2.0?

I love the new internet.  I love the ease with which content can be shared, stories can be told and communication is being revolutionized by those sites out there which we so buzzword-tastically refer to as Web 2.0 (though that may be the last time you hear anything refered to as buzzword-tastic).  All that said, I really hope that the 2.0 version of our online world grows up fast enough to realize that just because new and effective online business models are making the internet bust a more forgettable phenomenon, it doesn’t mean it can’t happen...

Will consolidation benefit audiences? We’ll have to wait and C…(TV)

So the CRTC tap dance seems to be coming to a close (for now at least) and it looks like the fate of the CHUM Empire (?) has been decided. While I like to try and be the optimist – well, sometimes – I’m a little nervous about whats in the works following this monumental reshuffling of the Canadian media landscape. It seemed for a little while there like CTV Globemedia was all set to unload the A Channel group of stations to Rogers and hold on to the coveted City TV brand, but the CRTC’s ruling put a cramp in that plan. Now Rogers will acquire...