Jeff Bezos: "Let me show you something." Charlie Rose: "Oh, man...Oh, my God!" That five-second clip, showing Charlie Rose opening a door, was teased all weekend on CBS, in the walk-up to the greatest 15 minutes of sponsored content ever to appear on "60 Minutes." (Except Amazon got the editorial gratis.)» 12 Comments
Sometimes it's hard to pick your battles of the sexes; this particular little dust-up has my head spinning. It's devolved into a fight between Beastie Boys and Mean Valley Girls. (That's Silicon Valley.) And so far, I'm siding with the Beasties.» 12 Comments
Rob Delaney is one of the luckiest people in the Twitterverse. Well, aside from all the insiders who made billions of dollars via the company's recent IPO, of course. Never mind. We're talking profiting the old-fashioned way, by slaving for almost three years to produce that thing that is printed on paper and bound between two hard covers -- you know, a book.» 3 Comments
These "Bro-surance" ads first surfaced three weeks ago, under the auspices of The Colorado Consumer Health Inititative and ProgressNow Colorado to bring attention to their website. Please excuse me -- I'm going to bro-mit.» 14 Comments
This new 60-second commercial reintroduces the born-again Jeep Cherokee with the tagline "Built free." And just as in the movie "Born Free" with Elsa and her cubs, the spot, called "Manifesto," is filled with images of birth, newness, and freedom in nature: muddy trails, open skies, little boys swimming, jumping and showing their muscles.» 14 Comments
"Talent, I believe, is most likely to be found among nonconformists, dissenters, and rebels." -- David Ogilvy. Though we can't know what the great D.O. might have thought of street artist/media provocateur Banksy, I think we have a pretty good idea of what the still-anonymous Banksy would think of David Ogilvy.» 15 Comments
"It's not that we are women. It's that we are not men, we are the other," said Cindy Gallop, founder of IfWeRanTheWorld.com, speaking of the agency world, and firing up the audience, 400-women strong, at the 3% Conference last week in San Francisco.» 10 Comments
Let's talk about Vines. Not the sub-Twizzler variety of licorice candy sold in bulk at warehouse stores - although they too are delicious, in an underdoggish, Hydrox vs. Oreo way. Nope, I mean Vine, the year-old, six-second video-clip-sharing system now owned by Twitter.» 1 Comments
My original intention was to write a column about the marketing of Obamacare to millennial youths. Indeed, up until last week, it seemed to be the big story, since the economic well-being of the Affordable Health Care Act itself rests on enough young, healthy people signing up. The theory is that this cadre of "Young Invincibles" in turn would subsidize the cost of insuring the mass of older, sicker Americans. (Should we call them "Vanquished Elders?" Or just "frequent users"?)» 30 Comments
Last Tuesday, I caught the debut of "The Crazy Ones," the CBS sitcom created by David E Kelley, featuring Robin Williams and Sarah Michelle Gellar. There's definitely a tone problem with the show: violently uneven, the pilot swings from Williams' manic, razzmatazz riffs to "American Idol"-ish musical moments to scenes between a childlike, divorced father and his adult daughter/partner that become almost maudlin.» 20 Comments
