New Media News: Daily Candy Sweetens Up Comcast. Microsoft’s Latest Attempt at Cool –CrowdFire — to Launch At Outside Lands Fest.

Media junky favorite, Cynopsis, reports the following tidbits this week:

Women’s fashion and lifestyle email newsletter DailyCandy was acquired by Comcast for a reported $125 million. The site sends out daily emails to some 2.5 million readers in 12 U.S. cities and London, England. Guru’s Note: This simple announcement does not do justice to Daily Candy’s pioneering role in spreading juicy new products, sites, styles, and do gooder causes to a vast network of lifestyle-hungry readers.

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Federated Media Publishing and Microsoft teamed up to launch CrowdFire, a social networking platform for uploading, sharing and remixing music and musical performances with the festival scene as a sweetspot. Federated Media CEO John Battelle describes his vision of it as a happening enabler of sorts. Users are encouraged to send SMS, email and uploads of media directly into the CrowdFire database and media jockeys will create streams of CrowdFire imagery in real time, sent back out into the festival grounds through a network of digital screens. Groovy.

Crowdfire will be on full display at the Outside Lands Music & Arts Festival in San Francisco on Aug. 22-24. Guru’s Note: Naturally, Guru & company are already planning to attend Outside Lands (Favorites Andrew Bird and Wilco are playing on the 24th, and rumor has it that Beck may show up all three days) so uber-cool ticket holders (and me) have already been pinged by Crowdfire.

Granddaddy of web video news shows Rocketboom was acquired by Sony Pictures Television for a seven figure guarantee plus a share of future revenues generated from the show. Sony plans to distribute the show across multiple digital platforms including Crackle and its syndication network, the PS3, the PSP and Bravia internet video link televisions. Rocketboom is already one of the most widely distributed video blogs on the net, available via iTunes, Tivo, Apple TV, Pando, TVTonic and multiple web video portals including YouTube, Metacafe, blip.tv and Vuze.

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Source: Favre Has “An Itch To Play Again”

ESPN is reporting that Brett Favre may want to come out of retirement and report to training camp. The legendary quarterback hinted at this possibility while on Letterman last spring. While this Cheesehead is also a Golden Bear, which means Aaron Rogers is okay by me… there’s no one like #4.

 

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Your 15 Minutes of UGC Fame & Fortune Start Here.

While researching my article on Rickrolling, I came across a bunch of User Generated Content Contests that sound like fun. There’s something for everyone — from Creative Consumers to Brainiacs. Increasingly tuned-in marketers are playing it smart with these promotions, following the Three Rules of UGC Contest Development:

1. Tap into consumers’ passions
2. Use multiple social channels to reach consumers
3. Know your audience — pick prizes & content format accordingly

Some of these chances at fame and fortune end soon.  So hurry.

Casting Call: Lifetime Networks invites female filmmakers to submit their original short films. Deadline for entries is July 8. The winning contestant will have their short shown on Lifetime Movie Networks and receive a cash prize of $5,000 plus the opportunity to attend networking events and festivals.

TechwareLabs Case Mod Contest with over $600 in prizes!!!Quote: Are you a mad modder at heart? Have you taken the toaster over and crammed a quad core CPU, dual video cards, and four hard drives into it? Have you altered your washer to look like something that qualifies as a WMD and outfit it with a PC? If so we want to see your mod, big or small. Submit everything you have modified and we will incorporate it into a video to be hosted on our site. The winning case mod will receive over $600 in prizes and have their creation appear in the video and also be interviewed by us and be featured on our front page. Get your dremel and bondo out and let the mods begin.

Shoot, Share, Get On TV. Ziddio feels like a mash up of YouTube and Bix.com, allowing users to enter competitions and win prizes - including appearances on TV. People create videos and upload them to Ziddio.com for the world to see, laugh, question, mock, and even enjoy. Run by Comcast; frequent contests.

Do You Think You Have What It Takes To Be A Super Star?
Simon Malls is inviting you to come and check out the Simon dTOUR Live Video and Recording Studio! At select malls across the country you will have the chance of a lifetime to show us what you’ve got.

BrainReactions is an online brainstorming site. Most of the time, BStormers do it out of the kindness of their hearts and a persistent need to do something, anything with their random neuro-eurekas. But for the first time since I’ve been seeding the site with my genius, (mad) money will change hands. Check out the Monjee contest.

Someday Stories From Wells Fargo
Everybody’s got a dream for Someday. What’s yours? This is a contest that’s all about you and what you want for your “Someday.” Today, just tell us the true and aspiring story about your Someday dream and your winnings could help make it real.

Calling All Filmmakers!

Power up with this potion and get out your camera. Create a :30 (30 second) commercial featuring CUBA’s new ‘All Natural’ ‘Herbal Energy Juice’.

TruTv + Black Gold Teams Up To Go Social.
My old white water rafting buddy, Thom Beers, strikes it rich again with the premiere of Black Gold. In conjunction with this sure-to-be-another-hit, TruTV launched the Black Gold Challenge casual game on Facebook, MySpace and Bebo to promote the premiere of the new series about West Texas oil roughnecks, debuting Wednesday, June 18 at 10p. Players tap their friends to form a drilling crew then pick a spot in Texas to begin drilling for hidden caches of “black gold.” One hidden hole contains a voucher for $50,000.

What Would You Do For A Klondike Bar?
You know the drill.

CREATE ENTER JUDGE
Yahoo’s contest site, Bix, offers a variety of contests including a Spore Creature contest with a MacAir and 50-inch plasma TV as prizes. I’m thinking I might have a better shot with the Spore contest than with my karoake version of ‘Never Gonna Give You Up.’

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Just When You Thought It Was Eco-OK To Run That Online Media Campaign …

We calculated our carbon footprint for all those red-eyes we flew to London, the SUVs we rented, the hotel rooms where we showered for 20-minutes and requested extra Egyptian cotton towels.  We even tossed in the methane from the cheeseburgers we devoured after Brett was intercepted in overtime.

And while our eco-sins are piling up like so many plastic bottles imprinted with 7’s, it didn’t occur to us until this very moment that we marketers need to calculate the environmental impact of our online media campaigns.  We felt so virtuous switching from treeware to those flashing banners and Facebook fan pages.

But now, a company called imc2 has launched Clear Sky Digital Media, a free tool that allows marketers to calculate and then offset the carbon footprint of their online media campaigns. The tool converts an online media buy into a kilowatt hour measure of the energy necessary to support its delivery. This measure is translated into carbon emissions and then used to determine the cost of buying offset credits.

Initially, I tried to calculate the carbon footprint of this blog but was quickly disheartened by the quantity of 0.0’s that appeared. Then I fantasized I was Chief Media Buyer for The Plastic Bags of America account, deep into planning the launch of a major online campaign featuring user-generated videos showing off the many healthy uses of recycled plastic bags. I picked the dimensions, selected high traffic sites like Yahoo, MSN, and AOL, then added the number of expected impressions. In seconds, Clear Sky not only calculated the carbon cost of the proposed campaign but told me how much it would cost me in green credits to offset. In this case, my Healthy Plastics campaign would create about 10 metric tons of carbon — and cost around $127 to offset.

So why do we need this new tool? Isn’t switching from forest to server farm virtuous enough? After all, an average issue of Time magazine is responsible for a quarter-pound of greenhouse gas emissions, while newsprint consumption alone is some 9.2 million tons per year. Electronics have got to be greener, yes?

Apparently Clear Sky’s mission is to simply persuade us to re-think all of our energy consumption and to start an industry-wide conversation about sustainability. Although currently not as devastating as dead trees, electronic media is having a growing impact on the environment. It’s already running neck and neck with air travel, each accounting for an estimated 2% of the world’s carbon emissions.

imc2 has raised some interesting issues — and here’s another one: Should the candidates in this year’s Presidential Election be required to calculate (and offset) the carbon emitted as a result of their campaigns? Imagine what it might cost to offset only the $45 million the money-making machine known as Barack Obama raised in the month of February alone and then spent aggressively on TV ads, particularly in Texas. A Presidential campaign carbon offset could be a significant energy investment windfall.

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“I’m A Focus Group Moderator and I Approved Obama’s New TV Commercial.

As a veteran market researcher and focus group moderator, I usually can spot Projective Exercises like Perceptual Mind Maps or ‘Design Your Ideal Product’ techniques.  Sometimes smart ad agency creatives, if they’re not too engrossed in either the Merlot or the M & Ms in the viewing room, pluck verbatims from the groups and sneak them into television commercials. There are countless anecdotes about this – like the classic McDonald’s theme “You deserve a break today”, which supposedly emerged during a focus group in Chicago.

One of the reasons to conduct focus groups is the off-chance that an expressive respondent in Cleveland will blurt out something so right on and real that it can quickly be transformed into a tagline or campaign that resonates authenticity. Another reason is to further understand what’s polarizing about potential products — in this case, fully figure out how Obama can satisfy the wants, needs and hopes of Hillary supporters who continued to passionately plead the case clear through to the bitter-end of Puerto Rico and South Dakota. And then there’s grokking to the likely toolkit of Karl Rove-style tricks that are already being emailed 24/7.

The minute I saw Barack Obama’s new television commercial “The Country I Love” now slated to appear in some 18 states starting this month, I knew that market researchers everywhere were nodding. The spot is so tightly targeted even a marketing newbie can’t miss the strategic genius in this commercial. Every sentence and shot, from the very visible flag pin to the neighborhoods ‘devastated when steel plants closed’ is perfectly calculated to resoundingly answer those persistent questions. Not only is the ghost of Hillary most decidedly flickering about but so are other symbols of white America — like Barack’s mother and grandparents. Carefully designed to be warmly reassuring with its message of Heartland working class character and values, this spot is a classic example of smoothly going from Me Media to We Media.

Much of this affecting and effective 60 seconds is subliminal.  While it’s all about heading off the negatives, it never feels anything but positive.

I only wish I’d been the Moderator facilitating those Perceptual Mind Maps.

Here’s the full transcript: (video link above)

OBAMA: I’m Barack Obama.

America is a country of strong families and strong values. My life’s been blessed by both.

I was raised by a single mom and my grandparents. We didn’t have much money, but they taught me values straight from the Kansas heartland where they grew up. Accountability and self-reliance. Love of country. Working hard without making excuses. Treating your neighbor as you’d like to be treated. It’s what guided me as I worked my way up – taking jobs and loans to make it through college.

It’s what led me to pass up Wall Street jobs and go to Chicago instead, helping neighborhoods devastated when steel plants closed.

That’s why I passed laws moving people from welfare to work, cut taxes for working families and extended health care for wounded troops who’d been neglected.

I approved this message because I’ll never forget those values, and if I have the honor of taking the oath of office as President, it will be with a deep and abiding faith in the country I love.

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The Un-Facebook: New York Times Launches TimesPeople Social Network Beta

From the moment you register with your existing New York Times log-in, you know you’re not on Facebook, MySpace, Ning, Linkedin, Bebo or any of today’s rather plebeian social networks.

Here’s the almost graceful greeting: The TimesPeople Team wishes you a pleasant experience.

The site then invites you to “Share and Discover the Best of NYTimes.com” by sharing articles, videos, blog posts, slideshows, comments, ratings and reviews of movies, restaurant and hotels. In other words, all that newfangled social stuff the grown-up media is yearning to make work.

It was a bit disheartening to search and discover NO FRIENDS were waiting to ping me on TimesPeople. However, it’s early on in this new network, with the launch just hours ago. Surely I won’t be alone here long, wanting fervently to share the latest article on Amy Winehouse or Bush in the Rose Garden.

Currently, TimesPeople is only a (easy and quick) beta release of a Firefox browser add-on. Later on, the public launch will work on all browsers without a plug-in.

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The Tale of Two Bettys, Both Confidential.

This is the tale of two Bettys, both products for women, both with a just-we-girls brand strategy, both looking to chisel an identity in this fiercely competitive and hugely complicated marketplace.  With America’s CPOs –Chief Purchasing Officers – controlling 85% of all purchases, the stakes are high for these tightly targeted products.

One succeeds beautifully.

Let’s start with Betty Beauty. I first heard about this particular kind of follicular-fun from my dear friend,  glam hair stylist, Alicia.  I walked into her salon and found her giggling hysterically.  Then she handed me a small package decorated with a bright magenta triangle and the words: COLOR FOR THE HAIR DOWN THERE.  “FUN” BETTY.  HOT PINK (Rose) 

On the back of the package: FUN IS WHERE YOU FIND IT! GET YOUR BETTY READY!

Lest you think this Betty was destined for the backroom of beauty salons, it turns out that prettying up your pubic hair has gone public in the biggest way possible — via the June issue (hello Bridal Betty) of Oprah’s magazine.  According to beauty editor, Valerie Monroe, she put off getting her Betty ready until the story deadline loomed and finally she had to “match carpet to drapes.”  Amazingly, she admitted to actually liking the new product.  In fact, Ms. Monroe said she was ‘inordinately pleased with my new  (zingy) look.’

Are you ready for the other Betty? This one is a new website for women’s ‘lifestages’ developed by a high profile executive with long experience in the media.  The site features a wide array of writers opining on everything from ‘kissing frogs’ to ‘navigating a career’ to ’shaping a marriage’ or ‘finding you.’  There are message boards called Betty Talk and lots of tips and teasers.  And like Betty #1, the ‘product’ is front and center on the big media outlets like Good Morning America via founder Deborah Perry Piscione.

So there you have it.  The two Bettys. Two contenders for the hearts and minds and Kate Spade purses of America’s 66 million+ time-trapped, stressed, striving and thriving women. 

Did you think I was going to tell you which Betty won my heart and mind? Never mind my preppy striped Kate Spade bag?

Not this time.  You tell me.

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The Church of Apple Gets A New iPod Bible: iLounge Launches The Free iPod + iPhone Book 4.

Now this is droolworthy.
If you worship all things Apple, this brand new version of what has been called the iPod ‘bible’ is bound to ramp up your religiousity a few notches. With 268 pages of bleeding edge content from hot website iLounge.com, this free book is likely to set another record for mondo-millions of downloads. Packed with juicy new information about the iPod, iPhone and iTunes, this sleekly designed and streamlined fourth-edition is, only hours after its launch, already being dubbed iLounge’s best pub yet.

Along with in-depth guides and ratings of more than 1,800 iPod and iPhone-related products, readers will find new cool features like “iDesign Retrospective,” a look at how talented designers created the world’s most impressive iPod accessories, “Sneak Peeks” , exclusive world premieres of 20+ new accessories and even the inevitable “iPhone Baby”, outlining the ways expectant Moms and Dads can get baby hooked on Apple while in utero. 150 iTunes Answers has been reorged and updated, with 100 pages of tips, tricks and pix.

Another inevitable in these days of user-generated-content, but still compelling nonetheless: The Next-Generation iPhone and Photo Galleries: luscious photographs and images submitted by iLounge readers that depict the past, present, and future of Apple’s iPhone family, as well as the latest globe-trotting iPods.

And even better, iLounge made their instant classic hassle-free as well. When you go to the site to download it, you will find a wide variety of options for easy viewing: from desktop to laptop or smaller pocket-size screens, including the iPhone and iPod touch.

Download The Free iPod + iPhone Book 4 in Adobe PDF format at http://www.ilounge.com/book4/.

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Winners and Sinners in the Green Name Grab

Everybody’s out to grab a green name. 

Last year, applications with the word ”green” more than doubled from 2006 to 2007, from 1,100 to 2,400; there were some 900 applications each filed with “clean” and “eco” (up from 800 for “clean” and around 450 for “eco”), and trademarks with “environment” or “enviro” went up from 325 to 450. 

Other words that saw some of the largest jumps in applications were “earth” (increasing 60 percent from 550 to 900), “planet” (a 50 percent increase to more than 400) and “organic” (going from 450 to 700 applications, a 57 percent increase).

These tidbits come from Greenbiz.com, itself a big Winner this year, with a newly launched site redesign that finally does justice to Greener World Media’s pioneering place in the thriving environmental business landscape.  Cleaner and uber-readable, the new look showcases the remarkably robust level of cutting edge content. Joel Makower, with 20+ years as a leading Green Guru, and Pete May, b2b publishing veteran, lead the charge.

Not such good news over at another (formerly) growing green pub.  One of my favorite girly-green sites, Green Girl Guide, will be no more as of June 23rd:

We didn’t want to say goodbye, but a few months ago National Geographic sent us a cease-and-desist letter because of a perceived conflict between our site and NatGeo’s TheGreenGuide.com (Who knew?) and suddenly, what started out as a side-project for three green-minded women suddenly turned into a David and Goliath story of epic proportions. With no resources to fight the geological giant, we’ve decided to part ways.

Thankfully, we sense a new green winner-in-the-works, with the upcoming ecostiletto.com, founded by ex greengirlguider Rachel Lincoln Sarnoff, who wisely hired (my friend) Courtney Owens Zielinski to design the site.

Stay tuned for updates from Sustainable Brands 2008, held right here in eco-paradise Monterey.

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“Getting” The Mom Market: Three Winners

It’s my daughter’s birthday today.  Which means that my Momhood is front and center this morning, as I scroll back, way back to the day before being a Mom was rockstar cool and wearing your kids on your hips is hipper than Prada’s latest.

I remember the day a senior executive (and Mom) took me aside at my new job and whispered: “Never talk about your daughter. Don’t post her pictures. Don’t bring her to the office. No one should even know you have a kid.”

Nowdays, Momism is not only a badge of honor but also a booming business, thanks to some 83 million U.S. Moms who are spending 2 trillion + dollars a year on everything from baby spas www.skinspababy.com to NASCAR umbrella strollers.  Although the whisper in the VC world in Silicon Valley may be that the ‘Mom market is saturated’, the Guru thinks that conversely, the marketplace is going to continue to grow right along with every toddling step these kids take.  

Here are a couple of winners:

www.cubesandcrayons.com Cubes and Crayons, ‘office space and kid space’ is a concept well worth watching.  Launched in January 2008 by frustrated Mom and Founder MF Chapman, this savvy combination of full-time, flexible childcare and office space is already a hit and sure to spawn more mini-Mom communities where both Mom and kidlet benefit.

http://maternalinstinct.net/   Just up the road from Menlo Park’s Cubes and Crayons is Mom-marketing powerhouse Maternal Instinct. The brainchild of award-winning creative marketer, Kat Gordon, this talented team of Creative Problem Solvers knows exactly how to tap into the growing band of Mom Influencers.  Check out ‘What’s My Blanket’ for tips.

And finally, we Moms know that each and every one of our offspring is a creative genius.  Check out this latest winner, where self-publishing meets kids, Tikatok: beta.tikatok.net.

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