The Wall Street Journal recently ran an article about proposed regulation of TV product placement disclosure that would have significant relevance for the growing web video business of advertiser sponsored, viral video campaigns.

The gist of the article is that the FCC is looking into requiring TV shows to include notices similar to what political candidates must say before or after campaign ads.

“You shouldn’t need a magnifying glass to know who’s pitching you,” said FCC Commissioner Jonathan Adelstein. “A crawl at the end of the show shrunk down so small the human eye can’t read it isn’t really in the spirit of the law.” Current rules require disclosure but allow it at the end of the show. (more…)

NPR’s Claude Brodesser recently asked Wired Magazine’s Chris Anderson for his thoughts on the size and effectiveness of movie marketing budgets. Claude suggested that the new Indiana Jones movie was so highly anticipated, had such awareness and pedigree that despite opening to over $311 million worldwide, Paramount must have overspent in its $100 million plus marketing campaign. Right?

Nobody knows anything.

Oscar-winning screenwriter William Goldman’s famous dictum about Hollywood starts to answer the question, Chris Anderson completes it. (more…)

Tip of the hat to Kirk Skodis who turned me on to Mitch Joel’s blog, Six Pixels of Separation. In anticipation of this week’s Advertising 2.0 panel in New York, Mitch’s macro perspective on the value of Social Media has added relevance:

What if everything we knew about Marketing and Advertising until now really was just an anomaly…maybe what we’re really seeing with Social Media and Web 2.0 is how Marketing, Advertising and Communications was really meant to work… even as traditional agencies continue to clamp on to business as usual. (more…)

My recent post “Economic Constipation and Digital Malnutrition” was an attempt to critically analyze Mark Cuban’s provocative May 4th post entitled “The Ala Carting of Video on the Net - Will it lead to disaster?”.

Incidentally, it was my most trafficked day and much to my surprise, I received a comment from one of my favorite bloggers, Hank Williams, who writes the influential whydoeseverythingsuck.com?”

Mark’s post has sparked a debate that has spilled over from the circle of web video bloggers into a broader conversation. Next week I’m in New York for the Advertising 2.0 event and plan to bring Mark’s position, and my rebuttal, to the panel on which I’m speaking. (more…)

Despite its cliche, the question of “what is the next version of the web” provokes as intense a debate as you’ll find within digital circles. Web 3.0 definitions vary wildly with any number of partisan descriptions coming from very smart, yet fundamentally biased people.

These descriptions are all forward thinking, yet intrinsically flawed. They neglect that versioning, or defining the next version of the web, isn’t just about software or hardware. It’s about culture.

(more…)

Let’s make a bet.

I’ll bet that by the time you’re halfway through watching the below video your commercial instinct will suggest that what you’re watching is a piece of marketing material. I’ll also bet that you’re going to keeping watching until the video is over. It’s that good. (more…)

I admire Mark Cuban and not just because he helped me find God. He’s got chutzpah. His basketball team loses again in the first round of the playoffs, he fires his coach and then he goes out and writes a semi-apocalyptic blog post about the disastrous effects of web video distribution.

Cuban is working from Craig Moffett’s report for Bernstein Research entitled “And Now for the News…The Emperor has no Clothes,” which raises real questions about the economic viability of web based video entertainment content. It’s an important report because it highlights the stagnation in web economics that more people are becoming aware of and the future that this stagnation suggests. (more…)

Nothing as far as I can tell.

But if you figure something out please let me know. Just thought I’d send some pics out from day one of the Int’l Auto Show here in Lisbon. It was set-up in the morning and press only in the afternoon. Pretty light crowd, but I had a good view. Take a look. If you make it to the end of the slideshow you’ll see a few shots of the Megaphone screen. (more…)

Heavy dose of travel this week. I’m in Lisbon for the Portuguese International Auto Show. MegaPhone has an installation at the Fiat booth which we’re deploying today. MegaPhone is one of the early-stage technology companies that SDG both has an ownership position in and represents as a client for entertainment & media. They design software that allows for multi-player, casual gaming on big screens through a simple phone call. Check out the MTV demo in Times Square here. It’s a ground breaking product that has caught the eye of several agencies and brands interested in cutting through the clutter to communicate directly with their audience. The European response to MegaPhone has been phenomenal and I expect that this event be be the first of many.

I’m in Chicago for the Ad Age event, Marketing at the Movies. I’m particularly interested in how new technologies are being used to enhance the moviegoing experience from a advertising perspective.

How’s that for an oxymoron? (more…)