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The Future As I See It.In struggling to come up with a suitable topic for the first column of the new year, I was torn between something topical or a conversation I had with a senior intelligence operative on the ramifications of the "Cool American" Campaign. I chose the safer of the two. In a recent post on the forums of AdRants.com ( now you know what I do in my spare time. Rant on other people's web sites) the topic of defining the future came up. Since my daughter turned 3 on January 8th, I thought it worthy of comment. |
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Jasmine loves to dance. In the future an electronic device will read that statement and the URL of this website upon which I publicly posted that information. Instantly it will determine from Network Solutions my name and mailing address. It will store that information until some music company ( perhaps Motown) is smart enough to purchase it and add it to their data base. On my daughter's 4th or 5th birthday, Motown will e-mail me an MP3 of the greatest dance tracks of all time. They will do this in conjunction with a brand that they know my wife buys regularly at the supermarket ( say Coca-Cola) they got from the swipes on her Ralph's Card. |
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THIS BLOG IS
SO COOL THAT I JUST WANT TO THANK YOU. THE ARTICALS ALWAYS MAKE
ME THINK. JEFF D. MEMPHIS |
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EVERY TIME YOU OPEN YOUR MOUTH YOU SEEM TO PUT YOUR FOOT IN IT. WHAT MAKES YOU THINK PEOPLE IN ADVERTISING NEED YOU TO LOOK OVER OUR SHOULDER? WAYNE Q. NEW YORK People in advertising - HW |
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If I download the MP3 file they will make note of it. When my daughter turns 5, Motown and Coca-Cola will invite me to take my daughter to Universal Studios ( right in my zip code) for a free dance lesson with Michael Peters. At this event will be at least 8 other kids from her kindergarden class. All of them will have a great time. The next day I will receive a DVD in the mail from Motown/Coca-Cola/ NBC Universal with my daughter and her friends learning to dance and Michael Peters coaching her on how to dance even better. For the next 12 months Motown/Coca-Cola/ NBC Universal will invite my daughter and her friends to free dance lessons at Universal Studios every Saturday morning, where she can drink free Coca Cola products and dance to Motown's latest music before it is released to the public. Naturally, they will ask my daughter and her friends, which of the dance tracks and artists they liked best. By the time my daughter is ten, she will have a room full of Motown/Coca-Cola/ NBC Universal/United Airlines posters and trophies from dance competitions all over the Western States and be eligible for a full dance scholarship to the Motown/Coca-Cola/ NBC Universal/Microsoft High School Of Performing Arts, Hollywood Campus. Since she will be in the Motown/Coca-Cola/ NBC Universal/United Airlines/ Actors Equity Talent Bank she will be automatically cast for the Sponsored Roadshows of the Motown/Coca-Cola/ NBC Universal/United Airlines/Microsoft "Fame Shower of Young Stars" that will compete with the Warner Bros. Music/Pepsi/Fox/ United Airlines "American Idol Sing-A-Thon for the allowance money of sub teens and tweens all across America. This means we will only get to see her one weekend a month during the summer. But that will be fine, because we will be enrolled in the Motown/Coca-Cola/ NBC Universal/United Airlines/Microsoft/Merrill-Lynch "So She Wants To Be A Star" Summer Theatrical Management Workshops three nights a week and kept busy with the Microsoft Media Fan Management software app that lets us forward her personal MP4 Thank You Dance Video to those hundreds of teenybops that go to her shows and think she's their new word for "all that. Did I mention that Microsoft will covertly be porting all of those email addresses to their own data base for future exploitation? And when Motown/Coca-Cola/ NBC Universal/United Airlines/ Microsoft/ Actors Equity/SAG/Sony creates a digital licensed composite of Diana Ross+Celine Dion+Beonce's voice with a Michael Jackson at 12 topnote for her to lipsync to professionally when she hits 16, they will each have a special place in my heart for making my daughter's dream ( which they created) come true. And, quite naturally, my wife and I will invest 40% of her earnings in the Motown/Coca-Cola/ NBC Universal/United Airlines/ Microsoft/Sony/ Merrill-Lynch Entertainment Fund tracking stock to show our undying gratitude. That is the future. And advertising will have not one thing to do with it. Pity.
Write If You Get Work. One of the things I never seem to get around to doing is using this space to promote the exceedingly good taste of those people who upon occasion employ my services. I thought that this would be as good a time as any because this particular assignment came from someone who reads this publication and made contact through e-mail. That's not usually how I get work. My preferred method is through my agents in New York, Chicago or San Francisco. That way I don't have to deal with the preliminaries and I can just focus on delivering the goods. These guys were all the way different. When I found out what they were bringing to market, I could understand why their need to play it close to the vest. This group from Stanford, MIT and Wharton had developed a television rating system. That's right boys and girls. They had a product that was positioned to go after one of the nation's biggest monopolies. The Neilsens. So far I've been on the job for sixty days and I must say what I have seen in the test beds has blown me away. It's no secret that the current Neilsen subscribers are less than satisfied with the status quo. The recent flap over Hispanic weighting in the Los Angeles ADI is just one of many issues that have been dealt with in both an arrogant and high-handed manner. These guys are about to change everything.
Stay Tuned. |
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MARKETERS
FROM OGILVY
& MATHER ADRANTS BANK
OF AMERICA DELTA
AIR LINES And
You. |