Got a blog tip? Contact us

« May 2005 | Main | July 2005 »

Peoples Jeans campaign

A few months ago, I was on a panel with a guy who presented an awesome idea for marketing a nonexistent product, Peoples Jeans. The basic pitch is summarized on a fake corporate website created by an rtmark-like collective that calls itself Conglomco:

Put simply, Peoples Jeans markets clothing that has previously been worn by actual people, whose greatest asset is their lived experience.

Migrant agricultural workers, factory workers, prisoners, and populations in economically stressed urban communities have more to offer than cheap labor. They offer us authentic human experience, which is in short supply in today's fashion industry. We have found a way to capitalize on this underutilized asset in order to give consumers the authentic experience that they can't find elsewhere.

The last I heard, Conglomco was pitching this to retail giants like Diesel to try to get them to bite. I'm guessing they haven't had much luck, because the site hasn't been updated in months. But it probably won't be the last we hear from Conglomco.

RSS feeds survey

Update 7/26/05: Thanks for the feedback. Since the response was about 50/50, divided between those who favor excerpts and those who favor full posts, we're going to stick with excerpts for now. If Typepad comes up with more options for RSS feeds, maybe we'll offer full posts in the future.

Technical query alert: For those of you reading this via a news reader (most of you?), I'm debating whether to switch our RSS feeds from excerpts to full posts. If you have an opinion, let me know. I set the RSS feeds on "excerpt" originally because we want to encourage people to look at the actual blog... 1, because links to the magazine, back issues, and merchandise are on there....2, because unless people click-through to the blog, we don't get stats on what they're reading... 3, Newsreaders make all feeds look the same and can therefore get disorienting. (I don't know about you all but I often forget which blog I'm looking at when reading my feeds.)

But as a blog reader myself, I find excerpts annoying. Sometimes they don't make sense without the images, and I wonder whether including full posts might encourage people to actually read more. If we did this, though, I'd probably bug you more often to buy stuff from us. I always feel kinda pathetic doing that, but I'm too old to still be working 30 hrs a week for free (15 would be more like it...).

If you care strongly about this, leave a comment or email me at carrie (at) stayfreemagazine.org.

And for those of you who have no idea what I'm talking about, I'd strongly recommend trying a newsreader out. Once you start using one, it seems impossible to read things on the web without it. There are a bunch of recommended readers listed here.  I use Bloglines myself; it has it's share of  problems but at least it's easy.

This land is your land (reprise)

After a series of shitty Supreme Court decisions, I was psyched to see one developer's response to the eminent domain case -- you know, the ruling that says that the government can take over your house if some corporation offering promising greater tax revenue wants it. The deciding vote was cast by Justice David Souter. So Logan Darrow Clements, a private developer in The Towne of Weare, New Hampshire, is seeking to build a hotel on Souter's house:

The proposed development, called "The Lost Liberty Hotel" will feature the "Just Desserts Café" and include a museum, open to the public, featuring a permanent exhibit on the loss of freedom in America...

"This is not a prank" said Clements, "The Towne of Weare has five people on the Board of Selectmen. If three of them vote to use the power of eminent domain to take this land from Mr. Souter we can begin our hotel development."

(Via Boing Boing)

Real Men of Idiocy

Today I stumbled upon a press release indicating that Bud Light's Real Men of Genius campaign had won the "world's most prestigious advertising award" at the Cannes Lion Ad Festival. I must point out that handing out an award in Cannes does not immediately grant it the cachet of that city's film festival. Just ask the Corvette Hall of Fame which is NEAR Cooperstown, New York.

Now, I've been amused by several entries in what was a cleverly conceived radio campaign. But they've clearly gotten weaker, occasionally offensive (for example, one mocking carb counters), and one that has truly angered me: humiliating those who would apply sunscreen with a very high SPF. (mp3 available via KsiToyko)

The ad's "joke" is based on a dangerous misconception--that SPF equals the number of hours you can stay in the sun. It doesn't. The truth is, SPF is very difficult to explain. The guideline used to be, take the amount of time it would normally take you to burn, and multiply it by the SPF, which showed how long you could stay out with that sunscreen applied. But this isn't really accurate, and has encouraged people to stay in the sun longer if they are using a higher SPF. This was not the FDA's goal. Closer to the truth is that the greater the SPF, the higher the percentage of UVB rays that are blocked.

I'm not a dermatologist or an FDA scientist. This is all information available to anyone with an Internet connection. Clearly the ad copywriter could have done a little homework. But the whole concept should have been shot down. If one person buys a lower-SPF sunscreen because of this ad, then shame on you, Anheuser-Busch.

This summer, liberally and regularly apply a high-SPF sunscreen, wear a hat, shirt, and sunglasses, and drink a different brand of beer.

Accutron 2000

The robot thing below just reminded me something I wrote years ago (circa 1996) about Accutron 2000, the Matador Records robot. It was for Matador's newsletter and, lo and behold, it's still online.

No idea what Accutron 2000 is up to now. Last I heard, he was laid off and converted into an end table.

Robot to robot marketing

A couple of Stay Frees ago, we interviewed a man who creates robots for corporate marketing. These days, robot man has a lot of company. Several firms have sprouted up with hi-tech creatures designed to sell things to consumers, whether by cuddling with them, chatting them up, modeling clothes, or working as animated billboards. A Japanese company has even introduced in-store mannequins that do doubletime as spies.

Of course, we've known for some time that robots work for Fortune 500 companies. Usually, they're placed in public relations departments, where they churn out press releases and respond to journalist queries about the side effects of Vioxx or Philip Morris' (Altria's) charitable efforts.

But the neobots are on the frontlines, interacting with "end users." And they are only the beginning. The ultimate goal of sellers is not only to turn marketers into robots but consumers as well. This is the fantasy behind neuromarketing. By studying the human brain, corporations hope to uncover reliable methods for making us buy what they want us to buy.

Instead, what they really ought to do is build consumer robots specifically designed to interact with with the advertising robots, sparing humanity the burden... a win-win situation!

New from Stay Free! magazine

I just posted Eugene Mirman's "About Town" column from the latest issue (#24). Mr. Mirman reviews Brooklyn restaurants, but this is worth reading even if you plan to never step foot in Brooklyn or its restaurant 'cos Eugene is brilliant. From the introduction:

Carroll Gardens, Cobble Hill, Boerum Hill and Park Slope are beautiful neighborhoods filled with everything from delicious restaurants to shops that sell weird crappy glass things from Europe. Hey, do you know where I could get a children's shoe made of silver to hang in my kitchen? Yes, there are five stores for that. Where can a guy go to get a glass penis with eagle wings (hand crafted in Vermont!)? Where can't you buy that, fuckface? Is there an accessories store whose tag line is "Peace is always in fashion"? Yes. Finally, a skirt that says (through its spirit of design), "We should not have entered Iraq under false pretenses," or a pair of mittens that frown upon America's actions in Chile. Come with me on an adventure through BOCOCA (Boerum Hill, Cobble Hill, Carroll Gardens) and Park Slope. Pretend I am an unmagic, 30-year-old male Mary Poppins, who has no interest in child care, but instead loves fish and steak. Come with me on this adventure and let's enter a world of deliciousness and betrayal (except the betrayal). (CONTINUED)

Eugene is a local comic, whose record you should pick up forthwith. He he just got back from touring with Patton Oswalt, so New Yorkers can catch him on Wednesdays at Cinema Classics. (Schedule here.)

No, I'm happy to see you

Newsweek reports that, taking a page from the Wonderbra, manufacturers are designing men's underwear to give more lift (but presumably not to separate).

The article has reviews of package-enhancing briefs, including some that feel "like wearing your mother's underwear." I don't know the reviewer so ... is that a good thing? Are they roomy? Silky? Incredibly creepy? Newsweek doesn't let on, and if I try to figure it out next Thanksgiving, it would be the last one I spend with family.

Still, it is certainly easier than some other ways of creating the illusion of size.

Print and stick fun, Biblical edition

So my friend Galen was thinking about the case in Cobb County Georgia, where a US District court judge recently ruled against their practice of placing disclaimer stickers on textbooks that contained content on evolution. Those stickers read:

"This textbook contains material on evolution. Evolution is a theory, not a fact, regarding the origin of living things. This material should be approached with an open mind, studied carefully and critically considered."

Though the judge ruled against the disclaimer stickers, this is far from over. In an effort to clarify how incredibly unconstitutional it is to dictate a religious belief in a state-supported and run public school, Galen had the idea of making similar stickers for Bibles. Seems fair, if you ask me. So now, instead of wasting all the time and money in court, the next time this comes up the states can save a lot of hassle by letting the Fundamentalists sticker all the textbooks they want, as long as there's an equal stickering of Bibles.

Just to get things started, I've taken the liberty of making  a sticker for anyone who wants to print them out and do some Bible stickering. Try your hotel drawers, or even your preferred house of worship! It's fun!

Ratman Begins

An odd Q&A with the Darth Sidious of NBA owners, Bruce Ratner, appeared in the New York Times Magazine this weekend. Is he TRYING to come across as a bad-guy pro wrestler? He sings the praises of "advertisements all over the place" in stadiums, badmouths buses, belittles panhandlers, and happily admits to having not been a basketball fan. And somewhere in there, a cautionary tale: As you age and become successful, idealism can vanish if you're not vigilant.

Fight the good fight against him, Brooklyn. But as a New Jerseyan, I can only say, good riddance.

Junk Foods Against Obesity

When Armageddon comes, fast food clowns will dress up as fitness instructors and cola companies will write nutrition guidelines for schools... Oh wait, that day is already here, at least judging from this new batch of corporate "health" websites.

Coca-Cola's Step Challenge - "Promoting Health and Fighting Obesity" by marketing Coke-branded pedometers in schools. Coke, of course, continues to fight for its right to sell flavored sugar water in elementary school lunch rooms. Drink up, kids, then walk it off! Don't miss Coke's tips for getting in shape:  #8: "Window-Shop 'Til you Drop: Do a couple of laps around the shopping mall...before you stop in." And (my favorite), #9: "If you and your family are glued to the TV, get up and walk around the room during commercial breaks."

PepsiCo says its "wide spectrum of products can be part of a balanced diet."

PepsiCo, Health Is Power - This site encourages schools to sell as many Pepsi products as possible so they can earn "prizes" like Pepsi-branded pedometers. Pepsi: Where a "balanced diet" is washing your Baked Lays and granola bars down with Tropicana.

McDonald's Go Active - Man, Ronald is looking skinny these days. No doubt it's the McDonald's-branded pedometer.But someone obviously got confused when writing this site. Ronald's Online Coloring Book is "For those days when you can’t go outside to play" but notice the doozy of a disclaimer at the bottom of the page:  "This site is intended for adults only and is not intended for use by children of any age. This site does not provide medical or any other health care advice. " Oh, really?

General Mills' Choose Breakfast - Unlike competitor Kraft, General Mills doesn't shy away from touting the nutritional value of its cereals (Trix, Lucky Charms, Cocoa Puffs) and plans to promote them in its new campaign. "We think kids should be eating cereal, including presweetened cereal," a spokesman told the Wall Street Journal. Naturally the food industry's PR wing applauds the campaign. As one tool put it, "Most kids breakfast cereals are better than no breakfast at all."  Yeah, and most kids breakfast cereals are better than getting punched in the head or devoured by robots, but why set the standard so low?

The Beverage Institute for Health and Wellness - Another Coke site, but this one's devoted specifically to "Helping people all over the world live healthier lives through beverages." Because human evolution really sped up after fluids were introduced to our diet. Thanks, Coke.

There are more but you get the idea. The one thing I want to point out about these campaigns is that, while most adults know fast food and soda isn't good for you, that fact is largely beside the point. For one thing, most of this stuff is targeting kids but, more importantly, marketers' goal isn't to persuade. They know that when people stop to think about nutrition, they'll realize whole wheat and salad is better than fried chicken and sugar pops. Their goal is, rather, to make sure that the first image that comes to mind when somebody says McDonald's is a seductive one. When you think of McDonald's, do you think "tasty convenience" or "greasy liposuction"?

If album covers were advertisements

Update (6/28/05): Thanks to all the negative publicity, Nike has cancelled its ad campaign and issued an apology.

After the unfortunate news spread that Nike has ripped off a Minor Threat album cover for a new ad campaign, some enterprising readers of I Love Music tried to imagine what other well-known album covers would look like if advertisers got a hold of them. There are loads of funny examples here so check 'em out.

(Thanks, Robin Edgerton and Lyle Hysen)

Critical Mass, June

IT IS UNLAWFUL TO RIDE A BICYCLE IN A PROCESSION ON THE PUBLIC STREETS WITHIN NEW YORK CITY

I missed last month's ride (and I'm unfortunately going to be out of town for July's) but this month's was significantly different from April. I'm guessing it's the weather that brought so many more riders out (although the ride in April was on a fine day) because the rides just have a natural tendency to swell during the warmer months. This time during the rally speeches at Union Square, the Community Affairs cops were handing out flyers "request[ing our] cooperation in complying with the law and protecting the public from harm." The fliers go on to inform us we need a permit for any "bicycle procession" and that one has not been issued for June 24, therefore "if you choose to ride in a procession this evening, you may be arrested and your bicycle may be seized."

I saw more than one person crumble it up and throw it in the trash disgustedly. The speeches ended around 7:30 when their permit ran out and the bikers only millled for maybe 10 minutes more (as opposed to the twenty or thirty it took in April) before the ride took off.  April's ride was maybe 50 bikes; this ride was closer to 300 or 400. It followed Broadway to Houston and then west to 6th Ave, at which point it took over the road completely, cheered on by crowds on the sidewalks. Somewhere around the high teens, the scooter police showed up -- easily a dozen of them -- and trailed the ride,  keeping their distance. An unmarked police SUV joined them a few blocks later. The ride then moved further west in the low 30s to 8th Ave all the way north to the 50's, then back east for a few loops through Columbus Circle. Again, the police stayed at the tail of the ride and I was beginning to think they were going to let it happen and maybe even keep the cross traffic in check.

At this point -- and it was hard to see from my vantage -- I think a fair number of riders left the Circle and headed up Broadway while the majority chose Central Park West. I don't know what happened to the riders who went up Broadway. At 65th, the ride turned east through the park and out to the East Side. Now, at this point, the ride's been going along smoothly for probably close to an hour. I'm convinced the cops are going to let it go, because what's the point after letting people ride that long? In April, they did everything in their power to break it up at every turn: calling ahead to cruisers to cut bikers off, aggresively riding their scooters up into the pack of bicycle riders, sending out a helicopter to track the last of the riders into the night.

Obviously, I was wrong. As the front of the pack slowed to wait for the southbound traffic on Park Ave, the ride got caught up in a stop on 65th between Park and Madison. For reasons known only to them, the cops at the tail decided they'd had enough. I was fortunately on the sidewalk at this point with my camera, so I saw it, but I unfortunately got only a few seconds of it on film, as I was moving fast to get out of their way. Without warning, the scooters moved quickly up into the back of the ride and each cop cutoff a cyclist, forcing them to dismount and drop their bike on the ground. They arrested 6 riders and as far as I can tell, let the whole of the ride in front of them go.

I stayed behind to shoot the arrests, so I don't know what happened to the rest of the ride. By my count, 12 police on scooters stopped to arrest 6 riders. By the time additional cruisers and trucks arrived, there were nearly 30 police on hand. I don't pretend to understand the point of their actions. Maybe they thought it was clever to lull everybody into thinking the ride was going to happen without a hitch. Maybe they just got sick of following us and had to arrest somebody to fill a quota. The good thing is the ride continues and the city didn't have as many police assigned to it this time, so they weren't able to stop it completely the way they did in April. I hope that's a sign for the future. I'll hopefully have a bit of the video footage put together later in the week for everybody to see.

Quick links

One Group of Doctors Changes Its Ways
Great story about how anesthesiologists have found a novel way of lowering the costs of medical-malpractice insurance: by improving patient safety.

The Nuts and Bolts--but Mostly Nuts--of Scientology
A handy summary of the group's history and its methods, by Daniel Radosh

What's the Worst Ad Song Every?
Slate readers' nominations for the most ridiculous use of pop songs in commercials.

The Chiffons v. George Harrison

I pulled out a Chiffons CD the other day, a collection called The Best of the Chiffons, which I hadn't listened to it since posting about the group's lawsuit (in the 1970s) against George Harrison, alleging copyright infringment.

Anyway, this will amuse maybe five of you but the fourth song on the CD is a cover of Harrison's "My Sweet Lord" (mp3). Yes, the song the Chiffons claimed was an infringement of "He's So Fine" is considered one of their "best"!

Fair Use: use it or lose it

Exercising your fair use rights is easy! Here is Stay Free!'s reenactment of the deleted Mad Hot Ballroom scene. You won't get arrested for putting this in your movie (but your movie will suck). Courtesy of Steve Lambert

I want to point out something about my Mad Hot Ballroom interview because there is a lot of confusion about these kind of copyright disputes. I've said it before but I'll say it again: there is no law requiring filmmakers to clear everything that these filmmakers cleared. The Mad Hot people did so on the advice of their lawyers and lawyers as a rule are extremely risk averse. Their conservatism may seem to benefit their client in the short run, but in the long run everybody (except the Warner Chappells of the world) lose out.

Indie filmmakers don't have much power in using copyrighted works, but they do have fair use. And since so much of intellectual property practices are based on habits rather than laws, when it comes to fair use, we've got to use it or lose it. Copyright reform can't be done by activists and legislators alone. Creative people have to be willing to stand up for the First Amendment by standing up for fair use.

I don't mean to pick on the Mad Hot folks; they did an awesome job on the movie. But the excised clip featuring Ronnie's soundbite is a perfect example of spineless lawyering run amok. The chance of Warner Chappell actually suing over this is close to zero. They're not morons. In the unlikely event that Warner Chappell did sue, our filmmakers have to spend a couple of painful years in court. True. But their fellow documentarians and artists couldn't have asked for a better test case.

Related post (12/21/05): Documentary films and fair use.

How did Mad Hot Ballroom survive the copyright cartel?

When Agrelo and Sewell were filming boys playing foosball after school, Ronnie (right) at one point shouted, "Everybody dance now!", a line from a C+C Music Factory hit. Incredibly, the filmmakers' lawyer said the line had to be cleared with the song's publisher, Warner Chappell. The price? $5,000.

Answer: by limiting music that played in classrooms, haggling over clearance fees, and cutting out a scene.

Okay, some background: I saw Mad Hot Ballroom a few weeks ago with a couple of friends and we all fell in love with it. The documentary, directed by Park Sloper Marilyn Agrelo, follows New York public school kids in a citywide a ballroom dancing competition. If you haven't yet seen it, you should run out and do so.

One of the things that amazed me about the movie was how the filmmakers were able to clear so much music on an indie budget. Those of you who follow this blog or who read the Untold Stories report know what I'm talking about: clearing song rights for films has become close to impossible for small documentary films, thanks to the exorbitant rates copyright holders demand.

To find out how the makers of Mad Hot Ballroom dealt with copyright clearances, I talked to producer/writer Amy Sewell by phone last month.

* * * *

Stay Free!: There's so much music in your movie, I'm wondering: did you think about copyright before you decided to do this film?

VIEW CLIP #1 Due to the high costs of music clearances, some songs -- such as Peggy Lee's "Fever" -- were used repeatedly. VIEW CLIP #2 This second clip is gratuitous. I'm including it 'cos Wilson and Elsymia are so damn cute.

Amy Sewell: No, and naïveté worked well for me! If I had known all that I had to go through, I'm not sure I would have done it. I read a book about clearances and started clearing the music by myself, but ended up bringing in Mark Reynolds to help. We cleared almost 50 songs before we started filming. American Ballroom Theater, which sponsors the courses and competitions, had a list of songs they use so we took that list and saw what we could clear and for what price. We narrowed that down and went back to American Ballroom Theater and asked them to use only these songs, because source background music can't be edited out easily or cheaply. If a song we couldn't clear -- like "Hit the Road Jack" -- was playing on a boom box, we would have had to cut the scene.

Stay Free!: Did you license the songs for a particular time period, or did you get them for perpetuity?

Sewell: We first cleared music for two years for festival use, and then went back and negotiated for worldwide commercial use in all media, for perpetuity. It was extremely expensive. For most films, music licensing is 1 to 10 percent of the production budget; ours came in at 45 percent: $140,000.

The biggest problem was granting Most Favored Nation status. [Granting a rights holder Most Favored Nation status requires giving them the highest fee you pay for a comparable song. For example, if Warner Chappell asks $10,000 for a clip but you have to license a Sony clip for $12,000, you'd have to also give Warner Chappell $12,000 if it has MFN status. - ed.] I would only agree to that for the classics. Things like Frank Sinatra hits.

I wasn't going to edit or cut any music, so I would continue to negotiate everything down until we could afford it. I'm sure I annoyed people in the music industry. But the industry should have a different set of standard for documentary films. We're not Applebee's.

Stay Free!: When you explain that this is for a low-budget documentary, does that matter to rights people?

Sewell: They do have discounts but the costs are still heavy. As a businesswoman, I don't blame them for making money. I just think the prices should be fair.

Stay Free!: There's a scene where a woman's cell phone rings and she has the "Rocky" theme ring tone. I noticed that you even cleared that! I would have thought that could be an example of fair use.

Sewell: I thought so too. It's only six seconds! But our lawyer said we needed to clear it. So I called Sprint, which owns the ring tone master rights, and they gave it to me for free because they saw it as product placement. But then I called EMI, which owns the publishing rights and they asked for $10,000. I said no way--even the classics weren't getting that much. Luckily, we were able to get it for less.

Stay Free!: How much did it cost for the average song?

Sewell: It depends on how many entities are attached to it. Our typical total cost for a classic was about $15,000-20,000, split between publisher and master rights. With the Rocky theme, the publishers didn't want to overexpose the song. That was the issue with Ray Charles' "Hit the Road Jack" as well.

Stay Free!: He should have thought of that before he did all those lousy Pepsi commercials.

Sewell: But "Hit the Road Jack" was special for him. His lawyer said, "I don't care if you were the president and had half a million dollars, you're not going to get this song." There are two songs Ray Charles seldom granted rights to, "Hit the Road, Jack" and "God Bless America." I love that: "Hit the Road" is right there with "God Bless America."

Stay Free!: There was also a scene with a TV on, and a commercial was on the TV. Did you clear that?

Sewell: That was unidentifiable, so we had to run it by another lawyer for our errors and omissions insurance. (You have to buy insurance to cover all the things in the movie that might be subject to legal questions.) Our lawyers and the insurance agent agreed that it was fair use, though, because it was unidentifiable and on the screen for less than 10 seconds.

Stay Free!: Were there any other inconvenient clearances you had to deal with?

Sewell: Well, we had to watch out for billboards and Frito-Lay trucks all the time. But I usually didn't care, we would just shoot. The biggest danger with clearances is when they interfere with documenting real life. Something spontaneous like a cell phone ringing is different than a planned event. If filmmakers have to worry about these things, documentaries will cease to be documentaries! What happens when the girls go shopping and there's music playing in the stores? We were lucky because in our movie the music wasn't identifiable, but otherwise what are we supposed to do: walk up to the store manager and say, "Excuse me but can you turn off your radio?"

Stay Free!: What about that scene where the teachers start dancing after their meeting? And the one were the kids went up on the rock and danced. Those seemed like they might have been staged.

Sewell: No, we didn't tell anyone what to do. The kids went up there on their own. And after the meeting, somebody put on a disco song and the teachers broke out in dance. We thought it was funny.

Stay Free!: Were there any scenes you had to cut out of the film because of copyright?

Sewell: When we were down shooting the boys playing foosball, Ronnie yelled out, "Everybody dance now!" Just when I think we've finished the film, someone points out that we have to clear that because it's a "visual vocal cue." So I went back to the publishers, and the first publisher, Spirit, says they'll throw it in with the other things we've cleared if Warner Chappell throws it in. But Warner Chappell said, "Look, we've cut you some nice deals, we can't give this to you." They said this three-second bit would cost $5,000. And since they had Most Favored Nation status it would have raised the cost on similar uses, like the Rocky ring-tone. So I went back to lawyer and said we should keep it in because this should be a poster child for fair use. But he didn't recommend taking on the music industry. Those corporations have too much money for us to play Norma Rae our first time out.

Stay Free!: You guys should have done it and then gone to the EFF if Warner Chappell threatened you. For a clear fair use like this, lawyers are often willing to work pro bono. And the negative publicity would have scared Warner Chappell off.

Sewell: Yeah, I know, but more than anything else, it's the fear factor. That's what's discouraging.

UPDATE 6/22/05: FAIR USE: USE IT OR LOSE IT

SEE ALSO (12/21/05): Documentary films and fair use.

Real limited world

Sunday's New York Times had an article about cities vying for the chance to host The Real World that includes this knee-snapper by an MTV drone: "Philadelphia, more than any city I know, recognized they really need 'The Real World."

That may be true of, say, the Mayor or the city's PR department. But according to former Stay Free! intern/Philadelphia scenester Ryan Creed, the cool places in Philadelphia "needed" The Real World so badly that the crew kept gettting turned away at the door. The cast was forced to go to the same fame-whoring clubs over and over while the Philadelphia's real world marched on without MTV's cameras intruding.

If the Real World wants to shake things up, they should send those kids to the real world. Am I the only one who wants to see Real World Lahore?

Who Owns Culture?

This is probably old news for all you New Yorkers, but in March the New York Public Library hosted a conversation called "Who Owns Culture?" with songwriter Jeff Tweedy, of Wilco, and Lawrence Lessig - copyright lawyer, chairman of Creative Commons and my drinking buddy (not really). Carrie's headache, Steven Johnson, serves as a moderator. The downloadable video includes a presentation by Lawrence Lessig that's worth watching if you want a good overview on the whole copyright thing. On whole the conversation covers a lot of interesting ground. And Steven Johnson isn't so bad as a moderator either.

I put off blogging this for a very long time.

Why did I wait so long to blog this? The event you're scant sentences from reading about happened months ago-- yet some lingering vestiges of propriety, modesty,  decorum, and, yes, perhaps shame, have caused me to keep this a secret. But no more.

Gentle webbrowsers and assorted timewasters, I would like to present to you The Little Twisted Tissue and Earwax Man What Was Birthed Unintentionally Out of My Ear. Sometimes I call him Mr.Waxman.

His birth was as follows: feeling that my ears could use a bit of maintenance, and, lacking a Q-Tip or anything sufficently swablike, I DIY'd myself a bit of twisted tissue and plunged it into my ear canal. After some satisfying rooting around, I withdrew it and (of course) looked at it.

Normally, I look at things I pull out of my ear for satisfyingly large amounts of earwax, which I then use  as kindling to stoke my already out-of-control ego. This time, I was met with a small, cheerful face looking back at me.

I was stunned. The strikingly facial arrangement of earwax clods happened entirely by chance-- I swear I did no arrangement or manipulation whatsoever. I am ashamed to admit I spoke to it, just to see.

Today my progeny lives stuck in the join of a men's room stall bracket and the tile wall-- and he looks just as anthropomorphic as the day I extracted him from my ear.

So, people of the internet, I ask you now to make this new comrade feel at home. I can't help but feel we should expect great things.

UPDATE: The response has made me see how selfish I am to keep Mr.Waxman to myself. He's now for sale on  eBay.

Action Alert: Help fight the broadcast flag

UPDATE (6/22/05) FROM EFF VIA BOING BOING. Thanks to all everyone's effort, we're winning!

I try to be discriminating with action alerts, so suffice it to say that when we post one here we think it's pretty important.

If you live in the following states, please take a minute to contact your senator about the broadcast flag legislation discussed below (courtesy of Public Knowledge). These call only take a few seconds; you either leave a message in voice mail or ask a secretary to write down your name as opposed. Painless!

MS, AK, PA, NM, MO, KY, MT, AL, NH, UT, ID, TX, OH, KS, CO, WV, HI, VT, IA, MD, NV, WI, WA, ND, CA, IL, SD, LA

FROM PUBLIC KNOWLEDGE:

We won the broadcast flag case, but this thing just won't die!  You've
heard that some in Congress want to bless the FCC and reinstate the
broadcast flag, but how could they do such a thing without even a hearing
or without us all knowing?

Public Knowledge has discovered that the "powers-that-be" may attempt to
sneak the broadcast flag onto a spending bill.  That's right, we've heard
word that The Senate Committee on Appropriations (the committee that
decides how your tax dollars are spent, or appropriated) will be
considering the spending bill **TOMORROW**, and that broadcast flag may be
hitching a ride as an amendment.  Without any debate, the content
protection scheme could be added to a bill that was originally meant to
spend money--not protect content.

We need your help right now!  If you live in one of the following states:

  MS, AK, PA, NM, MO, KY, MT, AL, NH, UT, ID, TX, OH, KS, CO, WV, HI, VT,
  IA, MD, NV, WI, WA, ND, CA, IL, SD, LA

one of your Senators is on the Appropriations Committee, and they need to
hear from you **TODAY**.  Click here to find out your Senator's phone
number here...

http://www.publicknowledge.org/resources/us-senate-approps-109

...pick up the phone now, and ask your Senator to oppose any broadcast flag
appropriations amendments.  The following talking points should help:

* There has been No Debate in the Appropriations Committee over the
  Broadcast Flag.

* No Government Mandated DRM: Content protection is one thing, but
  government mandated content protection that puts the FCC in the
  role of gatekeeper for new technologies is wrong.  There are
  other options for protecting content, and the marketplace should
  sort them out.

* Broadcast Flag is Not Narrow: There is no “narrow” way to implement
  the broadcast flag scheme because it necessarily puts the FCC in
  the role of gatekeeper, having to approve and certify every
  technology that might carry DTV - computers, cellphones,
  gameboys, etc.  As proof of the broad scope of the flag, when
  petitioned to exempt lawful uses of digital television, the FCC
  declined saying “practical and legal difficulties of determining
  which types of broadcast content merit protection from
  indiscriminate redistribution and which do not.”

* Causes Consumer Confusion and Will Slow DTV Transition: At a time
  when Congress is concerned about making television sets obsolete
  at the end of the DTV transition, the flag would similarly render
  obsolete much consumer equipment because commonly used devices
  will not work together unless all use the same copy protection
  technology.  The flag will not help the transition to DTV, and
  indeed might harm it because it makes consumers’ TVs less
  functional than before.

* Limits Fair Use: As the May 11, 2005 Congressional Research Service
  report noted, the flag will prevent important fair uses, like the
  ability of teachers to engage in distance learning and the
  ability of individuals to email fair use portions of works to
  themselves and others.

* Not about P2P: The infringement associated with Revenge of the Sith
  and other movies that have appeared online has absolutely nothing
  to do with the flag.  Rather, the flag is about protecting
  supposedly "free" over the air digital television.  MPAA provided
  no evidence that this content was being pirated nor would it be
  anytime in the near future.

* Content Already Shown in HD with NO PROTECTION: In contrast to the
  argument that broadcasters won't put on “high value” content, we
  note that most prime time television is already broadcast in
  HDTV, without protection.  Viacom threatened in 2002 to withhold
  programming, but did not do so and is now one of the leading
  producers of HDTV.

* Court Spoke to the Merits: The D.C. Circuit's broadcast flag decision
  was not merely "procedural."   In ruling that the FCC did not
  have the authority to impose a broadcast flag scheme, the Court
  was ruling on the scheme's merits - namely, that it is so far
  reaching in its scope that it would permit the FCC, in the words
  of one judge at oral argument, to regulate "washing machines."

Sincerely,
The Public Knowledge Team
June 20, 2005

Alas, Too Late for the Genius Who Created "Puck"

Big news hot off the wires, dateline Hollywood! The Writers Guild of America is organizing the writers and editors of reality TV. Yep, "writers of." Sorry to blow your mind.

Personally, I love how WGA chief Daniel Petrie coins a new (to me, anyway) term for entertainment biz exploitation:

"The creative men and women who make reality television possible work without health and pension benefits or minimum salary protections or residuals. They often work under oppressive conditions, among them near universal indifference to and noncompliance with state and federal overtime laws. The Writers Guild is committed to seeing the end of this 'Holly-Mart.'"

Always lowest common denominator. Always.

Axing corporate graffiti, part II

The Chicago Reader has a followup to the Axe "graffiti" billboards defaced in Chicago a couple of weeks ago. (Story available here as a pdf.) The billboard went back up shortly after Edmar's crew painted over it, but now other people have stepped up to deface it.

What's interesting here is that, as an anonymous reader points out (echoing the Reader's Liz Armstrong), the city of Chicago "claims it DOES NOT distinguish among signage, murals, advertising, or tags. In their eyes, graffiti is graffiti. The only way any art or 'art,' in the case of this Axe ad, technically gets to stay up is if the owner of the building contacts the city and asks if it can stay."

Underground Advertising

When writer Jeff Johnson was taking the tube to Heathrow airport, he became the audience for British Airways' latest whispering campaign:

... on the train back to Heathrow, two men stopped in my car and started talking about how one of them wasn't going to make his flight. The man insisted that he was going to make his flight because he'd checked-in online way before hand at BA.com. The conversation/argument went on for about a minute and a half before the BA.com stuff got out of hand and it turned out that the guys were actors paid to make us think about BA.com. They went to the next car and began again.

For me this would rank as less desirable than "I am homeless and hungry... " but preferable to "Have you been saved?"

New from Stay Free! magazine

An Interview with Flavor Makers. What's it like on the frontlines of food chemistry? A couple of former factory workers talk about non-blueberry blueberries, the dangers of peppermint oil, and why you really, really don't want to spill the diacetyl. by Amy Balkin and James Harbison

From Stay Free! #23
(courtesy of Lackluster)

This Land is Your Land

In the midst of some research I stumbled across the website of The Center for Land Use Interpretation.  Most interesting is their Land Use Database.  Pick a state and it will show you "unusual and exemplary sites" catagorized by everything from cultural, to nuclear, to transporation, and more.  Selections from California include an abandonded solar power plant, the now abandonded Ambassador Hotel, the world's largest parking lot, assorted military bases, power plants, mines, environmental disasters, and Jonnies Coffee Shop... I swear I can't stop looking at this.  Oh man, Tinkertown!?! For planning cross-country trips or scouting locations for sci-fi movies, this site is like one-stop shopping.

The CLUI site warmed that special place in my heart for ruins. Perhaps it plays on my obsession with post-apocolyptic stories, but I don't think I'm the only one. Apparently this photographer from Modern Ruins is pretty into them as well.  Who doesn't want to see what's left of the '64 World's Fair?  And when that doesn't satisfy you, there's always the Fabulous Ruins of Detroit. 

And did someone say abandoned bunkers? How about a VR tour of West Virginia's Greenbrier Bunker,  designed to house the members of the House of Representatives and the Senate in case of nuclear attack?  Why not?  But that doesn't give you half the taste of luxury bunker living that photographer Andreas Magdanz gives you in Dienststelle Marienthal.  Creeeeepy.

Wal-Mart to employees: shut up and put a bandage on it

I thought we covered all of Wal-Mart's major offenses in our feature last year, but apparently I was wrong. Adding to its growing record, Wal-Mart aggressively disputes workers' compensation claims; as the Portland Phoenix reports, in Maine Wal-Mart fights 94 percent of them.

Fighting valid workers' comp claims appears to be a cottage industry at Wal-Mart. By pressuring employees that can't afford health insurance, Wal-Mart can settle legitimate claims at a discount. Washington State suspended Wal-Mart's right to self-administer workers' comp claims because of findings similar to Maine's. If the retail giant doesn't have a similar record in other states, chances are it's because other states aren't checking.

Maybe we should change our t-shirts to read, "Sprawl-Mart: Always Lowering Settlements."

Ghost bike in Park Slope

Some members of a local activist group, Visual Resistance, have created this heartbreaking memorial for Liz Padilla, the young public interest lawyer who was killed while riding her bike in Park Slope last week. As the members say on their blog: "The installation is meant as a reminder of the tragedy that took place on June 9 at the corner of Warren and 5th Ave., and a quiet statement in support of bikers’ right to safe travel."

Delete!

Check out this awesome public art project in Vienna, where Christoph Steinbrener and Rainer Dempf somehow managed to convince city officials and local businesses to cover all commercial signs and other advertisements for a two-week period.

The photos remind me of Matt Siber's Untitled Project, which appeared in Adbusters a year or two ago. Siber, like Steinbrener and Dempf, digitally manipulates photos, giving them a surreal quality, but Steinbrener and Dempf have brought that surrealism to the work-a-day world.

After seeing Steinbrener and Dempf's simulation of New York, I must say The Gates seems much less ambitious in retrospect.

Introducing the cola mashup

Photo by M. Chadwick, as seen in Bangalore, India.

Kinda like the "wine mashup," which is what happens when my parents go to a restaurant, order a glass of red wine and of white wine, and ask the waiter to mix them.

Super Free Beer

Danish artists, SUPERFLEX have created the first open source beer called Version 1.0.  The beer is licensed under Creative Commons' Attribute-ShareAlike license so any one can make the beer and, if they choose, sell it using the Version 1.0 recipe, design, and branding elements as long as they credit SUPERFLEX. 

The group also has a new project called COPYSHOP. I'm guessing a lot is lost in the translation, but it sounds like they are creating shop where people can photocopy anything, paying no mind to copyrights, as well as selling products "that challenge intellectual property."  Anyone read Dansk?

Radar love

It's taken me a while to get to the new issue of Radar magazine, but I must say I'm impressed. The celebrity coverage isn't my bag, but there's a lot of really smart, biting reportage here: the gay children of rabidly anti-gay politicos, the secret lives of Disney World workers, a psychopath who buddies up to celebrities, and brainless TV news anchors.

My favorite piece is a bit of stunt journalism: Radar took bottles of Poland Spring water, replaced the labels with fake celebrity-based brands and pretended to be market researchers offering samples in Times Square. The results? Middle-aged men find that Paris H20 "tastes sexy," while "Star [Jones] Mist" comes in last for its "syrupy," "heavy" flavor.

Assholes criticize Radar for being too much like the old Spy, as if that's a bad thing. Fuck 'em. You can find the issue on newsstands for $1.95 or order a free sample issue online. End of plug.

Literature losing out to media studies

From the Independent UK:

LONDON: Increasing numbers of students are opting to sit courses in analysing soap operas and TV commercials rather than studying the classics, according to a report by the government's exam watchdog.

Schools are abandoning English literature GCSE in favour of media studies, which is regarded by many as an easier option, the study by the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority found.

We're seeing a similar trend in the US, which I find worrisome, given the increasing commercialism of media literacy programs. But, alas, I sound like a broken record.

Jem Cohen: Terrorist

Sure, we've read about cops going after photographers and filmmakers for shooting in public spaces, but little did we know they had captured one of our own. Documentarian Jem Cohen contributed part of his film Chain to our Illegal Art Exhibit and made the New York premiere of his Fugazi documentary a benefit on our behalf. Now he's being hassled by the Man. From Eyeteeth:

This January, Cohen was using his hand-wound 16mm Bolex to film passing scenes out a train window en route from NYC to DC, something he's done for 15 years. After an Amtrak ticket-taker asked him to stop filming, he was met by four armed police officers at a stop in Philadelphia; they confiscated his film. When he arrived in Washington DC, he was confronted by FBI and Homeland Security officers who questioned his motives and credentials.

And he has yet to get his film back. More here.

Mermaid Parade Ball in New York

As an official sponsor of the 2005 Coney Island Mermaid Parade Ball, it is not only our pleasure but our duty to inform you of the good times to be had on Saturday, June 25. Join us on that night, from 6 pm to midnight, following that much-loved annual freakfest, the Mermaid Parade.

Live music at the Ball will come courtesy of Park Slope haunt Barbes, featuring Las Rubias Del Norte, the Cuban Cowboys, & the Beat Circus.

Plus fantastic performers from the Coney Island Circus Sideshow and burlesque dancers, including Miss Dirty Martini.

All happening at Velocity, in the historic Henderson's Music Hall building, 3015 Stillwell Avenue, between Surf and the Bowery.

VIP package includes food, bottomless Rheingold, exclusive access to a loft lounge over the dance floor, and gift bags full of treats from Brooklyn Industries, Beautiful Twists, Soft Skull Press, Akashic Books's Brooklyn Noir series, Stay Free!, and Random House, among others. Plus a membership to Coney Island USA, with all attendant rights and privileges.

Tickets are available in advance for $10, or $50 for VIP tickets. (Info here.)

And a candy apple.

For questions, answers, or to volunteer before or during the event, contact mermaidparadeball@yahoo.com.

Tribute: A Rockumentary

If watching a bunch of middle-aged rock star wannabe's struggle for 80 minutes sounds darkly hilarious to you, you'll love this documentary.  Apparently the movie was released in 2001 or so but I just caught it on Sundance a few days ago.  It's going to be on again soon so program that Tivo, or VCR, or whatever.  Brilliant and hilarious.  The site is here but it really doesn't do it justice.  From the Sundance website:

"These are dedicated middle-aged rockers, who tease their hair and put on make-up to recreate every riff, strut and kick originally created by their idols in bands ranging from KISS and Judas Priest to the Monkees and Queen. Film Comment called this fascinating peek into music's subculture, "a bottomless quagmire of melodramatic weirdness.""

Private Grooming

Queer Eye for the Straight Guy mainstreamed the metrosexual, but even the Fab Five couldn't have predicted that promoting daily showers and Kiehl's would lead to ads for balls-shaving gear.

Remington and Philips have both created ads for their shave-everywhere products. The print ads are amusing, but Philips' flash animation came straight from my nightmares.

It was hard for me to believe that the "smooth package" market was big enough to warrant its own advertising, but Philips claims that "trimming pubic hair is thought to add an extra "optical inch" to your manhood." Enough said.

(via adland)

Overdosing the elderly

Following the news that orphaned babies are being treated with psychiatric drugs, a couple of medical journals report that people in nursing homes are increasingly dosed with antipsychotics. According to these studies (see CBC News and Archives of Internal Medicine), roughly 25% of all nursing home residents are given antipsychotics, often for no medical reason or benefit... and despite the fact that the drugs are linked to an "increased risk of death" among the elderly.

Antipsychotics are typically used to treat schizophrenia and manic depression, but nursing home doctors have been prescribing them for angry or "delusional" patients.

If we are just going to dope the elderly up with drugs that can kill them, why not save the expense of eldercare altogether and set them adrift on ice floes?

Textbook advertising

A few years ago, McGraw-Hill published a sixth-grade math textbook littered with product placements. Exercises required students to find the diameter of an Oreo cookie ("The best-selling packaged cookie in the world") and informed them that "Consumers can purchase unique clothing and accessories, and products for the home [from Land's End]." A spokesman for McGraw-Hill denied that the product plugs were put there for any commercial or promotional purposes... which is funny because the Toronto Star recently discovered (reg. req. - use BugMeNot) that McGraw-Hill is now slyly marketing textbook ads to corporate advertisers. A pamphlet makes the pitch:

Reach a hard to get target group where they spend all their parents' money.... Do you really think 18-24 year olds see those on-campus magazine ads? Do you really think they could miss an ad that is placed in a very well-respected textbook?"

McGraw-Hill is not only turning curriculum materials into product ads, they're keeping their insanely overpriced textbooks overpriced. According to a spokesperson, the new advertising "won't affect the price of the textbooks."  Yes, the lucky students will get the ads for free!

(Via Erika Shaker)

Is deodorant the new tobacco?

An image from the Secret Sparkle blog, targeting "tweens." What's that she's drinking?

Remember the post about Procter & Gamble's new deodorant spray targeting 7 year old girls? The deodorant, Secret Sparkle, bears a warning: KEEP OUT OF REACH OF CHILDREN. What a riot. The marketers at P&G apparently didn't think twice about marketing something to children that they know to be unsafe, because when the Children's Advertising Review Unit (a public relations tool for the ad industry with no actual regulatory power) raised a red flag, P&G's spokesperson expressed surprise.

So P&G gets a scolding and then what? Following the genius logic of the market, it agrees to stop advertising Secret Sparkle to kids, but not to stop targeting them. Print ads and TV commercials are out. But iPOD giveaways, blogs, and sampling programs are in... conveniently, I might add, since it sounds like P&G's original marketing plan.

Study finds that people vote based on candidates' looks

Study #54991 shows that students can correctly guess the candidates that won political races by simply looking at them. But let's get back to our exercises, shall we? Remember: TV is good for you. TV makes you smarter. TV is good for you. TV makes you smarter. TV is good...

Discovering buried rocks

Every school has a universally acknowledged "gut" course - minimal work for an easy A. At SUNY Albany the intro Earth Science course was called "Rocks for Jocks." At Cornell there was a survey Physics course that the engineers called "Physics for Poets." Can you guess what would happen if everyone knew what the easy courses were?

The Atlantic recently reported on a study about the impact of Cornell's decision to publish the median grades in all courses (after I graduated, of course). Not surprisingly the "easy A" courses saw a dramatic increase in enrollment and students with the lowest SAT scores were the most likely to take them. Cornell intended to preempt this problem by including the median grade of each course on student transcripts, but never got around to changing the transcript policy.

Some may say that the tendency of students with high SAT scores to stick with the tough classes is evidence of academic rigor. I suspect that it just means that high SAT scores at Cornell are ultimately correlated with underemployment.

(Via eLynah Forum)

An Inquiry into the Effects of Preservatives in McDonald's Food, or, What Does the Fungus Know That You Don't?

Everyone knows McDonald's food isn't healthy, but is it really any worse than other fast food? A friend of mine told me about an experiment Morgan Spurlock did for Supersize Me comparing McDonald's food to a place that made homemade burgers and fries. (The experiment wasn't in the movie but it's one of the DVD extras.) Spurlock let food from both places sit out for weeks in order to see see how McDonald's use of preservatives and other additives affected the way the food broke down.

I liked the idea but wanted to see what would happen if, instead of using gourmet stuff, I experimented with the local equivalent of McDonald's -- a cheap restaurant/take-out joint. So I went and bought burgers and fries from a nearby diner, New College Restaurant, and from McDonald's and compared the two.

As you can see here, the local place uses crinkle fries that come frozen, not unlike McDonald's. (I suspect the burger came frozen too, but, to be honest, I didn't ask.)

Next, I photographed each food item (see burgers | fries), put them all in a plastic bin, and placed the bin outside my apartment in the hallway. Then, I waited and observed. Here's what happened.

Day 3

The crinkle fries from the local joint show signs of mold. Nothing on McDonald's.

The McDonald's burger has a pronounced white spot (some kind of growth) toward the bottom right. The local burger has several white areas and a thin white film coating sections of the burger. None of the spots on the local burger are quite as large as the one on McDonald's.

* * * * * * *

Day 5

Local burger is now encrusted with something resembling cold sores; fuzzy white areas of a slight greenish tint. The white spot on the McDonald's burger has grown considerably, but the burger otherwise weathers the storm.

Thick green spores cap off the fuzzy coat on the crinkle fries. McDonald's remains unharmed. Unfortunately, after putting the fries back in the bin, I accidentally knocked over the tray that they were on so that the McDonald's fries fell on top of the local fries, contaminating them. (I didn't notice the mistake until.....)

* * * * * * *

Day 7

Local burger: pigeons wouldn't eat this. McDonald's has a .7" cluster cake on the top right region, and two small growths on the bottom section, but is otherwise clean.

McDonald's fries now show signs of decay, though perhaps that is due to the fact that I found them laying on top of the crinkle fries and had to move them back to their own tray.

CONCLUSION

Are McDonald's products worse for you than other fast food? Anecdotal data suggests that McDonald's is less like food than its local equivalent and therefore the answer is "yes." (However, for people who tend to leave food unrefrigerated around the house for days, McDonald's may be an ideal choice.)

Incidentally, Morgan Spurlock used individual glass jars for his experiment and didn't identify any appreciable differences in burger decay. His McDonald's fries, however, remained unvarnished and fungus-free for weeks. Since I contaminated my fries, I can neither confirm nor refute Spurlock's findings. And I wasn't going to repeat the test and risk pissing off my landlord, what with the stench and all. You?

- - -

ALSO FROM STAY FREE!
• The Freaky Universe of McDonald's Advertising
• Flavor Makers: Ex-Food Factory Workers Discuss the Mysteries of Flavor Science

"Entertainment Every Night," Indeed

Who needs positioning clauses?

So, you know how big advertisers like Coca-Cola have strict policies about what kind of editorial their ads can be placed next to? Colombo's Restaurant has no such policies.

As seen on the Boulevard Sentinel website. Naturally, if you have information about this robbery, we encourage you to contact the LAPD.

Alanis Morissette Delocator

Alanis Morisette is releasing an acoustic version of Jagged Little Pill for sale exclusively at Starbucks (at least for the first six weeks).

Inspired by the Starbucks Delocator (explained here), Stay Free! presents the Alanis Morissette Delocator. If people use this post as a link for "Alanis Morissette," you can direct people to small-label female singer/songwriters who are not Alanis Morissette. I'll get you started:

Kimya Dawson
Holly Golightly
Cat Power
Loretta Lynn
Neko Case
Edith Frost
Barbara Manning
Beth Orton
Lucinda Williams
Gillian Welch
Mary Lou Lord
Laura Cantrell

Add your own suggestions in the comments.

Axing corporate graffiti

In Chicago, pretty much anyone has the right to remove graffiti from private property, thanks to a citywide initiative known as Give Graffiti the Brush. So last week, a trio of champions used the rule to their advantage and painted over a graffiti-style billboard for Axe, the perfume for boys. [video clip]

Ed Marszewski, Elisa Harkins, and Matt: we love you.... though naturally not everyone feels the same. As Ed and the gang were putting final touches on the paint job, a rep from Axe's ad agency, called Critical Massive, showed up, livid. The owner of the building had a litany of complaints as well; many of them even make sense.

But if you ask me, the Axe team should be grateful. They've gone to great lengths to earn inner-city street cred. According to Ed, Critical Massive (not to be confused with a certain grassroots activist movement) hired a homeless man to pose next to the billboard in photographs to lend it that "extra gritty touch." And Critical Massive actively promotes its work with "top graffiti artists."

Thus, Ed, Elisa, and Matt actually did Critical Massive a favor: by painting over the billboard, they made it more authentic. Of course, their actions also mean that people will no longer see the ad, but as any real graffiti artist will tell you, those are the breaks.

(Thanks, Tree Johnson and Rob Walker)

Update: here's a followup to this story.

Boo to the Moo

MooLatte sounds suspiciously like "mulatto." I missed this controversy last summer (tending to avoid all references to coffee served any way other than hot). But it's back: Dairy Queen has reintroduced the puzzlingly named "MooLatte." For others who missed it: Timothy Noah looked into the matter on Slate last July and again in August.

Loosely defined

Gothamist recently asked Carrie about her favorite Brooklyn curiosities. This restaurant / grocery on the corner of Park and Carlton in Prospect Heights is one of mine.

I may not be up on the latest lingo, but doesn't Sam have to make a choice?

Maybe it will change when Sam's BB-Q & Vegetarian is replaced by the store that is "Coming Soon."

Beer and babies

This recent story in Smithsonian Magazine about attempts to sell "medical beer" during Prohibition reminded me of another another curious alcohol story during the Prohibition era. Circa 1929, Scientist Charles R. Stockard conducted a study measuring the effect of alcohol fumes on pregnant rats and concluded that alcohol increased "prenatal mortality." Prohibitionists, who tended to be eugenicists, had a field day with the study and used it to promote their agenda: Alcohol kills!  In response, their opponents (aka "Wets"), including Stockard, argued that the fumes of alcohol were a good thing, because they weeded out inferior individuals while they were still eggs.

...alcohol is highly beneficial as a selective agent tending to eliminate weak and defective individuals from the stock. It also may be noted that this elimination of defective individuals is performed in the gentlest manner by pushing the death moment back into the prenatal life-time, which in popular opinion is before the individual's existence has begun.

So, as fanatical as both groups of people were, they found a form of fanaticism they could agree on: eugenics. (I found this bit in a book by one T. Swann Harding called The Joy of Ignorance, 1932).

"Brandjacking" Coke in India

Photo by A. Jay Pillarisetti, found via flickr

Nice reporting in today's Wall Street Journal about the activists/badasses blamed for "brandjacking" Coca-Cola in India. Maybe you remember the brouhaha a couple of years ago, when tests showed that Coke products in India contain pesticide and incesticide residues 11 - 70x above the safety standard? (Pepsi products were guilty too.) After that story came out, activists started spreading the rumor that farmers were using Coke as a cheap alternative to pesticide. The Guardian, for example, reported that Things Grow Better with Coke.

Coke's other crimes read as typical corporate shenanigans (polluting groundwater, offering toxic sludge to unwitting farmers, aggrevating water scarcity), etc. But one of my favorite outrages isn't mentioned here, which is a shame because it nicely illustrates Coke's ethos on global matters:

Once cases of Coke expire and can no longer be marketed in the US (poor neighborhoods featuring colored people excepted), Coke ships them to Latin America. Of course, a little staleness ever killed anyone.... though Coke has done that too.

You Hear (Stuff about Radio Conglomerates) Here First

Continuing on the radio news beat, I'm posting the feature article from this week's Stuart Elliott "In Advertising" e-column after the jump. (Read a complete sample and sign up here.)

At the risk of sounding like a shill for the Times, Elliott's column is consistently informative and, often, unintentionally hilarious. The chuckles come from two sources. First, Elliott's style. He is a shameless pun user, and he takes giddy delight in chronicling campaigns he enjoys. A recent email, featuring a recap of some new 2(x)ist underwear ads, actually caused cold sweat and drool to puddle on my monitor. Calm down, Stu.

The other highlight is the oddball "Ask Stuart Elliott," in which reader-submitted questions tend to reveal too much information about the readers' lives. (I've pasted this week's edition after the jump also.)

A few years ago, readers bombarded Elliott with questions about a Lamacil anti-fungal ad. The animated fungi characters reportedly made children cry. Then there was the reader who asked about another underwear ad (!) featuring a football player shouting "We must protect this house!" She claimed her kids became obsessed with the ad and ran around the house screaming "We must protect this house!" Ah, the Stuart Elliotts of tomorrow.

Enjoy.

*********************

Stuart Elliott/In Advertising from NYTimes.com
Tuesday, June 7, 2005
-----------------------------------------------

1. Campaign Spotlight: Commercial Radio Fights Back

A medium now castigated by critics for not being as well done as it once was is fighting back with a double-barreled campaign aimed at its core younger-adult audience.

The medium is radio, which has been under fire from former fans who charge that play lists have become restrictively narrow and commercial loads have grown ridiculously large. Many of the complainants are voting with their ears, switching to the Sirius and XM satellite radio services, streaming audio on the Internet or Apple Computer's iPods, which offers the ability to be your own deejay, as well as the delight of discovery through random "shuffle" play.

The National Association of Broadcasters, a trade association that represents the owners of 13,000 local radio stations across the country, is sponsoring the campaign, with billings estimated at $28 million. DeVito/Verdi in New York is creating the campaign's radio commercials and print advertisements.

The double-barreled nature of the campaign comes in the form of separate themes for the radio spots and the print ads. The former proclaim: "Radio. You hear it here first." The latter declare: "Tons of artists. Zillions of songs. And oh yeah, it's free. Radio."

The campaign began in February with six commercials and was quickly expanded to more than two score, in 15-, 30- and 60- second versions. The print ads started running in May issues of five music magazines read by younger consumers: Blender, Rolling Stone, The Source, Spin and Vibe.

"We have not done a good job of tooting our own horn as an industry and promoting the medium in the face of these attacks," says David J. Field, the chairman of the association's radio marketing committee. He is also the president and chief executive at Entercom Communications in Bala Cynwyd, Pa., the fourth largest radio broadcaster

Radio is "exciting and healthy," he adds, "but cast in a negative spotlight by our critics and foes."

The campaign "starts with the fact that free local radio is a business that still reaches the same 96 percent of Americans as we did 15 years ago," Mr. Field says.

While "there has been some modest erosion of listening levels," he adds, the downturn has been less severe than suffered by other media, like newspapers.

DeVito/Verdi was selected last September after a competition among what Mr. Field describes as "a significant number of creative shops." What the committee liked so much was DeVito/Verdi's concept that the campaign be focused on music programming and centered on the artists.

"It's terrific, straight from the artists' mouths," Mr. Field says, "and speaks to radio's importance in the artists' world, the role radio plays in championing them early in their careers."

The six initial spots featured Ashanti, Hoobastank, Alicia Keys, Avril Lavigne, Ludacris and Nelly. Each follows the same format, presenting the singer or a member of a group speaking in an informal, often humorous manner, some offering puns based on titles of their hits.

For instance, Nelly says, "Even before it got 'Hot in Herre,' you heard me, Nelly, on the radio." Lucacris says, "Before you even heard my name, Ludacris, you heard me on the radio." A member of Hoobastank says, "Before you knew our name meant absolutely, positively, nothing, you heard us, Hoobastank, on the radio." Each spot ends with an announcer enthusing: "Radio. You hear it here first."

The artists who joined the campaign after the initial spots are varied in their performance styles and genres. Among them are: Hall and Oates, Lynyrd Skynyrd, Brad Paisley, Lee Ann Rimes, Slash, Rob Thomas, 3 Doors Down, Vanessa Williams and Lee Ann Womack.

Mr. Thomas, in his spot, says: "Before the Grammys, before FedEx broke my Grammys, before I wrote for Mick or Willie, or Carlos and I got so 'Smooth,' you heard me, Rob Thomas, on the radio." His reference is to his hit duet with Carlos Santana.

Ms. Rimes says, "Before it took 10 years to make it overnight, you heard me, Lee Ann Rimes, on the radio." Slash mentions his trademark top hat in his commercial. Ms. Williams makes a reference to "Save the Best for Last" and Hall and Oates work in the titles of two of their songs, "Maneater" and "Sara Smile."

"In doing our homework, we found the area of the most decline in listenership was music, and in teenagers and young adults who viewed radio as 'not cool,'" says Andrew Brief, director for account services at DeVito/Verdi.

"They were still listening, and listening quite a bit, but radio was not the box of choice, if you will," he adds. "That led us to the focus on music and the use of artists to say radio is still a cool medium, because these artists represent people the younger audience look up to."

Commercials are also being added with newer artists to underscore the idea that "the first place you hear them is on the radio," Mr. Brief says. Among them: Blue Merle, the Bravery, the Ditty Bops, the Kaiser Chiefs, John Legend, Anna Nalick, Sum 41 and Brooke Valentine.

The new-artists spots, which run 60 seconds, are introduced by an announcer who says that because radio "has always supported up-and-coming artists and connected you with new music," each singer or group is being given "the next 40 seconds to do whatever they want." In their spot, Sum 41 describes being on the radio "before being the official guest photographers of Playboy" and before appearing on "Saturday Night Live" with Ludacris. The Kaiser Chiefs, from Britain, talk about how they found the sandwiches in America to be "as big as shoeboxes."

And Ms. Nalick uses her time to play a recording of a phone call she made to her third-grade teacher to invite her to be in the audience when Ms. Nalick appeared on "The Tonight Show with Jay Leno." (The teacher took Ms. Nalick up on the offer.)

Research shows the initial radio spots are already hitting the mark, Mr. Field says, with one in four young-adult listeners recalling hearing them, and their view of radio improving as a result.

The print ads make their point with parody, presenting mock charts and graphs to demonstrate the variety of artists played by radio stations. One ad shows a pie chart -actually a pizza! - to visualize the "chance of getting the munchies at 3 a.m. while listening to" various bands. The Grateful Dead leads, of course, at 35 percent, followed by Cypress Hill, 33 percent; Pink Floyd, 31 percent; and Hanson, 1 percent.

Another ad aims at dramatizing the "chance of getting lucky while listening to" different artists, whose names are alongside the bases on a baseball diamond. 'N Sync is on first base, the Commodores on second, Boyz II Men on third and Barry White at home plate.

Other ads use bar charts, some showing stereo speakers stacked atop each other to illustrate the "chance of your neighbors calling the cops" if you listen to various bands. The odds range from 98 percent for Megadeth, down to 8 percent for the Partridge Family.

2. Ask Stuart Elliott: Airbrushing Out the Action

A Reader Asks: A month or so ago, I saw on some TV program - can't remember which show, sorry - a story about a couple of TV spots that I believe were for DirecTV. The commercials took several games from the 2005 N.C.A.A. tournament and did things like airbrushing out the basketball or an entire hoop; they had to make adjustments frame by frame. At the time, they were still working on the commercials and did not say when they would run.

I was wondering if you have heard of the spots and if you know where I could go to view them. The short clips that were shown looked great and I hope I can see the entire spots.

Stuart Elliott: The commercials were indeed for DirecTV, dear reader, and the program that reported on them was "Dateline" on NBC, in April. Roy Elvove, a spokesman for the DirecTV agency, BBDO Worldwide in New York, says that the spots have completed their run and alas, they have not been posted anywhere "due to previous licensing agreements with the N.C.A.A."

The commercials were "limited to broadcast on DirecTV systems only, targeted to DirecTV subscribers," Mr. Elvove says, "and were part of DirecTV's N.C.A.A. basketball package promotion."

A Reader Asks: One of the more effective commercials I have seen is the one currently promoting the coal industry, featuring "Sixteen Tons," a song made famous by Tennessee Ernie Ford. I don't think the baritone singing is him. Could you tell us who is singing and the agency that made the commercial?

Stuart Elliott: Coincidentally, it is BBDO New York again that has also created this commercial, and Mr. Elvove, the spokesman, says that indeed the singer is Tennessee Ernie Ford.

The commercial is for a longtime BBDO New York client, General Electric. It is part of a new campaign, carrying the theme "ecomagination," about the company's environmental policies and products. The spot seeks to reintroduce coal, as it were, as an energy source, by touting G.E.'s coal gasification plants.

As for the effectiveness of the commercial, another reader recently wrote to complain about it. The reader disliked the appearance of models in the spot as coal miners, meant to be a metaphor for the idea that coal gasification produces energy in a more "beautiful" way.

The reader also disliked the use of "Sixteen Tons," likening it to "Swing Low, Sweet Chariot" in that both songs are about "enslaved workers, singing for hope and eventual salvation from their current predicament."

How far have we come, baby?

Back in the 1970's, British tobacco companies used research on women's neuroses to get women to start smoking and discourage them from quitting.

This research was later discovered and used to great advantage by Nabisco's Snackwells and Sigma Nu.

(Image from HCAAT)

Quick links

Interview with yours truly at Gothamist, by Mindy Bond

Wal-Mart photo labs (and others') won't develop photos that look too "professional"
Yes, due to copyright (via)

Seattle cafe turns off wireless on the weekends
Because customers had stopped interacting with each other

Fair Use Day - July 11
Celebrate your right to use copyrighted works without permission (via)

The sounds of propaganda

Years ago, Ken Freedman at WFMU put together a compilation of propaganda recordings. Weeks ago, he posted the audio on his blog. Days ago, I got around to downloading. And today I'm suggesting that you do the same. 

The Happy Listener's Guide to Mind Control runs the gamut, from terrifying WW II-era knocks at the Japanese to the classic 1981 Quincy episode attacking punk rock. Some highlights:

The Exxon Singers - "Efficiency"
An anthem for the free-market.

Hank Levine and George Atkins - "The Trumpet"
From Sing Along with JFK, in 1962. Records like this were a fad for a while. Someone recently made a modern version about Bush (check "Commiserate Not Commiserate" from Songs in the Key of W), though it's not nearly as good. Maybe some day I'll post my sing along with Nixon a LP....

Byron MacGregor - "Americans"
Based on a 1973 radio speech by Canadian newscaster Gordon Sinclair. If this sounds familiar, it's because the text of this speech was widely circulated on the Internet after September 11 in an attempt to preach the selflessness of American foriegn policy. (Cough)

Victor Lundberg - "Open Letter to My Teenage Son"
It's okay to be a hippie, son, as long as you're willing to kill for it. (Be sure to stick with this one through the end.)

Jets stadium grounded

Sheldon Silver (Democrat and NY Assembly Speaker)