WILL SELF-EXPRESSION THROUGH SOCIAL MEDIA MAKE US DUMBER?

The kid who does this video, has just become the first person to get 1m subscribers to his YouTube channel and YouTube says he is also making "tens of thousands" of dollars each month via text overlays and display ads on his YouTube channel.

The content is truly atrocious, but it does signify two things:

• One positive: It starts to establish there can be a model for commercialising user generated video (and Google will breath a big sigh of relief). This opens the door for the citizen consumer to establish platforms for self expression, and get paid doing it
• One very negative: When the consumer citizen gets his platform, the base of that platform is not usually very high off the ground. Instead its usually only one step up from the swamp, and the dumbest things are usually the most popular things. Sounds a bit like commercial television doesn't it?
  

All those revolutionaries that thought unmediated self-expression would lead to a new republic... have now got Fred.

THE ENGAGEMENT MODEL MEANS BRANDS WILL BECOME SOME OF THE BEST AND BIGGEST MEDIA OWNERS

If you are going to sell a TV set it makes sense to sell it by demonstrating the quality of the viewing experience -and it probably makes sense doing that using a spectacular film. But the film has to be great. Remember the Sony Balls campaign

This Philips campaign to sell their 21:9 Philips Carousel shows how to do it.



I love the film, but have very mixed feelings about this as an overall campaign. The site is a bit of a disappointment. Great film, but it didn't make me feel any different to Philips. They create this film that draws you into this amazing world, but that's it. The film says nothing about the product in any truly meaningful way. Once you watch the film, the only thing there is an invitation to visit a very basic product site.

Its a bold move, but I wanted to get involved. I wanted to solve the mystery and work it out, but I couldn't. People will definitely talk about this idea - I have - so it also creates conversational capital about the brand, but when you create a world like this you have to plan the whole experience not just the film.

What's missing here is a understanding of how carry the audience with you right through the whole engagement experience. Overall its a great idea, with great production values, and people who wouldn't normally talk about Philips are talking about Philips. It's a further demonstration of how brands will need to invest in great content, and it supports my view that brands will eventually become some of the best and biggest media owners.

THE SECRET ART OF STAYING RELEVANT AND IN THE NEWS

Not many of you would link 50 Cent, the rapper, with HP's Social Computing Lab. But they agree completely when it comes to understanding the relationship between relevancy and the scarcity of attention in today's media market.


In a recent interview the 50 Cent was asked who has the best model for staying relevant to fans [amongst his rivals]? He answered:

"Puffy has the best model for staying relevant, because [he does it] without a song. He’s been able to maintain an interest and stay in a space to executive produce television and film projects, and stay relevant to hip-hop culture. What was the last record that made you feel like, ‘Oh, my God, Puffy is on fire’? You don’t need it. That’s what makes his business model exciting to me.'

Smart words. 50 cent is no fool. To be up there and successful in today's media is no small task. Diddy and 50 cent know the art of public relations very well, and have the knack of being able to read the zeitgesit, contrive a story that is newsworthy, and consequently keep themselves in the spotlight. 50's approach is usually to contrive a 'beef' with another rap star, or cause some type of 'trouble' to re-affirm his positioning as rap's most dangerous bad boy. Diddy 's approach is to push his take on glamour and hedonism, he has even coined a term for it - Ghetto fabulous. This is all skillful, professional stuff - sophisticated public relations.

For a rap star and for a brand keeping relevant is today's key skill. However, attention is today's most valuable commodity, only a few can aim to be relevant at a given time. It's a zero-sum game. In a recent post on the BBC, Bernardo Huberman, a senior fellow at HP labs, and head of HP's Social Computing Lab, has called this a return to the "dawn of the age of intimacy".

Huberman and his fellow researchers have focused on what people do when information becomes more available, cheap and valueless. He and his team have studied why people gravitate to certain websites, stories or products and how long they stay there. "Attention is now the key commodity in this information explosion," said Mr Huberman.

For those striving to be novel and popular at the same time for a long time, Mr Huberman suggested looking at how Paris Hilton maintains near constant headline status.

"There is something to be said about people that, however trivial we might consider them, manage to create enough novelty to be on the front news page all the time.

"If I were to do something idiotic like stand on my head now on this table perhaps some of you might write about it. If I keep doing that every hour of every day of the week, most likely you won't do it. So I have to invent new things to be on the news the way Paris Hilton is.

"That's a huge talent in a sense," said Mr Huberman.