-Just 42% of Americans say they consider the television set to be a necessity, compared to 52% in 2009
-Some 62% of Americans say the land line is a necessity of life, down from 68% last year.
-Over 47% now say that mobile phones are a necessity of life.
-Fully 82% of adults now use cell phones, up from 53% in 2000
-There are now more cell phones in the U.S. than landline phones.

So in the interest of truly understanding why this is important give Al 13 minutes to break it down. He pretty much nails it even if you hate AF you gotta respect his argument. Free Net Free Us.

Full Article

Craig Aaron Managing Director, Free Press:

“So Google and Verizon went public today with their “policy framework” — better known as the pact to end the Internet as we know it. News of this deal broke this week, sparking a public outcry that’s seen hundreds of thousands of Internet users calling on Google to live up to its “Don’t Be Evil” pledge. But cut through the platitudes the two companies (Googizon, anyone?) offered on today’s press call, and you’ll find this deal is even worse than advertised. The proposal is one massive loophole that sets the stage for the corporate takeover of the Internet.

Real Net Neutrality means that Internet service providers can’t discriminate between different kinds of online content and applications. It guarantees a level playing field for all Web sites and Internet technologies. It’s what makes sure the next Google, out there in a garage somewhere, has just as good a chance as any giant corporate behemoth to find its audience and thrive online.”

Remember these….

*assuming they havent already broken it

The first thing to consider when doing an event like this is of course getting people there. You need butts in the seats if you are going to have any kind of impact. So to get the message out we reached out to blogs and other publications.  Through positive outreach and by having a compeling story to tell….we got terrific press traction for the event. If your story is compelling enough…anyone can get coverage…just give them something to talk about. www.dmnews.com,  www.wwd.com, www.stylemepretty.com.

While the press added a special flavor….like any recipe its success if dependent upon the ability of all the ingredients to work together. Accenting the press coverage was a nicely designed and timely email invitation  informing the community about the event. This was further marinated in a special social media sauce of foursquare and Facebook.  And as with any dish…you need to know when to stop seasoning.  Use the appropriate channels, let the juices simmer and and let it work

Now that the dish was cooking nicely its was time to focus on execution. Cardinal rule…if you make it a big deal….make it a big deal.  After all the build up the worse thing you can do is underwhelm your community.  No one likes it when you wait 3 hours for a turkey then when you finally get a bite its dryer than a mouthful of sand. If you advertise it as a duck make sure it has a bill and feathers.  So the store was decked out with flowers and champagne….the store looked emmacluate…the models from the campaign were there showing off the dresses as live mannequins…and of course the designer was there. Undoubtedly a positive brand experience for not just those form the community who attended but also for the random passer by who happened upon the smell of the delicious Bouillabaisse. A key note to remember….that even if your customer doesn’t buy anything today making an effort for your community will put you at the top of their list when they are ready to buy.

This particular recipe is also a good example of how the age old adage “it takes a village” certainly can apply to effectivly building and maintaning a brand of any kind. That’s it for this edition of Digital Recipes. Keep it simple keep it real.

Don’t feel bad to unfollow: Pulling from the good old annuals of the Free Market mentality…let’s let the market decide. Don’t be afraid to unfollow the guy who really doesn’t bring you any value. Value can be anything remember….even a providing a laugh is value enough for me.  In our rush to get friends and followers I think most if us started following people we really didn’t care about. Now there is something to be said for following the random person but seriously I am getting tired of reading tweets and updates that bring now value to me. And hey with this examination you have to be prepared to question the value of your own digital contributions. Do I bring value?

Multiple Accounts: Ok so there are some obvious things to point out. When I say multiple accounts I don’t mean one for every product you like or one for every friend or family members. Here is an example of what I mean, over the years I have noticed that although I want to receive grocery coupons via email I don’t necessarily want them clogging up my personal inbox everyday when I only need to reference them once a month. You see where I am going here. With so much access we owe it to ourselves to self regulate and self segment. Hmm did I coin a phrase?

If you look at the center of this logo, you can see two people enjoying a Tostito chip with a bowl of salsa.

Their logo is actually made up of the letters M (on top) and B (below the m). These two letters also form a baseball glove.

The yellow swoosh looks like a smile: Amazon wants to have the best customer satisfaction. The swoosh also connects the letters a and z, meaning that this store has everything from a to z.

The first two letters of the VAIO logo represent the basic analogue signal. The last two letters look like a 1 and 0, representing the digital signal.

“Twestival™ (or Twitter Festival) uses social media for social good.  Twestival is the largest global grassroots social media fundraising initiative to date, raising over $1.2 million within 14 months for 137 nonprofits.  All local events are organized 100% by volunteers and 100% of all ticket sales and donations go direct to projects. Twestival™ Global is a series of offline events hosted on one day for one cause in cities around the world. Twestival™  Local is a series of offline events which aim to support local causes over a designated weekend.”

So there are a series of parties going on around the world on the same date for the same cause. What is it about collective experience that is so sweet? Knowing you are a part of something global seems to resonate a ton these days….especially with web heads. Its was at Good Units which is an underground venue for parties and shows…it was a pretty sweet set up save the fact that it was so far underground that my BB couldn’t quite catch so you notice my own tweet stream end about the time I get there. At any rate the venue was great and the energy of the rooms were good. The band certainly kicked ass….Shinobi Ninja. More on them in a bit. On a global scale the event seemed to do well. Mashable just wrote an in depth post about it…here are some highlights:

• $450,000 raised for Concern Worldwide, an international NGO helping fund educational projects around the world.
• Contributions to Twestival Global 2010 grew by more than 80% during its second annual fundraising event.
• $1.2 million has been raised over the past 14 months on behalf of 137 organizations.
• Twestival helped accept a truly worldwide outpouring of support from 45 countries in 12 different currencies.

So kudos to the planners and organizers of this whole thing. I can only imagine how much work went into it. I met some cool people there and saw some old friends as well. If you read through my blog you know that I document almost every event I attend however as I went through my assets for this event I realized I was pretty thin on video. I did however get a bunch of great stills. I realized my night is actually best documented by going through the unedited pics on my camera in sequence.  There is some video in in there to set it up though.  I did reach out to #nyctwestival for more video assets so I could make a proper one but I haven’t heard back. At any rate the video is a bit raw but that isn’t always a bad thing.

A bit more about Shinobi Ninja….they are a Brooklyn based self proclaimed “super group of the 21st century”. That night they probably were. They were terrific and I highly recommend you check out their shows.  High energy high movement. They made the night for sure.  They are highly active on twitter and also have an EP out that I picked up which happens to feature a video game as well.  Nice work. They are an odd mix of peeps with an eclectic and hard sound. The video above uses a remix of their Brooklyn to Babylon single. @shinobininja hit me if you need/want any of these assets.



Here are some links to more pics from the night:

www.nbcnewyork.com

Guest of a guest

Random night out