Wow. If you are going to announce a new policy that is mirrored on that of the communist government in China, New Year’s Eve is probably a good day to do it as no one is paying attention to the media and they’ll be too hung over on the 1st of January to read the newspaper.
Telecommunications Minister Stephen Conroy says new measures are being put in place to provide greater protection to children from online pornography and violent websites.
Senator Conroy says it will be mandatory for all internet service providers to provide clean feeds, or ISP filtering, to houses and schools that are free of pornography and inappropriate material.
"Labor makes no apologies to those that argue that any regulation of the internet is like going down the Chinese road," he said.
This is a significant move and one that is achievable from a technology point of view, but very difficult to administer and maintain I would imagine. No one is going to object to trying to filter out child pornography (well some disturbing people maybe), however, once this platform is in place, and depending on how the legislation is drafted, it could be up to some civil servant somewhere in Canberra to decide what else they deem "inappropriate material". Perhaps blogs from Australian soldiers serving overseas are glorifying war and so are not deem appropriate.
I think that the quote about making no apologies for following the lead from China is interesting. This is a Labour government that seems unashamedly left-wing, in a world where Labour parties seem to want to play down their historical links to trade unions and communism.
Here is my summary of Shawn Gold’s presentation at ad:tech Sydney today. Shawn is the Chief Marketing Officer for MySpace.com, the world’s biggest social network. How big you ask? Well;
0 – 150 million registered users in less than 3 years.
Number One in the US in terms of page impressions, downloads and average time spent (an indicator of how “sticky” the content is). Other sites have more unique visitors (those with much wider appeal such as CNN.com etc) but no one can match them in terms of actual content delivered.
Number 5 in Australia of all websites, Number 1 based on the same metrics as in the US.
400 billion page views per month, over 100 billion ads served.
Currently in 7 countries, with internationalised sites, and will be in 20 countries by year end 2007, including China.
What advertising options do they offer now to advertisers beyond just standard online ads?
The movie industry were really the first to adopt MySpace seriously as an advertising option by setting up dedicated MySpace pages with video trailers and allow other users to comment on and become friends of the movie. A movie studio can spend between US$1 – 3 million in a period of a couple of weeks to promote a new release through targeted advertising on the network. They can get instant market feedback and research on a movie as soon as it is released via comments on their MySpace page.
Bands and comedians have used MySpace to build and maintain a loyal fan base. It is becoming common for them to offer exclusive access to events to just their MySpace friends. The Beastie Boys recently did a show recently where only their MySpace friends could gain entry.
MySpace creates originally branded video content that can then be promoted through the network.
MySpace can promote original video content. Dove Skincare in Canada created a 1 minute video, did a very small TVC campaign and then pushed it entirely online, using MySpace and other tools. They got 20-30 million unique views for a fraction of the dollars it would have cost to get via traditional air time.
They can offer highly targeted campaigns e.g. if you wanted to advertise to all hip hop DJ’s in the US market or just California, they can do this.
If you have a MySpace page and have built up a significant number of friends, then MySpace can run demographic profiles on your friends, given you deep metrics on who is interested in your product/brand.
What’s next? Well like everyone, they are trying to figure out how to monetise consumer generated video content. I was interested to discover that MySpace delivers more video content than YouTube or Google Video. Videos with “hotspots” with hyperlinks, branded/”wrapped” video players and pre and post rolls are all being experimented with.
What are the key areas of focus for MySpace?
Self Expression Platform – Growing their toolkit of widgets and tools to allow more consumer generated content to be put up on MySpace. They really believe that this idea of self-expressionion, 21st century cyber-hippies if you will, are the key to their success. Other previous social networks, such as Friendster, which was the basis for their business model, failed because they were very restrictive on the content you could publish and in what format. For example they wouldn’t allow you to customise the look of your Friendster page.
Communications Platform – Various tools such as instant message, text, Voice over IP, video calling, to enable their users to communicate easily with one another.
Content Aggregation – They already have massive communities for movies, music and comedians, they intend to pool more content in specific communities such as fashion.
Marketer Platform – Tools for marketers and agencies to more easily advertise and run/analyse campaigns on their site. Importantly, all advertising and the type of advertising will always be elective to the user to avoid the impact being diluted over time.
Safety & Education – MySpace gets a bad rap from people about the dangers of meeting people online. Confidence in the site is critical to the site and they have a big team working on this area. Every photo (about 5 million per day!) and video(about 40,000 per day) posted to the site is looked at by a human being to screen out pornographic or hateful material.
Internationalization – Continuing to roll out MySpace to different countries in different languages with regional specialisations.
Here are some final soundbites:
Andy Worhol said “Everyone is famous for 15 minutes” well today “Everyone is famous for 15 people”
The arty kid in a small time who used to feel isolated because he coudn’t relate to the friends in his local school can now connect with thousands of like-minded people around the world. It’s a great time to be lonely on the Internet.
Last year I made some observations about the role the pornography industry has played in the establishment of emerging technologies. I won’t go into detail here, so here’s the link to the original post if interested.
I couldn’t help but think back to that little gem when, browsing the NY Times this morning, I found a great article entitled: In Raw World of Sex Movies, High Definition Could Be a View Too Real. The upshot of the article is that, despite leading early adoption of that technology, producers are fast reaching the conclusion that HD-porn really isn’t that great an idea.
You could probably take all you need to know from the article by reading a single quote, taken from one Ms ‘Stormy Daniels‘:
I?’m not 100% sure why anyone would want to see their porn in HD
Good point, and one which leads to some interesting questions.
Since Sony still stands by their policy not to mass-produce pornographic movies (the policy that prompted the adult entertainment industry to adopt HD over Blu-ray in the first place), many have speculated that this would lead to HD dominating in the same way that VHS killed Betamax in the early 80’s. Personally I think a better question is whether either format is really that much of an improvement (in terms of viewer enjoyment) on the status quo.
If you look at the big new media technologies of the 20th Century, they’ve all given us something new that we really wanted: 8mm let us take movies home; VHS let us make home movies without having to use a film lab; ditto the Polaroid’s impact on photography, and to a greater extent the digital camera; the Walkman let us listen on the move; and the mobile phone meant that lonely people didn’t have to stay at home all night waiting for the phone to ring (now they can do that anywhere). What previously un-fulfilled need is either new DVD format really meeting?
A good question to ask with any new toy, I suppose: Just because it’s bigger, faster, louder, brighter – does that make it better? Sometimes, but not always. In the meantime I think I’ll stick with my regular old DVD player till my box-set of the Star Wars trilogy turns to dust. Or I do.
Ok, so some of you will have picked up by now that my general opinion of ad agencies isn’t that high. By far the majority are still stuck in the 80’s, pouring money into pointless TVC’s that may win awards and raise a few smiles but contribute nothing to the client’s bottom line.
This campaign, on the other hand, is really cool. Take a bunch of well-known men – Burt Reynolds, Eddie Griffin, Aron Ralston (American hiker who amputated his hand with a pocket knife), etc – and have them sit around a table debating ‘Man Laws’. Topics include:
The TV campaign was closely integrated with a website, where people could view all the ads (there are a ton of them), and also propose and debate their own Man Laws. The ads were also scattered through the various CGM and social networking sites. Search Google, YouTube, MySpace etc for ‘Man Law’ and you’ll find thousands of references to the Miller campaign site, and countless home-made homages and imitations.
Let’s just say that the buzz surrounding this campaign has been … ’significant’. This has been a huge success for Miller, and should stand as an example to agencies around the world of what can be achieved with a well-conceived, integrated (across media) campaign that embraces its audience as participants, rather than spectators.
See Jon? I finally submitted a post that didn’t mention porn… D’oh!
… but I ended up going to Dubai this past weekend. 20 hours to get there, 48 hours on the ground, and another 20 hours to get back. HM Customs found my itinerary a little bizarre too, thus the hour-long interrogation in the pokey little back-room upon my return to NZ.
Anyhoo, for those of you who haven’t been there, Dubai is an amazing place. The shopping is great, architecture astonishing, and clubs rockin’ (particularly those run by the Russian mafia). 48 hours doesn’t make for much sightseeing, but I did manage to get out to the Emirates Mall (complete with an indoor skifield that leaves SnowPlanet for dead), the Gold Souk (home of the world’s cheapest and most garish jewellery), and of course the Burj al-Arab.
To be honest though, my strongest memory of Dubai is a bad one, and a reason I’d encourage you all to spend your tourist dollars elsewhere till they (hopefully, one day) sort themselves out. I captured this screenshot while browsing my usual array of blogs from my hotel on Saturday morning:
Some of you will wonder why I removed the URL of the blog in question from the screenshot. You’ll say ‘It was probably porn, you dodgy bugger!’ Ok, so think about this for a second – even if it was a porn site (which I can assure you it wasn’t) would that make it ok? Is it ok to censor stuff that some people find objectionable? Which people? Define ‘objectionable’? What about people that don’t find it objectionable – don’t they have rights too?
As the man said, you either believe in freedom of speech or you don’t. These guys don’t.
Some of you will think I’m over-reacting. If you do, give me a call and we can discuss it. I’ll share my reasoning with you and listen to yours. I’ll hope to convince you with a superior argument – a logical chain of valid premises, which you’re free to try and refute. You’ll probably make some good points that will help me to understand the UAE position, if not sympathise, and we’ll both hopefully walk away wiser and better people. You see – that’s what civilised people do.
Whangarei District Court heard (the perp), 40, downloaded pornography and music videos while using a computer at the Poster Faktory in the town.
Let’s just be clear here – this had nothing to do with the subject matter. He wasn’t charged over the porn. Or the music downloads. He was busted for stealing his employer’s bandwidth. That is really scary.
One thing i couldn’t help noticing – and don’t get the wrong idea here people – is that no adult sites made the list. Are the editors in denial, or just naive?
I read a great article a couple of years back – sorry, damned if i can find the reference – about the role porn has played in emerging media technologies. Super 8, VHS, DVD, the web – all provided consumers with the ‘take home’ alternative to sitting next to Paul Reubens, which is pretty appealing to anyone who’s seen Pee Wee’s Big Adventure. After driving us online, porn really pioneered the affiliate advertising model, and provided an income stream to people with nothing better to do than sit at home and rant – the first wave of bloggers and the beginning of the end for the old media barons.
I could go on, but you get the idea. The web (the world!) would be nothing like it is today without porn. If Larry Flynt had figured out a way to deliver jollies via carrier pigeon, we’d all be in our Lofts right now shoveling pigeon crap into the JunkMail box. Think about that next time you’re in Trafalgar Square.
Astonishing report in the Herald this morning, concerning everyone’s favourite NZ e-tailer Flying Pig… oops – I mean Ferrit.
Ferrit’s new advertising campaign – by its new agency Consortium – was launched on Sunday, with half its budget allocated for TV.
Seems that while Ferrit’s business model is all about selling online advertising, that’s apparently not the best way to reach consumers. Do they mention this in their sales collateral when pitching to enlarge their miniscule pool of participating retailers?
This is scary news, folks, but not uncommon. Advertising agencies are still clinging to the old ways and pouring money into TV. Why? 1. They don’t understand this whole Interweb-thingy, besides its utility as a source of humorous emails and top-notch porn. 2. They’re scared, because it’s so easy to demonstrate Return On Investment from online campaigns. 3. TV production costs big bucks and leads to hefty commissions. 4. The 80’s were such a groovy period for the industry (ponytails, Concorde, all the blow and Dom you want to know about etc) and they just… can’t… let… go!
BTW – the last paragraph in the aforementioned article cracked me up also:
Wogan said more functions were in the pipeline, including the ability to buy on the website. “The biggest competition for us, and for New Zealand retailers, is overseas sites.”
Marker is a full service digital agency, which means we help you with your strategy (we’ve been doing this stuff for nearly a decade), execution and ongoing campaign management.
We’ve got developers, designers and online marketers, not to mention our project management and strategy capability.
