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Posts Tagged “
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summer trends
Why Does Everyone Insist on Dining and Drinking Alfresco?
It's one of the many things that makes New York so insufferable in the summer—besides the heat, the crowds, the construction, the smells, and the humidity. Being forced to eat or drink outside—with wind, blinding sun, bugs, pedestrians brushing too close, and the way restaurants that have added outside tables often corral their diners in like cows—is simply uncivilized. More »
Twitter Nation, @Y'all?
Has anyone else noticed this trend (or is it a one-person trend piece?) From a reader: "People [are] starting to put the dreaded @ signs from Twitter in emails! Such as @Tricia, how did making that Excel spreadsheet go? and other horrible things of that nature." Has this infected your office as well?
Has anyone else noticed this trend (or is it a one-person trend piece?) From a reader: "People [are] starting to put the dreaded @ signs from Twitter in emails! Such as @Tricia, how did making that Excel spreadsheet go? and other horrible things of that nature." Has this infected your office as well?
publicity stunts
Times Uglifying Own Building To Thwart Climbers
Though they clearly aren't experts at building security, executives at New York Times Corp. read their own paper often enough to understand that three examples of something marks a trend. So, after the third stunt scaling of the building since May, the company is having many of the climber-friendly ceramic tubes removed from the building's facade. How many? Even the Times' own reporters don't seem to know, though they're guessing maybe 8-10 feet worth, measuring from a canopy used by all three climbers. More »
Things we actually like
One-Person Trend Stories Mock Anecdotal Leads
Someone started an aptly-named site called "One Person Trend Stories," which does a pretty fantastic job of skewering the thinly-sourced, heavily-caveated features familiar to readers (and writers!) of pretty much every major newspaper and newsmagazine out there. It's not clear if the anonymous author — J-school student? Disgruntled intern? — intended the site as a parody, or as more straightforward humor. But it's pretty obvious that bloggers everywhere love the site and are linking to it. To be sure, the only example I have is the post you're now reading. Ahem. One of the better posts is after the jump. More »
the internet
Russian Regime Tries To Ban "Rude Comments" Online
Oh, hey, remember how Vladimir Putin and his thugs control everything important said on television, newspapers and radio in glorious free ex-Soviet Russia? Well, it seems the regime would like to extend its power over the media so as to stop people from saying mean things on the Web while stifling any real online dissent while they are at it. A blogger from Syktyvkar recently wrote that police are "scum" and that the force "should be cleaned up by ceremonially burning officers twice a day in a town square." Syktyvkar is basically next to the north pole, so this was probably just a misunderstood offer to warm everyone up by the campfire, but the blogger has been given a suspended one-year prison term, and everyone is upset that the police state is about to ruin the last fun place to say mean things about people (oh and also express political opinions or whatever): More »
trends
Hipster Irony Removes Fun From Pop Music, Leaves Various Words For Butt
Acoustic versions of highly produced pop songs are the new easiest irony, as evinced by yesterday's most watched Youtube video, an acoustic version of Four Minutes to Save the World. This is just-add-water cultural criticism that bespeaks no thought or compelling effort, but which is publicly lauded for adhering to the structure of an actual parody. Ironic T-shirts, I'm talking to you. The acoustic cover amusements began with Alanis Morisette's version of My Humps. That actually was funny, My Humps has stupid lyrics, and underscoring them with legitimate sentiment was something like a commentary. Then there were the thousands of Umbrella covers. At the beginning of hers, Mandy Moore talks about how she doesn't like pop music. This is precisely what's wrong with this trend: Mandy Moore is not allowed to condescend to pop music, she is pop music. After the jump, the Four Minutes video. More »
advertising
Doctors On YouTube May Be Shadier Than They Appear
If you ever selected a plastic surgeon or LASIK doctor based on a random YouTube video, it's probably apt that that video only happened as a result of an under-the-table payment and the doctor was really incompetent and now you walk around blind and ugly. But what about the victims of the future? Plenty of doctors have gone right ahead and offered patients rebates or huge discounts in exchange for posting glowing videos about their procedures online, although something like that would be patently unethical in the "regular" media. Docs are like, "Huh, rules, really? I just thought it would be nice!" Patients are like, "Sweet, cheap surgery!" The loser is you, the affluent, narcissistic consumer. A couple of typical videos are after the jump; just because "a famous celebrity (name undisclosed for privacy)" gets LASIK from Dr. Feinerman doesn't mean you have to, too: More »
uniqlo
The Future Of Advertising: 'Brand Presence,' Robot Dancing
Let's say up front that the super-prestigious Cannes advertising awards are, like most awards, a bit of a scam. They're a for-profit operation that charges ad agencies a lot of money to enter, and in return bestows something that the agencies can use in their own marketing materials. Plus they gave an award to those crazy sexist beer ads this year, so their judgment is obviously fallible. Still, the ad industry considers them a big deal, and they're a good guide to what's considered important in the field. So it was extremely groundbreaking when an online campaign (rather than a TV campaign) won the Titanium Grand Prix at Cannes this year. On the other hand, maybe it was just because people love Japanese dancers? More »
trends
Horny A-Gays Under Attack
Every summer, the gays of the culural elite (like John Waters, Atlantic Monthly's Andrew Sullivan, musician Rufus Wainwright) gather on the car-free Fire Island and Provincetown, Mass., to party and play. And yes, sometimes have sex outside, they way all creatures were meant to! Only in recent weeks, they've been getting arrested for that. (Awkward!) As Cherry Grove resident Choire Sicha writes for Radar, "[The Fire Island arrests] are the first known arrests for public sex on the federal land." (Some people think a "circle jerk for freedom" might help matters.) Meanwhile, in Provincetown, an effort to keep public sex under control via citations for "lewd acts" have shot way up, says the Cape Cod Times. More »
trends
Film's Venerable Actors Shuffling On Over to Television
All the olds are moving to TV. Jon Voight, 69, announced today that he'll be appearing on the next season of 24, Fox's jingo-jango rah-rah Republican hour. This comes on the heels of the news that William Hurt, 58, will be joining Damages, FX's slick show about wicked lawyers, and that crazy old Dennis Hopper, 72, is set to star in the new Crash series, based on the stupid movie. Hopper has done series before, but these Oscar-nominated (and winning) actors still represent an increasingly popular trend. Movie stars, especially those of a certain age, are making the leap to television. More »
trends
Nerdy Girls Are Socially Acceptable, OK?
How could the Observer have missed this trend piece? Newsweek introduces us to Nerd Girls. It's a nerd trend: the Observer already covered hot male nerds "of steel," and Benjamin Nugent just published American Nerd: Story of My People. But girls have been overlooked thus far. (Well, sort of: there are at least two nerd-themed girl pinup sites.) If you haven't heard, some girls can do math and are smart and cute and totally worth a trend piece! More »
the internets
Political Violence: Congressman Shoves Camera Guy
Bloggers and politicians continue to not be good friends. So sad! First there was a big uproar over the Huffington Post's Mayhill Fowler publishing quotes from Bill Clinton without even warning him. Now there's this: Democratic Rep. Paul Kanjorski got so mad at a guy doing a YouTube interview with him that he pushed his camera (almost) onto the ground! Stop the violence! Politicians: bloggers really just want to be loved. [via Times-Tribune]
how things work
The Future Of The Music Industry Is 15 Pop Bands
Because the music industry is an even worse place to invest your money than the newspaper industry at the moment, everyone is looking for the next big thing. The closest they've come is "360 deals," where artists get a huge check in return for a big cut of all their different revenue streams. First, Madonna signed a contract like this with Live Nation for $120 million. Then Jay-Z signed a contract with Live Nation for $150 million. Live Nation wants to sign 15 more artists to contracts like this. Then everybody else in music can quietly retire. Hope you like the Jonas Brothers a lot! More »
branded entertainment
New Advertising Paradigm: 'Meow Meow Meow Meow'
Ads, of course, are everywhere. But at least back in the good old days (last week), they would only creep into the borders of our TV shows, rather than becoming the entire show itself. Well, those days are gone, friend. Give up your outdated ideas about what programming should be, and settle in with a bowl of wet food and your hungry cat for a fine evening receiving the subtle marketing messages of the "Meow Mix Game Show"! More »
media
Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia Dumps CEO
Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia, the domestic queen's massive publishing and television conglomerate, has just announced that its CEO, Susan Lyne, has (ahem) "stepped down." Replacing Lyne will be two co-CEOs—an equivocation that often signals that a company was not well prepared for an executive transition. Lyne came on as head of the company when Martha Stewart went to jail in 2004, and has presided over a big drop in MSLO's stock price. But while her departure may have been inevitable, it's not necessarily a productive move. The magazine industry is in an irreversible decline, and no number of firings will change that fact. Sorry! More »
publicity stunts
Best Promo Ever: Punching Employees In The Face
There's a new list of the top 40 publicity stunts of all time out, and we've found what is—without a doubt—the most worthwhile of them all, from just two weeks ago: a production company called Action Figure produced a techno-scored, super slow-mo, two-minute video of all their employees getting punched in the face. Really. This should be a mandatory stunt for many of America's top corporations. Its power can hardly be described; just watch it, after the jump. More »
trends
