When you’re a movie maker, could there be a more positive inquiry from a potential viewer?

Isn’t that what trailers are designed to do? How many hours are spent creating trailers? How much money? How much time and effort is spent crafting the perfect show-a-little-leg-but-not-too-much tease to get people to sit forward in their seats and expand their pupils by the time the name of the movie and the opening date fades in?

And yet, thousands of people asking “What movie is this from” doesn’t seem to be influencing the poor decision made by the lawyers representing Constantin Film, who have decided to systematically destroy what is probably the most successful marketing campaign they’ve ever been a part of (Well, at least since the NeverEnding Story).

Constantin Film AG is the production and distribution company behind the movie “Downfall,” which is also the source from one of the Internet’s most hallowed memes.

Read the rest of this article on Threeminds

Tucked away near the end of one of the best Slideshare’s I’ve come across, is this lil’ gem of UGC brilliance. Musicians C-Mon & Kypski need a little help with their music video, and it’s crowdsourcing that makes this video memorable (and affordable, I imagine). They’ll show you a frame from their video, and all you have to do is mimic it via webcam.

But before I tell you why I love this so much, let me share the Slideshare presentation with you – In “Stop Saying Viral – A Case For Spreadable Media,” Eva Hasson of Trendspotting makes an argument against “The Viral” strategy on which so many agencies and brands are stuck. If you’re a marketer, the best thing you could do today is open your mind to Hasson’s Wisdom Bombs…

Read the rest of this post at Threeminds

In Hockey, there is nothing more hair-raising than a perfect Dangle.

Disclosure: Full-on own-horn-tooting coming up.

I’m really excited by some of the work we’re doing at Organic for Nike at the Olympics. Steve Dangle’s back, and he’s blowing up Vancouver with his YouTubian magic. How can you make Team Canada even more exciting? Invoke the Dangle.

I’m loving how we’re humanizing this brand.

Look for more of his videos at http://youtube.com/niketraining and he’s tweeting live from pretty much every Team Canada hockey game at http://twitter.com/niketraining or @niketraining.

Update (Feb 21, 2010): Dangle sits down with Bilodeau and his magic medal.

Update 2 (Feb 28, 2010): GOLD! (Sorry, but YEAAAHHH!!!)

The buzz words are changing. As the term “Web 2.0” becomes antiquated, and the masses embrace social media, brands, corporations and organizations are starting to understand the implications of the new paradigms of the web.

Transparency is what’s driving consumer decision now, and the trust that is formed through the authentic collective voice of a brand’s management team, employees and customers.

At this point, I’m starting to feel dirty just saying the words “messaging” and “tone” when discussing “campaigns.”

In Boy Scouts, young campers are taught to start a one-match fire – focusing one’s skill on building the framework of the fuel so that it catches with only one match. I’ll do better than that. I’ll give you six matches to start the transparency fire in your organization.

Here are six catalysts to spark your new focus on authenticity and transparency.

Authencity drives consumer choices…

1. Joseph Pine defines the new Experience economy in this TED talk from 2004, and how “Authenticity is becoming the new consumer sensibility.”

… and they trust only human voices…

2. The Cluetrain Manifesto celebrated its 10-year anniversary with a new edition published this year. It describes how consumers are finding trust and truth through human voices within your organization, or elsewhere – that is, however they wish. From the book: “The corporation pretends to speak, but its voice is that of a third-rate actor in a fourth-rate play, uttering lines no one believes in a manner no one respects.”

… and some of these voices are much “louder” than others…

3. Chris Brogan and Julien Smith’s Trust Agents just hit the New York Times Bestseller list. It’s a how-to guide, defining and training the individuals in your organization best practices to be honest as they build genuine relationships. From the cover flap: “Trust Agents wield enough online influence to build up and bring down a business’ reputation.”

… so organizations must find a new way to communicate…

4. Shel Holtz and John C. Havens’ Tactical Transparency presents a framework for dealing with all the scary situations that big brands fear as they dip their toes in to Social Media. From the book: “Tactical Transparency provides dozens of case studies and interviews that address the implementation of transparency tools at the highest levels of the organization and the lowest. Transparency succeeds when it is embedded into the culture of a company, not implemented as a program designed to be exercised by only a few.”

… and it must go all the way to the top…

5. Organic’s CFO and COO Marita Scarfi explains the opportunity CEOs are missing if they don’t participate in Social Media and open conversations, in this recent Threeminds blog post. “Being engaged with your customers allows you to produce better products/services which, in turn, leads to improved customer loyalty. Ultimately this helps increase sales and fosters stronger company financial performance (e.g. increased shareholder value).”

… just like these numerous examples of management-level-driven open conversations.

6. The NewPR Wiki lists dozens of blogs written by Management-level contributors, where issues are being discussed, and trust is growing in brands… and the people that are behind them.

One last tip, campers: Campfires start quicker when the team works together, and when the structure of the tinder allows in oxygen… Keep it open.

(Insert Seth Godin Quote here)

Here’s a quick link to the Google Search: ebay wicked sick bmx

Phil “PhotoPhilCro” Crozier’s Final Canvas

50 new Nissan Cubes are driving off Canadian cubes dealer lots this month. Each one’s being driven by a brand advocate you only wish you had hired to tout your brand.

The new cars are the reward for months of creation and promotion by these musicians, DJs, dancers, programmers, designers, bloggers, podcasters, poets, writers and artists, and all kinds of creative thinkers; the cream of the crop of 500 competing “auditions” broadcast online over the last three months via social channels. Nissan openly called The Hypercube a social media marketing experiment, choosing to invest only in this channel, and is now pleased to announce (or tweet, perhaps) the successful proof of their thesis.

Nissan Canada’s creative agency, Capital C, went beyond the boilerplate hey-make-us-a-video and please-retweet-our-propaganda “campaigns” that are all too common these days, by offering prizes on which creative minds could really envision spending time and effort.

The Contest

Of 7000 applicants, 500 elite were given Hypercube canvases to audition for the mass public, stumping for daily votes with photos and animation, video, poetry and song. Competitors even took their campaigning offline, including Telma “TSwizz” Costa, who created and distributed pins to drive traffic, and Sean “Cube Man” Williams who literally drove offline traffic in his homemade cardboard Cube costume.

The cream rose quickly, as canvasses brought out the best from these competitors. And believe me, if you followed or friended any of them, you were hearing about it.

Over the course of the contest, so much exceptional content was created, it’s difficult to “highlight” the best stuff. Here are pieces of just three of the intense and daily updated canvasses:

Tony “Tony Holiday” Elston’s final canvas

Brittany Jade “Gunandagirl” Hanson’s final canvas

Delphine “Delf Berg” Bergeron’s final canvas

You can view all of the winning canvasses at thehypercube.ca

The Platforms

The Hypercube site was just the town hall of this experience, though, as competitors created videos on YouTube…

Posted images to Flickr…

Tweeted (like crazy)…

built web pages and blogs, and invoked social graphs from their other communities. For example, contestant Andre Molnar looked to leverage the passionate Drupal community, by promising to create the “Drupliconcube,” a Nissan cube “decked out in Druplicons, spreading the Drupal love to the streets.

Deeper Interactions

More than just pleas for votes, these daily updates became meaningful interactions between the competitors. Williams sent out a YouTube dance-off challenge to his fellow participants, and created this mashup:

Some social media users voiced disapproval of the campaign, including Shawn Micallef, who questioned the quality of the engagement suggests a line had been crossed, from daily updates from friends and outright spam. I disagree, as social media users are constantly pushing out posts and tweets that may annoy some, but be useful to others. This is the very nature of Social Currency, and one can, in fact, “Unfollow.” Furthermore, this type of repetition occurs with non-marketing events even more than with campaigns. When Michael Jackson died, or during the Obama campaign, the tidal wave of repetitious posts seemed to drown most other conversation. The Hypercube campaign wasn’t perfect, but neither is Facebook, nor Twitter, themselves.

The Finale

Such a momentous story had to end with an explosive climax, and on June 24, it did just that. Contestants gathered with friends at events simulcast in Toronto, Montreal and Vancouver. (Small-town contestants got together on their own in other provinces, too.) Contestants performed live between DJ sets, mingled over drinks, and sat in the highly-coveted Cubes on display. Winners were announced across the country via big screen video and some tight computer graphics. The dance floor of CiRCA in Toronto was like a minefield as groups of friends exploded in cheers when the local winners were listed off. It seemed like an endless supply of car keys were handed out, and many of the winners were ironically rendered speechless.

One can’t argue the level of quality and vastly disparate creative skillsets with which the Cube brand has been aligned.

The Outcome

Now, Nissan Canada has tons of authentic content to work with, generated by skilled creatives at a low cost. The winners are required to update their canvasses twice a month for the next year, but the brand will get a lot more than that, I predict, as these content generators are eager to share their experiences on the road. And they’ve also got promises to keep with their fans. Singer/Cube-winner Curtis Santiago promised to drive to a voter’s house in his cube, anywhere in Canada, to play a house party. No doubt he’ll be blogging and vlogging the whole trip.

I’ll admit, at first glance, I assumed Nissan Canada and Capital C’s campaign was a huge gamble. All too often, big brands create deep connections with new communities, but then drop these connections as soon as their campaign is over. Nissan has demonstrated how to think and plan long term; find–no, create passionate advocates who themselves created a plethora of content and awareness; and build a brand in partnership with their customers.

The Community

Moreover, this campaign was just the spark, a great success already, but the story of the Nissan Cube and the CubeCommunity is just beginning. Cubecommunity.ca teases us with a “coming soon” page, but the long-term strategy is obvious, as the community has all of the core requirements, starting with deeply invested and passionate community leaders. I look forward to following this community, and, in many ways, the hard work for Nissan and Capital C has just begun.

I’m happy to admit, the bar’s just been raised for “social media marketing.”

There is life in the marketing departments of big corporate. There is energy and understanding at the executive level of many blue chip companies. If you’re a part of these companies, welcome to the new paradigm. If you’re a competitor to a member of the Social Media Council, big brand beware. These old dogs are getting a new social life.

I’m excited because more large businesses are starting to accept and embrace the future — transparency, the social web, some even the inevitability of The Cluetrain Manifesto.

I know this, because last week, Bob Pearson (@bobpearson1845), Dell’s Vice President of Communities and Conversations, and representing the newly named Social Media Business Council (formerly “Blog Council”) presented “15 Key Trends & Observations For Leaders Of Great Brands” to Toronto’s Third Tuesday attendees.

Some of the highlights:

3. Realize that your customer does not care where you want them to go.

4. Less than 1% of a customer’s time is spent actually purchasing a product. (99% is spent browsing and socializing) Pearson then asked, “Why would we spend 100% of our budget on that 1%, when the decision-making process is so well underway?”

Pearson also spoke of his agency partners as “Iterative Innovators” in this space, working with the marketing team, but not leading the social media practice — that, he explained, has to come from within the company.

This is a dramatic shift — from digital experts talking to brand managers and delivering the good news (or bad, if you liked the old ways of interruptive marketing) about the new paradigms of the Internet.

This simple presentation speaks for itself. I don’t agree with every small detail here, but the core ideas are light years ahead of most brand managers’ understanding of what the future and the immediate present requires.

Pearson and fellow Social Media Business Council member (from Molson Canada) Ferg Devins are big advocates of the council, proclaiming it an open, honest exchange of experience and knowledge that is “establishing a practice.”

After listening to Pearson, I think the benefits are undeniable.

You can learn more about the Social Media Business Council at SocialMedia.org.

‘Trouble At The Henhouse’ dropped in 1996, just as marketers were starting to try to think about the Internet. In my opinion, this was and is the much-worshipped (by Canadians) band’s best album. But, until today, when ‘Let’s Stay Engaged’ shuffled through my iPod’s earbuds, I didn’t realize they wrote the anthem for today’s best practice marketing strategies ten years early.

Let’s Stay Engaged

It might be late but it won’t be early
you got me to the gate with time for a coffee
it’s getting late sounds like a departure
it’s getting close sounds to me like a departure
Until we meet again lets stay engaged
until then lets stay engaged
Lies over time float to the surface
lies over time they equal surface
lies over time though the reasons desert us
lies over time with no apparent purpose
Until we meet again lets stay engaged
until then lets stay engaged
See the dead art and you see your reflection
fear no art and you fear no reflection
but don’t look at me, I’m not the artist in question
sounds good to me, but I’m not the artist in question
Until we meet again lets stay engaged
until then lets stay engaged

Maybe ‘Henhouse’ was a full brand/marketing/social web/social commerce concept album…

Gift Shop – “After a glimpse over the top/The rest of the world/Becomes a Gift Shop”

Does this refer to Chris Anderson’s “Free! Why $0.00 Is the Future of Business” concept?

They really were Ahead By A Century.

It’s been too long since I posted a three-pack from Organic’s ThreeMinds blog. These great posts are creating a lot of discussion:

1. Where Does Brand Experience Begin and End? by Anthony Viviano and Sarah Jo Sautter examines the rare execution of holistic brand experiences, across media and from web to office or retail.
2. Do Social Media Marketers Dream Of Monitoring Tools? by Anna Banks outlines the features needed for deep social media monitoring. This new discipline is noisy, and expanding rapidly. And also;
3. Why You Shouldn’t Care About Seeing Flash on iPhone by Fang-Yu Lin shuts down the speculation. If you care about user experience, you’ll understand why.

I’ve never used Lolcats on my blog, so this is the first, and last time. Promisses.

Photo credits: Marc Shandro.

Back in May, I tweeted eight “Web Strategy Reminders” that got some great responses. Here they are altogether, with two bonus reminders to allow people to laugh like Count von Count when they’re done.

Web Strategy reminder No. 1: If you’re just adding a “Community” tab to your web site, You’re doing it wrong.

Web Strategy reminder No. 2: If you’re pushing Content out through banners, You’re doing it wrong.

Web Strategy reminder No. 3: If everything you build has a unique interface, You’re doing it wrong.

Web Strategy reminder No. 4: If you start with a tactical gimmick on a platform your market doesn’t use, You’re doing it wrong.

Web Strategy reminder No. 5: If your platform doesn’t separate form from function, You’re doing it wrong.

Web Strategy reminder No. 6: If you’re ignoring the fact that Search is the number one way that users find you, You’re doing it wrong.

Web Strategy reminder No. 7: If you’re not considering how your experience will change over time, You’re doing it wrong.

Web Strategy reminder No. 8: If you’re not implementing a holistic measurement strategy beyond clickstream analysis, You’re doing it wrong.

Web Strategy reminder No. 9: If you’re ignoring the fact that your employees are telling the story of your brand (good or bad) better than your corporate web site, You’re doing it wrong.

Web Strategy reminder No. 10: If you’re excited about your new banner ad pushing to your new television ad on your new Flash web site, You’re doing it wrong.

As the shimmering waters of Facebook, Twitter and other social spheres are opened, many marketers are diving in the shallow end head first and hoping that the API waterwings their social media guru has supplied will keep them afloat.

I blogged about a few of these examples here, listing some brands gasping for air as their Twitter API “strategy” gets pulled from their lungs, and others just treading water.

Enter Prototype-Experience.com, a console game site (the Mitch Buchanan of this metaphor), where users link the Prototype trailer with their social graph and assets via Facebook Connect.

This is an excerpt of a post… Read the rest of this post on Organic’s Threeminds Blog

Apparently, API stands for All Projects are Implemented, according to some agencies. Marketers are trying to find their way in the Times-Square madness of the Social Media space, but when someone is asking for directions, they don’t really want every street on the whole map.

With Twitter, for example, it’s still important for strategy to drive decisions on tactics. An open API seems to be a maddening siren’s call for agencies and developers, causing them to lose all sense and launch campaigns just for the sake of integrating Twitter.

Let’s learn from these campaigns and stop all the gimmickry.

Skittles

If you haven’t heard of the Skittles.com debacle (which they continue to host), welcome to the Internet. Kidding aside, this web site has thrown away caution and its brand, allowing Facebook, Twitter and YouTube to define its message and its value. Upon launch of this “strategy,” users gamed the sites, associating swear words, offensive posts and negative messaging. Now, weeks later, the aggregate social destination sits passive; the brand message confused and tarnished.

The glass-half-full viewpoint: I should, however, acknowledge the 1 million+ fans subscribed to the Skittles Facebook fan page. It will be interesting to see what, if anything, Skittles does with these subscribers.

FixOutlook.org

This recently launched grassroots site hopes to grab the attention of the Windows Beta evaluators, and send a powerful, organized message to Microsoft before they commit to the sin of continuing to use Word to render emails in the 2010 version of Outlook. I admit, it’s a noble cause. But the twitter implementation at the core site is reminiscent of 90s designers using animated gif backgrounds just because they could. It was a terrible idea, and the addition of a Twitter avatar feed doesn’t change this. This is/was a great opportunity to unite these users in a deeper way.

The glass-half-full viewpoint: The people behind this cause did keep it simple, and don’t necessarily have a need for a long-term view. The virulence of the tweets are visible, and I’ve yet (with 17,489 “tweetitioners”) to see any tweets against the campaign.

Terminator Salvation (Resistance 2018)

The film over-promised and under-delivered, so I suppose we could say the Twitter campaign stayed true to the brand. This Twitter game sent Jumbled words to decode and trivia questions to answer to followers who would earn points. It also incorporated some Terminator-world messages, such as, “You have been harvested by the machines, you lose 5 points.” Games on Twitter are starting to multiply, and this one seemed to have good promise, but the challenges became repetitive quickly, and the burning Terminator face rolling by among my smiling happy Twitter friends weakened the impact of the experience. If this is SkyNet, we have nothing to worry about.

The glass-half-full viewpoint: Games on Twitter are still a new concept, and this early attempt did earn some pretty good reach and buzz. It does foreshadow more robust and solid twitter contest and gaming to come.

Polar Ice

The ultimate in Twitter API gimmickry lives at PolarIce.ca. This flash site pulls in what appear to be completely random Tweets, with a muddled interface featuring confusing functionality creating the ultimate why-am-I-here experience for users. It seems Polar Ice just likes Twitter. But what does this have to do with Vodka, or partying?

The glass-half-full viewpoint: If you have a glass half full of Polar Ice, tip it back and Google your way off this site.

Nike’s The Hookup

Nike’s work-in-progress started with a whimper, but is now, it appears, starting to evolve into something a little more useful. The Hookup tweets local shoe drops to followers, and has other functionality pulling key terms for their fashion product/item/lines called “icons.” Fans are starting to use the tag #thehookup, which may connect to this strategy too, but it’s difficult to say.

The glass-half-full viewpoint: There is a lot of activity around these items on Twitter, and this team has a long-term view. A few changes will lead to success for this program.

(Full disclosure: I work for Organic, with Nike Canada as one of our clients. I haven’t, however, worked on The Hookup)

What’s the common thread here? These API implementations are all ideas conceived based on the brand’s needs, instead of the users’.

If instead, one considers the drivers behind users’ behaviours on Twitter and other Social Media, one realizes that these are surface ideas that don’t serve their preferences, desires and needs. Start with user-centric thinking, think long-term, and ease into Social Media with grace and success.

It’s just this easy.

1. Facebook tried to be Twitter, with a partnership with CNN. Will this happen more and more? Will Facebookers feel the need to Tweet?
2. CNN.com served 13 million+ streams… but fell behind, and offered lower quality than UStream and Joost.
3. Twitter stayed up, and so did the mobile networks!
4. Whitehouse.gov launched at 12:01pm including a blog, podcasts, video, RSS… but without comments? (Like Obama’s inauguration, it’s a good start)
5. The world watched, Together.

Organic’s ThreeMinds blog has a couple of great posts that I think you’ll enjoy:

1. Social media micro case study: “X-Men” by Russ Hopkinson estimates the value of a brands’ friends on MySpace, and what they may have lost.
2. Turning Nothing Into Something by Michael Beavers examines a fantastic idea from ThisIsReality.org — Advertising in context on a 404 error page. And also;
3. A Look Back at Some Favorite iPhone Apps from 2008

My 1,700+ followers on Twitter may have caught a few of my tweets recently about my frustration with Twitter’s 2,000 follow limit. That is, one can only follow up to 2,000 people until one’s own followers has caught up to that number.

As it turns out, one’s followers only have to reach 1,850 before one can add more follows. (For those of you that don’t really understand what I’m talking about, please join twitter and follow me, and I’ll be happy to explain further. Or, watch Commoncraft’s ‘Twitter In Plain English’.)

I learned this new information last night, as I saw that I had surpassed 1,800 followers and was also now following 2,013 tweeters. This ratio had apparently been “approved” by the twitter code and database, allowing me to continue to find more great people to tweet with. I understand that Twitter needs some type of processs or security against spammers, who generally follow hundreds of tweeters without reciprocal follows using scripts and other techniques. For this reason, new twitter users soon learn the value of gauging the ratio of follows to followers, filtering for spammers. Basically, if you don’t “earn” the followers, you’ll be limited to 2,000 people…

Also last night, the Twitter team chose to eliminate accounts they judged as spam accounts. I woke up to about 90 less “followers” and was only now following about 1,975. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t want to follow or be followed by spammers, but this couldn’t have happened at a worse time for me. I’m now once again struggling with the 2K barrier designed to thwart spammers — and only because all the spammers were removed.

Every community needs spam and abuse measures. However, Twitter’s 2K barrier is an over-simplistic measure that should have other checks and balances that don’t limit power users like me. If followers see that my follow-to-follower ratio is suspect, they can choose not to follow me. This is allowing the community and users to self-police.

I should be back up to 1,850 soon enough, but a little more thought should have been put into this measure. Say, once a user has passed the 1,850 mark, dropping under again no longer applies; or, before the Twitter team hits the big trapdoor lever to dump spammers, they could have thought about how this would affect their user types… With such “simple and elegant” functionality, one would think that this wouldn’t be too long a conversation.

Photo by Chinaguccio

I’m an Olympics junkie. But, until the olympiad when I can watch the event I want, when I want, wherever I want, my craving will remain unsated.

Athens 2004 gave a glimpse at the potential of the future of Olympics coverage, and as Beijing 2008 approached, it seemed that on-demand, super-immersive web strategy and mobile tactics would be ubiquitous and all-encompassing.

As it turns out, it’s not quite there yet. NBC’s has no regrets however, as their lock down of the coverage has grabbed a 17.6 Nielsen rating and $1 Billion in advertising revenue.

Nevertheless, social media and Web 2.0 has opened new doors for the dissemination and celebration of the games to spread higher, faster and stronger.

Here are some of the strategies and memes that are defining the Olympic Games online and on your mobile device:

Video

Wired’s “How to watch the olympics online”

If you’re hunting for the ultimate on-demand and live coverage online, this is a good place to start.

• howto.wired.com/wiki/Watch_the_Olympics_Online

CCTV Olympics Flash interface

Flash designers are boasting about the scope of the content being delivered on a Flash platform implementation. It’s “pretty,” I suppose, but severely limited as far as organization of the content and usability. It’s possible this answers the question whether Flash can support large projects, but that’s secondary to delivering a good user experience… and Flash just isn’t the right fit for this type of content.

• cctvolympics.com

NBC using Silverlight

… but at least the CCTV site is Flash and not Silverlight. Users, if they’re so fortunate to own a Windows PC, are forced to download the new Microsoft Silverlight plug-in to view NBC’s online video. After that hurdle is cleared, the experience is good for some, terrible for others.

• nbcolympics.com/video

Googolympics

StartupMeme lists the many Google initiatives for the games, including Gadgets, One-box search, Maps visualizations and the (arguably) revolutionary dedicated YouTube channel.

• startupmeme.com/google-geared-up-to-fix-beijing-olympics-2008-2

And here’s Google’s mobile access to stats and updates.

• google.com/m/messageboard?mb=08bj

Widgets

All the major content providers have built desktop widgets.

• www.google.ca/search?q=olympics+widget

Lenovo’s TVTonic Super-Widget

Lenovo’s has sponsored a skinned TVTonic app that allows you to subscribe to full-length events, viewable on- and off-line.

• www.tvtonic.com/olympics/install/

Interactive Strategies

CBC’s Sport Explainer

CBC explains events with simple animations. You can learn water polo by clicking on the link at the bottom right here>

• cbc.ca/olympics/water-polo/

BBC Interactive Olympic Map

The BBC leverages Microsoft Live Search Maps to surface blog and twitter coverage via a geographical visualization.

• news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/olympics/7493757.stm

NYT’s Medal Count Map Visualization

The New York Times shows us the historical (and current) medal counts for all of the modern games.

• nytimes.com/interactive/2008/08/04/sports/olympics/20080804_MEDALCOUNT_MAP.html

BBC’s Olympic Myth: “Monkey”

The Gorillaz’ Damon Albarn and Jamie Hewlett adapt and animate a classical Chinese novel to promote BBC coverage.

• news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/olympics/monkey/7521287.stm

Mobile

Blackberry Cool’s Olympic Roundup

Follow on your Blackberry with these apps.

• blackberrycool.com/2008/08/get-the-olympics-on-your-blackberry-round-up/

Softpedia’s Blackberry Beijing Travel App

Going to Beijing? Here’s an interesting targeted Travel App.

• handheld.softpedia.com/get/Travel/Travel-Beijing-China-2008-Summer-Olympics-BlackBerry-60532.shtml

Zumobi’s Olympic iPhone App

Zumobi has a simple app – no video, but general coverage, including photos and blogs. If you have an iPhone, let me know what you think of this…

• macworld.com/article/134963/2008/08/olympics_app.html

Social Media

Twitter Hashtags: BG08, Beijing, Olympics

The twitterati can’t make up their mind on a tag, so here’s all three as they are rolling out on Twemes.

• twemes.com/BG08,Beijing,Olympics

Flickr

Wow, Flickr had a great opportunity to capitalize on all the great photos from the event… but finding the good photos is tough. Most searches return almost an equal number of protest and political images as mediocre shots of the games.

• flickr.com/search/?q=beijing+2008+olympics&s=int

Facebook Apps

Pramati has built an interesting Guess-the-Podium app for Sun. It’s a good idea, but tough to guess many events – that is, I could have an educated guess on a World Cup or March Madness app, but I’m not sure who to pick for 60kg Men’s Freestyle Wrestling. Will it be He Qin, Yandro Quintana or Mavlet Batirov who take the gold?

• facereviews.com/2008/08/07/facebook-olympics-app-by-sun/

NBC’s and other also-ran apps are available too.

Wikipedia

• en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2008_Summer_Olympics

Blogs

Bloggers Blog Olympics Blogs and Twitterers

A great list of bloggers and twitterers is collected here.

• bloggersblog.com/cgi-bin/bloggersblog.pl?bblog=808081

Athlete Blogs

With so many to follow, I haven’t had a chance to sift through these massive lists. (If you have any highlights of great athlete bloggers or entries, let me know.)

• danwei.org/blogs/athletebloggers_at_beijing_oly.php
• hehe2.net/misc/60-beijing-olympic-athletes-blogs-opml-file-directly-to-your-reader/
• summergames.lenovo.com

Wordpress Tag: Olympics

Of course, there are lots of other bloggers talking about the olympics. Wordpress aggregates the tags from these posts.

• wordpress.com/tag/olympics/

Reuters Olympics Podcasts

• blogs.reuters.com/china/2008/08/08/olympics-podcast-day-one/

User-generated content and Memes

We can’t ignore the waves of UGC and the viral contributions of general public.

FriendFeed Spanish Faux-pas

This story exploded across the web, and gains strength still via social networks.

• friendfeed.com/search?q=spanish+team&public=1

Blue Screen of Death @ Opening Ceremonies

The meme says Windows projected its infamous artwork on during the opening ceremonies. Real or fake? Either way, geeks grabbed on to the story and added another chapter to the Windows Fail mythology.

• gizmodo.com/5035456/blue-screen-of-death-strikes-birds-nest-during-opening-ceremonies-torch-lighting

LOLBush @ Olympics

The Guardian wonders if Bush “can haz” anything else to do, besides watching Misty May dig sand.

• guardian.co.uk/world/gallery/2008/aug/12/bushlol?picture=336501045

Sponsor Strategies

Most of the official international sponsors have weak (if any) strategies – Flash timelines and movies that unapologetically cram the brands down the users’ throats. If your computer doesn’t crash, check out Panasonic’s “World Wide Wave.” Yikes.

On the other side of things

McDonalds’ The Lost Ring Cross-channel Immersive Storyline

Wow. I stumbled on to this only recently, and it looks expansive, and impressive. It also looks like it’s nearly over. I’ll be looking deeper into this multilingual social media play.

• thelostring.com

Atos Origin’s On-site Infrastructure

Here’s an overview of Beijing 2008’s IT provider’s offerings, including the “Olympic Family Intranet”

• computing.co.uk/computing/news/2216061/beijing-olympics-primed-break-3988584

Kodak’s Blog?

Meh. Kodak’s final olympiad as an Olympic sponsor passes on a weak note online.

• 1000words.kodak.com

… one interesting post however, is the comprehensive gallery of Kodak’s Olympic Pins.

• tomhoehn.1000words.kodak.com/default.asp?item=2245002

Samsung’s Medal Mania

Medal Mania is a cross-Internet hunt for medals. The clues are kind of lame, but it’s a good attempt at engagement.

• medalmania.com

Official Web Strategy

Beijing 2008’s official site

One wonders at the missed (?) opportunities for the official sites to host and stream on-demand content. And for revenue streams? Sponsorships, subscriptions and fee-driven access. How about a deal with iTunes?

• en.beijing2008.cn

Vancouver 2010

Finally, a shameless proud plug for the home team currently building towards the next winter games. Go Canada Go! (See you there.)

• vancouver2010.com

This list is a work-in-progress. Send me your links and thoughts on the games…

Yes, this is another blog post about Twitter.

It looks like Twitter’s ready for your brand. Is your airline, coffee franchise, financial services organization, non-profit, car dealership, landscaping company, ad agency, funeral home or laundromat ready to Twitter?

From a social media marketing analysis standpoint, the conversation has changed from questioning Twitter’s viability as a channel to acceptance of the tool, its audience stability and growth. The question now is, how does a brand use it without (as the internet-savvy say) EPIC FAIL?

Here are some of the recent thoughts, proofs and discussions:

1. Dell expands Twitter strategy
2. Dell explains their strategy on YouTube
3. Zappos (@zappos) has 400+ employees on Twitter (and amazing online reputation/WOM momentum), and here are the employees: twitter.zappos.com/employees
4. Bryan Person (@BryanPerson) is collecting “BrandsOnTwitter” Delicious Links
5. Jeremiah Owyang (@jowyang) analyzes at the Brands that have been unsuccessful on Twitter
6. Fortune Magazine highlights Twitter’s potential

Let me know if you find more analysis to help brand planners and marketers understand Twitter.

Follow me here: @craigritchie

Update: Jeremiah Owyang has posted his recommendations for Brands on Twitter.

Commoncraft does it again. Thanks Lee Lefever and crew.

Social Media in Plain English from leelefever on Vimeo.

For a recent project, I needed to quickly produce a timeline of events. I thought this would be a great idea for a web tool and app across social media. It turned out that < a href=”http://www.dipity.com”>Dipity is already doing a great job with their timeline product, I was happy to find. Now, they’ve mashed up their UGC timeline generator with the YouTube API to create TimeTube. Brilliant.

Now I just need a tool to keep all of these great new tools organized in my brain so that I can remember them nanoseconds after the need arises…