Happy 25th Anniversary to David Stern as he celebrates a quarter century as NBA Commissioner. He was named commissioner in November, 1983 but officially took office as the NBA concluded its celebration of the 1984 All-Star Game in Denver, Colorado. Stern took over the Commissioner's office on February 1, 1984.
I remember the weekend well. It was marked by Larry Nance's Slam-Dunk contest upset over Dr. J which I featured in The Blog on Saturday.
Anyhow, here's to David Stern and his amazing accomplishments over the years (43 and counting since Columbia Law and 31 and counting since becoming the NBA's first in-house General Counsel). I wish David and the NBA all the very best in the years to come.
“The good old days sometimes were not quite as good as people say they are, and these may be the good new days, and the richness of talent, the 75 international players that we didn’t have available to us in 1984, all of the young talent that’s coming in,” Stern said. “I’m a fan, and I think it’s as good as it’s ever been.”
- David J. Stern
My best,
TL
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CBS Market Watch is launching a new online consumer site for the 'post crash' era. (Gotta love that phraseology?). See the trailer:
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Super Bowl advertisers taking the plunge are looking for different ways to maximize exposure. That's certainly nothing new, but this story delves into some of the ways marketers are honing their deliveries:
Marketers Hone Digital Game
New Media Play Featured Role in Super Bowl Campaigns
By EMILY STEEL
Super Bowl advertisers have stepped up their digital game this year.
Interactive TV ads, sophisticated search strategies, Web-only outtakes, mobile-phone applications and social-networking campaigns are part of the game-day playbooks of major marketers, including Anheuser-Busch InBev, E*Trade Financial, CareerBuilder, PepsiCo and Pedigree, a dog-food brand owned by Mars.
"We're definitely trying to change our mind-set to use mass TV in a more efficient and effective way," says Matt Ramella, manager of media and digital marketing for Labatt Breweries of Canada, a unit of Anheuser-Busch InBev that also handles Canadian advertising for Budweiser. "Digital extensions pick up where mass media leaves off."
Labatt is among the marketers testing new technologies designed to make the most of the short exposure their ads will get on the Feb. 1 game broadcast. Drawing on technology from Canada's etc.tv, Labatt will give Quebec viewers who watch the game on sports network RDS the chance to use their remotes to click on links embedded in Budweiser ads. The links will take them to a channel where they can watch a longer versions of the ads, bookmark them to watch later or choose to return to the game.
The Budweiser ads will be the first Super Bowl commercials to use such interactive technologies. Labatt will pay for the interactive component of the ads based on the number of unique views. The brewer says the test is part of a broader effort to shift its traditional media spending to targeted digital ads.
Digital extensions for Super Bowl ads once were just an afterthought. The latest initiatives go beyond standard online display ads, sponsorships on Super Bowl-related Web sites and ensuring that the commercials aired during the big game appear on online hubs, such as YouTube's Super Bowl AdBlitz, where viewers vote for their favorites.
The shift comes as marketers strive to squeeze as much value as possible from their Super Bowl ad time, which this year costs as much as $3 million for a 30-second spot. They have also gotten savvier about incorporating digital-ad features in their campaigns from the outset, ad executives say.
"The economic climate has forced people to wake up and be more efficient with their marketing dollars. A couple of years ago, this kind of collaboration would never have happened," says Josh Stylman, managing partner at Reprise Media, a digital-ad agency owned by Interpublic Group that handled the Super Bowl search and social-media ad strategy for Castrol motor oil.
Among other things, Castrol, a brand owned by BP, is buying online ads tied to Web searches for Castrol Edge, a new eco-friendly product it is promoting in its Super Bowl TV ad.
Several advertisers have used the Web as a vehicle to drum up interest in their ads ahead of the game. Since October, PepsiCo has sponsored a contest offering $1 million to anyone who can create a Super Bowl commercial for its Doritos tortilla chips that scores No. 1 in USA Today's Super Bowl ad competition.
The contest has generated a significant amount of free publicity for Doritos. The ad videos have chalked up hundreds of thousands of views, and some contestants have launched their own Web sites to promote their entries.
Other advertisers, including Pedigree, E*Trade and Cars.com, are posting outtakes, "sneak peaks" or expanded versions of their commercials to the Web. The ad for PepsiCo's SoBe Lifewater features original music that will be available on Apple's iTunes Store.
Some Super Bowl advertisers are attempting to use their 30-second TV spots to create a digital ripple effect. CareerBuilder, the jobs site jointly owned by Microsoft and newspaper publishers Gannett, Tribune and McClatchy, has created anonymoustipgiver.com, a Web site where visitors can send anonymous messages to annoying co-workers or others. The messages feature characters from CareerBuilder's TV ad and lets senders choose from texts like "One out of 10 people think your barking-dog ring tone is funny, that one person is you."
(TL note - Anonymous Tip giving is a cop-out. Own up to your tip-giving and face the person eye-to-eye. The anonymous, on-line, email, internet, non-communication, leave room for interpretation, lack of communication world is what has set us all back 100+ years. We call it progress? People don't talk to each other anymore.)
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Sign of the 2009 Marketing and Financial Fallout Apocalypse? GM, Ford and Chrysler are all looking for bail-out money and laying off workers at new record marks, but Hyundai is sponsoring the Super Bowl pregame show.
Hyundai Motor America will be the presenting sponsor of NBC's Super Bowl XLIII pregame show. The deal includes three 30-second spots preceding the game. The program's full title will be the "Kick-Off Show Presented by the Hyundai Genesis, '2009 North American Car of the Year'" (Hyundai).
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AZ Central.com made note of the following:
Keith Olbermann spent part of his 50th birthday on the field, admiring Larry Fitzgerald.
"We go through this whole routine," said Olbermann, a political and sports commentator for NBC and MSNBC. "You come here, there is no news, and now (teams) are sending in ringers. This kid's father is a sports writer. He's the guy everybody wants to hear from, and he's been practicing these answers since he was in the womb."
Though Olbermann mocked the nature of media day, he marveled at the Cardinals' presence in Tampa.
"The last time they played this late in a season, Truman was president, they were in Chicago and there was no television, really," Olbermann said. "It's kind of startling. It's kind of bizarre."
(TL Note: I enjoy watching Olbermann on his nightly Countdown show which was aired from Tampa last week. Of course, Countdown would rip the fact that shows airing from Tampa are selling out in the fact that they base from the site of the SuperBowl.)
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Jane Gross of The New York Times is a tremendous writer. I enjoyed her prior work on sports and education. Now, check out her writing on a very tough topic to address; The New Old Age:
http://newoldage.blogs.nytimes.com/author/jane-gross/
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Boys With Unpopular Names More Likely to Break Law
from http://www.LiveScience.com
Boys in the United States with common names like Michael and David are less likely to commit crimes than those named Ernest or Ivan.
David E. Kalist and Daniel Y. Lee of Shippensburg University in Pennsylvania compared the first names of male juvenile delinquents to the first names of male juveniles in the population. The researchers constructed a popularity-name index (PNI) for each name. For example, the PNI for Michael is 100, the most frequently given name during the period. The PNI for David is 50, a name given half as frequently as Michael. The PNI is approximately 1 for names such as Alec, Ernest, Ivan, Kareem, and Malcolm.
Results show that, regardless of race, juveniles with unpopular names are more likely to engage in criminal activity. The least popular names were associated with juvenile delinquency among both blacks and whites.
The findings, announced January 28, are detailed in the journal Social Science Quarterly.
While the names are likely not the cause of crime, the researchers argue that "they are connected to factors that increase the tendency to commit crime, such as a disadvantaged home environment, residence in a county with low socioeconomic status, and households run by one parent."
"Also, adolescents with unpopular names may be more prone to crime because they are treated differently by their peers, making it more difficult for them to form relationships," according to a statement released by the journal's publisher. "Juveniles with unpopular names may also act out because they consciously or unconsciously dislike their names."
The findings could help officials " identify individuals at high risk of committing or recommitting crime, leading to more effective and targeted intervention programs," the authors conclude.
TL Note: For references to the veracity of this story, please consult with: Richard Nixon and Bill Clinton.
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Spirit(s) in the Sky?
Should'a had a Bud Light?
The Spirit Air flight attendants do not necessarily agree. Read On:
MIRAMAR - Spirit Airlines flight attendants are fuming over the latest addition to their work wardrobe: Inflight aprons sporting a Bud Light beer logo.
"Turning flight attendants into walking billboards is unacceptable," Deborah Crowley, Association of Flight Attendants-CWA Spirit president, said in a news release.
The group says the apron ads are not only "demeaning" but raise safety concerns, as flight attendants are obligated to enforce federal regulations regarding intoxicated passengers.
The Miramar-based airline says the new aprons are the latest revenue-generating tactic in its onboard advertising initiative, called Mile High Media, launched in September.
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Headline Writing 101?
Check this out:
Man accused of drunken horse riding in snowstorm
CODY, Wyo. --A man has been cited for public intoxication while riding a white horse during a snowstorm in the northern Wyoming town of Cody.
Police say they cited 28-year-old Benjamin Daniels after they received a call Sunday afternoon from a motorist concerned that a man was creating a road hazard by riding his horse on a street in conditions with poor visibility.
Cody Assistant Police Chief George Menig says officers noticed Daniels was intoxicated after they stopped him to explain that drivers were having difficulty spotting his slow-moving white horse.
Menig said Thursday that Daniels was detained Sunday and released the following day. He will go before a municipal judge later.
A friend of Daniels picked up the horse. There was no telephone listing for Daniels.
TL wonders... Shouldn't it say "Drunken Man accused of horse riding in snowstorm. Or? was the horse drunk?
-30-
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