Every time we say that a piece of video content will become viral, I believe it de-values the video.  The creator of the content cannot decide what will become viral, only consumers can.  Typically what becomes viral are stunts and humorous 2 minute clips and this hurts the adoption rate of longer serious form video into the minds of marketers.

I was scheduled to attend the JackMeyers Future of Media breakfast yesterday but could not attend due to a few work conflicts.  My friend Dina Kaplan (and one of the most front facing COO’s I know) was part of a power-panel that spoke about the Realities of Dealing with a Changing Marketplace.  She mentioned a few things that were written up that I’m going to reblog here:

Kaplan, sees a significant change in the business as “the lines are blurring between professional and independent content producers. Networks used to control what would get on the air; now you might find a Revision 3, Next New Networks or Worldwide Biggies show you like as much as a network show.” She also points to series launched at blip.tv such as zefrank and Amanda Congdon.

The challenge, Kaplan admits, is monetizing this content and “convincing people at the brands and agencies there is more to viral videos than cats flushing toilets. They can reach people in ways not possible before. Consumers are engaged with other consumers in online conversations and web video is an important new trend.” Kaplan believes it will take at least until 2010 before video content developers will have a clear picture of the economic potential, but several of blip.tv’s content producers, she says, are generating revenues and are profitable.

Kaplan believes consumers will increasingly be viewing content across TV, the computer, mobile devices and personal video displays and that content will be available across an array of platforms. “The era of destination sites is over,” she says. “The belief you need to build a site that is all things to all people is over and it will sound silly in a few years.” Even Hulu, the joint venture of News Corp and NBC, she points out, is doing extensive distribution deals to make their content available wherever consumers want it.

Dina and I share the notion of her last paragraph especially:  Kaplan believes consumers will increasingly be viewing content across TV, the computer, mobile devices and personal video displays and that content will be available across an array of platforms.

I’ve been harping this for a long time - content is portable.  Our world is on demand and soon, it’s going to be pretty much custom (more on that in subsequent postings).  If I want to watch Fast Lane Daily on my computer, my television, or my iPhone, let me do so.  Oh wait, Next New Networks is already making that happen.

Going back to a changing marketplace thought, one of the ways to innovate AND survive is to not be too far a head of the curve, but far enough to be a thought leader.  The reason why you don’t want to be too far ahead is because you need to generate revenue to sustain yourself (after all, you’re probably not a charity) and folks who are too far ahead have a hard time generating repeat and sustaining revenue.

If interested in this topic, re-read my hyperdistribution post here.

I take the web’s infrastructure for granted.  I open up Safari or Firefox and I access the web.  I turn on Xbox 360 and connect to Xbox Live to play friends across the world, buy virtual goods, and download trailers.  My iPhone can surf most sites on the web in native format, a favorite is Grub On the Go.  This blog is hosted at MediaTemple and people can reach this site 95% of the time (uptime could be better).  The infrastructure of the Internet with all of it’s plumbing is extremely intricate and changes quite often, but the one thing remains the same:  we need to access the web one way or another.

Traditionally, the gateway to the web has been Darpa, CompuServe, Prodigy, America Online/AOL, RED, Mindspring, Optimum Cable, RCN, Windstream, and various other access providers.  Some of the folks on this list are defunct but they all provided a way for us to access the richness of the web.  As a consumer, I didn’t care what they did behind the scenes to get me online; all I cared about was the speed I access the Internet at.  I want my webpages to load quickly, my tweets to go from pointA to point b, xbox live to load, and my connection to be reliable.

GigaOM wrote an article tonight entitled, As Broadband Growth Slows, Expect Speed Bursts.  A little excerpt from the article:

The latest company to follow this path is Windstream, a Little Rock, Ark.-based RLEC. The company said recently that it’s offering 12 Mbps ADSL2 service in some parts of its 16-state network. More importantly, it has increased its lowest-speed tier to 3 Megabits per second. Our good friends at DSLReports add that Windstream is offering the 12Mbps/1Mbps tier for $19.99 for the first six months, and $45 per month after that.

For sake of full disclosure, Windstream is a client of The Media Kitchen, the agency in which I work for and one of the digital media accounts I directly oversee.  I didn’t put them into this blog posting because they are a client, but because 12Mbps ADSL2 service is FAST and if they can roll this out, imagine what the larger providers can do.

Speed is a byproduct of a bigger pipe to and from my computer (or access device).  As consumers, we’re demanding bigger pipes because we’re not just reading content online, but we’re also creating content.  As we’re creating and consuming content, the quality of the content has gotten much greater and watching your favorite television show now takes more speed in order to watch it in high quality.

Besides access infrastructure, cloud computing and storage has been a hot topic for the past year and a half.    Amazon Web Services and Google are pioneering this space, but networks like AppNexus and 10Gen are emerging as unique players within a huge and potentially extremely lucrative market.

Web infrastructure is certainly interesting and it’s only just begun.

A lot has happened in the past few days and I’ve been wanting to write about it but haven’t had the time. I’ll cover a few news items here and hopefully offer up some interesting insight.

• Morgan Stanley released its Technology/Internet Trends document a few weeks ago and it was finally picked up by bloggers. I pointed a few things out internally to my agency but the most important trend here is that this report doesn’t really talk about portals/aggregators/technology players, but rather, communication in a social context which happens to be online. The highlights of the report are all about the “social media” landscape and what people are doing within the ecosystem. I think too many people view the Internet as a technology; but as an entrepreneur and someone who has innovated within the space, technology is an enabler to ignite something else… in this context, communication. Think about how much communication happens on a daily basis online…

• Media6Degrees, announced about $2MM in funding. I have a friend who has been telling me about this company for a few months now and finally, they emerge. I believe he has also joined the team and if he’s there, then they are onto something really interesting. What interests me about them is the quote from the VentureBeat writeup: “With Media6, marketers don’t buy space - they reach interested people regardless of where they are. This not only means that publishers and advertisers get higher returns on their investments, but it also translates into a better online experience for consumers.”

• BrandWeek is telling us why marketers like small social networks. In this article, BrandWeek’s Cumming’s talks about why niche social networks may get the lionshare of advertising dollars. The main reason why they think this is because that these smaller networks are focused on particular niches. Yes, this is true, but can’t Facebook, for example, appeal to everyone and have groups for particular niches as it currently does? The issue I have here is that as a consumer, I don’t want to join 5-10 different networks as I have a hard time dealing with just one… What I like about the article is something I’ve been saying for a long time: Subtle branding messages are key and a big part of what emerging sites are offering to brands, said Kelly Twohig, senior vice president and digital activation director at StarCom USA.

• My friends over at StyleObserver sat down with Sex and the City designer Gilles Montezin at his 7 story luxury brownstone. If you’re a fan of SiTC (I openly admit I am) or like fashion, this is certainly a video you would like to watch. Gentlemen, if you want to score points with your wife/girlfriend/friends, send this link around… For those who want to keep up with StyleObserver often, you can Twitter them.

• I think prediction markets are interesting and I’d like to learn more about them. I don’t know where to start. Anyone know?

This post is in response to Inside Facebook’s post entitled, What CPM is your app making?

As someone who is in charge of quite a bit of digital advertising budget from 12 brands ranging from consumer electronics to financial services and many things in between, I find advertising in/around Facebook applications very challenging and questionable.  As marketers get smarter about their media selection and care about joining the conversation with their audience, extremely integrated opportunities have emerged within the digital space.

For quite a few marketers, their audiences are on social networks such as Facebook.  As many Facebook users are installing applications and such, the marketers are trying to buy their way into the consumers attention span.

Just as we have advertising networks such as Advertising.com, we’re starting to see the same type of networks emerge within the widget/application space.  If history repeats itself (which it very likely will), we will see these widget/application networks create standardized ad units (IAB standard if not already) and go on a scaling spree… how muc inventory can they sign up to maximize their reach across the web.  The top 2-3 will be acquired to bundle into a Platform-A type approach by most media companies, and the world will not be any better off than it was prior…. why?  Because these type of ads are non-integrated.  Most of these ads run alongside these applications and don’t have high interaction rates.

Do these ads running in these Facebook applications add any value?  Can they be amplifyed offline?  What is the real value of them?  I think we’re seeing the value from the Inside Facebook posting… <$1.00 eCPMs.

One of the best cartoons about social networks. Thank you David Berkowitz for the tip!

Watch the video below: 

I’ve been virtually non-existant in the blogosphere recently… you may have noticed the volumes of postings decreasing on the blog. I’ve been focusing on building out the digital media organization at work, going to the gym (Printing House in Soho), spending time with my wife, and golfing (Myrtle Beach, Augusta, Doral, etc).

I have no idea where folks like Fred Wilson, Greg Verdino, and Bijan Sabet get the time to blog and live a life offline (with their family) but I’ve not mastered it yet… far from it.  I don’t even have enough time to answer all my email these days.

The interesting thing is that I don’t miss my RSS feeds.  Even though I’m not getting “hot” information as it arises from the blogosphere, I still get that information one way or another either thru people sending me articles or colleagues and co-workers sharing it in meetings.

I wanted to share a few links to articles that I feel are interesting:

• Omnicom Beats Expectations for First Quarter - Profits up 14%
•  Mindshare Moves Beyond Buying, Planning
• Starcom’s Ad Deal for Kelloggs Hinges on Engagement - Go Pointroll!
• Yahoo’s First Quarter Good; Not Good Enough for Higher Microsoft Bid
• Investors Put $184 Million in 23 Virtual Worlds in Q1
• Are You Sure You Want to Be in San Francisco?
• Liveblogging Q1 Yaho0
• We Love Free
• Three Reasons Federated Media is Growing
• The Declining Power of the Firm

Sony has launched Sony Home, their virtual world enabling their community of users to interact with each other in a “game like” setting.  Apple is now toying with opening a store in Second Life (speculation).  Will this mean that ultimately, they will acquire Second Life and roll it out as their communications platform for their computers?  Will it be the next iteration of iChat?

One thing that we have learned is that people do not have have time to manage identities in multiple virtual worlds at the same time. If you are engaged in Habbo Hotel, then chances are, you don’t have time for Second Life.  If you’re playing World of Warcraft, then you may not have time to utilize IMVU.  Also, many of the previous brands who have released their wares into Second Life have all abandoned them after it being all the hype (front page of NY Times, etc).

I’m curious to see how this plays out.   What are your thoughts?

Arbitrage is making its way into the advertising industry. According to Dictionary.com, arbitrage can be defined as the simultaneous purchase and sale of the same securities, commodities, or foreign exchange in different markets to profit from unequal prices.

Making headlines a few weeks ago was Wenda Harris Millard’s speech about trading media like pork bellies. She states that… “We must educate one and all about the value our digital offerings provide marketers and not trade our advertising space like pork bellies.”

Today, I uncovered an article in Advertising Age about MindShare’s restructuring into four groups, one of the groups entitled The Exchange is accountable for arbitragueing inventory.

An important aspect of the Exchange is that MindShare will be getting into arbitrage — meaning it will be both buying and selling media. Arbitrage is an important play of MindShare’s parent company, Group M, which has invested in Invidi, a company developing addressable TV ad technology. Though specific plans are still unclear, Group M will likely use the technology to buy chunks of TV inventory, make it addressable and resell it to marketers. MindShare will seek out similar opportunities where it actually owns media space it can sell to marketers.

For the past year, I’ve seen a few “exchange” based startups emerging into the advertising world. My friends at MediaMath are one of those folks. For those who aren’t familiar with exchanges, please reference this reference guide. The ADSDAQ trading desk was launched just weeks ago and they already have 6 agencies using it. It sounds like agencies are starting to move beyond just buying media…

This is where my issue lies. [to reiterate, these are my thoughts, not those of my employer] How are agencies structured today to handle a trading desk? Now that Bear Sterns is being absorbed, does this mean I have to go and recruit traders? Does the media buyer become a trader (buy and sell)? How does the current agency model account for this? That’s what I’m trying to figure out. Also, are agencies buying and selling media utilizing their clients money? How does that work? If I know that ClientX gives me $5,000,000 to buy digital media, and I happen to arbitrage some media and turn a $1,000,000 profit, does that belong to ClientX or my agency? Just a few questions that I’m really interested in figuring out… who wants to help?

Pick up the newstand copy of Advertising Age today if you can.  Today’s copy includes a circular entitled “Ad Network & Exchange Guide” and so far, it’s excellent if you are involved in digital media or the advertising business.  I haven’t finished reading it as I’m trying to balance phone calls, emails, and the magazine, but it’s sure to be on my list to finish by tomorrow.

I cannot stress this enough:  If you are a startup who is selling advertising space on your website/product/service, please read Advertising Age or MediaWeek to keep current with the industry you are generating revenue from.

You might have read that I was selected as an AdAge DigitalNext blogger along with my friends and peers David Armano, Craig Daitch, Colleen Decourcy, Ian Schafer, Reuben Steiger, Troy Young, and Mat Zucker.  I’m excited to be part of this group and some of the content on this blog will find it’s way over to the DigitalNext blog as well, as, the print magazine.

Ian Schafer penned a piece in the AdAge Magazine today about how social-network sites should get a relationship point person.  His thesis for the article is that since social networks are all about conversations and relationships, just buying an ad on the sideline may not bode well for the advertiser and the sites are going to have a hard time of selling the majority of their inventory.  Certainly check out the article to read more or click over to his blog to see some commentary.

I spent the last 3 days down in Augusta, Georgia @ the Masters with some friends and colleagues.  I had absolutely no idea what I was in for as I had not been to a golf event of that magnitude.  Here are a few things I had observed and learned this weekend:

•  The Masters is offline:  Do you think the airport has tight electronics security?  Head over to the Masters… they do not allow any electrical device including ANY cellphone, Blackberry, camera, etc. The only people with cameras are the press photographers and even most of them do not have cellphones.  It’s extremely nice to shut-off for 6+ hours per day.
• Respect:  Sometimes we forget this living in Manhattan.  At the Masters, you can put a chair down by the fairway and return to it 4 hours later… and still use your seat and not worry that someone else has moved it.  If you aren’t in your seat within the first inning of a Yankee game, chances are, someone will move down to it and remain there until you kick them out.
• Tiger Woods is the PGA Tour:  Unless you see him in person at a golf event (that he’s playing), you cannot understand the magnitude of his fanbase.  Even if you aren’t following him around the course, you always know where he is by the cheers and screams of his thousands of fans across the fairways.  When Tiger moves onto the hole you’re standing on, his thousands of fans follow and you’re instantly surrounded on all sides and generally, it’s 5-10 people deep.  No other player had his following but the closest was Phil Mickelson.
• Food is cheap; merchandise is not:  The Masters is old school and the prices have stayed the same since the late 50s (I believe). Sandwiches are $1.00-2.50 and beers are $2.  You can have an entire meal for under $4.  Where else can you do that?  The famous sandwich is a cheese and pimento sandwich on white bread… and it’s pretty good!  The merchandise is not cheap but I didn’t see anyone NOT buy something.  The lines into the merchandise store were incredible and the amount of inventory moving off the shelves was more than Walmart on Black Friday.
• People Love to be Social and Share:  As we walked the course and ate on picnic benches, we met people from all walks of life and the one thing we all had in common were stories of golf.  We heard from people who had been coming to the Masters for 30+ years and others who were here for their first time.  People love to share their stories and if given the chance, more often than not, will do so.  This makes me think harder about all of the startups in the digital media world who help people communicate.
• The Best/Most Popular Doesn’t Always Win:  This tournament wasn’t Tiger’s best, but congratulations to Trevor Immelman.  Show’s that ANYONE can win at anytime - Google/MSFT/Yahoo doesn’t always dominate and there is room in the market for everyone.
• Brands Don’t Have to Be Everywhere, Just Strategically Placed:  There are NO brands on the inside of the Augusta National Grounds… the only brands were on the clothing of the players.  Even the food was branded, Masters.  There were hundreds of opportunities to have areas of the course co-branded but they were not…

Lots of observations and looking forward to more golf events this year…