Mass Media Trends for the Tweenties

A presentation I wrote for a meeting today about where our media are heading in the next 5-10 years. It doesn’t make a lot of sense without my accompanying narrative, I realise. Nonetheless, I wanted to keep it safely bookmarked and you might enjoy a round of Powerpoint-Karaoke against it.

Also, no image sources are acknowledged *slaps own hands* – sorry, Internet people: it woz Google Image Search wot made me do it. Happy to add.

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Hell Freezes Over: Google and the Super Bowl

Hell Freezes Over: Google and the Super Bowl

While the UK slept last night, it appears there was some sort of sporting tournament across the Atlantic and that the world’s most-used search provider advertised its search capabilities and new(ish) browser. It’s quite a nice advert, telling a (cliched) story in an original manner with a clean style.

The excitement over Google advertising Chrome and Search during the Super Bowl comes from two hot-spots of media attention:

  1. Google Search is continually used as the prime example of the power of word-of-mouth over traditional forms of marketing: ‘…and they never spent a dollar on advertising it!’ says the social media guru.
  2. The slots between segments of the Super Bowl are famously the most expensive and sought-after TV ad-spots of the year. (On the official site, linked above, a link to a video of the commercial slots was the top item when I looked!)

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Real-World Objects as Infographics

via fast company. I LOL’d but then realised literacy of infographics and data visualisations has become mainstream. Which makes me even happier.

image thumb Real World Objects as Infographics

image thumb1 Real World Objects as Infographics

image thumb2 Real World Objects as Infographics

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Taming the Spirit of the Times

Taming the Spirit of the Times

On most news organisations’ websites, you’ll find a widget called ‘most read’, ‘most shared’ or ‘most commented’, possibly all three. The Guardian’s Zeitgeist experiment suggests an interesting alternative.

Typically, the content found in the most-X sections provides a salutary – if depressing – reminder of humanity’s baseness and stupidity. What tends to get flagged is not ‘Picasso retrospective opens at the ICA’ or ‘Proposed Amendments to Digital Economy Bill’: it’s ‘footballer shags team-mate’s wife’. If you’re seeking the Wisdom of Crowds, look away now.

Here’s the latest from the BBC:

news.bbc.co.uk 2010-2-4 11-9

Even worse is the equivalent list from the Telegraph:

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The Word: Publicy

The Word: Publicy

You’ll have seen this word flying about recently and it’s time for some explanations.

Err… don’t you mean ‘publically’? ['publicly' if you're American]

No. Well, in some ways, yes, I do. Let me explain.

In the past, there has been an assumption that privacy was the default state of human existence. It was only when you, someone or something else acted on that state that your privacy was broken. You did something ‘in public’, ‘went public’ or ‘published’. But if that was ever really the case – I’d argue that it’s partly a symptom of late C20th urban living – then it most certainly not true at this point in the early 21st Century. There’s a database entry just a few seconds after your birth that stays attached to you for the rest of your life. Everyone has got information on you – lots of it – from the government to the police to the supermarkets you use. And they’ll probably lose it or allow it to be stolen at some point.

Things get even worse when it comes to the Internet: your ISP is monitoring your data stream; Facebook is keeping your teenage indiscretions alive forever; Google is retaining your search history. Our brave new world of mobile applications sometimes seems particularly geared to recording (and judging!) your location to within a few yards using GPS.

So one part of the meaning of publicy is this status of not having privacy, for which historically we haven’t had a single word, so strong is the assumption that privacy is the natural state of affairs.

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Digital Marketing Outlook

Digital Marketing Outlook

In mitigation of my not being able to think of anything interesting to write about today, I shall pass on several thousand words by other people, published by The Society of Digital agencies (SoDA). It’s a survey and editorial on what members of the society think 2010 holds for digital media marketing.

It’s a 70-page PDF, but don’t worry too much about the apparent weight – it’s all microchunked into big charts and easily-digestible 500-word thought pieces from the leaders of a number of digital agencies.

Overall, the outlook is bullish:

  • 81% of Brand Execs expect an increase in digital projects for 2010
  • 50% will be shifting funds from traditional to digital media
  • 78% of global participants believe the current economy will actually spawn more funds allocated to Digital

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Growth of Social Networks (or Not)

Growth of Social Networks (or Not)

New data from Nielsen confirms what you probably already know. Traffic to and time spent on social networking sites has boomed over the last two years. As the charts below show, people across the world are spending around five-and-a-half hours per month on social networking sites compared to just over two hours at the end of 2007. Meanwhile, their reach has increased from 2bn to 3bn over the same time period. Note that when Nielsen say ‘global’, they actually mean 10 countries, only one of which might be classed as ‘developing’.

image thumb1 Growth of Social Networks (or Not)

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Memesurfing: iSlate and Social Media

Memesurfing: iSlate and Social Media

There is a fever of anticipation over the imminent release of a tablet-style computer from Apple – let’s call it the iSlate [Thursday Update - actually, let's call it the iPad - I stand by everything else in the post, though].

Nobody outside the company knows very much about how it works or its specifications, but the consensus of opinion is that it’s basically a big iPhone. Let’s imagine that’s the case, and I’ll write an apology on Thursday if this turns out to be very wrong.

It’s not just Apple that thinks that 2010 will be the year when Tablets finally come of age. Models from HP and Nokia were just two of the slew unveiled at CES a couple of weeks ago.

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Wonky Rungs

Wonky Rungs

Groundswell – the Forrester Research social media blog – has produced an update to its engagement ladder diagram:

groundswell ladder

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Making is… Making?

Making is… Making?

My estwhile colleague, the excellent David Gauntlett, has posted a new video about the work towards his next book Making is Connecting:

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