I'm really diggin' the AVIS spots

It seems that AVIS rental cars kicked off one of the funniest campaigns in years immediately after their stock tumbled. Maybe the ads have been airing prior to the crash, but I only started to see them recently. Either way it's got to be tough to differentiate yourself among rental car companies. At the end of the day, who really cares about their rental car? For the average annual or semiannual vacationer I find it hard to believe that anyone cares about the car. I know from experience, price is my only concern.

However, AVIS decided to solely focus on their core competencies...business travelers. Their TV spots feature a boring, sad, long term parking lot with an ugly late model 90's car. The VO is from the car's POV and imitates a sad, lonely wife whose husband is out "traveling" but in reality, cheating on her. The copy is perfect and the visual works beautifully. It's funny, easy to get, and clearly makes you think AVIS is hot, young, and exciting. I cannot think of another way to get that point across without insulting the audience. Bravo AVIS, Bravo.

New DVD Formats are already obsolete

It doesn't matter that Blu Ray is becoming the new accepted DVD format because it too is already old news. With ability to download HD movies and TV shows without ever leaving the comfort of your home, Blu Ray will live a very short life. People love to make the argument that "we" material westerners always love tangible things, and that there will always be a desire to physically "own" the movie. This notion is false. Of course there will always be a group of people that need to touch their possessions, but for the rest of the material westerners, we'll put the movies on our peripherals. The peripherals are the desired material item, not the content.

There is nothing physically cool about a DVD. The content may be cool, but the actual device does not say anything about who you are other than your taste. A Blackberry however, speaks volumes. A Blackberry lets the people around you know that you think you are important. It tells people that you know how important business is, and you need to be in touch with the world at every second. Even swankier than a Blackberry is an iPhone. Oooooo! An iPhone really lets the world know who you are and what you truly value. For those who want an iPhone strictly because "it's that damn functional" have to catch all the flack for being similar to the superficial iPhone users. Just like sports cars, there are true enthusiasts and then there are truly insecure wealthy people.

DVD's are different. A bookshelf full of DVD's will never impress people the way it used to. Too many people have access to the content. It might be hard to imagine, but one day your neighbor with "all those movies" is going to look "old school" because you have all your content on a little pocket sized flash drive. Good bye Blu Ray, I am committed to never buying one single Blu Ray or HD DVD. The future is already obsolete.

WAP it. WAP it good.

WAP is great. E-mail, Google, CNN, Facebook, ESPN or whatever you want right in your palm. As most "great" things go there is a catch. In this case, the catch is a mobile internet addiction. "Hi guys, my name is Ian, and I'm a WAPaholic." WAP is a drug, and to be quite honest I'm surprised the DEA hasn't created a new department to adddress it. As scary as it may sound, the first thing I did upon crossing the border from Canada to the US was check my e-mail. I was driving home, still had hours to go, but couldn't resist the temptation of checking my e-mail. I don't know what I was expecting to receive on a Sunday afternoon that could have been that pressing, but I love to check the mail. I hate that I need to check my mail all the time, but I do. I think it is an epidemic with my generation. We've learned from past experience that most e-mailers expect timely responses. Therefore, we've created a situation where it is "0kay" to check the mail whenever we wish. I know this pathetic dependence on technology will somehow rear its ugly head in my life at a later date, but what about the people that cannot afford WAP? This is where the rift exists. What is going to happen when people assume everyone has their e-mail all the time. Currently, I pay $45 per month to get an unlimited data plan from Verizon Wireless. Are these astronomical rates going to persist? Is bandwidth going to lose its value? Is a company like Google going to make WAP free as long as you allow yourself to be inundated with ads? I am so confused.

High speed mobile internet will one day be available to the masses. It has to. I've read about the future, I've seen movies about the future, I've even postulated my own future, and it always has people with WAP. So what is going to change to make WAP cheaper. In my mind, the only thing holding companies like Scanbuy, Slingbox and every company that uses the internet as a delivery method back is the lack of WAP proliferation. Will this expense just be something that people add to their list of essentials? I think that is the only way. I know that WAP will come down in price, but by how much?

Let's imagine it's 2020, everyone has a smartphone. Cellphones have been dead for 8 years. Everyone is logged on all the time. Exclusivity concerning the internet or WAP for that matter is dead like a Dodo. Everyone has access. If everyone is checking their e-mail all the time, and 85% of the country finds out about the newest celebrity overdose within 2o minutes are we all addicted to WAP? If everyone uses WAP are we all addicts? Were we addicted to radio and newspapers before TV? Were we addicted to landlines before cell phones? Yes and no. Yes because you can probably classify much of human behavior as "addictive," but no because unlike real drugs, there isn't physical repercussion when refraining from WAP. We're in a time of transition, where the "haves and the have-nots" are separated. As time marches on, we'll all be on an even playing field again, where WAP is as common as a car radio. I don't know how it's going to financially occur, but I know it will. I just know it.

Websight?

People are getting Flash happy...way too Flash happy. I fully appreciate the UI benefits of Flash programming and am all for it. However, too many websites are getting cluttered with stuff. Whether it's news updates, concert tour information, or RSS feeds, many websites are becoming hard to navigate cluttered. I'm having trouble navigating through all the hubbub. CNN.com does a good job with "BREAKING NEWS" but everything else is so annoying. You have to search what you are looking for opposed to have it cleverly presented to you. I assume at every large company there is specific person in charge of maintaining the website, and that person is gets nervous when seeing empty space. I understand how addicting it can become to fill all empty spaces with 'stuff' but after a while it all becomes a blur. Does anyone remember why Google.com became so popular? I do. I remember hearing that it was a better search engine and that it didn't have anything on the web page. To be honest, I was never disappointed with my Yahoo! searching experience , but I was intrigued by the Zen style Google homepage. I know that I was able to convince myself to switch based on 'quality' but I assure you that was not the case. The general populous will credit Google's superior algorithm for searching, but they're lying to themselves. It's the aesthetics of Google. Google was very clever with iGoogle, as it came into effect far after many people has switched. Google won because Google was cool. They changed their little logo everyday like a Simpsons intro, and it worked. Although the acronym gets too much airtime in recent years, KISS (keep it simple stupid) is a great policy. It's time that websites merged design and content into an 'easy to navigate' experience. For now, I'll just continue sifting.

Why local ads have to look like local ads

The other day I was watching TV and noticed a local commercial with extremely high production values. I was really confused. It looked like a national ad, felt like a national ad, made me laugh like a national ad, but it was for a local business. I didn't know how to feel. To me, this local business was unreal. How can a local business brand themselves as a local business while their commercials look professional? They can't! I never thought this would happen, but I finally understood why local commercials have to be aesthetically low budget. I always hated local ads because they were so cheap and lame, but now I get it. I understand why they use 1990's looking video/graphics, and why the jingles are so pathetic...because that's what local ads are. Local ads, by definition, are more than just local businesses advertising themselves; it's local businesses branding themselves as LOCAL BUSINESSES. I never fully appreciated the beauty of local ads. Everyone across the country has their own " Bob the Mattress Guy" "Mario the Baker" and "Billy the Used Car King." These local businessmen and women are pseudo celebrities. I really would distinguish between "Loretta the Real Estate Guru" and any other casual passerby. Local ads bring people back in to the real world and far away from the beautiful Maui 'Cialis' sunsets. As corny as they may be, local ads help me appreciate where I'm currently living. There will be a time where the technology becomes cheap enough that local ads will step up their aesthetic and production values, but for right now, I'm liking them just the way they are.

Have you ever seen a website completely naked?

The title of this blog comes from an inexplicable feeling I get when I see a website without any ads. In case you are unaware, there are plug-ins and 3rd party software that strip a website of their ads. Software such as Greasemonkey performs this task. A year or two ago my "super-tech" friend turned me onto some ad removing software, whether it was Greasemonkey or not I cannot recall, but I tried it immediately and was quite impressed. NYTimes.com, Facebook.com and ESPN.com were all stripped naked! I knew that this miracle potion was supposed to "make my day," but I found it to be lonely. I have become so accustomed to surfing the web with ads, that their absence didn't sit well with me. I never disclosed to him that I reverted to my "old way" of surfing, but I did. Within a day or two, I removed the software/plug-in and went back to the pedestrian method of Internet perusal. Recently, I've stumbled across a Firefox plug-in called Stylish v. 0.5.3. Supposedly, it allows you to restyle the page so you don't have to "suffer" the way I did a couple years prior. I'll give it a try soon and see if it alleviates the lonesome feeling of surfing without ads.

It's clear that people enjoy looking at familiar things. Whether it's their computer's desktop icon arrangement, or the picture frames on their dresser, everyone likes things a certain way. I'm not used to seeing an 'ad less' website. I felt left out when the ads were gone. Although I rarely am interested in the featured product, I like knowing that I am privy to and current on all that is advertised. I don't want to miss the chance that a new Subaru WRX STi or Slingbox ad might be featured. I somehow consider an ad to be the 3rd cousin once removed of 'real news.' Maybe, we the consumers, are subconsciously hoping to stumble across the next great "must have" item of the year. Maybe not.

Why GM Cadi-lacks Cool

In case you haven't seen the new 'swanky' Cadillac TV spots let me provide a critical summary. The commercial opens with some person driving and speaking to the non-existent audience/passenger. The soliloquy's try way too hard to be cool, sexy and sarcastic. "In today's luxury game, the question isn't whether or not your car has available features like a 40 gig hard drive...or pop-up navigation etc..." Then, with a down shift and copy like "when you turn your car on, does it return the favor?" the commercial 'kicks in' the ill fitting, over dramatized hard rock music and drives all the way to the cheese factory. (Probably in 3rd gear) The reason this ad is so unbelivably lame is because it appeals to no one. In an attempt to appeal to too many dems, it falls incredibly short. I read an article explaining how Cadillac's new campaign was heavily rooted in market research. This may be true but read the endless list of demographics this ad hopes to reach are...• Loyalists – those who already own Cadillac’s • Boomers – the group turning 60 who really don’t like Cadillac • Alphas’ – tech types who search for information • Hot Moms – not your prototypical soccer mom • Move Ups -- young adults without preconceived ideas. I understand all the listed demographics are highly sought after, but you cannot use the same ad on 'Alphas' as you do on 'Hot Moms' and 'Boomers.' BABY BOOMERS and ALPHAS in the same 30 seconds???? That is an utter paradox. In their attempt to be 'hip' Cadillac really misses the mark. The ad needs a 'hip replacement' along with their boomer demographic. I am not sure where they are steering the brand, but I know it's the wrong direction.