My Name is Kate

Early media influences .. exerting their power for over 40 years

The other day, Rosemary was doing the dishes and I was helpfully sitting at the dining room table keeping her company (hey, don't judge, I could have been playing Kingdom Rush (when, WHEN are you going to release the new version, Ironhide Games?!?!!)). She was drying a frying pan and I started singing "I'm gonna wash that man right out of my hair." [mp3 of my singing unavailable]

Rosemary looked at me quite quizzically. I realised that my possibly martini-addled brain had crosswired the visuals from Enjoli's "Bring Home the Bacon" and the soundtrack from the Clariol "Wash that man right outta my hair" commercial from my youth. Terrifying. And then I remembered my third ghost of TV-viewing past, Jordache's "You've got the look, I want to know better" commercial. My nostalgic shame trifecta was complete. You can see all three of the spots below. Now, I was raised in the US, so I'm not sure which of these aired up here. But all three of them (and their insidious sound tracks!) drift in and out of my consciousness more often than I'd like to admit.

You know what else has a stranglehold on my auditory cortex? After-school and Saturday morning interstitials. Surprisingly, not the well-known Schoolhouse Rock ones (though I love all of them and can sing most). No, the ones that rise unbidden to my lips are the Time for Timer series. My favourite was "Hanker for a Hunk of Cheese" though I think I probably hear "Don't Drown Your Food" more often. It is this one that I blame for my inability to truly enjoy any type of creamy dressing on my salad. The Time for Timer series (like Schoolhouse Rock) was created by ABC. Are there educational series like this now? The Saturday Morning Brain Food site does an amazing job of cataloging all these educational tidbits.

Finally .. there is one last set of auditory memories that still get dropped into my playlist of life - theme songs from TV Shows (of course!). But not your Brady Bunches or Gilligan's Islands. No .. the New Zoo Revue is what pops up occasionally. I watched a clip of an episode - it is actually pretty hilarious. And the theme song: INTENSE. And I'm pretty sure that this is where I acquired all my fancy dance moves. Other theme songs I hear rattling around: Electric Company and Zoom! (oh how I longed to be a Zoomer). And, of course, Land of the Lost. Poor Marshall, Will and Holly. Sid and Marty Kroftt did some pretty cool shows. I loved Sigmund and the Sea Monster - but I don't remember the theme song.

These are my recurring childhood earworms. Any favourites you'd like to share?

The Evolution of Geek

Flowtown has an awesome infographic on The Evolution of Geek. And I swear, it's like they looked at my high school year book picture to create the illustration for the D&D Geek.

Something I learned from their infographic is that geek is a variant of geck, a word from the 1500's indicating fool or simpleton. Wikipedia, of course, goes into a bit more detail:

The word geek is a slang term, with different meanings ranging from "a computer expert or enthusiast" to "a carnival performer who performs sensationally morbid or disgusting acts", with a general pejorative meaning of "a peculiar or otherwise dislikable person, esp[ecially] one who is perceived to be overly intellectual".^[1]

This word comes from English dialect geek, geck: fool, freak; from Low German geck, from Middle Low German. The root geck still survives in Dutch and Afrikaans gek: crazy, as well as someGerman dialects, and in the Alsatian word Gickeleshut: geek's hat, used in carnivals.^[2]

Formerly, in 18th century Austria-Hungary, Gecken were freaks shown by some circuses. In 19th century, in North-America, the term geek referred to a freak in circus side-shows. In some cases, its performance included biting the head off a live chicken. The 1976 edition of the American Heritage Dictionary included only the definition regarding geek shows.

Although often considered as a pejorative, the term is also often used self-referentially without malice or as a source of pride - an example is the 'Geek Squad' of the Best Buy company.

So, any of these geeks resonate with you?

Now this is some good marketing - Telus offers free Yule Log channel as Shaw cancels theirs

Update: As Lori pointed out below, Shaw has responded to customer feedback and now has two versions - a free one on the Frame channel and the one for charitable donations.

I know, in the grand scheme of things, that this is the tiniest smallest most ridiculous issue. But Shaw Cable is going to start charging for the Yule Log channel during the holiday season.  So no more blissful scenes like this for Rose, EmmyLou and I.

But Telus has responded. And is apparently offering the Yule Log free on their service.  And they have created an incredible "making of" video to promote it.

 

Love it! Way to go, Telus!

Homestead House Paint Offers a Great Example of Hyperlocal Guerrilla Marketing

A few weeks ago when I was in Toronto, I was browsing through a local bookstore spending a few pleasant minutes before the start of a movie at an adjacent theatre.  I spent some time in the "eco" section, looking for some content ideas for a client, and I came across Adria Vasil's Ecoholic.

Sweet.

As I picked up Ecoholic to flip through it, it fell open at the "Home Improvement" section of the book.  On the PAINT page.  The page was marked with postcard from Homestead House Paint Company, a Toronto company that specializes in eco-friendly paints, stains and finishes.  The other side of the postcard advertises Cycling Painters, another Toronto-based company that will apply your eco-friendly paint for you - and cycles to your location, for the good of the environment.

I thought this was pretty clever. It reaches a targeted, local, niche audience when and where they are looking for a specific product or service that the advertisers have to offer. And it's portable, so the potential customer could event take this piece of marketing with them without buying the book.

One reason this works, of course, is that everyone ISN'T doing it.  I certainly don't want to have my book browsing time turned into a hybrid of Times Square billboards and "Subscribe!" magazine notices.  But I thought that this was a good, highly-targeted low-cost  example of what a local business can do to get the word out.

Plus, I now have a handy bookmark.

"If You Voted for Me Change is on the Way, Know it!" - AlphaCat video on YouTube

I am obsessed with this video and song from Iman Crosson (aka AlphaCat) - YouTube Obama impersonator.

Obsessed.

I got hope on my lips
Blackberry on my hip
Secret service we rollin deep!
In the white house
Take the bowling alley out
I can care less what you think.
I need no permission
Did I mention
I am the first black president
I want a b-ball court
With a little bling to sport,
How's that for 'change you can believe'?

It's actually a spoof of a Beyoncé song which I'm now also a little obsessed with. But not nearly as much as the spoof.

You can follow AlphaCat on Twitter too :) Oh, and if you go directly to the video there is a link to download the MP3.

Show you my WHAT?!!? AdHack wants you to finish the ad.

I have a confession - I didn't watch the SuperBowl this year.  And I haven't seen the commercials.  I haven't even sought them out online.  I'm kind of over the whole SuperBowl ad thing.  A stupid amount of money for generally lacklustre creative.  Meh.

But then, a silver lining to my SuperBowl ad cloud.  I got an email from AdHack that they partnered with Giant Ant Media to create an ad for a yet-to-be-determined product.  They released part 1 during the SuperBowl on Sunday and they want you to write the script for the second half.

(If you're not familiar with AdHack - it's a cool startup by James Sherret here in Vancouver that connects ad buyers directly to ad creators.  Like an ebay for ads.)

This latest program from AdHack is called "Show Us Your Balls".  They've written and filmed the first half of the commercial.  And they want the second half of the script to come from one of us (One of Us. One of Us.)

The ad itself is pretty cute.  Giant Ant does a great job with video!  (Check out their other awesome work).

One way that AdHack is promoting the commercial is through themed avatars.  They've created a template for a tennis avatar and written a great tutorial on how to make your own using Pixlr (essentially, an online PhotoShop). You can see Emmy Lou, our junkyard sharpei, here as a tennis star. 

Custom avatars is a pretty hot trend right now.  I've seen these balls ones all over Twitter.  Plus Twitter collectively went through a manga my avatar phase a few months ago.  Want to get your message out? Make something that people want to avatarize.  Another case in point - Simpsonize Me.

So, check out the whole "Show Us Your Balls" program.  They've got the soundtrack up for remixing as well.  And if you're feeling inspired, write a script for the second half.  Ad Hack and Giant Ant Media will film the best one.

Oh yes, it's Catmas!

I don't know if anyone is celebrating Catmas this year, but I'm a fan, so I will celebrate it quietly.  Happy Catmas, everyone!

What is Catmas?  Joey deVilla says ...

Back around the fall of 2003, Ross and I wanted to come up with a little event to commemorate the launch of Blogware, the software with which our blogs (and this blog) are built. It didn't take long for us to settle on "Post a Picture of a Cat to Your Blog Day", an unwieldy title that refers to the cliche that bloggers always post pictures of their cat on their blogs. The day took place on Friday, October 3rd, 2003 and enough blogs participated for us to call it a success. From that day forth, we declared that the first Friday in October would be the official day on which you should partake in that most bloggy of blog activities: posting a picture of a cat on your blog.

The following year, we gave the day a pithier name: BlogACatMas, and more people participated. By 2005, BlogACatMas had caught the attention of the Canadian national newspaper, the Globe and Mail, which made mention of our holiday in an article titled The Truth About Cats and Blogs.

There isn't a post about Catmas 2008 up on their blog, but that's OK.  Catmas 2008 Lives! We'll keep the torch lit this year.  And I look for a resurgence of Catmas in 2009!!

 

Ever Wondered What It Would Be Like to Attend a Font Conference?

I am so in love with this video.

Found via MyRagan.com

The latest singing hamster sensation (plus, free ticket contest!)

I've mentioned before that I'm on the organizing committee for this year's From Mass to Grass conference on June 12th in Toronto.  To give you a sense of some of the great conversations and learnings that are in store for this year's gig, Jay Moonah (also on the committee) has whipped up this awesome video.  I love this thing.  Catchy tune.  Hamster.  Lyrics that include the word "plenary".  What isn't there to love?

Also, end of day Monday is the deadline for submitting your entry to win a free ticket (or pair) for From Mass to Grass.  We're looking for small biz and non-profits to get engaged, plus the blogger with the best idea for a WOM campaign for Chia Pets.  So get those entries in!!

You can see the amazing speaker line-up over on the M2G Website.

Web Design Coding Rap

I have the best clients in the world.   For a number of reasons, but not the least of which is that they send me great videos like this.

Some of my favourite lines:

every page that they click should provide an explanation
should be easy to understand like having a conversation

and

describe your doctype so the browser can relate
make sure you do it great or it won’t validate
check in all browsers, I do it directly
gotta make sure that it renders correctly
some use IE, some others use Flock
some use AOL, I use Firefox

Chuck (the dude in the video), aka Poetic Prophet, works as a Project Coordinator/Marketing Specialist for Pop Labs, an SEM/Social Media firm in Houston.  He has a whole series of these videos, including Social Media Addiction Rap (I'm lookin' at you, craphammer) and Paid Search Rap.

Interestingly, Pop Labs doesn't promote Chuck on their website, or even their blog.  I dunno, but if I had a staff member who made some fun introductory videos on the stuff that I want to educate clients about and ultimately sell them services on, I'd promote it.  Sure, Chuck isn't the most popular guy on YouTube, but the above video has over 128K views.  Chuck's stuff is good content and relevant to clients.

What up, Pop Labs?