The Insanity Of Web Metrics

Last week I wrote a post called "Why Creatives Are Always Confused." It was the most popular post I've ever written.

The link was re-blogged and re-tweeted a million times.

According to the hit counter I use, visits to the site skyrocketed -- tripling my normal traffic every day for a week, and some days hitting 4 or 5 times the normal traffic. The blog went from 40th most popular ad blog to

Send In The Brand Babblers

There was a time in America when every problem was a communications problem.

If you couldn't get along with your husband, you weren't communicating. If your kid was incorrigible, you probably weren't on the same wavelength. If your boss didn't like you, you just couldn't get through to her. There were no problems of substance, just problems of communication.

The truth is, sometimes your husband

3 Oddball Ideas About Media

Okay, before we get started here, let's put our cards on the table. I know nothing about media planning or buying. I'm a copywriter. Nonetheless, as in so many other areas, I have strongly held, ill-informed opinions. Here are a few.

Never before has the science of media planning and buying been so precise. Never before has there been more data available, and more analysis done. Never before

The Web Advertising Dilemma

What if you picked up the telephone and instead of getting a dial tone you got an ad? You'd be angry, right? That's because the telephone is a medium of communication. When you are in the process of communicating, you don't want to be slowed down or sidetracked.

What if you picked up a dictionary and instead of finding a definition you found an ad? You'd be disgusted, right? Because a

Top 10 Music Moron Tweets

Here at Ad Contrarian world headquarters, we are often dismayed and alarmed at the amount of attention and respect that is given to entertainers. There was once a sensible age in which entertainers were called "fools."

Because they have contrived to become famous, they are often also assumed to have intellect, character and judgment. Gazing at the magazine rack at a supermarket check-out lane

Focus Group Friday

Morons And Their Focus GroupsAfter a year and a half of design, and 40 -- count 'em, 40 -- focus groups, the London Organising Committee of the 2012 Olympic Games introduced its Olympic Mascots this week.
These two monstrosities are called Wenlock and Mandeville (don't ask) and are supposed to help kids "engage with sport." Apparently this is a problem in London.

A design critic named Stephen

Why Creatives Are Always Confused

As you stroll the halls of an ad agency you often encounter people wearing baseball caps, wandering aimlessly and muttering to themselves.

We call these people "creatives." They are the ones who make the ads.

They are always confused. Here's why.

They are pressured by their leaders to do "great" work. But when they do, they usually get reprimanded for not being "on strategy."

They are

Is Bill Gates Still Stunned?

From FoxNews.com, January 2007
Bill Gates: Internet Will Revolutionize TelevisionDAVOS, Switzerland —  The Internet is set to revolutionize television within five years, due to an explosion of online video content and the merging of PCs and TV sets, Microsoft chairman Bill Gates said on Saturday. "I'm stunned how people aren't seeing that with TV, in five years

When White People Run Wild

My daughter goes to school in Portland, OR and I've been spending some time there.

Portland is a lovely city with nice people. But it's an extreme case of what happens when white people are allowed to run wild without the palliative effect of other races.

First you notice that there are way too many bicycles clogging up the roads. And that every bicycle rider has one of those pointy-headed

Five More Things Everyone Is Wrong About

After about a hundred years in advertising, there are still things that continue to amaze me.
How much we don't know 
How the business is still driven primarily by legends and rituals
How specious opinions about advertising become facts when repeated enough times by self-promoting loudmouths at worthless conferences
A little over a year ago I wrote a piece called "Facts Still Matter: The Death

What Is Evil?

In my hometown, Oakland, CA a few weeks ago, Jin Cheng Yu, 27, and his 59-year old father were walking down a street.

For no reason, two men approached Jin and started punching him. When his father interceded on his behalf the two men beat him to death.

A few days later, the lawyer for one of the accused stated, "this is not a murder case...(my client) is not an evil person."

Really?

I wonder

The One Thing You Can Never Believe: People

From the Economist...
...one of the oddest and most consistent findings of television research: that people seem unaware of their own behaviour. In surveys they almost always underestimate how much television they watch, and greatly overstate the extent to which they watch video in any other form (See chart below -- TAC). In particular, they underestimate their consumption of live television

Nothing Human Works As Advertised

I'm astonished when people are surprised at the failures of capitalism, or socialism, or communism.

I'm amazed when people are stunned that Democratic policies don't work. Or Republican policies. Or liberal policies, or conservative policies.

I'm astounded when people express dismay that Wall Street is stupid, or government is wasteful.

I laugh when I hear people complain that economists were

Going Through Life Rolling My Eyes

"The new consumer psychology on the rise around the world is one of networks and prioritization, of explicitly pricing in consequences and externalities, and of giving more than lip service to being resourceful and vigilant about downside risks. This is the global zeitgeist now aborning." Run for your lives! There's a global zeitgeist aborning!
 
This lovely gobbledy-gook comes to us from a "

Not Following The Herd

A few days ago I was reading a blog I often read called "If This Is A Blog Then What's Christmas?" The post I was reading was called What Can Moneyball Teach Us About Advertising? It seemed to me that I had written a very similar post about the book "Moneyball" a few years ago. I went back into my archives and found that I had written it in July of 2008, but apparently never posted it. So I'm

The Power of Specificity

There are a lot of good Italian restaurants in my neighborhood. But I go to one regularly because I love the bread.

My favorite sneakers aren't the ones that look the nicest or absorb shock the best. They're the ones that are the widest.

My favorite recording isn't of the best song I ever heard, or have best vocal I ever heard, but it does have my favorite sax solo.

The point is -- like most

The Demise Of Advertising

One of these day I'm going to write a book about the demise of advertising.  It will start like this:
Once upon a time, advertising people decided that they no longer wanted to sell things. Instead, they decided it would be more fun to be amateur psychoanalysts.And so, instead of making ads about the attributes of the products they were selling, they started making ads about the imagined