Other – Page 7 – Media Culpa

Microblogging and blogg quake new words in 2008

Språkrådet is the official body that oversees the Swedish language and minority languages in Sweden. Every year the institute presents new words that have been introduced in the language and obviously the web has had some influence over the years. Examples include wiki in 2001, skajpa/to use Skype in 2006 and näthat/online hate in 2007, which is described as hate expressed against someone on the Internet, for example in comments on a blog.

New words from the online world that made it into the list in 2008 are:

– mikroblogga/microblogging
– bloggbävning/blogg quake (when a large number of blogs are discussing the same topic at the same time)

Related: Webster’s New World named “overshare” their new word of the year.

overshare (verb): to divulge excessive personal information, as in a blog or broadcast interview, prompting reactions ranging from alarmed discomfort to approval.

Tags: overshare, microblogging, mikroblogga, ord. Ping.

Build your own Nokia 7310 phone

I recently wrote about how Swedish banks are letting customers design their own credit cards. Now Nokia are also starting to offer mass customization solutions to customers. A new Flash application called Nokia Build is out in a beta version for UK customers and it is also live in France, according to Mashable.

Nokia Build lets users design the cover of a Nokia 7310 Supernova with different drawing tools. You can add your own images or use a variety of available backgrounds, themes and icons. And of course, you can order your customized phone and have it delivered to your door.

How about a Mia Rose phone?

Tags: mia rose, nokia, nokia build, musik, nokia, mia rose. Ping.

Guns ‘N’ Roses PR stunt backfires for Dr Pepper

In March, soft drink manufacturer Dr Pepper made a promise that if the long-awaited Guns ‘N’ Roses album Chinese Democracy, that had been almost 14 years in the making, came out on the market during 2008, they would give every American a can of Dr Pepper.

When the album eventually was released on November 23, Dr Pepper announced they would keep their promise, which of course was a great PR opportunity. People haven’t been talking like this about Dr Pepper for years. So on the Sunday of the album release, they gave fans 24 hours to go to the web site for a coupon they could exchange for a can of soda. But the site got so many visitors that it crashed. And although the deadline was extended one day, to Monday of this week, fans were angered. Now Guns ‘N’ Roses front man Axl Rose sent his lawyers after Dr Pepper because it didn’t deliver on its promise:

The Washington Post reports:
“The album came out, but the sodamaker’s coupon-offering Web site malfunctioned. And though the promotion was extended, Alan Gutman, the band’s Beverly Hills attorney, demanded a full-page apology in major daily newspapers and “an appropriate payment to our clients for the unauthorized use and abuse of their publicity and intellectual property rights,” according to the AP. No sum was specified.”

Talk about a missed PR opportunity.

Tags: axl rose, chinese democracy, dr pepper, musik, guns n roses, axl rose. Ping.

The change of copyright

The theme for this year’s SIME event is the DNA of Change. This morning Joi Ito, the CEO of Creative Commons, talked about the different levels of change that has brought us the social internet of today. Creative Commons is the non-profit that hands out licenses for a new type of copyright. Ito described how copyright used to work, and to a large extent still does. If you want to use someone else’s copyrighted work you have to ask for permission and then you need a written agreement. But today when all the tools online are available for users to take content and remix it into new work, there is a strong need for a model that makes content available for reuse without running the risk of getting a letter from a lawyer. And therefore Creative Commons have created a number of licenses that lets content owners approve in advance what users can do with their work.

Ito then went on to describe how a CC license can be used to drive sales. For example when the band Nine Inch Nails made their latest album available as a free download. Then on the site customers could buy different versions of the album and extra material. The music in this case was merely seen as advertising. In one week the band sold for 1.6 million dollars without almost any distribution costs.

Ito also described tecnobrega: “one of Brazil’s most thriving pop scenes: tecnobrega, a musical movement that’s expanding exponentially thanks to musicians and producers who see copying as a marketing tool rather than intellectual property theft.”

Photo Credit: Dennis Stefani

Another example was when singer Gwen Stefani hired a photographer and shared a photo of her newborn baby under a CC license. Normally famous artists would sell baby pictures exclusively to traditional media for very large sums, but Stefani chose to take control of the process and use the photo as a way to get fans to talk about her and build engagement. Barack Obama also published personal photos from election night with a CC license.

Tags: sime, joi ito, sime, creative commons. Ping.

Preparing for SIME

I will be attending SIME (Scandinavian Interactive Media Event) tomorrow and on Thursday in Stockholm, Sweden. Hope to get to listen to exciting speakers such as Joi Ito, Technorati founder David Sifry and Kris Hoet from Microsoft. I also look forward to hear about Mohammed El-Fatatry talk about Muxlim – the world’s largest muslim community. If you will be there, do say hi. Hopefully I will get time to do some live blogging as well.

Tags: sime, muxlim, sime, stockholm. Ping.

Laughing baby video makes the Queen giggle

For some reason a large amount of people suddenly arrive at my blog through different links to the world famous Laughing Baby video, the amateur video with Swedish baby William. After a few Technorati searches I found what might be the reason behind this sudden interest. Apparently Queen Elizabeth and the Duke of Edinburgh visited the UK headquarters of Google a few days ago and were shown the video, which according to reports made the royal couple giggle.

The Queen thought it most amusing. “Lovely little thing, isn’t it?” the Queen said. “Amazing a child would laugh like that.”

Maybe that was a great distraction from a somewhat embarrassing moment when Google staff were unable to show the location of their own office to the Royal visitors using Google Earth.

The video has to date been viewed 64 million times and is among the top ten most viewed YouTube videos of all time. Little William has even become a character in South Park.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5P6UU6m3cqk

Tags: laughing baby, queen, youtube, google, youtube, video. Ping.