Grown Up Thinking

It’s no surprise that most creatives are obsessed with music. From finding the perfect track to make a TV spot iconic to creating unusual (and genius) pairings to pay homage to the individual spirit of a classic brand, we LIVE music. Why? Because it fuels our ideas. Period.

Some musicians just GET branding (like Trent Reznor, who, in my eyes may just be the Bogusky of the music biz), but now, even the less web-savvy can measure their buzz using RockDex, an innovative site built to search Myspace, blogs, YouTube, music sites and more for info about any budding band (and those well on their way to complete world domination).

Other reading/exploring for my fellow music fiends:

Social Music: 5 Essential Tools for Marketing Your Band by Jennifer Van Grove (who also inspired this post- she’s a woman of my own rock-wizened heart, I tell ya)

The always insightful Ruby Psuedo’s post on how youth align certain brands with music, and the further exploration of those affiliations.

And Sleevage.com, a delicious little piece of blog heaven on album cover design. Well, just because.

EDIT: More music-related delightfulness- http://www.hypetape.com/. Hype Machine & Mux Tape hooked up and made one sassy baby. Thanks, J!

If you are like us, your OCD goes into overdrive every time you receive a package tracking number. Maybe if I refresh it now. How about now? Or… now?

Next time, just use this.

Get instant package updates via sms, twitter, email or facebook. What a great way to drive information you care  about to the places and channels you’re already on. Well done.

We have entered a new era of social-holidays. While it’s nice to celebrate our own local holidays, do any milennials  really connect with Memorial Day other than the fact that it’s a great 3-day weekend with (hopefully) a lot of sun? Wouldn’t it be more worthwhile to applaud mothers abroad who are doing a lot with a little for Mother’s Day?

My bud Scott Harrison has done a great job by linking Charity Water with birthdays by allowing friends to donate a b-day present towards clean water wells. But last week, TOMS shoes one upped the effort with an event I really dug: sponsoring an activity-packed holiday called a One Day Without Shoes.

Today’s consumer seeks the perfect combination of finding a community connection and participating in spontaneous activities both online and in-person. This month alone, we saw International Pillow Fighting Day and the infamous Snuggie Pub Crawls, that successfully combined social drinking with a charitable cause. In short , some brands are deeply rooted with a cause from Day  (like TOMS).  Other brands seek to align with the right cause, miss the mark when it comes to being authentic (like Greenwashing).

My recommendation is to rally behind a cause that your brand can own. Do something that has a direct effect, even if it’s small. We recently started working with a kick-ass crew at Do Something, creators of a program called Teens for Jeans w/ Aeropostale. What impressed me most was the straightforward mission and the number of teens who jumped on board. 

One brand can’t save the world, but smart brands like Method Soap can challenge consumers to help Save the San Fran Bay, just like Burts Bees can fight to Save the Dissapearing Bee Colonies. So ask yourself, What has your brand saved lately?

And maybe for ’10, instead of getting a cheesy calendar in the mail from your premium vendor, you can look forward to a Social Cause Calendar from Mr Youth, chock full of new holidays to celebrate!

Today, the New York Times reported on what must be the dream internship for most tech-savvy college students. Pizza Hut is hiring a “Summer Twintern” to join the company in its Texas offices as the official tweeter for the brand. Intern responsibilities include attending special events & photo shoots, participating in company brainstorms, and monitoring social media in general for the brand.  The position is currently featured prominently on Pizza Hut’s home page, and is popping up all over the media.

This is an extremely smart move, and an example of how a simple idea can have a huge impact in the world of social media.  Seemingly inspired by Mentos’ 2007 Trevor the Intern campaign, Pizza Hut is turning to the millennial audience and essentially holding a casting call for the social media voice of its brand.  Instead of paying some established blogger or PR expert, Pizza Hut is wisely embracing its core consumer base and allowing them to speak for the brand on a very public level.

“They’ll be our social media journalist,” said Pizza Hut marketing VP Bob Kraut, “chronicling in 140 characters or less what’s going on at Pizza Hut.”

At Mr Youth, we constantly encourage brands to empower the consumer and let them be the authentic  voice of the brand.  It doesn’t really get much better than this.  The only downside is I’m not eligable.

In the continuing saga of Facebook’s effort to formalize its Terms of Use policy, the social network today launched an app that will allow users to vote on which version of the governing document they prefer.

The central debate here revolves largely around the issue of privacy and content ownership, and previous efforts to announce a final resolution on the topic were met with a huge public outcry.  Wronged users complained that Facebook should not have the right to own or even use user-posted content at their own discretion, whether or not that was Facebook’s intention.  In response, Facebook turned to users to provide feedback and inform a new version of the terms.

Where has this netted out? The revised rules state:

“You own all of the content and information you post on Facebook, and you can control how we share your content through your privacy and application settings.”

However, the same section goes on to say:

“You grant us a non-exclusive, transferable, sub-licensable, royalty-free, worldwide license to use any IP content that you post on or in connection with Facebook.”

Will this provision satisfy users who were aghast at the previous version?  Facebook took a great step by embracing user collaboration to revise the rules, but have they gone far enough? The social media world will wait with bated breath to see how the vote pans out on April 23rd.  Something tells this user that the revised rules will prevail. Regardless, the revised version is sure to spark some serious debate.

Just when I think I’m tuned in and on top of this Twitter phenomenon, I hear news of the birth of Tinker. Sound familiar? It looks familiar, too. Tinker.com was launched last week by Glam Media, Inc. as yet another micro-blogging platform for users to share real-time opinions/thoughts/rants/conversations. To be honest, I didn’t know we needed another one. The difference is that Tinker breaks their network down into categories and topics ranging from the über-cool Coachella Music Fest to the seriously dorky (okay, and secretly über-cool) Comic-Con. I’ll leave you to decide for yourself if this is necessary. Personally, it’s more than I need, though I can see if you had plans to attend one of these events, or were really hyped over the last episode of American Idol, it could be a fun way to share your thoughts and get into friendly debates with like-minded ‘Tinkerers’. This leaves me to ponder what’s next in the world of social networks and micro-blogging. When will one finally be enough? I’ve already begun drafting up a streamlined fantasy social network, complete with instant messaging, micro-blogging, status updates, file sharing, private messages, profile updates, fan pages, groups, games, gift-giving, music players, applications, Skype, event invites, and of course, the Poke. And obviously, this would all be accessible through your mobile device. Amazing how something so complex has the potential to be the most straight-forward way to communicate through the World Wide Web. Think I’m on to something?

Recently I came across a Vanity Fair article covering Anomaly’s partnership with YouTube sensation Lauren Luke to launch a makeup line soon to be sold at major retail stores. Its excellent to see this type of entrepreneurial output from a talented YouTube star. For those out of the loop, there are many YouTube phenoms with excellent audience bases, many with over 100k+ subscribers to their channels.  These new-aged Video Stars  generate over 5+million video views, some even with 30+ million views and armed with the ability to quickly produce mutiple videos under their belts that satisfy the appetities of their online crowds. This viewership is the type of stuff advertisers beg for. While beauty seems to be a hot button for online tutorials, other brands have found partnership opportunities and endorsement deals around YouTube celebs. Recently iJustine did a video promo on for Sanyo and tagged a contest to promote their video camera. In short, the news on the Lauren Luke make up line is truly in stride with the gospel we hustle; authenticity is key and credible voices are often more powerful than celeb pay to play voices..  While there is still a lot of parody, spoof and nonsensical videos on YouTube there are some budding stars that brands can align with in a low-cost, high-reach, and immensely authentic manner. In the coming weeks we will share some news on an exciting project Mr. Youth has been working on with a viral sensation. Till then you can check out the list of YouTube celebs on Wikipedia.

Taking cues from both the Champion Hoodie Remix contest and the current trend of food personalization (including granola, chocolate and even tea), Dunkin Donuts launched a contest this week that challenges people across the country to create their own donut for the chance to win $12,000 and to get their tasty treat produced. Just more proof on how customization really is king.

There’s probably not much to do in Brattleboro, Vermont, the hometown of 18-year-old Omegle.com founder Leif K-Brooks.  Boredom is most likely what inspired the high school senior to create the site that lets you anonymously chat with a random stranger.  While the concept isn’t new (it completely gives me flashbacks to 6^th grade slumber parties, staying up to 4am talking to boys in the AOL Disney chat room), it has created a lot of buzz lately and has continued to grow exponentially since it launched on March 25^th. 

The site is simple- with a click of the mouse you are connected to a random stranger, where you can engage most often in meaningless banter.  Since it is completely anonymous, it does appear to give people the push to be slightly inappropriate but at the same time, completely hilarious.  In the end, this probably won’t turn out to be the next Twitter, but if nothing else, a good place to vent.