Last year’s video (displayed below) followed the same family, brought in millions of hits on YouTube and left many in awe of Corning’s interpretation of what’s possible with photovoltaic glass, LCD TV glass, architectural display and surface glass.

Do you think this is possible in the future? Connect with us on Facebook and tell us what you think.

I have a slightly Type A personality and, to me, organization is a beautiful thing (Although I have to admit that all the recent ‘Best ____ of 2011’ lists that every publication on earth seemed to be putting out around New Year’s were getting a little out of hand, amiright?). That being said, I’m intending to keep this list fairly short and just give a little shout out to a few of my current favorite bookmarks that I hope might be useful and interesting.

I do most of the front-end programming (HTML, CSS, Javascript, etc.) here at TPI World Headquarters, so anything that I come across to help me streamline that process is aces is my book. I’m also fortunate enough to have a few friends in the industry who help keep me in the know and introduce me to the latest and greatest technology for creating beautiful and functional websites:

1. Visual jQuery – (http://visualjquery.com/)Ok, ok, this Javascript library (jquery) isn’t news to anyone in the industry. It’s been around for a while now, but I gotta admit that I am still enamored with the way jquery simplifies javascript and makes things like animations and manipulations so easy and, dare I say, fun. This site is one of the most easy and useful documentation sources I’ve ever seen. It’s clean and easy to navigate and I can find what I’m looking for, usually, in a matter of seconds. Bonus: Each entry has syntax, examples and options all lined up and organized (Type A, remember? *sigh*).
2. Chosen – (http://harvesthq.github.com/chosen/)Speaking of jQuery, this little gem is a great plugin if you’re digging on some creative ways to utilize select lists.  Whoa. Did I just get a little excited about using select lists? I did. What can I say? A few lines of code and your oft-unwieldy multiple selects become an enchanting experience for the user. Ok, I have to stop now before this gets embarrassing.
3. CSS3 PIE – (http://css3pie.com/)Mmmmm, pie. If you’ve been reluctant to embrace the new-fangled awesomeness that comes with CSS3 because you’ve been worried about IE compatibility, fret no more! My friend, early-adopter, and programming wunderkind, Skye, introduced this to me on a recent project we worked on together. What a difference! While I haven’t had much opportunity to utilize it on other applications just yet, I’m definitely going to be putting it through its paces on some upcoming victims, er… projects we have in the works.

A short list, but a good one.

There’s new plugins, languages and tricks coming out all the time, it seems, to make our lives as developers ever more exciting. Have you come across something lately that’s changed your coding life forever? Let us know! We love expanding our knowledge and keeping our clients happy with interesting and engaging websites and applications.

It turns out there’s an advantage to old-school search directly from Google.com. Not just content to sit around fine-tuning their algorithm and counting their money, the web wizards of Mountain View, CA have also taken to working some clever tricks and treats into their programming to the delight of users that happen to stumble across or successfully uncover them. These fun little surprises have come to be affectionately known as “Easter eggs,” hence the shade of  hide-and-go-seek involved.

Here’s a few of our faves for your viewing pleasure (Fair Warning: this list is a time drain!):

• Find Chuck Norris…if you can.  Type “Find Chuck Norris” into Google, hit I’m Feeling Lucky, and Google will tell you what’s up with Chuck
• We can only assume that this one is meant as an ode to lost productivity: www.Google.com/Pacman
• Type “Do a Barrel Roll” into the search bar.  We dare you not to turn your head
• Type in “Askew” or “Tilt.” Same dare
• A holiday classic:  type in “let it snow” and watch the magic happen.  You can even defrost your screen and write in the snow with your mouse!
• See if you can find the subtle humor in this one: type in “Recursion.” Get it?
• Type “gravity,” click I’m Feeling Lucky and watch the Google logo defy Isaac Newton
• Ask Google Maps for directions from Japan to China.  You might want to pay close attention to step 42…
• BONUS: Google has a bit of Pirate in ‘em with this next Easter Egg.  Simply click here and have a good time, matey (or whatever pirates call friends)

For the rest of my very cold walk through the park I took my gloves off so I could text, take a picture of my dog and answer my phone…I might have been able to do all this with my nose but I choose not to look like an idiot and just let my hand freeze.

Fast forward to last night when I’m Christmas shopping at Target and I happen to come across the perfect present for everyone who has a smartphone:  TOUCH SCREEN GLOVES!  How did I not know about these before?  I ended up buying a pair for all my friends and family with smartphones – which is everyone.  So after my semi-expensive trip to Target, I Googled these gloves and it turns out they are everywhere!

While I realize you (or my boss, hi James!) are probably thinking this has absolutely nothing to do with what we do here at Thoughtprocess Interactive, consider this:  Morgan Stanley’s analysts believe that based on the current rate of change and adoption, the mobile web will be bigger than desktop Internet use by 2015.  That means if you want to get on the internet anytime during the winter in the future (without your hands freezing off) you may want to invest in these touchscreen-friendly gloves.

Or you can just use your nose.

From the headline alone, I knew immediately what the author was referencing as far as Starbuck’s goes. I saw an ad on Facebook this morning that featured their new holiday tagline, “Let’s Merry,” and though I’m not quite as worked up about it as this guy is, I definitely winced when I saw it.

“Merry” is an adjective. “Let’s,” as in “let us,” as in “permit us to,” demands a verb. Presumably, this slogan represents some effort to make a pun. The effort fails. Would Starbucks write, “Let’s funny” or “Let’s delicious”? Apparently, Starbucks would. Customers ought to be concerned: Word play at the expense of grammar is not play at all. It’s antisocial.

I’m with ya, buddy (although you’d probably smack me for my use of “ya”).

I also second his call out of the Starbuck’s sizing terminology:

(The shop’s drink-size appellations shift, inexplicably, from general descriptions to specific numerals—and, what’s more, from English to Italian.)

I love you Starbuck’s, but seriously, what is that?

Here are some of the clear winners:

• Family
• Friends
• Kids
• Spouses
• Health
• Employment

And here are a few of the more random replies:

• Soy peppermint mocha latte’s from Starbuck’s
• Alexander Skarsgard
• Habanero peppers
• DVRs
• Alcohol
• Opposable thumbs

And of course, we’re thankful all year round for great clients that trust us to do good work!

Got anything else you’d add to the mix?

We know, we know, Facebook has had so many changes lately it’s hard to keep up with them all. If you are a casual user, there are plenty of new features to explore. You may see some changes in accessing some of your games, or notice different content on some business pages, but generally you’re good to go.

However, it gets trickier if you’re a business owner who has developed Facebook apps. Starting October 1st, apps that run on Facebook must be hosted from a secure server. Facebook is requiring this to help protect the privacy of its users. What does it mean to you? If you don’t have a SSL certificate for your app’s site domain, your app will not show up on Facebook anymore – meaning your fans won’t see it!

Don’t worry, we’re here to help. If you host your application with us, we can get a SSL certificate set up for your domain. If you use a different host, they’ll be able to help you. Either way, you’ll just need to provide some specific information that verifies you are the owner of the site, and you’ll likely have to pay a small amount to buy the certification from the company that provides it. The most commonly known certificate provider is VeriSign, but there are plenty to choose from, with a variety of features and prices.

If we can help you, let us know. In the meantime, enjoy the latest features on Facebook… we will be back soon to guide you through more of the interesting changes that are happening there — stay tuned!

Ticker & Chat: The new ticker on the top right of your homepage shows real-time posts making them easier to go through.  Just hover over any story to see entire update.  Additionally by clicking your chat sidebar the ticker attaches to the top.  You can chat while navigating to any page you like while watching your friend’s status updates change.

Photo Layout: You probably noticed the creative way our pictures are now laid out in our News Feed.  This is purely for our viewing experience and gives business pages a more unique way to attract “likes”.

Top Stories:  Facebook’s new concept shows posts that you will most likely find interesting and puts them at the top of your feed when you first log in.  The top stories are marked by a blue tag on the top left corner of the post.  To remove them from your top stories just click on the blue tag and they will be removed.  To add a top story that you are interested in just hover over an update where the blue tab would be and click-it’s that easy!

Friend Lists:  Facebook’s new “Smart Lists” are just that-Smart.  Smart lists automatically create lists for your city, work, family, and school.  You can add friends or brands you follow to the lists Facebook automatically created for you, or you can create a new list to organize your friends even better.  To create a new list or edit an existing list click on “Lists” on the left of your News Feed.

Here you can see a list I created based on my favorite movies and television shows making it easy for me to skip all the news feed and go straight to my shows.

Friend List Dropdown:  You can also organize your friend into lists right from their profile page.

Subscribe:  The subscribe button allows you to hear from people that you are interested in, even if you’re not friends.  You are automatically subscribed to all your current friends updates and with the subscribe button you can choose which of their updates you see.  For example, if you have a friend who is always playing Facebook games (we all have those friends), you can hide all those game posts in a simple step.

Not all profiles have a Subscribe button.  Only people who allow subscribers will have the Subscribe button on their profile.  If you choose to allow Subscribers they will only see the things you share publicly.

What do you think of all these new features?  Love it or hate it?

Once there you select your avatar and create your own playlist, which can be anything you want in Turntable’s huge library of tracks or you can upload your own.  You can also bookmark songs on other sites and if you like a song that is playing you can buy it right there from iTunes or add it to your own playlist.

The beauty of this social music site is that you can choose if you like the song that is being played or not…it’s either “Lame” or “Awesome”.  The more “Awesome” points you get the closer you become to changing your avatar to something bigger and better, if the song gets “Lamed” too many times then that song is skipped and the next person DJing” gets to play their song.

Simple enough right?  Well there is one downfall…for the moment you need an “invite” from a Facebook friend in order to play music or join a room, but once you’re in, you’re in!  You can start inviting friends each time you start to play music!  Enjoy!

UPDATE: Now you can take turntable.fm to go with it’s new iPhone app.  It offers all the same features as the online version but fits right in your palm.  It’s easy, just log in with Facebook and up pops all the rooms you are used to seeing!  I’ll be in the Top 40 room!

iPhone Screenshot of turntable.fm

http://2011.uxlondon.com/
http://www.saltercane.com/

Any person or company with a consumer-facing web site, if they are paying any attention at all, will want their site to be mobile phone accessible soon if not sooner. Assuming 1024 pixel wide screens isn’t going to cut it, these two sites show how it can be done really well in just one smart design, rather than the usual way (sniffing out the client browser and redirecting mobile phones to a different version).

Resize your browser and watch what happens as it get narrower. (Use Firefox or a webkit browser like Safari — IE need not apply.) The first site re-flows in each section and the bio pictures shrink down as the page gets narrower. The second site dynamically re-flows from three columns to two columns to one.  If you have a browser on your mobile phone, look at the sites there too. Very cool!

You can read about the technique from the guy who designed those sites here:

http://adactio.com/journal/

Something to think about.

Unfortunately, now having seen the trailer, I still can’t tell you much about it. Why is that? Because I was so busy marveling at the choice of music that accompanies the entire preview to notice any of the actors or plot points. The whole thing plays against a gussied up version of Radiohead’s classic anthem, “Creep,” sung by a youth choir accompanied by piano.

As I listened to it alongside a montage of Facebook status updates, changes in relationship status, profile pictures and the like, I was totally blown away by what an absolute perfect commentary it is on Facebook and the population(s) it serves. Totally one of those connections you can’t believe you haven’t already made yourself.

To whomever is responsible for this stroke of genius: Bravo.

This morning James called my attention to a really great column from Al Ries that was published at adage.com a few days ago, “Long Slogans are Absolutely, Positively More Effective Than Short Ones.” Now, we work on the web where it’s a commonly agreed upon fact that your homepage  has about three seconds to grab the attention of a viewer before they move on to something else that will, so right away I start running through all the reasons I disagree with Mr. Ries:

• Long isn’t catchy
• Long is too hard to remember
• People lose interest before you’ve made your point
• Long is too complicated

You can preface all of these arguments with “usually” because, of course, there are exceptions to every rule, but generally that’s where I stand on slogans. Short, simple and straightforward win the day.

Then, about a quarter of the way through the article, Mr. Ries gives a list of short slogans that he deems ineffective, followed by this statement:

Short slogans like these, in my opinion, are not very effective. And it’s not because they’re short; it’s because they’re not very memorable.

Hmmm. He might be on to something there.

So what does make a slogan memorable? According to Mr. Ries: Emotion.

Sure, slogans should be as short as possible, but there’s a trade-off. Slogans should be long enough to contain some words that knock on the right side of the consumer’s brain. The emotional side of the brain as opposed to the left side, the logical, analytical side.

Sold.

Check out the original post to see some  examples of both “good” and “bad” slogans, but here’s one of our own:

Our “official” slogan is “Strategy. Creativity. Technology.” That is absolutely the most succinct and simple way to describe us, but if I asked you what is was tomorrow, would you remember?

Now consider our homepage. We have a short little Flash animation that automatically runs  if you’ve never been to the site before. It mimics someone typing in a word processor (which sounds boring, but actually isn’t – I swear ). At the climax, if you will, the screen reads “Thoughtprocess Interactive: a blend of strategy and creativity with a dash of techie geek.” “Geek” is then replaced with “chic .”

This is clearly a play on our tagline and essentially boils down to the exact same thing. But, I have never heard anyone refer to or even comment on our tagline. This 48 second Flash animation on the other hand gets rave reviews. It’s truly rare for a new client not to mention it in our first conversation.

If Mr. Ries is to be believed, that’s because the second example adds in just a handful of additional descriptive words that inject a little warmth and playfulness: otherwise known as emotion.

This plugin seemed to have all we needed except one thing. There was a choice in navigation between arrows left and right (previous and next) OR numeric/individual item navigation below. (For this case, we’ll use actual ‘Sliders’ as our representation of the easySlider. Hungry yet?)

For the design we’re envisioning, both systems needed to be utilized. It seemed like a simple fix and I set about combining both  navigation types to show up at the same time. Problem. For some reason, the next/previous buttons weren’t behaving properly when you used the numeric navigation below to choose an item! If you clicked on an item in the numeric nav, the next button would inexplicably send the gallery zooming off into space and then slowly return to the first item in the list.

How do we fix this!? Good ol’ scheming and know-how to the rescue! I’ll give you the quick-and-dirty since I’m pretty sure that’s what you’re interested in, anyway.

First, to show both navigations, go into easySlider1.7.js and find this part:

if(options.controlsShow){
var html = options.controlsBefore;
if(options.numeric){
html += '<ol id="'+ options.numericId +'"></ol>';
} else {
if(options.firstShow) html += '<span id="'+ options.firstId +'"><a href=\"javascript:void(0);\">'+ options.firstText +'</a></span>';
html += ' <span id="'+ options.prevId +'"><a href=\"javascript:void(0);\">'+ options.prevText +'</a></span>';
html += ' <span id="'+ options.nextId +'"><a href=\"javascript:void(0);\">'+ options.nextText +'</a></span>';
if(options.lastShow) html += ' <span id="'+ options.lastId +'"><a href=\"javascript:void(0);\">'+ options.lastText +'</a></span>';
};

html += options.controlsAfter;
$(obj).after(html);
};

And change it to this:

if(options.controlsShow){
var html = options.controlsBefore;
if(options.numeric){
html += '<ol id="'+ options.numericId +'"></ol>';
if(options.firstShow) html += '<span id="'+ options.firstId +'"><a href=\"javascript:void(0);\">'+ options.firstText +'</a></span>';
html += ' <div id="arrows"><span id="'+ options.prevId +'"><a href=\"javascript:void(0);\">'+ options.prevText +'</a></span>';
html += ' <span id="'+ options.nextId +'"><a href=\"javascript:void(0);\">'+ options.nextText +'</a></span></div>';
if(options.lastShow) html += ' <span id="'+ options.lastId +'"><a href=\"javascript:void(0);\">'+ options.lastText +'</a></span>';
} else {
if(options.firstShow) html += '<span id="'+ options.firstId +'"><a href=\"javascript:void(0);\">'+ options.firstText +'</a></span>';
html += ' <span id="'+ options.prevId +'"><a href=\"javascript:void(0);\">'+ options.prevText +'</a></span>';
html += ' <span id="'+ options.nextId +'"><a href=\"javascript:void(0);\">'+ options.nextText +'</a></span>';
if(options.lastShow) html += ' <span id="'+ options.lastId +'"><a href=\"javascript:void(0);\">'+ options.lastText +'</a></span>';
};

html += options.controlsAfter;
$(obj).after(html);
};

Then find this part:

if(options.numeric){
for(var i=0;i<s;i++){
$(document.createElement("li"))
.attr('id',options.numericId + (i+1))
.html('<a rel='+ i +' href=\"javascript:void(0);\">'+ (i+1) +'</a>')
.appendTo($("#"+ options.numericId))
.click(function(){
animate($("a",$(this)).attr('rel'),true);
});
};
} else {
$("a","#"+options.nextId).click(function(){
animate("next",true);
});
$("a","#"+options.prevId).click(function(){
animate("prev",true);
});
$("a","#"+options.firstId).click(function(){
animate("first",true);
});
$("a","#"+options.lastId).click(function(){
animate("last",true);
});
};

And change it to this:

if(options.numeric){
for(var i=0;i<s;i++){
$(document.createElement("li"))
.attr('id',options.numericId + (i+1))
.html('<a rel='+ i +' href=\"javascript:void(0);\">'+ (i+1) +'</a>')
.appendTo($("#"+ options.numericId))
.click(function(){
animate($("a",$(this)).attr('rel'),true);
});
};
$("a","#"+options.nextId).click(function(){
animate("next",true);
});
$("a","#"+options.prevId).click(function(){
animate("prev",true);
});
$("a","#"+options.firstId).click(function(){
animate("first",true);
});
$("a","#"+options.lastId).click(function(){
animate("last",true);
});
} else {
$("a","#"+options.nextId).click(function(){
animate("next",true);
});
$("a","#"+options.prevId).click(function(){
animate("prev",true);
});
$("a","#"+options.firstId).click(function(){
animate("first",true);
});
$("a","#"+options.lastId).click(function(){
animate("last",true);
});
};

NOW, to make it work properly (and here’s the kicker), parseInt!!!!!

Find the ‘animate’ function (~line 140):

function animate(dir,clicked){
if (clickable){
clickable = false;
var ot = t;
switch(dir){
case "next":
t = (ot>=ts) ? (options.continuous ? t+1 : ts) : t+1;
break;
case "prev":
t = (t<=0) ? (options.continuous ? t-1 : 0) : t-1;
break;
case "first":
t = 0;
break;
case "last":
t = ts;
break;
default:
t = dir;
break;
};

And insert this itttty bitty little parseInt:

function animate(dir,clicked){
if (clickable){
clickable = false;
var ot = t;
t = parseInt(t);
switch(dir){
case "next":
t = (ot>=ts) ? (options.continuous ? t+1 : ts) : t+1;
break;
case "prev":
t = (t<=0) ? (options.continuous ? t-1 : 0) : t-1;
break;
case "first":
t = 0;
break;
case "last":
t = ts;
break;
default:
t = dir;
break;
};

Thats it! Wow, that seemed a lot harder than it was. We figured out that the two navigations were treating the current item differently (one as an integer, one as a string – who knew!) so basically we’re just telling them all to be integers so both methods will work the same.

For reference, here’s another little proof of concept we drew up. Sliders. Get it? We’re hilarious, i know. (click the pickles OR the ketchup. CRAZY!) easySlider plugin ‘Sliders’ demo

Sure, this isn’t the complete picture. Why isn’t early MPEG on here? What about player technologies, like Flash Player? Where’s YouTube? Honestly, I left those things off because they dilute the minuscule amount of humor I’m working with here… but, I’ll justify it this way: the story of video quality on the web is mostly about the advancement (and adoption) of compression algorithms — the underlying mathemagic that squeezes video down to something less than than mammoth-magnitude. (I’m not kidding about the magic: one second of uncompressed standard-definition video is about 30MB. Compressed with h.264, it’s about 63KB. That’s a reduction of about 500:1!)

The point is, walk before you run. Know that h.264 and MPEG4 are the compressors that pass for ‘good’ on the web right now, and you won’t be left behind with Australopithecus and the other IE6 users. Then note this: that last guy in the diagram still has a way to go…

To that end, I’ve taken the liberty of compiling a short list (in no particular order) of some great marketing and business books to light your fire and help jumpstart your business in 2010 with new fervor, focus and inspiration. A lot of ideas in these books aren’t earth-shattering, new and different ideas, but common sense practices that sometimes fall by the wayside in business and want for a good reminder. The key is using the good advice you find. Good advice only works if you put it into practice.

Admittedly, I haven’t ready all of these books. For what its worth, its a list I’ve compiled from other business leaders I follow and have been written by or invaluably helpful to them. That’s good enough for me and I will undoubtedly be picking up a few of these to read on a few cold nights this winter.

Have you already read any of these? What are your thoughts? We’d love to add to our library as well so definitely leave us a comment with your own recommendations!

Happy Reading!

1. How to Win Friends and Influence People – Dale Carnegie: An oldie but a goodie. A nice reminder on how the key to being successful is all in how you treat the people around you.

2. Citizen Marketers: When People Are the Message – Ben McConnell and Jackie Huba: If you’re curious about social media and how it might relate to your business, this one is a good resource.

3. Love Is the Killer App – Tim Sanders: I haven’t read this one but its definitely on my list. Its also about dealing with people but with an emphasis on networking and sharing information.

4. Good to Great – Jim Collins: Need I say more? Which one will YOUR business be?

5. Just Ask a Woman: Cracking the Code of What Women Want and How They Buy – Mary Lou Quinlan: This was recommended to me and I’m actually looking forward to reading it. Discover the power of the female buyer!

6. Blue Ocean Strategy – W. Chan Kim and Renée Mauborgne: All about the ‘blue ocean’ of uncrowded and untapped market space.

7. The Long Tail – Chris Anderson: From the Editor-in-Chief of Wired Magazine. If anyone will know about the future of business, this is the guy.

8. How To Be That Guy – Scott Ginsberg: This guy started wearing a nametag everywhere as an experiment and learned a lot about how people responded to it. Now he shares how to be unforgettable.

9. Selling the Invisible: A Field Guide to Modern Marketing – Harry Beckwith: Selling the way you do business and treat customers, rather than a product. Because everyone wants good customer service!

10. Purple Cow – Seth Godin: And just for good measure, Mr. Godin is considered one of the most brilliant minds in marketing. Read this one.

As HTML5 and faster Javascript engines become common place, it’s becoming increasingly tempting for developers to want to abandon Internet Explorer users and simply provide them with an upgrade path away from Microsoft.  However, there might just be a compromise that lets developers use the newest technologies, while still keeping Internet Explorer users within their comfort zone.  This compromise is Google Chrome Frame.  This new Google project aims to take the Google Chrome browser, and place it inside the Internet Explorer shell as a plugin.  Much like how Flash works within Internet Explorer, so does Chrome Frame.  If a user installs Chrome Frame (which is very simple and didn’t require a restart for IE8), they can view the web as if nothing was different.  However, if they visit a page that requires newer technologies, a developer can put a <meta /> tag in the page that triggers Chrome Frame.  The user will not notice any difference in the way the browser works (other than new features and faster rendering/processing).

This could just be the best solution for newer sites that wish to take advantage of new technologies Internet Explorer will be slow to adopt (if they even adopt the new technologies at all).  New features such as the <audio /> and <canvas /> tags will make the web much more friendly and consistent to develop for.  A faster, more modern Javascript engine means new APIs such as Geocoding and better user interface features such as animations and drag and drop support.  With these new features already starting to show up in Google Chrome, why wait for Internet Explorer to catch up, when they’re just a plugin away.

Obviously, both of these networks hold value (and/or create value) for their users. Both are very popular and both are adding members like mad. Both are also likely to take a hit in membership over the next several years as users grow bored with them and move on to the next big thing (which will probably be something from Google – like everything else). That said, if you had to hedge a bet on the success of one or the other, you might be inclined to go with Facebook since 250 million users is a lot more than somewhere around 5 million (though no “official” membership data has been released by Twitter). But it’s another shared characteristic of both networks that gives me pause: each has yet to turn a profit.

Popularity aside, we all know that nothing is free – and if these networks can’t figure out how to turn their fame into fortune, they’re sunk. Both have legions of super-smart people working tirelessly to try and figure out how to be profitable.

So why do I think Twitter has a better shot? Two reasons:

1. This article from today’s NYTimes.
2. And this article from Newsweek.com.

I found the most important information in the Twitter article to be this:

Twitter, which does not yet make money, is now concentrating on teaching businesses how they can join and use it, Mr. Banerji said, and the company plans to publish case studies. He is also developing products that Twitter can sell to businesses of all sizes this year, including features to verify businesses’ accounts and analyze traffic to their Twitter profiles.

For the Facebook article, it’s this:

The paradox of the social network is that trust—the very lifeblood of the site’s growth—may be the same thing hindering its financial success. Recently, the company faced a series of heavily-publicized battles when users were turned off by Beacon, an initiative by the site that targeted advertisements at individual users without their consent. After many Facebookers protested, discussions arose over what information Facebook owns about each of their users, and a new privacy code was established on the site.

Facebook members have grown too comfortable with the idea of the site being used for any purpose beyond the one it currently serves in their lives. They don’t want to get messages from advertisers in their inbox (even if they really might want what’s being peddled), they want messages from friends. Period.

Twitter on the other hand is new enough not to have fully cemented this kind of relationship with their users, and already seems to have an audience that is more open and accepting of commercial overtures. What’s more, some of the possibilities for revenue opportunities they’ve floated seem like winners. If I was a business owner or celebrity, I’d be more than happy to pay for the ability to weed out imposter accounts or access analytics of my profile page (at least one of which should be possible and free to begin with, but that’s a topic for another post).

Anyone disagree?

As part of their sponsorship efforts, Black Magic entered a customized, Ford F-150 SVT Raptor driven by the guys at Garage 419 into the rally to get in on the action and get extra mileage (pun intended) out of their participation.

To put rally fans in the passenger seat with the Black Magic team, we built a custom microsite with flash features for daily updates, race tracking and even a custom YouTube Channel. Through daily blog posts, an up-to-the-minute Twitter feed, maps, photos and videos, Black Magic fans were able to live the experience of an exclusive and world-renowned automotive event and interact directly with the brand in an engaging and authentic way. Check out our portfolio for more information or visit the site to see things for yourself!

The move to the web follows FedEx’s surprise decision to forgo ad space in the last Super Bowl after 20 years as a notable advertiser. At the time, the company felt like the expense ($3 million for a 30-second spot this year) was unjustifiable in light of the economic downturn. As FedEx’s director of advertising makes clear to the NY Times, the reach and relative affordability of the web has become impossible to ignore:

Steve Pacheco, director of advertising at FedEx, said the new infomercial campaign reflected FedEx’s acknowledgment of the growing sentiment that “lunchtime is the new prime time,” meaning that the multitudes who watch videos online while chomping sandwiches in cubicles rival those wielding remote controls at night.

“We’re still very involved in television, especially with all our sports and sponsorship support,” Mr. Pacheco said. “But digital advertising and communication is taking a bigger role in the overall plan, because we try to scale our media plan to be where our customers are.”

http://theguysmanual.msn.com/

It’s actually pretty cool, and they’ve done a pretty good job making some web videos that are fun, and make you want to eat Grape Nuts (the make me want to them at least).  Will this angle work?  I haven’t had Grape Nuts in forever, but I’m definitely jonesin’ for a bowl now.

Next up in the contenders’ corner – Microsoft’s Bing. Check out a few reviews of Bing and a short video that illustrates how it feels it may knock off the Champ.

http://www.reuters.com/article/bigMoney/idUS183638463920090529

http://www.decisionengine.com/Default.html

Niche social networking sites are absolutely something people want to do. People clearly want to do this. . .[and] as people get more comfortable with social networking via Facebook, Twitter, they will look around and say, ‘I want a social network for this particular group.’

Read the whole interview…

Behold: The Wordsmith

Now, thanks to Charmin, users can download free mobile applications for iPhones and BlackBerrys that use GPS to show you the way to the nearest public pit stop. Not only will you get location, Sit or Squat also lets users rate each restroom based on ick-factor (an average rating above 2.5 is “sit,” below “squat”) so you can avoid less than stellar accommodations (if you have the luxury of being picky).

Being a toilet paper company, this is obviously a great fit for Charmin, and it’s getting them a lot of buzz on blogs and other traditional media outlets-which is the point, of course. What’s so interesting about it though, is that Sit or Squat was a pre-existing site – the lesson being that you don’t necessarily need to be a corporate giant for a good, common-sense interactive site or application to pay off. Certainly, Charmin’s saving some cash by avoiding the cost of custom application development and Sit or Squat now has a corporate sponsor to finance their brainchild and tell the world about it. It’s a win-win.

My second take is that I can’t decide whether this is a positive commentary on iPhone users (i.e. they know useless crap once they’ve seen it and never look back), or a somewhat less flattering one (they have an endless and apparently purposeless appetite for the latest gimicky digital froth).

I dunno. You guys tell me what you think.

Full disclosure: The device in my pocket was purchased when you still called them “cell phones” and they all had hinges in the middle, so this post might just be my pent-up gadget-envy lashing out at my luddite wallet.

Since I started writing AS3 code, I’ve generally viewed the mouseChildren and mouseEnabled properties of the InteractiveObject class (and by extension the Sprite class) as relatively superfluous. They existed as little more than a recourse for when something accidentally got ‘in between’ the mouse and a button that needed to be pressed. And in a sense that is true. But I realized today that those crafty AS3 creators had bestowed upon me a much more substantial tool than I’d first realized.

Fundamentally, these two properties are straightforward. Setting a Sprite’s mouseEnabled property to false tells that Sprite to not bother interacting with the mouse. In other words, to stop dispatching MouseEvents such as MouseEvent.CLICK. Likewise, setting a Sprite’s mouseChildren property to false tells the children of that Sprite to stop dispatching MouseEvents. By default, both properties are set to true.

The magic comes by virtue of the fact that these two properties work independently of each other. If a Sprite has children, setting that Sprite’s mouseEnabled to false does not prevent the Sprite’s children from dispatching MouseEvents. Similarly, setting the Sprite’s mouseChildren to false doesn’t prevent the sprite itself from dispatching MouseEvents. Why is this cool? Let me count the reasons:

• Sprite ‘flattening’. It used to drive me nuts that that a button made of multiple sub-elements (label, hilight, border, icon, etc) would have an indeterminate MouseEvent ‘originator’. That is, the target property of the MouseEvent would be ‘label’ or ‘highlight’ or whatever depending on the exact pixel over which the mouse rested, rather than simply ‘myButton’. I found myself putting invisible ‘mousetrap’ layers in my buttons to sit on top of everything to fix this. It turns out I don’t need to. By setting myButton.mouseChildren = false all the button parts become a single unit, collectively dispatching MouseEvents with a target of ‘myButton’.
• Group disabling. Need to disable a whole group of buttons? Make them siblings and set the parent Sprite’s mouseChildren to false.
• Event-bubbling simplification. By setting a container Sprite’s mouseEnabled = false but leaving mouseChildren = true, you prevent the ‘middleman’ from sending unnecessary MouseEvents to high-level MouseEvent handlers. Imagine a calculator, with multiple keys, a display screen, a surrounding ‘case’, a nice little Texas Instruments logo, whatever. If I add a MouseEvent.CLICK listener to the high-level calculator object, I will receive all of the various key clicks, but I will also receive events from the other child elements… the display, the case, the logo. Even if I set those elements to mouseEnabled = false, the calculator Sprite itself will still trigger its own MouseEvents when I roll over them. By following up with calculator.mouseEnabled = false, the high-level listener will now only receive events from the children that matter, and will not be encumbered with ‘false positives’.

Given this greater understanding, I almost wonder why the AS3 creators chose to set the default of mouseEnabled to true. After all… aren’t there generally far more ‘passive’ display objects on the stage than interactive ones? I’m sure they had a reason, and it’s probably one that I could find by Googling around a bit… but enough is enough. Hardcore geek session over.

I did an experiment over at WhatWouldDadSay.com, where I asked readers to create a SIX-WORD résumé for themselves. Given the widespread fascination with Twitter and its 140-character limitation, I thought it would showcase good writing discipline. Not that you have to make your own six-word résumé, but notice how effective some of the (personal or otherwise) entries were:

• “As I live, so does Apple.”—Steve Jobs
• “Solving complex problems efficiently and elegantly.”—A personal entry
• Another personal entry: “I stand alone, next to me.”
• “Fire it up. Ready to go.”—Barack Obama
• From a real estate staging person: “Staging it better. Selling it faster.”
• Here is one of my favorites that combines two movie characters: “Now reverse in aging am I.”—Yoda Button

This may seem to be a worthless exercise—and it is certainly silly—but it’s not worthless if it only makes you realize that a lot can be said in a few well-chosen words.

That last paragraph there really hits it on the head. In my opinion, in the majority of instances- and almost always when you’re talking about web or ad copy- quality trumps quantity.

That said, anybody want to take a crack at their own six word resume?

Beyond keeping a watchful eye on risky interests and pictures, parents should also use social networking sites such as MySpace — which had about 120 million users as of this summer — as an opportunity to learn about their childrens’ favorite movies and hobbies, as well as their top friends, she said.

“You so often hear parents say ‘I don’t even know my kid anymore.’ Here’s a very easy tool to get to know your kid again,” she said.

Here’s the whole article: http://www.cnn.com/2009/HEALTH/01/05/myspace.teens/index.html

http://www.thoughtprocessinteractive.com/holidaycard

It was a collaborative effort for sure, but expert snow-manimator, Abram, really made the magic happen.  I hope you all enjoy it.  Happy Holidays!

http://www.popularmechanics.com/technology/industry/4259135.html

And apparently Microsoft is working on just this thing, with collaborative searching:

http://www.popularmechanics.com/technology/industry/4292830.html?page=2 (see #7, collaborative search)

My mind’s too simple to make sense of it all, but it looks like there are some big things coming.

This is a web ad that was launched as part of a print and online advertising campaign for Motrin on Sept. 30th, and it’s a great example of two things:

1) Copywriting matters.

2) Word of mouth combined with web 2.0 is powerful thing.

So, what happened here is Motrin designed a campaign that is obviously targeted to a very valuable demographic: women with children. Their primary message can be found in the Clintonesque tagline they’ve used at the end of this ad: “Motrin. We feel your pain.” Nice, right? Simple enough. Makes sense. And then it all goes downhill.

Someone at Motrin decided that the best way to make this connection would be to focus on the aches and pains associated with wearable baby carriers – which have become popular with parents over the past several years because of the unique bonding experience they provide. This too, is all well and good, until you read/hear the first line of the ad:

“Wearing your baby seems to be in fashion.”

Hmmm. Right off the bat, you’ve got problems. First, this statement could (and coincidentally, did) imply that wearing your baby in a carrier has more to do with appearing fashionable or hip than bonding with your child (think Paris Hilton clutching a miniature dog on a red carpet). Generally, anything that may compare someone’s child to a celebutant’s chihuahua is unwise. But, there’s still an opportunity to clarify with the follow-up statement, which includes the phrase:

“Supposedly it’s a real bonding experience.”

So close! Replace “Supposedly” with “There’s no denying that” and you’re home free! Until this next doozy:

“I’ll put up with the pain because it’s a good kind of pain. It’s for my kid.” (getting warmer…) “Plus, it totally makes me look like an official mom.” (Cold)

Clearly, nobody ran this copy past anyone from the target audience-or a good editor (which, for the record, is almost always a wise move). As you might expect, mothers of America were none too pleased, and they voiced their dismay in a big way. The ad was pulled after two days of a massive mommy 2.0 backlash on Twitter and blogs across the internet.

Motrin’s new PR problem is a perfect example of how little appealing graphics and a good idea (or intentions) mean if the copy isn’t right.

http://www.rhesus.at/

I think I’m gonna use it anyway…

Check it out: http://www.thoughtprocessinteractive.com/roi/

http://www.hyundaigenesis.com

I’m pretty impressed.  Makes good use of video, some cool pseudo 3D stuff, and… I got there by clicking on a banner ad, so their ads are good too.  Pretty nice campaign altogether.

http://www.silverpop.com/news/press/10_02_08.html

So, that new bike you’ve been eyeballing at the bike shop, now’s the time get it.  Maybe save $20 to $40 a month in gas, plus $20 from the gov.

http://www.bicycleretailer.com/news/newsDetail/1878.html

How to Blog for Your Business – the Good and the Bad.
http://www.usnews.com/blogs/risky-business/2008/9/10/how-to-blog-for-your-business–the-good-and-the-bad.html