Bottom line: it really is a Hail Mary. If everything goes right… If Ford can stave off bankruptcy for the next year, and if their design is appealing and the car is actually quality… and if the uncensored posts are overwhelmingly positive while coming across honest and real… then this might just be the play to give Ford a much needed win. Then again, that’s a lot of things that have to go right. Recent history is not on their side. But for the sake of the the American car industry, I wish them luck and hope that they can find a way to be relevant again. If they succeed, I would be happy to buy American, even Ford. But if they don’t produce a superior product, then I’ll continue to buy elsewhere.

Unfortunately, I haven’t seen too much to get excited about lately. Yes, Facebook Connect is big for the company has quickly expanded its footprint. And they are working on a homepage redesign (Yipee). But MySpace continue to buzz like an annoying little fly.  Their own website refresh, MySpaceID (connect competitor), and the MySpace Music.  Today, much to my chagrin, I have to read about the launching of  MySpace Local.  So when will Facebook step up and wow us the way they used to?  Perhaps my expectations are too high.  But where is the much anticipated payment system for on site and in app purchases?  Where is the streaming music service?  When will localization be added to the web and mobile versions of the site?  What about the planned classified upgrade?  And why the hell has the site been so buggy lately!

Will the real Facebook please stand up?

This makes sense, at least at the most basic level.  None of the major players are doing much with it yet.  Some are experimenting; no one has found the right fit to be sure.  But it will be commonplace at some level in the near future.  You can count on that.  What about all those answers that aren’t on the web though? (Yes, they do exist).  Or what if you just don’t have time to research to get what you want?  For all the useful information on the Internet, sometimes nothing is better than knowledge transferred directly from one person to another.

In comes Aardvark.  Aardvark is made for those times.  On their company blog, co-founder Damon Harowitz describes the service as “a newfangled world-changing thingumabob.”  The name is funky as it is, and this description doesn’t help much.  But his point is valid: its a great new service that is hard to describe but easy to love once you figure it out.

It’s fast, personal, relevant, and easy.  Check out the flow of the product in this image I pulled from their site:

Check out the site.  Right now the service works online via the website and instant messaging clients, and on your mobile via email.  Soon it will work via SMS on mobile and an iPhone app is coming too!  They are also continuing to make the service more intelligent, pulling in data from major social networks and other places to learn how to pair your question with the best person to answer.  It joins the list among my favorite online services and I will defintitely keep an eye on its maturation.  You should too!

Some of the benefits overall:
- Scalability: Almost everyone has a cell phone, rich and poor alike. They carry it with them all the time, all over the world, and they continue to get more sophisticated.
- Universalism: software based payment system is easily customizable for different languages and currencies, and mobile systems can be setup to be highly compatible with one another.
- Security: No other payment form has the ability to determine and verify a) a unique id [in this case, for the cell phone], b) a user pin, and c) gps coordinates all together to detect and prevent fraud. Biometrics could add an additional layer of security.

The market includes massive amounts of people in the developing world. The majority of the world’s population is unbanked.  In fact many people argue that this is the only market for m-commerce.  I disagree.  The US may be slower to change, as it has both a larger banked population and entrenched payment systems, but it will change eventually.  First, there are many unbankable people in the US (poor credit, etc.) for which a prepaid solution would provide the normal functions a banked consumer has come to expect.  But beyond that there is real value for the banked population as well.  As the software is more widely supported on mobile phones, and mcommerce is integrated into POS systems people will adapt.  They always do, especially when it means they can simplify your life – and that is indeed one of the value propositions for US users.  Get rid of more of the shit your carry with you all the time, let one device handle more.  Do things you couldn’t do with a card, like transfer money wherever you are to whoever you want (another phone, card, or bank account), change your pin, even make international remittance payments.

The key for adoption will be support and ease-of-use.  If that’s all in place, sign me up.

Read the full AdAge article here.

1) Brickfish
Brickfish offers unique, innovative ways for brands to engage with their customers. They help brands craft a message that then solicits consumer interaction.  Consumers create user generated content all around their brand and then share it virally to all their friends online.  Some of their most recent success stories have been campaigns for David’s Bridal, Nike, and others.

2) Pixazza
Millions of images are used by content publishers around the web. They add great value to the content but are never monetized and often even incur licensing fees.

Pixazza, Inc. provides an internet service that turns static images into engaging content, while generating incremental income for web publishers. Pixazza enables consumers to simply mouse over images on their favorite web sites to learn more and see related products.

3) ConciseClick, Compulsion.tv, and Innovid
All 3 of these firms are revolutionizing the monetization of online video in different ways allowing virtual product or in-video ad placements and clickable video elements, similar to the way Pixazza does for images, but with video.

4) Engage Advertising and Massive Inc.
Both of these companies create custom in-game advertising. Purchase in game products through an eBay powered marketplace, drive past branded billboards as you race through city streets, take your character to a bar and choose from Coca Cola, Absolut vodka, or Bacardi Rum. The possibilities for integrative experiences truly are vast, and based on results thus far they seem to be effective.

Unfortunately, the War on Drugs hasn’t worked.  What we want is healthier people, safe neighborhoods, reduced budget burdens, and better relationships with our international brethren.  What we’ve got is a nice sense of righteousness and retribution, along with the exact opposite of those desired outcomes.  But never in history has a US politician been successful without being tough on drugs.

I think it’s time for a change.  In college, I wrote a 30 page literature review on the history, consequence, and prospects for United States Drug Policy.  Here are the facts:

• The United States spends over $20 billion dollars per year on drug enforcement and interdiction.  Billions more are then required to support a bevy of overtaxed systems. Criminal courts are inundated, and penal institutions are overflowing with drug-related sentences.  California in particular has led the nation in the sentencing of drug offenders and has incarceration rates nearly three times the national average.  Not only that, early release of many different types of inmates is common due to overcrowding.  Meanwhile, taxpayers are forced to bear the responsibility of these actions as cost of drug enforcement continue to rise.

• Unfortunately, observation seems to demonstrate the failure of these efforts.  The United Nations International Drug Control Programme states that the United States is still the leading consumer of illicit drugs worldwide.  Quite frankly, the use of mind-altering substances by a segment of society is common worldwide, from the start of civilization to today.

• As a result of drug prohibition and staunch enforcement, suppliers have decreased the size and increased the potency of their products, making them more addictive and medically risky (this happened with alcohol during prohibition too).

• The “War on Drugs” has bred a black market for drugs, thereby actually increasing crime and violence in our society, which occurs mainly in the form of trafficking related activity (turf wars, etc.) and not at the user level.  This black market also opens the door for corruption amongst law enforcement and politicians.

• Drug related crime that does occur at the user level is mostly crime against property.  Even then though, research has shown that criminal delinquency usually precedes drug use, so it is hard to link the drugs as the cause, which is often the belief held by society.

• With limited resources, stronger drug enforcement requires a sacrifice in other important non-drug law enforcement.

There are a broad spectrum of differing policy approaches that could be used to better manage this issue.  What is the right approach?  I have some ideas (different post) but I don’t know.  All I know for sure it that what we’re doing isn’t it.

“Do as I say, not as I do.”
“You don’t always get what you want.”
“The best defense is a good offense.”
“What goes around comes around.”
“It is what it is.”
“Monkey see, monkey do.”
“Ignorance is bliss.”
“Let bygones be bygones.”
“Never bite the hand that feeds you.”
“Rome wasn’t built in a day.”
“Variety is the spice of life.”
“Better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all.”
“Don’t judge a book by it’s cover.”
“Actions speak louder than words.”

Granted, not every cliche is good or accurate.  Many people are too quick to use them and it can get old hearing them.  But before we cast them off as simple annoyances of speech, maybe we should take the time to re-evaluate why they became colloquial staples and think about how we can integrate the lessons they teach into our daily lives.

Let me start by saying “I hope so.”  I have long favored this type of music consumption.  I love music.  In college, I downloaded music incessantly, growing my collection to close to 40,000 songs.  But I don’t have time for that anymore – I would glad pay $10 or $15/month for unlimited access to an endless library of music across multiple devices of my choice.  Unfortunately, due to DRM restrictions and proprietary platforms the latter requirement has been lacking to this point, and these services and floundered rather than flourished.

That said, I think that over time the leasing model will become more accepted as the use cases and benefits begin to rival ownership.  The record companies just need to let go.  Let’s be honest – I didn’t buy my 40,000 songs in college.  And I wouldn’t buy them now.  In an era of digital music, its too easy to share, and the marginal cost of distribution  for music approaches zero (meaning once the original tack is produced it costs almost nothing to make a million digital copies) for both record companies and users.  Something has got to change.

Predictions (I’m not psychic, many of these things are already happening):

-  Mass DRM will fail and platforms will standardize.
-  Some users will still buy music downloads and favor ownership, but many will move to a subscription model.
-  Many users will still “share” (sounds nicer than “steal”) music for ownership
-  Standard CD sales will die – record labels will need to adapt by offering limited edition packages that include more than just CDs – think artist bios, lyrics, exclusive content, collectible memorabilia, etc.
-  If record labels don’t adapt they will die and artists will go it alone or join a new breed or music management company.
-  Concerts, licensing, merchandising and other forms of revenue generation will become more important.

Thoughts–>Actions–>Change

You have to start at the beginning: the starting line. Thoughts are a precursor to behavior.  Focus with intent on good things, and things you can control, and things you want to be or do.  Then translate that thought into actions.  Often times this will happen naturally.  And those actions will be the catalyst for change.

In other words, keep you head up and keep moving forward.  You will come out at the end of the tunnel blessed by light.