TV is dead. Or it will be dead unless it evolves drastically. I came to this conclusion sometime in 2002-2003. That was the point when I was abruptly weened off religiously watching television. Since then, only a few shows have caught my attention enough to actually turn my TV into a TV, and not just the screen for my XBOX(/DVD player). However, I have seen a new direction for TV, and it came from NBC of all people. Their great show last season got me hooked into a new way to watch TV shows. Online viewing. And boy am I hooked. No cable service to buy, no expensive equipment to buy or lease, no endless commercials. Its just great. I can watch when I want, pretty much anywhere I want to and the commercials are minimal. I like it so much I even got my technologically-limited mom to start watching this way and its amazing how quickly she caught on.

Commercials are the real thing I wanted to blog about though. While watching Heroes online, I did get some commercials, but strangely, it seemed to be the same commercial every 10 minutes. But it was only one commercial every 10 minutes it seemed like so I could deal with it. Yet I found myself wanting more commercials, or at least more relevant commercials. This was a strange feeling for me, having always changed the channel or went and did something else while commercials were on.

Being online so much, I am always looking for more to do, more to see. I usually have at least 4 different programs running, some with 2 or more viewable things each. Call me ADHD if you will, but only call me that because the Internet made me that way. So when I said I wanted to see commercials, I was serious. I wanted something to focus my attention and keep me on that one screen. While watching Heroes, I would switch it to take over my whole monitor, one of them anyway, and I wanted something to fill the space the inevitable commercial would take up. I don't think I am alone in this feeling either.

TV execs, if you are reading this, take note. Give me options. Give me choices. You already do it by giving me the choice of which TV show to watch, so why not extend that to commercials. Here's a simple way to do it online that benefits you twofold and is very simple thing to do. Give me categories of commercials to choose from such as movies, cars, technology, food, etc. This benefits you because then I would be interested in the commercials and would probably watch them. It also benefits you because then you would know what I wanted to see and you can tell your advertisers: "See? He wants to see your content. Give us more money and we pretty much guarantee your ad will get the placement you are aiming for." After all, isn't that what advertisers want to hear, guaranteed product placement?

Ask.com recently released their updated interface, and I have to say it's quite amazing. The initial screen is nice esthetically but it seems like any other search engine, however once you submit things begin to change rapidly from google and yahoo. A three paned page emerges with search modification options/suggestions on the left margin, and then paid and natural search results emerge in the body pane. Then, depending on what your searching for the right pane will either not appear for obscure searches, or will present a depth of content for broader searches. If you search for a band you will see images first, followed by music (with samples built in) powered by iLike.com, then it will show videos (which begin playing in place when you hover over them), or encyclopedia listings from wiki. The new interface is pushing google to launch a similar change in the near future where search results will be a mix of videos, images etc. since google users have been avoiding using the tabs/categories...even after google recently made the menu bar like approach common through most of their applications.

But the most impressive thing is that the new ask.com turned me onto iLike.com. For a while I've heard music geeks like myself complaining about missing one of their favorite bands when they were in town, or being out of touch with new music since they only listen to their iTunes... iLike uses the facebook platform with a plugin for iTunes and contact importing from the major web email providers to make one of the most holistic social music sites out there. Right away you send invites to your friends, then you install the iTunes plugin and populate what kind of music you like and your favorite artists. From there the fun begins, all of those artists you imported from iTunes are now displayed when you want to find out who is going to be on tour in your area...and it's directly connected with ticketmaster. The other really interesting feature is that it's tied into garageband.com so when you're listening to some of your old standby artists it will recommend similar new artists and let you download their mp3s for free. Compared to the other social music options out there...I like iLike.

How all of this will come together and who may or may not buy iLike and whether the new ask.com interface will grow their 5% search share are TBD...but I know the data implications are amazing for whomever may snatch up iLike considering the advertising opportunities...and the search behavior on Ask.com as well as video advertising opportunities could be quite revolutionary.

I read a wonderful article by Christina Binkley in the Wall Street Journal [subscription required] this past Thursday entitled: "The Gatekeeper: How Posh Hotel Sizes Up Guests."  It struck me as a message for two things we need to do well, and do better everyday.

Here's a short piece of the article.  "...Recognizing an influential guest requires putting together the pieces of a puzzle, using both eyes and ears.  A woman in good jewels but poor clothes may have recently inherited wealth....  It's like a skunk... There's enough scent being sprayed around that you can connect the dots."

1. For the Agency:  Know Your Customer.  The article points out how The Peninsula Beverly Hills hotel uses nonverbal cues and secondary research to provide extraordinary personal service.  While we can out-think just about any digital marketing firm, we need to relate to our clients as unique individuals.  If we know what our clients enjoy, if we can share their interests, then we can connect with them as people *and* marketers.  
2. For Marketers: Connect The Dots.  Direct Marketers have nearly perfected the ability to take some data about a customer and use it to gather much more, relevant detail about them.  Thanks to the magic of electrons and computers, we can speak to individual consumers like never before.  This is the point we're trying to make on our own home page. 
   

There's a bit of a buzz going on about PayPerPost, a new advertising company that pays bloggers to post about the products of their clients. Mostly this buzz is coming from TechCrunch (and filtering into Digg), which is interesting since the posts there are universally slamming the service while keeping the buzz going. I love the latest comparison to big tobacco. This some incremental step towards a full blown application of Godwin's Law. So, please let me be the first to say, "PayPerPost is Hitler!"

Seriously, the Internet loves authenticity. PayPerPost encourages people to be inauthentic. Normal people have natural radar for sensing this type of BS. It won't work. It's nothing to worry about.