Case Study 2: Collision Course

In the late 1970’s in the Bronx, New York, house parties ruled the social scene. The house party without room for a band had to be entertained by an individual who played music. This Disc Jockey set the tone for the party, and occasionally he would have a partner on stage to help entertain the crowd called a Master of Ceremonies. Since this duo couldn’t perform their own music with instruments, records from old jazz and funk artists were looped and scratched to create a unique sound. At this time funk was still king in the Bronx, and MC and DJ’s were simply trying to add to the genre, not create a new one.

The MC’s job was simply to talk about how amazing the DJ and he were and “move” the crowd. This production evolved into the MC “rapping” improvisational rhymes to the beat that the DJ played. It wasn’t until the Sugarhill Gang’s 1979 hit “Rapper’s Delight” that this process was recorded and reproduced commercially. The song sampled Chic’s song “Good Times.” MC Wonder Mike of the Sugarhill Gang begun the song with a warm-up and then started the first verse in the first rap song to be a top 40 hit like this:

“Now what you hear is not a test--I'm rappin to the beat, and me, the groove, and my friends are gonna try to move your feet, see I am Wonder Mike and I'd like to say hello!”

Wonder Mike certainly did say hello, and 30 years later he is the godfather to a whole genre of music that is a fundamental component of pop-culture. In order to sample Chic’s song, the band Positive Force had to be brought in to reproduce the music. Years after Sugarhill Gang came out samplers became an instrument used to create virtually all hip-hop music.

This background is important for people to understand who believe that sampling is “stealing.” Sampling is really about respecting the history of the art. Everyday people talk about remaining connected to the roots of an art, trade or sport. One example of this is the argument that adding instant replay to Major League Baseball will detach the sport from its roots. The same argument was made in the National Football League. History is an important component that respects the culture that the art came from and keeps the art connected to its foundation. Without funk, records and sampling there would be no hip-hop, just like how without soul and jazz there would have been no funk.

Copyright laws do not seem to agree with the evolving culture however and according to those rules a sampling artist must obtain permission in order to use copyrighted material. These rules are ignored frequently, sometimes due to the belief that publishing on a public domain like the internet means that it’s fair use. Many artists also believe that when they sample a song, they put their own spin on it, and the outcome is original, with a tribute to the old while creating something completely new. The law disagrees however, and coincidently, the same year as the Sugarhill Gang formed in 1976 the Copyright Act came out. This act stated that the owner of original material has exclusive rights to the reproduction, distribution and derivative works and that the material becomes property of author as soon as the work is finished. This act included musical works.

Though there have been many conflicts between this act and remixed material, one case is particularly interesting. Jay-Z, a once student and now legend of hip-hop released what was to be his final album “The Black Album” in late 2003. Jay-Z also released an a cappella version, with the implicit purpose of encouraging the use of his verses in mash-ups and remixes. Understanding and appreciating the history of the music that made him famous, allowed Jay-Z to encourage this creative behavior, instead of trying to stop it or profit from it. Linkin Park, a popular rock group, joined Jay-Z to officially release the album “Collision Course,” which combined, or “mashed-up,” popular tracks from both artists on their recent albums.

Not every artist and record company was as welcoming to this forum however, as “The Grey Album” produced by DJ Danger Mouse in 2004 did not go over as well as “Collision Course.” DJ Danger Mouse in “The Grey Album” mashed songs from Jay-Z’s “The Black Album” and The Beatles “The White Album.” DJ Danger Mouse did this without any permission to use the digital property of The Beatles. Record company EMI who owned the rights to The Beatles, ordered DJ Danger Mouse to cease distribution. Danger Mouse complied, however in this digital age, just one online download is enough to open the internet floodgates. On February 24^th, 2004 a day titled “Grey Tuesday,” electronic civil disobedience prevailed as over 100,000 downloads of the “The Grey Album” on over 170 sites occurred. While EMI sent cease and desist letters to some of those who downloaded the album that they could track, no legal action beyond that were taken in connection to the event.

The shame about this conflict is how it overshadows what should be the subject, “The Grey Album” as an artistic masterpiece. Danger Mouse did what DJ’s do, and did it very well, even being named Best Album of 2004 by Entertainment Weekly. Hip-hop is a genre of music that is here to stay, and the style it uses directly collides with copyright law that is equally as old as the entire genre. These laws were created so popular artists couldn’t steal from others and make money using their popularity as leverage. Act’s that allow for sampling in music should be in place, so people who own the rights to past artists do not control the future of music. The digital age has allowed for mash-ups and sampling to be commonplace for almost anyone in the present and future, and that’s where our legislations should be as well.

Simply put, laws should no longer reflect a world without hip-hop while pop-culture is being lead by it.

The Greatest Thing Since Sliced Bread? Week of Feb. 15th.

What's the buzz about this week? Well, Google Buzz.

Google Buzz, which launched last week, is Google's new attempt at social networking. It’s available immediately to any Gmail user and lets you share status updates, photos, videos and links with your friends or the public. It also allows you to follow people and provide @ replies. So far the features mentioned equate to a basic version of Facebook combined with a basic version of Twitter. In fact, the only unique feature I found after giving Buzz a test run on my own was that there is no private messaging, instead you just send someone an email or use Google Chat.

At first glance it really just seemed to me that Google took the best bits of popular social network platforms and added them to Gmail. Then I read what the product manager for Google Buzz, Todd Jackson, listed as the 5 key features of Buzz at the product launch.

- Key feature #1: Auto-following

- Key feature #2: Rich, fast sharing experience

- Key feature #3: Public and private sharing

- Key feature #4: Inbox integration

- Key feature #5: Just the good stuff

It was in these key features that I saw a possible future for Buzz. The reason I did not at first was because it's clear now that Facebook and Twitter can co-exist if there's only Facebook and Twitter. It's hard for competitors to enter in this market because people have had their Facebooks for years now, why would they want to go through all those hours of friend requesting and picture tagging over again?

Google however doesn't need you to do all that, because they already have most of that information about you from Gmail. I created a Google Buzz account in about 5 minutes. Now, if someone sends my Google Buzz a message and I receive an email notification about it like I would on Facebook, I don't have to follow a link and log into a new system to read it because the email is the message. Also I don't have to friend anyone because Google already knows who I communicate a lot with and had me following them the second I created my Buzz. There's also a mobile Buzz application, that can track where you are and when you click "nearby" it will tell you what people are saying in your area.

I do have some concerns for Google's newest creation. Google announced today that they will be getting rid of the "Auto-Follow" and will instead "Auto-Suggest." Todd Jackson said today that Google, "quickly realized that we didn't get everything quite right." This can hurt the overall reputation for Google if they continue to misread public interest. Google as a brand has to show it has it's hand on the pulse of culture and human interest. If Buzz fails due to privacy issues or lack of understanding of the millions of people who think that Google is all knowing, people won't trust Google like they do now for, well, everything. Maybe social networking just isn't Google's place. In other countries Google has a horrible record at attempting programs similar to Buzz, such as Orkut, Dodgeball, Jaiku, Notebook and OpenSocial.

The second concern I have for Buzz is how it plans to address the separation people have between who they email and who they message. I, for instance, am now only following professional acquaintances, as that is who Google knows I communicate with. Auto-Following was convenient, but it hasn't found all 1,276 friends that I found or found me in some way or another on Facebook and I don't feel like putting in the time and doing all that networking labor over again. After all, it's called "net-working," not "net-relaxing" (sorry I couldn't resist).

This brings me to my next point, there's little motivation for the non Google savvy to join Google Buzz. It's very similar to too many services already on the market where people have established a presence. Buzz is really just Google's "me-too" product that combines the best in programs, but doesn't offer anything new. The integration may have come too late, after people have settled too far into their social networking ways.

With great program integration, mobile applications and brand trust, Google Buzz has the potential to be the greatest thing since sliced bread. To put it in a clearer way, even if for some reason, no one without a Gmail wanted to create a Google Buzz account (which you may soon be able to do without a Gmail), but everyone on Gmail made a Buzz, Buzz would still become the second largest social networking site at 176 million users. Obviously this won't be what occurs, but it shows how strong an audience Google has should people not see the motivation to switch to Gmail and make a Buzz.

In the end, I think Buzz needs a new feature to add to the great social networking integration and competitive advantage that comes with being a Google program in order for it to reach a high level of success in social media.

The Greatest Thing Since Sliced Bread? Week of Feb. 8th.

Over the summer I had the privilege of working as an intern at Media Contacts. The team I was working with handled the online media for Reckitt Benckiser. RB was in a transitional stage, taking money out of their TV advertising budget, about $20 million and moving it to digital. What was so exciting about working on this campaign was how groundbreaking it was. Not only was I experiencing first hand, the evolution of advertising from TV to digital, I was seeing it done in a new way. Reckitt wasn't advertising on sites that represent TV on the internet, such as Hulu, which can cost $40 cpm. Instead Reckitt was buying pre-roll and in-banner ads at around $2 cpm on news video, casual gaming and low-end lifestyle sites. These sites, as Ad Age put it, "can stand as proxies for the daytime TV audiences that Reckitt wants to reach."

Even more innovative was how Reckitt was accounting for every ad it served and viewer it received. Reckitt and Media Contacts set up a system through a company called Telemetry that assured it would never pay for an impression that did not completely load. Also, the viewer at the end of the advertisement, had to click to see the video that came after the ad. To me this was a very interesting component of measurement in advertising, and through my internship I learned about other tools that existed for online advertisers. For example, there is a program that can tell you where on your digital ad, the viewer clicked or scrolled over with their mouse. This can help you see which parts of your ads are attracting the attention of consumers and which areas are not. I thought I had seen it all as far as tools for digital advertisers, and what information can be seen about their experience.

Until now.

While reading the Universal McCann blog, I learned about a program called RealVu. RealVu allows the advertiser to identify when and for how long an ad that ran was "within the viewable area" of the users computer screen. This is particularly useful for when an ad, because of placement, requires a user to scroll down to see it. When this is required the ad is called "below the fold," and with RealVu the advertiser would not have this count as an ad that ran, saving money and increasing the proficiency of the campaign. Much like how Reckitt did not pay for ads that did not completely load or play.

Then there's this depressing part. Across all the placements that have been tracked by RealVu, only 50% of online ads are never viewed because they are outside of the user's viewable area.

Whoa.

That means you're never really paying cpm, you're paying for cost per 500. As J. Wanamaker once famously said, "half the money I spend on advertising is wasted; the trouble is I don't know which half." Well, Mr. Wanamaker, RealVu does know which half, and they seem to have a solution. Now I don't know how expensive RealVu is, but I cannot imagine how that cost wouldn't be negligible once the ads you are serving becomes twice as efficient. This ads a whole new level of accountability to a medium that already offers the greatest amount of measurement.

A lot of what makes advertisers hesitant before moving advertising budget to digital is the lack of accountability. Now there's tools to help remove all doubt. Consider reaching an audience for $2 cpm, with ads that you know run and requires the user to interact with, and then add in the fact that it must be on the screen to count. You have just reached what was thought to be an advertising myth: reliable, accurate measurement.

And that, ladies and gentlemen, may be the greatest thing since sliced bread.