Around the Web: Leap

This looks awesome, but I am a little skeptical how well it will work... In any case, enjoy.



Thanks uncrate.

Your so funny.

Few things make more sense than plastering the back window of a truck (or any vehicle) with a giant, ugly sticker. In fact, the uglier, the better - it's not like people will ever see it.

The only thing that could make said sticker better? A massive grammatical error. 

It should go without saying that I am very impressed by the owner of this truck: 

I'm Okay

I'm in the LAX airport getting ready to fly to Salt Lake at an hour of the day when I feel people should not be overly chipper - especially not when they are at the airport (I believe it was Patrick Henry who, while dealing with the TSA, said, "aw forget it; give me death").

However, amongst the unpleasantries, I did overhear this little nugget. Southwest Airlines has booth in the terminal with a guy trying to sign people up for the Southwest rewards program. And I have to hand it to the guy, for have what seems to be an unenviable job, he seems to enjoy it and has a quick wit. To one passer by he extended his standard pitch, "Sir, sign up for our rewards program and receive a $417 credit." To which, this person replied, "I'm okay." The Southwest guy quickly responded in what seemed to be a sincere and non-snarky, "Great, okay people benefit the most."

I thought it was very clever and disarming. If he would have been talking to me, I may have actually stopped. 

However, I was in a hurry... and don't love flying Southwest. 

Silent Killer

There are a lot of things not to like about the internet (like the fact that it makes things too convenient¹), but wanna know what I love about the internet? It is a place of truth². Sometimes there is so much truth spewing out of the internet that I wonder why it isn't called the truthnet.

However, occasionally - and don't let this shock you - lies will creep onto the internet. Take this ad for instance:

I have heard snoring called a lot of things - in fact, I have called snoring a lot of things - but silent has never been on of them.

(In case you are wondering, no, I am not going to address that hideous mask-like-contraption... too easy)

If you google silent killer you will find references to things like carbon monoxide exposure, high blood pressure, hypertension, diabetes, etc; you will even see this simple definition for silent killer, "Many diseases are silent killers in that they are silent (no symptoms or only vague symptoms), and that they are deadly."

Whoever made this ad is exactly half right³. Snoring is a silent killer (see sleep apnea). Silent? Not so much; according to wikipedia (the ultimate source of truth⁴), "snoring is the vibration of respiratory structures and the resulting sound".  Basically, if you are silent, you aren't snoring.

I will let Toby tell you about the real silent killer:





1 - Special thanks to Amazon Prime and Zappos; shopping has never been easier. I don't know why I ever go to stores anymore... Christmas shopping this year was a breeze.
2 - uh, this should be read with a sarcastic tone...
3 - Literally half correct. 12 characters in the term silent killer - 6 are true, 6 are false.  4 syllables - 2 are true, 2 are false.
4 - See note 2

Your so smart

In my home town, they are resurfacing one of the main thoroughfares and, as I was driving home from a meeting on Wednesday, I saw this lighted road sign:

"Double
Lane
Closure"

"Tell
Sunday
Night"

Now, unless Sunday Night is a person and the construction company wants us all to tell her (or him) about the double lane closure, my guess is we are dealing with a serious devolution of the word "until". Let me demonstrate:

Until   >   'Til   >   Til   >  Tell

Which is annoying, confusing, and reinforces stereotypes about construction workers' intelligence, but may not be the worst lighted road sign I saw this week. It was at least helpful once you figured out what the author was trying to say - something I can not say for this sign:

"Road
Work
Ahead"

"Next
Four
Weeks"

There is nothing technically wrong with that example, but if you didn't see it the day the construction company put it up (and mark your calendars accordingly), there is no way to know when the four weeks of construction will be done. Therefore, the notice is completely useless; when I saw it, I didn't know if the construction was nearly done or had just begun.

However, if the author was trying to be funny and play on the fact that construction projects are rarely done on time, then I award him (or her) props for creativity and subtly mocking the system. But I also take away those same props for forcing me to think too much about it.

The Best Marketing Wednesday... on this blog... today.

Last year I introduced a feature on my blog called "Marketing Wednesdays" and there are some people (not to mention any names, but we will call them Esteban and MBSB) who rarely let a week pass with out reminding me that I have not stayed current on my Marketing Wednesdays. This is true. I have not. However, I would like to take a little trip down memory lane to that fateful day and re-examine my promise to the blog-o-sphere.

Wednesday, November 17, 2011
To that end, I introduce to you "Marketing Wednesdays: A Mini-series of Marketing Fails". This will run for at least 4 or 5 weeks.

Including that original post, I had 6 Marketing Wednesdays in a row, thus fulfilling my original commitment. Since then, Marketing Wednesdays have become somewhat intermittent and will continue to be an occasional gem to the world. Now that I have cleared that up, I present my most current gem:

Imagine, if you would, a nearly empty college library. In this particular room there 3 people:

Jessica - An attractive, young, single woman.
Bubba - a large, hygienically-challenged man who likes amateur gator wrestling and wearing clothes that are five years too old and two sizes too small. 
Ted - A nice, young guy who is average in every possible way.

After a few minutes of working up the courage, Ted walks up to Jessica and lays doozie of a pick-up line on her:

"Hi, my name is Ted and when I noticed you from across the room I couldn't help but come and mention that I am the most desirable man in the room."

What is Jessica to take from that? At best, Ted has issued an underwhelming statement of his desirableness; at worst, he has damned himself with faint praise*. Why would Jessica be intrigued by this? The best thing Ted could come up with was that he was better than Bubba?

Last week, on my iPhone, I was reading an article on the Occupy Wall Street movement. Embedded was the following ads:

Seriously? The #1 Fish App? How many fish apps are there? And why is your icon a clock? This reeks of poor marketing. If you can't come up with an icon and all you can say is that your app is the best in a minuscule market, then you don't have much of an app.  Needless to say, I was not impressed enough to look up, or purchase, Tap Fish 2.

* - There are those in the world who feel I use a lot of sayings and cliches in my everyday speak, to them this will be another example of such. "Damned with faint praise" means to condemn not by saying anything bad, but by not having any praise that is substantive. 

Dear Kylee, I am sorry that the public school system failed you...

On November 5th last year, my friend Kylee authored a blog post about how she hates Thanksgiving and attributed most of the hatred to the fact that Christopher Columbus is remember too fondly by history and really wasn't a good guy. However, myself and several other people pointed out that, while Columbus may not have been a great dude, Thanksgiving is not a holiday to celebrate Christopher Columbus (that's what Columbus Day is for); Thanksgiving is about giving thanks (if only we gave our holidays more obvious names, then we wouldn't have these confusions).

Well, once that was pointed out, her blog post became much, much shorter and without mention of Columbus. (This is why I have a love/hate relationship with the internet... anyone* can publish anything and then change later to cover up damning (or embarrassing) evidence).

Well Kylee, today - October 10, 2011 - is Columbus Day; if there is any day to post your beef with Chris Columbus, this is probably it. Or you can wait until Thanksgiving again.

*Case in point - I have a blog.