Slashdot Mirror
Dr. Pepper Tries New Astroturf Method
glh writes "Blogging continues to make its way into corporate America. Dr. Pepper is now blogging to build a community around their new dairy based Raging Cow product by using "key influence bloggers". The key influence bloggers are currently made up of six people mostly in their late teens/early twenties who get promo merchandise as their only form of compensation. In return, they get to "advertise however they want" through their blog. Seems like this experiment could turn into the next "big thing" in advertising-- assuming people are willing to sell out their blog space. Bloggers beware!"
Sorry, but we're already hosting blog-ads here @ slashdot. Nothing to see here, move along. :P
I claim this fp in the name of.. uh.. Radiohead! New album? Eh? Eh?
you can take the road that takes you to the stars...
I'd happily write about Dr Pepper each day I was sent a crate.
I hope they don't try to launch that brand in the U.K.
Share and Enjoy!
Shit, if it gets me free Dr. Pepper, I'll be a shill.
I'm sure he knows what he's doing.
YES! A way to piss and moan to all the world and GET STUFF at the same time!
Yes!
Where do I sign up?
My LiveJournal is so sold out.
"Live Free or Die." Don't like it? Then keep out of the USA
This is just more of the same ol' story: companies sticking their advertisements everywhere: cramming every possible orifice full of their logo. Now instead of being obnoxiously located above, below, and to the sides of all the content your reading on the net: it will now be located inside the content.
George Carlin was right.. bend over a little more..
does it make you lactose intolerant?
Since I've never read a blog and and never plan to, I don't care how much advertising they put in it. Plus, maybe they would spend less on other areas and I would have to deal with less annoying flash ads.
Cogito ergo sum in Slashdot.
You saw it here first, as Google takes over blogging, advertisers and spammers flood all the blogs with their products and ruin another medium for all.
Slashdot has legitimized this concept by linking to Raging Cow since the site is high on Google's pagerank index. I hope Michael enjoys his new hat.
Well, I have an important reaction to post here. But before I do, I think I'll go for a nice cool Dr. Pepper. MMMMM. Refreshing!
First they hire "Garth Brooks" as their spokesman and now they target bloggers... I think they are showing their total lack of "clue" when it comes to marketing. Why not mix the two and go after redneck bloggers who dig bad country music?
Or maybe they should think about picking up Britney Spears now that Pepsi has dropped her for Shakira...
All the best,
--Bob
Dr. Pepper is the Official Elixir (TM) of the United Brotherhood of Freaky Coding Sprees, bless our jittery hearts.
So I suppose that if I get some free Dr. Pepper I'll blog their warez to death. I mean, it's just par for the course.
What an odd name for a product line. Any demographics done on Raging Cow? Reminds me of Mad Cow. How about Ebola Monkey? Rabid Racoon... all edible of course.
Not to waste time on 'blogs'. Advertising I can avoid - what a concept! I suppose people who spend time reading blogs are people who would be influenced by 'blogvertising'.
to be a pepper too?
pajonet.com
Why would they have to pay people? Raging Cow is such a wonderful product, it sells itself.
Before I used Raging Cow, my life was miserable. Now I'm more popular than ever and my sex life has improved!
Where do I go to apply for my free stuff?
-- Don't Tase me, bro!
i never would've thought that naming a drink "raging cow" (after a much-feared degenerative brain disorder) is the way to market a product. then again, i never would've though of bribing bloggers with t-shirts and hats :P
sounds like a whole bunch of idiocy to me.
What does it tell you about this 'next "big thing"' that I spent 5 minutes at this site trying to figure out what it was trying to sell and had to google 'raging cow' to figure out somewhere else that it is flavored milk. Ugh.
Chicks wrestling in mud to sell beer. Now *that's* the 'next "big thing"'!
Q...
Slashdot has been doing this for how many years now?
"Raging Cow"?
That's sounds suspiciously familiar...
I think it's probably best to try and avoid dairy products where possible!
Girls suck anyhow. Err.. I mean they don't suck. That is, they don't like to suck. Therefore they suck. Well you know.
So they flew in 6 people and their parents to talk about this extreme milk drink called Raging Cow, and all they are going to pay these people is promotional products? Like Raging Cow shirts and hats?
/. I hope he gets a shirt out of it :)
Wouldn't it have been cheaper to just offer to mail out a shirt or hat or bumper sticker to anyone that posts a banner or something in their blog? And how did they determine that these 6 people are the ultimate in-crowd?
It sounds to me like some marketing monkey just started scanning headlines to see wht was popular. "BLOGS! That's the next big thing! We'll get lots of marketing done that way!"
Uh huh. Riiiiiiiight.
Unless one of those 6 was Michael. After all he did post the story to
I find it impossible to believe that in this day and age, a large soft drink company such as Dr. Pepper thinks that they can buy their way into the hearts of good American people and get them to buy their new drink Raging Cow. Shame on you, Dr. Pepper, for inciting many good-hearted Netizens to shill for your company, Dr. Pepper, and its new drink Raging Cow.
I would just like to say that advertising has no impact on me and that I do not associate this ongoing Dr. Pepper campaign with Raging Cow. I am a free-thinking, free-willed individual, and it would be an outrage to think that I am dumb enough to fall for Dr. Pepper's marketing. In fact, all marketing is evil, and you (Dr. Pepper) are furthering that stereotype with the marketing for your new drink, Raging Cow.
I'm so mad, in fact, that I will instead drink dnL , another new beverage. dnL has all the great taste of 7-up, but with caffeine and a new rush of citrus flavor taste! dnL - Flip it! In fact, if you reply to this post, I'll send you a coupon good for one free dnL. dnL - Flip it!
For more information, click here.
With product names of "Chocolate Insanity" and "Pina Colada Chaos" it seems they'll bomb. Some exec at Dr Pepper probably decided to try and see what kind of impact this "new medium" might do for advertising what should be a quickly dead product. If it makes their marketing marginally better, you'll see it down the road for Dr Pepper's regular products. (Dr Pepper Exec)"Let's not just tarnish the good old Dr Pepper and Diet Dr Pepper just yet with something that might be thought of as odd from an advertising standpoint."(/Dr Pepper Exec)
I used to have a good sig...
no one takes bloggers as an "unbiased news source" to begin with - and the people are free to advertise in any way they want, right? that means if they really do think it's crap, they're either a) going to say so or b) stop accepting it and stop writing about it. their only form of compensation is merchandise, so I'm more inclined to trust them than someone who says "oh, yeah, I LOVE Dr. Pepper! that's why they paid me $30,000 to appear in this commercial!". This blogger is saying "I LOVE Dr. Pepper! That's why I'm happily accepting crateloads of stuff to tell you about them!". IMHO, (I know, no such thing) this is actually a bit more sincere.
You see, without that little doohicky, the universe stops.
http://propheteer.org
This is really going to undermine the people that blog about how much Mountain Dew they drink. Now we'll think they were being paid.
Bah. They're not "up all night coding/playing Quake" or whatever. They really do sleep 8 hours a night.
Damn posers.
I bet there aren't really "key bloggers of influence". Bloggers out there are writing about "Raging Cow" astroturfing with no compensation thus attaining the original goal of spreading brand awareness (http://www.google.com/search?sourceid=navclient&q =%22Raging+Cow%22+blog). Nobel Marketing Prize 2003.
sarchasm: The gulf between the author of sarcastic wit and the person who doesn't get it.
And it sorta does have that twang! But, I still like it.
assuming people are willing to sell out their blog space.
Oh please. Most of the people who run weblogs would probably sell out faster than a $5.00 PlayStation 2.
I can't possibly see how this could really work in Dr. Pepper's favor, but considering the cost, it sounds like an interesting gambit. Individual blogs, while growing in popularity, will never reach the critical mass of readers to drive advertising interest. A more realistic model would be to tie in with the major blogging sites, to get visibility across a wide class of blogs, rather than hook up with individuals.
Stop by my site where I write about ERP systems & more
I don't trust any of it. Advertising by the "hip" youth is no better than that created by the corporation. It all looks the same, has the same message, and still smells lame.
I am a viral sig. Please help me spread.
So, in other words, in the near future, we're going to see the editor, Michael, walking around with a Dr. Pepper hat and toting a Dr. Pepper bookbag....
He posted the story, he must be one of the six.
"Yeah, I read his Blog till he sold out."
And you though punk and indie rockers could be bad.
You say you want a revolution....
They've done this with segway. They selected people that were highly involved with internet from a social aspect to give the first free segweys. Then the dorks did a better job than marketing ever could.
For this level of work, I think this is much better than hiring a marketer.
-- -- --
Help my mini cause: My journal
Whenever I post on here expressing my honest opinion in support of copyright laws, Microsoft, President Bush, the War on Terror, Christianity, and other things I believe in, I am accused by slashdot readers of being a paid shill working in someone's public relations department. This isn't the case, but it has made me interested: Is anyone actually doing this? A high modded or near-first post in a Slashdot discussion can generate an enormous number of views, so it strikes me as a great method to get a message across, especially if done in a sincere and subtle manner, and provoking heated discussion. It seems like some corporation ought to think about trying this, rather than a bunch of stupid fake blogs that no one will read anyway.
after all, slashdot is advertising Dr Pepper (r) Raging Cow (tm) for free.
In a related story, Star Jones is suing Raging Cow manufacturer, Dr. Pepper, for trademark infringement.
Best Windows Freeware
/. loves Raging Cow
"Hi, like.. my name is Ashley and I'm.. like.. a corporate BlogWhore.."
Trolling is a art,
You'll need it for strong bones for troll tuesday
So they plan on getting people to talk up a new product by plugging it on their blog. Then I suppose the idea is to make this new product into a cult phenomenon. Will that make the Raging Cow the next golden calf?
Hmm...making me hungry now. Anyone want to go get a Mooby burger?
Sometimes I doubt your commitment to Sparkle Motion.
Exactly the same. Except without the free merchandise.
Oh, wait...
You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
howard stern has been doing this for years. he follows their script just as far as he needs to in order to let the public know what the pruduct is. After that he'll start making stuff up, like how much Thor's vodka he drank last night. He justs starts making up details, usually fitting them into whatever bit he is in at the time.
At least it is nice to see some advertisers not going the route of picking traditional media and then using legislation to force that media upon people despite changing technology (Can anyone here remember a certain quote about using PVR's to skip ads being "stealing"?) Personally it's nice to see different models of advertising being explored... maybe with some luck we'll see a less invasive model that is more effective for advertisers and less annoying for everyday consumers. (Mind you I realize the likelyhood of that is about the same as Microsoft going the non profit corporation route..) Still, at least product endorsement/placement in blogging is preferable to having them install an LCD on the inside of my eyeballs and forcing ads into my subconscious. After all my subconscious is scary enough as it currently stands.
Blech!!! I'll have the crab juice.
-- ignoring AC's since... well, always --
Beware of what? Guess what kids - your culture is being appropriated by the marketeers! (pause for gasps of astonishment and chagrin).
Is there even a line between culture and commerce anymore? In any event, the raging cow site drips with manufactured "kewl" - if you're influenced by this kind of pap you deserve to be sold carbonated milk, or whatever the hell it is.
It Is the Nature of Information to Transgress Artificial Boundaries
Looks like I should contact Apple, Nissan, and Seven about improving my lifestyle. I already sing the praises of my iBook and XTerra...and a custom built Axiom Titanium would round out my stable quite nicely.
blog |
Definition of payola: The paying of cash or gifts in exchange for airplay. [...] the anti-payola statute was passed under which payola became a misdemeanor, penalty by up to $10,000 in fines and one year in prison.
Seems like the same thing to me, except we're talking about blog space instead of airplay. If I was a blogger who had this proposal come to me, I'd report them to the FBI. Or am I totally off base here?
I think just about every blogger out there would sell out if they were given the chance, atleast once. I know I would :)
I'm sure it won't be long before this form of advertising quickly soils what is reasonably pure right now (at least it looks pure compared to what it will in a year!).
--Thei Antispamist A useless endevor that will cer
he's a a blogger, she's a a blogger, would you like to be a blogger too?
sulli
RTFJ.
.. who don't know any better that you should get paid for advertising products that make money for other people. I mean why should you advertise for free for some corporation. I don't think the bloggies in question.. really have an idea of how much cheaper they're making things for Dr. Pepper. And in return they get what.. t-shirts.. hats merchanidise... Ha they're still advertising Dr.Pepper for free even with the damn compensation they get. Screw that! Thats why i hate most main line clothing products cause they plaster their name on the clothing. I mean what the hell I pay 80 bucks for a shirt.. that has the name of the company plastered all over it.. so i'm a walking advert for them.
Personally I have a blog.. blogs aren't my beef.. and yes I do advertise on my blog... for Blogger.. why? because its a free service.. i pay nothing to upkeep my blog, so thats good compensation. These people still have to upkeep their sites.. no compensation.
Oh well its gonna fail miserably anyway so who cares..
Who makes you Sig?
I don't have a problem with it. If the blogger states on their site that they are receiving promotional goods from Dr. Pepper, then this form of advertising is about equivalent to banner ads with the little word "advertisement" underneath. Annoying but fair.
Somehow I don't think the bloggers will do that, so ignore what I just said.
Doing the Right Thing should not be preempted by making a buck.
...he's a pepper... wouldn't you like to be a pepper too?
BlackNova Traders
This message brought to you by Coke.
I dunno, you can advertise a drink in any way you want to, but good advertising does not a good beverage make. Maybe it works for some people, but an advertisement makes me buy a drink once. From there on, the only way I'd buy it again is if it lived up to the hype.
Friends tell me how much I need to try Red Bull. I finally buy a can. Tastes like shit. No amount of persuasion from friends or TV will ever convince me to try it again.
Code Red. Why Pepsi is messing with Moutain Dew is beyond me. I try a bottle. Tastes like shit. I'll never buy Code Red again.
Vanilla Coke. I hear it advertised on the radio. I'm passing a convenience store, buy a bottle. Tastes like Coke and vanilla, but seperate. No blending of flavors. I'll never buy that again.
So, now there's some new drink from Dr. Pepper. I'll probably hear about it on the radio, or maybe see a blog. I'll buy a bottle some day. If I like it, I buy more. If I don't, I won't buy it ever again.
There is no reasonable defense against an idiot with an agenda
:wq
This is nothing! I've been a, ehm, marketing representative for Microsoft here at Slashdot for the past 4 years!
I prefer Dr. Rush!
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
Now that Google buyed Pyra, it's obvious which new criteria will be added to PageRank. Dr. Pepper are just trying to get a head start in exploiting them ;-)
but what do i know, i'm just a model.
Why would I want to drink something whose first association in my mind is mad cow disease?
All I wanted was a rock to wind a piece of string around, and I ended up with the biggest ball of twine in Minnesota
WARNING:
Do not let Dr Pepper touch your genitals; he is not a real doctor!
"dnL and the Flip It logo are registered trademarks of Dr Pepper/Seven Up, Inc. © 2002 Dr Pepper/Seven Up, Inc."
"I would say that 99 per cent of what my father has written about his own life is false." - L. Ron Hubbard Jr.
Oh, I forgot to mention just what the stuff was, just like the raging cow site did. It was an ultra-pasteurized flavored milk product. Came in flavors like "gnarly" chocolate (or something crazy like that), and similar naming schemes with their pina-colada and strawberry flavor.
I kind of liked it, they actually didn't taste too bad. But, it died. (They were 150% of the price of a pint of Nestle's Quik.) Why? No (reasonable) advertising. Maybe it was the lack of blogs back in the late 80s to the early 90s when the stuff existed.
This sig no verb.
Doesn't it seem ironic that the same corporations who go after anyone who uses the Internet to criticize them now want to coopt the Internet to praise them in exchange for goods and services?
Here is the fact plain and simple: profit motive and ethics are mutually exclusive. Truth and advertising are mutually exclusive. Civilization and capitalism are mutually exclusive.
It's time to find another way to live.
Or more accurately, blog readers beware.
Four fifths of all our troubles in this life would disappear if we would just sit down and keep still. -C. Coolidge
If you look at the blogs linked on the Raging Cow page, you will see they all have one thing in common.
Each one has some of the most horrible web design I've ever seen! Getting rid of any sort of indicator for URLs. Lots and lots of frames. Colors that make my eyes bleed. It's like they all read every book on what not to do and did it.
The marketing people must have thought that the pages are so bad they loop around the scale and become super-impressive and a hip.
Blogs- only fags and fat chicks blog...
Doesnt the Doctor know that?
Had to make a cow joke one way or the udder.
Have you ever been to a turkish prison?
Dr. Pepper et al could care less what the blogging public thinks about their practices of giving away their product to selected popular individuals. They just want free news. You usually can't pay a legit news service to spread the word about your product unless they want to cover it.
Bloggers may be more influenced by free stuff (aka disguised bribes) since they do what they want to do. If getting free stuff is cool, then they will get free stuff, talk about it for awhile, then drop it when the next new thing rolls along.
Remember the Simpsons, crowds are fickle.
robi
*spoiler*
this is a lot like what's in gibson's new book. a company pays people (reimburses, actually) to go out to bars and say they like a product when it's mentioned.
Corporate America has found a new advertising medium in blogging. However, to cut costs they have turned their prison-run call centers into "blog farms." While the results were extremely entertaining, they ended up sending the wrong message.
---
Slash, Rapist: Nothing in life is better than roughly grabbing the firm, artificial nodules of a semiconscious drunken whore and yelling exuberantly, "Ollie, Ollie, Oxen Free" at the top of my lungs to passing fear-filled elderly couples. Afterwards I had a Raging Cow with a shot of tequila in it...
Jim Tumor, Paranoid Schizophrenic: At the party we all had Raging Cows and celebrated by taking a slightly soggy slice of very moldy wheat bread and meticulously fashioning a quaint decorative party hat out of it for our dearest companion and pet lama, Cuthbert...
Lonnie Tingle, Murderer: Man, those Raging Cow drinks are great! I wish my life could have been as good as one of them. I guess it all went wrong when I repeatedly stabbed my parents with a dull kitchen knife because the circumcision I had when I was 8 days old went horribly awry...
Dave Candyman, Burglar: Often while enjoying the quaint bouquet of a Raging Cow, I would follow rich looking strangers at the local mall parking lot until they noticed. To explain myself I would innocently explain that I was looking for my baby brother, and at the same time, memorize their licence plate number...
Delbert Flapdoodle, Habitual Drunk: Gosh darn! Life can sure be funny sometimes. I always thought Raging Cow was an insult. It wasn't until the time my Jug and Washboard band was mistakenly booked to perform in a seedy dive in Harlem that I learned the truth...
Mac Soul, Stalker: As we relaxed on the couch, we shared a Raging Cow. I needed her to understand me. I would never hurt her in a million years! So I kept slowly massaging her delicate legs in a way that said, "Don't worry, I know we are just friends - but - if you ever want to take it further then it's fine with me." I kept waiting for her to say yes. Desperately waiting. Desperate...
Magzo Berman, Sociopath; I am taping the empty bottle of Raging Cow on my keyboard. Tap. Tap. Tap. Just 'cause I like the sound of the tapping, ever tapping, like the tapping on my chamber door. Quoth the Raven, "Nevermore!" Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha and ha!
I used to be a Mountain Dew junkie. I just couldn't last through an all night coding session without the stuff. Then I switched to Barqs Farmous Red Creme Soda. It's the elixer of life. It's smooth creamy flavor is wonderful. The best part is it's caffeine free. This means after a long night of pumping myself full of it's sugary sweetness while sitting in front of my CRTs I don't have to worry about having trouble falling asleep or waking up with a raging headache due to lack of caffeine.
Barqs Famous Red Creme Soda, I switched! Why haven't you?
You're welcome!
I don't know which is worse, the number of "Sign me up, dude!" posts, or the cheap price you all have for selling your soul to corporate America. It's like those Tufts students who let spammers use their email accounts for $20.00 a month.
What amazes me about America is NOT that we seem to be a nation of whores, but that we are a nation of cheap whores.
Boobies never hurt anyone. - Sherry Glaser.
It's more like companies like Coke paying TV and movie execs for product placement in their shows/films.
(Hint: check out that 3/4 pound burger!)
taken! (by Davidleeroth) Thanks Bingo Foo!
In return, they get to "advertise however they want" through their blog.
However they want? Some people will be paid to slam Dr. Pepper and crack daily jokes about how the new soft drink tastes like panther piss. I suppose that's one way to subsidize the blogging community but probably not what Dr. Pepper intended...
isn't that people are marketing this stuff in their blog. It is Dr. Pepper providing gear for their efforts.
Most people walk around happy to sport logos everywhere: their t-shirts, shoes, cars, computers (or computer components). They actually pay for the privilege. Why anyone would be surprised or upset about the tables being turned, I don't understand.
Product placement in our entertainment is everywhere and will become even more prevelent as traditional marketing becomes less effective. I view blogs as primarily entertainment and was frankly expecting this.
BTW, anyone see the Ford Focus car chase in Alias? I had to turn it off when they zoomed in for a lingering shot on the Focus' logo. Blech.
obviously no deficiencies vs. no obvious deficiencies
Is Michael getting a free copy of MS Visual Studio.Net or is it a copy of Windows 2003?
Don't tell us, that you fell for the larger penis that they promised.....
...i would so mod you down...
How are the two even related? Does the FCC regulate blogs? Are blogs public services that are required to have licenses to operate?.
No..it's some pimply faced kid with a web site. How is this anything as bad or close to "payola"
Call the FBI, they'll probably laugh at you...
I lost my concept of community when my community lost all concept of me.
I would happily rant on about how great their laptops are. Currently, I only use them as an example of how you can make money in a computing niche market. :)
unixkb.com -- articles on practical Unix issues.
Jesus H. Christ and his black bastard Bart!
They don't care if you pour it down the drain, as long as they get your $$$.
Nobody (other that selfimportant advertising morons) cares about branding if no one's buying the product.
Promo merchandise = more advertising.
So they "pay" you to advertise for them with products that advertise for them.
Personally, if I'm going to sell my soul I'm going to do it for cash.
The libertarian solution to the failures of capitalism is to apply more capitalism til the failures are fixed.
Who has the time to read about other people's shitty lives? I can barely find time to read Slashdot. Also, if I remember correctly , Dr Pepper sucks ass.
what does the word "astroturf" mean?
What is the origin of that word?
It's not in Webster dictionary.
I remember reading a long time ago about companies in Japan that would do this in the real world (as opposed as to in blogs).
They would give teenagers (usually girls) all sorts of fun toys (cell phones, PDAs, and other gadgets) and some spending money. The teenagers would go to the mall to spend their money, all the while playing with the stuff the companies gave them. Naturally, other kids would notice the new gadgets...
It was a pretty beautiful system, really. The kids got money so they could buy whatever they wanted (which probably made them appear more popular, since they could spend more money on stuff). Meanwhile, they also had all the cool products that hadn't hit the streets yet, which increased demand. The kids became popular, and the companies sold more products.
Astroturfing feels a little "icky", but as long as the companies aren't requiring the users to promote the products in a favorable light, then I think it's all right. If you're *required* to like the products, then you've become a salesperson, and should disclose that fact.
And just because somebody mentions Dr. Pepper in a blog, doesn't mean you have to go an buy it. If a blog you read starts handing out too many bad "endorsements" of products, guess what? You're going to stop reading. So I think there's a self-corrective measure built in to the system.
They are about the content, their words, their thoughts. Not the outward appearance, the sheel of their thoughts, the messenger. It is all about their ideas.
... with the cute pictures ..... and the drooling, I mean...
Well that and the kewl pixs they do in photoshop. Or their web cams, of girls
But it is all about their thoughts.
There is no period in Dr Pepper. There's a joke I remember reading about bad similes and one was something like "...he was missing but not noticed, like the period in Dr Pepper..."
(Just one of those things that helps you remember. Like, "Never use a preposition to end a sentance with.")
Withdrawal before climax is very ineffective and those who try this are usually called "parents."
Shit, we should get a grant from the NEA!
I've glanced over the website, and I still don't have a freaking clue what they're selling. To me, that's not exactly effective advertising.
So who knows where the link is to this Nicole's weblog? its "popular" so someone should know this.
This isn't the first attempt to use blogs as billboards. Looks like some ad weenies figured out that they can't fake authenticity, so they decided to try buying it. IANAL, but deliberately concealing the fact that advertising is advertising seems like fraud to me.
One way to respond to this, if you don't like it, is to stop buying all Dr. Pepper products and let the company know you are not buying until they publicly apologize and terminate this ad campaign. You can tell them on their (flash) consumer contact page. Of course they could lie about that too I guess.
Then have a Coke and a smile.
Funny how William Gibson discusses a similar thing in Pattern Recognition ... people were paid to wander around clubs and popular meeting places and casually mention products at appropriate times.
well, i didn't see anyone mention this as i scanned through so i might as well.
merchants of cool is a frontline show and it's pretty darn good. it, dare i say exposes, nay, since quite a few people already know of the connections with corporate marketing and the media. no, it documents several groups of 'kids' and how they sell out and love it. a really good watch.
as one who has grown up watching, through the 80's and 90's, the ever growing appetite of the mega-corp, i really can't feel sympathy much for anyone who sells their soul for an advertising buck. there's a lot of dots to connect across our various freedoms and some people have no problem relenquishing their freedom to be anonymous.
but, even though i'm not that old, i'm sure i'm considered 'old skool' to the kids who think corporate advertising like this is cool. somewhow, to me, it just seems like the ultimate loss of self-respect.
Jerry Pournelle was perhaps more of a trendsetter in pimping out his blog than he realized. I could just imaging this text taken from his articles:
...After spending two hours on the phone with Raging Cow tech support, we figured out how to suppress the projectile vomiting. It works much better than YooHoo.
Jerry Pournelle
Chaos Manor
Byte Magazine
Recommended.
There was a comment earlier that posted a link to a news story that criticized the blog itself, and that comment has been deleted. In fact, I had a few comments deleted, and I've been banned from posting on there. I recommend everyone post their favorite gibberish.
>>Seems like this experiment could turn into the next "big thing" in advertising-- assuming people are willing to sell out their blog space. Bloggers beware!"
This is great!
I hope I can by into the IPO's of these bloggers early and often. I need to make up all that money my 401K lost from the last "big thing."
You know you're a geek if you've ever replied to a tagline.
And now slashdot picks this story up, they might as well tell us they are going out of buisness due to this PR idea.
I really was looking forward selling out and telling the two that read my blog, me and that spam software that keeps to harvist my email address.
Finaly just a tip to those who are posting, don't mention it here until after they give you the promo.
Ok. It's not him, but here's an idea. There seems to be a list of teen bloggers at blogcontrol.theweblogreview.com. We can select teen as the category and monitor daily for mentions of Mad Cow or whatever it is they call it. At the first mention, the blog gets DOSd and the influential teen learns a lesson about the dangers of selling out (or at least learns to sell out for good money, not carbonated cow juice)
Oh, and doing a search for Teen Bloggers on google isn't as scary as I thought.
Why does Raging Cow come in bottles?
Oh, wait. That doesn't work...
I first read this, and thought it was a story about new artificial grass that Dr Pepper had analyzed. But then I realized that sports and nerds don't really go together....
Defender of Microsoft and Communism!!!
Matty, Don't be so paranoid ... relax and have a cool Raging Cow (now with extra prions).
note: support for comment also provided by Goodyear
Am I crazy, or is Code Red good stuff?
If it weren't for all the other problems, associated with Mountain Dew as well, I'd drink it lots more.
Instead, I'll stick to beer.
mmmm... beer
I like to insert Dr Pepper bottle up my ass, and spilling some Dr Pepper all over my anus. And for extra pleasure I make my pygmy goat lick it off my shit encrusted butt. Nothing as glamorous as eating your own shit out of a Dr Pepper bottle. Dr Pepper, the number turd drink!
there are no boundaries, etc etc. some of these bloggers start to get extremely popular -- popular enough for big companies to notice. an untapped market! there are tens of thousands of blogs and millions of regular readers. the 10 most popular blogs get more traffic than some daily newspapers. the people who write these things are influential, because the readers can identify with them and their daily struggle/musings/etc.
so now the marketers recruit the bloggers and pay them to endorse their product. it seems great at first -- we can have edgy *and* corporate messages. but then someone goes too far. they talk politics or say something in very poor taste and the company's lawyers get worried that they will be identified as promoting this kind of thought/talk/ideology. not good for the company's image, which said company spends $10s of millions promoting each year.
the company implements one tiny rule. and then another slip-up, and another rule, etc etc.
now instead of a "stream of consciousness public journal" you have what amounts to be a person being paid by a company to endorse their product and not talk about "bad things" and it ceases to become what made it so popular in the first place and blogs join other less-exciting media channels like radio, tv, and the pre-previews at the movies.
That got me hot! Where do I sign up???
Slow down, cowboy! That's what the bitches will be saying!
who cares?
Is it just me, or does the term "Blog" sound like a fucking retard invented it?
Is it THAT much harder to type WEblog? Two extra characters?
Blogging is mental masterbation. May as well get paid to do it if that's your thing. The rest of us who are too busy to blither on endlessly about ourselves will continue looking away embarrassed.
Would I let someone compensate me for writing this nonsense on my own site instead of giving it free to Slashdot?
You betcha.
-- Slashdot: When Public Access TV Says "No"
There's been so much buzz in the last couple of years about the "blogging phenomena" -- itself an astroturf campaign, nothing but a big, self-promotional circle-jerk among a certain clique of writers, programmers, pundits, and promoters. It grew from there, but there was nothing organic about it.
I've seen this before in numerous industries. There's no faster way to kill a movement or deep-six yourself than to jump on the greed train. Ironically, you won't even make any money this way. People who sold out in the sixties and became Yupies did so simply by getting jobs. --Bloggers are different. When they sell out, they're dumping their premier product; Honest Voice. --Which leave them exactly nowhere.
Imagine, for instance if you found out one day that Wil Wheaton didn't actually like any of the books and CD's and stuff he promotes on his site? --If Dr Pepper was getting the privilege by giving Wil free baseball caps and as much of their wet-fart drink as he could keep down.
Wil would lose his respect in an instant and become just another loser.
Of course, I may be wrong. I have this endless tendency, no matter how low my opinion of the Average Slob drops, to assume that people are offended by this kind of thing the same way I am. I forget that many people actually have a 'favorite corporation' and wear their swishes and arm bands with pride.
-Fantastic Lad
Please credit this Astroturfing to my Microsoft Astroturf Account (MSA#39893) and to my Dr. Pepper Astroturf Account (DRPA#3240848).
Seriously, do they really want this? I do not have the belief that any advertising is good advertising, poorly represented and pathetic ones can really do damage and are ineffective IMHO.
I don't think Joe Sixpack Blogger will be a good representative for the product they are hawking, and I really am not influenced by someone who I don't know puts an ad in their journal that hardly anyone reads.
I also wonder just how easy this will be, what they require, and if they limit what you can say.
check the dialy show online's clips with Steve Carell here:
w withjonstewart/videos_corr.jhtml?p=carell
:-)
http://www.comedycentral.com/tv_shows/thedailysho
click on all the ad nauseam clips to laugh and fully understand the evil that is advertising
with the doofus hyping "product placement" with disastrous consequences?
Pfeizer will be teaming up with LiveJournal.com to test out new antidepressants for various teens. Results from the new antidepressants can be measured by the "Current mood" feature pesent on most livejournal entries.
Common sense.
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
Personally, I try to avoid advertisements and I do pretty well. It can go days between me seeing one - most often it's billboards or in journals when it does happen. (I have a huge blacklist for Phoenix.) The town I live in also has a medium-to-big street culture group that does defacement and propaganda, which I find a refreshing break from the drone of sponsored media.
I really started freaking out once when I thought I heard commercials in my dreams. I thought it was like in Futurama. Turns out that the neighbours had the radio on so loud and that where the ads came from - I woke up a few minutes later and if you've ever awoken to the radio, you might know what that can be like.
I don't want to do business with corporations who try to trick me, and I view most advertisments as a form of trickery or manipulation.
They want to 'reach' me? Well, they can try ethical behaviour, and maybe then I'll seek them out. Maybe.
Need non-toxic hydraulic fluid? Try Raging Cow!
Okay, where is my free stuff?
Advertisers should be aware that astro-turfing can get out of control very easily.
Dr. Pepper bought advertising space from Fark.com a while back... I guess it was a test for future plans.
Gotta hand it to them for figuring out a way to use the internet to their advantage - I'm all in favor of it as long as they aren't spamming me.
It reminds me a lot of this earlier tactic for getting people hooked onto playing games on cell phones. As I recall, the variant was to have a few hot chicks playing cell phone games in bars so that onlooking guys in the bar would assume that acquisition of said merchandise was the new magic bullet to Success with Women.
But please. My mental environment is already overly polluted with high-pitched sales "information" that crowds out reflection, creative thinking, following a logical train of thought, etc.
"Provided by the management for your protection."
He's the most prolific poster on slashdot!
This is similar to Google realizing that there's plenty of ad-space going a-begging on blogs. Google will be making the ads more prominent, presumably these guys will be inserting the advertising into the copy. But really, the principle's the same.
Isn't that only one ingredient shy of the, Make Yourself Sick And Stay Home From School, drink?
-Fantastic Lad --Mmm. Pukey.
All the flavor of Dr. Pepper, and all the healthy aspects of Milk.
Dr Pepper, dairy-based? Prune-based, I'll believe. Unless that's diary-based, then, oh, great. Like I really care. What was the Dr Pepper knock-off. Mr T. Or Tibbs. Tasted the same.
On SpanishDot, all your Shakira are belong to us!
Chris
I would LOVE to see StileProject promoting Dr. Pepper.
Too bad the Goatse man is dead...
Excuse me for asking and appearing to be so lame, but what is a blogger... what does it mean to "blog"?
in some cases so far left because of "brainwashing" by educational institutions.
I agree with your post, for the most part... But I strongly disagree with this statement. I am almost 25 (2 weeks from now...), I am very far to the left, but to blame it on my education is just wrong. I was a centrist who thought that the USA did the right thing most of the time, until I graduated and got into the real world. The only religiously oriented book that my (public) high school used for text was a book entitled 'the bible as literature', all of my economics classes (I took 4 of them, which is a lot for an engineer...) started with the premise that capitalism is superior.
How can the fact that I am an anti-(Iraq)-war, Athiest, borderline-socialist now, be blamed on my education then?
The anti-war left is getting censored in our educational system right now. You can call me a liberal all you want, and all the dirty names that come along with that one, I will take it with pride, but I got this way by opening my mind, not through my education...
"I'll have a Guinness, no wait, make that a Coors Light" -Grad student I work with, who shall remain anonymous...
Yeah, and I still want to give those little fuckers the "sack o' doorknobs" treatment. Anybody wanna make a road trip to Tufts?
-Looking for a job as a materials chemist or multivariat
Bloggers "selling out" ? Isn't that the point for most of them?
Whale
the raging cow site, which looks like a blog, at least superficially, has links to six blogs on the lower right of the screen.
i take is these are supposed to be the "blogs" that are doing the advertizing? THESE ARE FAKES!!! look at them. they're all designed by the same person. they're all banal pap. they're not real!
am i just crazy? i think these were set up specifically for the purpose of this ad campaign. please tell me i'm nuts.
There are no trolls. There are no trees out here.
In a sad effort to broaden the brand, veteran trollmaster Amsterdam Vallon has tried to appropriate a page from the "*BSD is dying" and "$celeberty found dead" trolls by retooling and retargeting new markets. Unfortunately, while this works well for "*BSD" and "dying", "Pigs" is poorly structured to pull off this madlib-like repurposing successfully.
This bodes ill for "Pigs", which most likely will continue to bleed energy best spent on R&D on new trolls, spiralling into death. If this trend continues, "Pigs" will end up dying in obscurity just like "[%s ate my balls!]". Hopefully this will be a quick, clean death and "Pigs" won't sadly linger on like that clueless noob that keeps trying to get first post by replying to other's posts.
If people are willing to sell out their blogs? Since when has there ever been a shortage of people willing to sell-out on anything?
Bloggs follow a trend for a bit, then dump it and move on. That is their nature.
They accelerate a trend's time line. Faster upswing and mainstream recognition, faster crash and end of free marketing. It all evens out.
I happen to believe that like the OSS programmers sticking to their issues, some bloggs will never "sell out" by blatent sponsored postings. OSS isn't the only community to have moral reasons for sticking to a position/decision/political party/country or residence.
robi
Raging Cow? mmmmmm give me the crab juice instead.
News flash... this isn't a new technique at all. Marketers have been giving free clothes, drinks, etc to "key influence' people to go clubbing with for YEARS. They've paid attractive young people to take their fancy digital cameras out, and pretend to be a pair of newlyweds wanting strangers to help them take honeymoon photos. Etc. Etc. So what... Kids these days like playing on the web, so companies add the "cool kids" of the web to their marketing mix.
They realized anyone who reads and posts to fucks must have a IQ lower then 10, and the burger flippers that make up most of fucks users would never have the money to afford one or pay for one.
All I said was who cares. But then I went to the raging cow website and I realized that I care. Now that I have read a blog of a make believe cow, I am repentant on my cynicism. I never realized how cool a cow could be once it was personafied by the art of blogging. I am thinking of getting a cowectomy, or at least a botox injection.
Please wake up people and stop thinking up stupid advertising shit. Go look at a real cow sometime. They are big, smelly and stupid but they are anything but cool.
It never ceases to amaze me how incredibly naive these public relations and marketing folks are. Their intentions to "pitch a blog" to sell products will backfire. ]
/. post brought to you by Doctor Pepper. Be hip - do what you do - Drink Dr. Pepper]
[small objection -- for free beer I will shill anything that isnt milwaukee's best light. I'll tell everyone that im shilling the beer and then ill invite friends over to swill the shilled beer]
Blogs -- especially blogs that have been around for a while -- have established readership that knows what to expect. Blogs are set up as a portal of independent thought -- a diary. If we want mass market media, we read the newspapers of the content cartel.
The established readership of a blog will probably sniff the bullshit out and go somewhere else.
I wonder if anyone else sees that in that annoying Dr. Pepper ad, there is a representative of every single race in america. I dont see any asian men or black men, but the asian chick and the black chick are dancing to country music. There probably are a lot of asian and black women at a country revue in Nashville (or at least what Manhattan and Madison avenue think of Nashville).
The funniest thing is that grizzled old dude on the spoons. What the hell?!?
[this
Anyway, when I got tired of my collection and knew others were, too, I wondered if Dr Pepper would want it for their Dr Pepper Museum. Although they make it impossible to find a way to contact them, I eventually did, and was replied to with a form letter about where I can buy merchadise.
I felt loved.
I'm glad I've been so loyal.
Anyway, here is my sadly outdated page
Especially if you remember all the commercials from the 70's and 80's!
...but WTF is blogging
Fuck this term, "Blog". Fuck it up its stupid ass.
Although I get the reference to raging bull.
Why not shorten the brand to a shorter version with greater recall: "Mad Cow".
It will sell like crazy.
You're kidding me, right? attention 99.9% of the world, nobody reads your blog! people don't even have the capacity to listen to anything but what clearchannel tells you to,jeesh.
and I even have my own blog... Nobody reads it but my brother.
I make these: http://beatseqr.com
I don't know why they are bothering to pay people to blog for the Product. You would think they could simply create a simulated teen with a random text generator. All that really matters is that the blog adds to the Google Rank and bumps up search results.
Be You, do what you do. Dr. Pepper. Be you, do what you do. Dr. Pepper. Be you, do what you do. Dr. Pepper.
Mac OS X and Windows XP working side by side to fight back the night.
Leela: "Didn't you have ads in the 20th century?"
Fry: "Well sure, but not in our dreams! Only on tv and radio...and in magazines...and movies. And at ball games, on buses, and milk cartons, and t-shirts, and bananas, and written on the sky. But not in dreams! No sirree."
"PC Load Letter? What the $@#% does that mean?!"
The key influence bloggers are currently made up of six people mostly in their late teens/early twenties who get promo merchandise as their only form of compensation. In return, they get to "advertise however they want" through their blog. Seems like this experiment could turn into the next "big thing" in advertising-- assuming people are willing to sell out their blog space. Bloggers beware!"
Don't you mean, "Readers of blogs beware"? The bloggers are not being sold -- the readers are.
Get your media analysis straight.
GF.
Lots of petrified grits
Dr. Pepper needs all the help they can get. Taco Bell stopped carrying Dr. Pepper and I called both corporate headquarters in protest. Taco Bell just isn't the same without it. Bring Dr. Pepper back Taco Bell!
Speak truth to power.
I spent 5 minutes browsing ragingcow.com and all I've learned is that someone has spent an inprdinate amount of time writing a blog using a cow persona. I have no interest in returning to the site, reading what's on the site, or indeed, finding out why someone is pretending to be a cow in the first place. What an incredibly lame marketing ploy.
99% of blogs exist solely to promote their creators and their works -- I know that's what mine is for, he said with no trace of irony. If anything, this just gives people a chance to stop droning on and on about themselves for a second. Seriously... I think the blog community is nifty, but honestly I'll be glad for the break from navel-gazing.
PS Anyone need a plug? Paypal me...
filmcritic.com - Movie reviews on Internet time
Well it IS stealing. There was an implied and unspoken common agreement between broadcasters and the greater society in general that in return for your free TV programs you had to endure commercials to fund their development and production. Sure no one actually signed any legal documents that clearly spelled out such a contract but it was so prevelant for so long that no one would even question it.
Are you saying this should change just because of the INTERNET? I am fully confident that the media industry will figure out a way to deal with any future technologies that come along in a way that will allow them to rightfully so maintain their chokehold on the outlets of every single type of media imaginable.
Mac OS X and Windows XP working side by side to fight back the night.
As it was pointed out to me a few years ago, there is no period "." in Dr Pepper. There used to be but they dropped it in deference to the medical profession.
Self-respect is too expensive and its sure as hell not going to put a Lexus SUV in my garage! Forget food on my plate, I want an SUV in my garage!
Mac OS X and Windows XP working side by side to fight back the night.
Will Blog for Ammo!
Nothing is cuter than an MBA putting together a "viral" marketing plan, and then holding a press conference about it. A. Spokesman has seen this before. http://www.corporatebabble.com/comics.jsp?catid=19 &contid=51
Who cares about being called a loser by some counter-culture LOSER when you'll have made a ton of money from "selling out"?
Mac OS X and Windows XP working side by side to fight back the night.
A propos of nothing, she says "On a lighter note, I bet YOU ski better than I do...considering I have never tried".(YOU being the link to the Creutzfeldt-Jakob drink).
They did the same thing according to the book 'No Logo'. Give influential kids product to make it desirable by their peers. In Nikes, Hilfigers case give it to young, black inner city kids to create a 'need' amongst their peers.
[Please type your sig here.]
Me? I prefer street whores, at least they are honest about the way they earn their money.
...was all the rage in the Transmetropolitan universe.
You're half-right, in that I've coded better pages by banging my hip into the keyboard. :)
What the F is that supposed to mean? Are you trying to say you got fucked on your keyboard?
Joseph?
I don't drink the stuff, but I can guarantee I'll be thinking about it all day *grimace*
Now there's an interesting way to advertise - get your product made the subject of a /. story... we've been had!
Fly, my pretties! Storm those blogs and slashdot them to hell and back!!
Hey, I can be bought. Willing to help advertise your beer and hookers, compensated only by product. Both must be fresh on delivery, one hot and one cold, you figure out which is which. Act now before I get drunk and laid and lose interest.
Shawn
Because you gotta bitch
I don't know if any of you remember my site but I was one of the original bloggers. Anyway, sometime in ~1996 Intel took notice of my site and decided to make me a "beta user" of their new web cam. They asked nothing in return, but it was obvious that they were hoping to get a mention on my page (it was pretty popular...about 5,000 readers at its peak...remember this was the mid-90's). So, what I'm saying is that this is nothing new.
Kind thoughts do not change the world
This may be the wrong place to ask this question since Slashdot is mostly computer geeks and not marketing geeks, but I'll try anyhow:
Has there ever been a study that shows conclusively that advertising works?
I ask this question because I know that there are times when it doesn't work. My dad used to work for the local phone company in an economics position. At one point a study came across his desk that said that in studies the phone company had done, the rate of advertising for long distance services had absolutely no effect on the rate of long distance calls. But did they stop advertising? No! His take on this was that advertising was so ingrained in the corporate culture that nobody was willing to get rid of it, even if it didn't work.
Now this is one study of one service offered by a local monopoly so it's not anything I'd use to generalize, but I sure found it interesting. Here was a huge company that had seen a study saying that their advertising had no effect but they still kept advertising.
I just wonder how much of advertising is based on sound science. I would imagine that there are situations where advertising does work. If people are unaware of a product, advertising can announce its existence. Another one I'm sure works is advertising sales or discounts. Again, informing a potential consumer of a fact that might change their mind about buying a product. But what about advertising for established brands? If Coke stopped advertising altogether, how much of an effect would it have on their bottom line? Do the costs of their ads pay for themselves in increased sales?
I would love to see fewer ads. I already use an ad blocking proxy so I miss most of the ones on the web, but I still see commercials, billboards, magazine ads, and all kinds of other obnoxious things every day. Wouldn't it be great if someone could prove that most of these ads just don't work? I'd even be happier if they were replaced by more effective, informative ads. I just always have the impression that ads are chosen because the people with the advertising budget like them, not because anybody can show what effect they'll have on sales. Maybe I'm wrong?
I hated the Vanilla Coke classic. But Diet Vanilla Coke tastes great. If you like diet drinks, the diet vanilla is, IMHO, DA B0MBE.
So I can't write off this recent (mind-boggling) push for alternative drinks (Pepsi Blue, Red Fusion, Diet Coke w/ Lemon, etc.) as a total wash.
^_^
Fuck Beta. Fuck Dice
They're expecting teens/early 20s people to be positive about something? get off. I can't buy it. All I see are bloggers bitchin and whining unless it's about pr0n. I think Dr. Pepper would be better off paying them to diss their competition. THat's a natural fit for people this age. Then agian, maybe that's my generation (mid 20s). Maybe early 20s are happy and shit. Maybe they aren't cynical bastards full of pessimism. I doubt it ;-).
because I have been enjoined by this Holy Office to abandon the false opinion which maintains that the Sun is the centre
A couple of bloggers wouldn't have that much influence on the community as a whole. But it is a low risk way of dipping their toe into another advertising medium.
In any event, it would seem like any savvy marketer would prefer to leak "news" of astroturfing so that a big discussion is kicked off. And seeing all the coverage (including here) that came of it, it has worked.
Oh - I read about this yesterday and happened across them at 7-11 today. I bought the Pina Colada Chaos. It tastes like watered down milk with some sweetener. Nothing I care for, but maybe the under 20 crowd wants watery sweet milk.
-- Remember Johnny,
Did Dr.Pepper use Daypop to find the most infuential bloggers?
And what's that list going to look like once Coke and Pepsi get in on the act? Truth in advertising? No way, it's just endless ruminations on the imponderable. Dairy pop. Pop diary. Dairy pop diary. Pop dairy diary pops. Snap crackle dairy pop diary. Pop pop diary fizz fizz dairy pop. Pop pop pop pop pop dairy and pop diary pop.
Raging Cow? Do I sense this won't sell too well in the UK?
It's just like a fascist dictatorship, without the punctual rail service!
Why is anyone reading anyone else's daily adventures?
Seems worse than reality TV (which I hate). Ugh.
If Chaos Theory has taught us anything, it's that we must kill all the butterflies.
Vegitable.
I've always thought that Slashdot (or any other slash site) could make some money by having "sponsored" comments. Companies could list themselves as being available to be sponsored in comments. When a user posts a comment and marks it as a candidate for sponsorship (presumably by choosing a sponsor from a list), then the company gets emailed the post and dis/approves. For every comment they approve, they pay Slashdot some amount of money that could be split with the poster -- or maybe some amount of money towards a subscription.
The comment would get posted as sponsored so that purists can filter them out. I think it would be generally good for software and web site reviews/comments.
The bullshit thing about advertising is that companies can say whatever they want without backing it up, which means most of us have become very cynical about advertising -- and advertising in turn has become little more than an "awareness" tool. But commentary from users is usually pretty helpful (as long as it's not vague). Just look at the Switch campaign for Apple for a good example.
__________________________
Familiarity is one of the most powerful effects of advertising. There is an almost hard-wired association between familiarity and comfort: people will often stick with what they know, even if it's a spouse that beats them up on a regular basis.
Even if you ignore advertising, you must have noticed it. And by doing so, you have become significantly more familiar with it, especially in the short term.
Step 1: Create Blog.. Step 2: ...
Step 3: Profit!
YOU INSENSITIVE CLOD!!!!!
Then again, they just reported a loss of $16 billion for the last 9 months. They may be overextended.
who is READING the blogs. I really don't. I have no interest whatsoever in reading someone else's mental masturbation. Are there really that many people over the age of 13 who would take the time to read blogs besides their own? Show me the numbers please. Incessant drivel, meaningless pontification, textual diarrhea.
Thus creating, every day, more people I will want to punch in the face. And they won't even understand why.
She's a blogger, wouldn't like to be blogger too?
Slashdot basically gave them a free ad by posting this story. Oh, the irony.
Well, at these "re-education" camps, the terrorists will be ground into a pulp, and that will be marketed as "Light Chocolate Raging Cow".
Then they'll make a fortune because 60% of America is obsessed with doing something like that to Muslims.
Then, we'll all turn into terrorists ourselves from drinking Dr. Pepper sponsored (but not blogged) Terrorist Propoganda.
You know what that means...
-Chuck http://www.geocities.com/cw11284/
http://www.dpsu.com/nr_raging_cow.html
Dr Pepper/Seven Up 'Milks' Raging Cow(TM) in Effort
to Think 'Outside of the Barn'
Milk With 'Attitude,' Tantalizing Flavors, Spirited Mascot,
Help Expand Company's Beverage Portfolio
A PASTURE IN PLANO, TEXAS, Jan. 28, 2003 - Cheered by a rowdy mascot, Dr Pepper/Seven Up executives today announced the creation of Raging Cow(TM), a new milk-based product served cold in single servings, with an array of five alluring flavors. Packaged in plastic bottles, Raging Cow will appear in selected markets beginning in early March, eventually expanding to national distribution.
"Raging Cow is a very different way of looking at flavored dairy drinks," stated Dr Pepper/Seven Up President and Chief Operating Officer Mike McGrath. "This product does not have a herd mentality and therefore is unlike any other milk-based product on the market. We describe it as a milk-based drink 'gone wild' because there are outrageous, intriguing and delicious flavor combinations. Raging Cow also creates a new opportunity in our portfolio of offerings."
Consumer testing confirmed for Dr Pepper/Seven Up that people want new, exciting dairy drink products. "With flavors such as Piña Colada Chaos, Jamocha Frenzy, Berry Mixed Up, Chocolate Caramel Craze and Chocolate Insanity, Raging Cow has something for everyone," McGrath concluded.
"The consumer research we conducted helped us identify young adults as the primary audience for Raging Cow, although anyone who likes milk is likely to embrace this product," explained Andrew Springate, Dr Pepper/Seven Up director of brand marketing. "Having escaped from a dairy where milk was the only option, Raging Cow's unpredictable and mischievous mascot symbolizes the independence and enthusiasm of the brand's target consumers. We wanted a representative that would reflect the adventurous spirit in people, a creature with a flair for making a point. We found a perfect bovine, and she is 'udderly' overjoyed to be promoting Raging Cow until the cows come home," declared Springate. "Unfortunately, or fortunately, depending upon how you view it, her only utterance is an occasional 'primal moo,' which is tantamount to a bovine scream."
Raging Cow is a brand of Plano, Texas-based Dr Pepper/Seven Up, Inc., which is the largest division of London-based beverage and confectionery firm Cadbury Schweppes plc (NYSE: CSG). Dr Pepper/Seven Up, Inc. is the largest producer of non-cola soft drinks in North America, with about 16 percent of the carbonated soft drink market. In addition to Dr Pepper and 7 UP, the company's other leading brands include A&W Root Beer, Canada Dry, Sunkist, Hawaiian Punch, Squirt and Schweppes, as well as the RC Cola and Slush Puppie brands.
FORTRAN is usefull for anyone who wants to work for the famously well funded science projects instead of real world tech.
Wait, what was my point ?
There are no prunes in Dr Pepper.m
http://www.snopes.com/business/secret/drpepper.ht
- Soup is really good.
My bones have become soft and mushy because of the new beverage. They said it contained milk products - I believed them. I haven't been able to move in over three months, so I depend on my daily Raging Cow IV to be hung by the friendly Dr. Pepper people.
Day 392
Oh god, I think I am going to metamorphose! My body has begun to cornificate into a giant cocoon like structure. I am scared. They are bringing more and more Raging Cow every day now.
Day 396
Help me! Somebody please, have mercy on me!
Day 593
MOOOOOOOOOO! (as a giant cow emerges from the cornified cocoon)
But I think the inventors of that scheme are missing the point of blogging. It's not that blogging is inherently cool, it's usually that people have something interesting to say - and that they are not repetitive, either. Do I really want to read a blog about someones daily obsession with a dairy product??? I think not.
"...mostly in their late teens/early twenties who get promo merchandise as their only form of compensation..."
Who else read that as *porno* merchandise? :D
But seriously folks, who names a product "Raging Cow"? Never heard of Mad Cow Disease (BSE)?
Considering that it's a dairy beverage, they may get the unwelcome attention of PETA. Now that will be entertaining. Especially if their ALF friends get involved. We might see a REAL Flame war.
I wonder how much is too much.
First that started with the active blocks at the top of your web pages. Then they went to pop-up/pup-under ads. Banner farms...
Now you can find people at Amazon who write wonderful reviews about things in too much market-speak. And when you chase them down on the Amazon website you find out that this one person posted hundreds of reviews in a matter of seconds.
So we can't trust the implied User feedback to be honest, rather another Marketing shill pushing their wares.
Now we are entering the blog-space and we soon won't be able to know if someone really likes a product or if they are just getting paid to say so.
And the more they push, the more people don't care. And they more they want to get away from it all.
I will not buy a cellular phone becase I do not want to invite myself to the torrent of additional advertisements to buy supplimentary goods. And the idea of having ads piped into my cell phone makes me wretch.
And I'm learning that there is less and less that I need to buy and that most of what you hear on any media is that you really must buy this or that. Well, I don't. I have food, clothing, a house. I'm good.
And that really pisses them off.
What do you sell a society that has everything and more?
How do you sell it to them?
"...it was terrific, much better than Cats...I'll [drink] it again and again!" Now, that didn't sound forced, did it?
Are there any porn companies out there that want me to plug for them? Please? PLEASE!
http://www.throatpunch.com
Carpe Deez
There is Honesty and there is Dishonesty. There is Service to Self and there is Service to Others. There is Creation and there is Destruction. .
'Selling Out' is what we call it when somebody shifts away from Honest, Other-Serving, Creative behavior patterns so that they embrace dishonest, self-serving, destructive patterns. --And they do it because they had a price and somebody named it.
In a word, people sell their *integrity*. Pray told.
And, surprise! --As it happens I don't actually think that this is, 'kool'.
-Fantastic Lad
... everyone knows that _real_ coders drink Vanilla Coke or TAB. But some may like Regular Coke, Pepsi, Pepsi Twist, RC Cola, Canada Dry, Dad's Root Beer, 7Up (make 7up yours!), Mountain Dew, Sprite, Code Red, and Cherokee Red.
;-)
Now I _will_ be expecting several large cases of each brand for my advertising of said products!
Why does Dr. Pepper come in bottles?
Because can tabs cut his dick.
Badoom-crash!
A lot of times the people one hears accusing other people of 'selling out' are members of a subculture, and the 'selling out' has nothing to do with integrity, and everything to do with growing tired of the subculture and quitting it.
Watch the ad and the ego. Or maybe Manufactoring Consent.
Here is someone auctioning off his middle name for the Comic Relief charity, who hold bi-annual Donate-a-phons, called Red Nose Day.
The current winner is "Slurms" for 90 UKP, previous was "Lethargy", for 85 UKP.
It has become appallingly obvious that our technology has exceeded our humanity. --- Albert Einstein
Oxygen is a very toxic gas and an extreme fire hazard. It is fatal in
concentrations of as little as 0.000001 p.p.m. Humans exposed to the
oxygen concentrations die within a few minutes. Symptoms resemble very
much those of cyanide poisoning (blue face, etc.). In higher
concentrations, e.g. 20%, the toxic effect is somewhat delayed and it
takes about 2.5 billion inhalations before death takes place. The reason
for the delay is the difference in the mechanism of the toxic effect of
oxygen in 20% concentration. It apparently contributes to a complex
process called aging, of which very little is known, except that it is
always fatal.
However, the main disadvantage of the 20% oxygen concentration is in the
fact it is habit forming. The first inhalation (occurring at birth) is
sufficient to make oxygen addiction permanent. After that, any
considerable decrease in the daily oxygen doses results in death with
symptoms resembling those of cyanide poisoning.
Oxygen is an extreme fire hazard. All of the fires that were reported in
the continental U.S. for the period of the past 25 years were found to be
due to the presence of this gas in the atmosphere surrounding the buildings
in question.
Oxygen is especially dangerous because it is odorless, colorless and
tasteless, so that its presence can not be readily detected until it is
too late.
-- Chemical & Engineering News February 6, 1956
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