Month: September 2006

So, grocery retailer Pick ‘n Pay has hopped into the music download business. It’s a place they certainly don’t belong.

And to make matters worse, the first thing I see when I open their page is this popup box telling me I have to change browsers just so that I can get DRM licenses. Wow!

So let me get this straight: Not only is your media DRM restricted crippled, but I have to use a browser I don’t like as well? That’s like inviting me to your store and then telling me I can only drive there in a certain make of car and I’m only allowed to use anything I buy at a location you specify.

Pick ‘n Play, you’ve just lost a customer. A customer who spent quite a few hundred rands on music in the past month alone. And I guarantee you will continue losing customers. In fact, the sad thing is you won’t even know you’ve lost those customers, because they just won’t show up on your site.

Wow, will these music stores ever learn?

Tags: music, download, DRM, DigitalRightsManagement, Copyright, picknplay, picknpay, browser, firefox, IE, copyfight

It looks like more and more marketing is shifting to the virtual realm of Second Life. The latest is a T-Shirt design competition for rock band Seether that will be hosted in a virtual area there.

That in its own is pretty cool. There is one caveat though.

If you’re marketing to members of Second Life, you are by default eliminating anyone outside that realm. This seriously narrows down your impact group. You’re also completely eliminating those of us who live in a “bandwidth poor” country.

Let me explain. Seether is the offshoot of a South African band “Saron Gas”. By offshoot, I mean they changed their name and got two new permanent members – same songs, same lead singer, same guitarist. Saron Gas/Seether is by far one of the most adored rock acts in South Africa.

I suspect Seether in South Africa may even have the highest popularity per capita of any country.

Second Life apparently eats up bandwidth. Bandwidth in South Africa is massively expensive. It’s not too difficult to surmise that Second Life probably has the lowest per capita membership from South Africa.

So you’ve got a dedicated, committed audience that loves a band, and what do you do? You ignore them and exclude them.

Broken marketing.

Of course Seether has many many other fans worldwide, and are largely regarded as an American band, but we know where they came from – we right here in SA paid to watch them play, to keep them going, and supported them by buying their first album. Its only a stupid T-Shirt Design thing, but I still feel a little cheated.

So how do we fix this? Do we stop exploring virtual realms and opportunities? Do we laugh and turn our focus away from the problem? Do we keep pining away at Telkom’s door for cheaper bandwidth?

No, we take out an ad and give Telkom the finger!!

In the meantime, record companies, stop excluding and start paying attention to your audience.

Tags: secondlife, seether, marketing, telkom, bandwidth, tag, tectonic,

I’m continuing my love affair with Youtube Internet Video with my latest discovery:

This page is a list of links to 80s music videos which are available on Youtube.

Click with caution – you may just lose your entire day to the likes of A-HA, Katrina and the Waves and Nena (and you’d better be prepared for big hair and shoulder pads too!!)

It looks like I’m going to be busting my bandwidth cap on Internet video from now on.

So now I only listen to my iPod, CDs and independent radio, I don’t watch any TV, except the occasional sports game at a public venue or TV series which I obtain online. And now with Youtube, Google Video and myspace, the music vids are getting up there too.

Why should I pay for a TV licence for programming that I don’t watch when I can use that money for Internet costs to watch exactly what I want to see?

Tags: internet, video, youtube, google, vh1, music, content, iPod, timeshiftedmedia, media, TVlicence

If you have the connectivity and you’re not watching the little duckie show, you should be. This is what TV should be like, instead of some faked-out, prerecorded-laughing attached to a string of b-grade actors with a script full of bad sexual innuendo.

Tags: zefrank, theshow, tv, towatch

Unreal, in a little over 48 hours, tectonic has managed to get pledges to the value of R42500, 85% of the amount required to tell Telkom just how much we hate them.

There’s got to be something wrong with telecoms in SA when this sort of enthusiasm to stick it to the man prevails.

Go Tectonic!!

  Tags: telkom, tectonic, hate, telecomsactiongroup, southafrica, pledge