Global Media News

Digital Currencies: $ in the age of Bitcoin

Bitcoin Basics

"Paul Kemp-Robertson: Bitcoin. Sweat. Tide. Meet the future of branded currency"

Watch this TED talk for an introduction to money in the digital age:

Global Media News Webcast 7: October 25, 2012

 Shopping:  The Digital Revolution in Retail

Global Media News for October 25, 1012

Global Media News is a weekly webcast covering media & technology news from around the world.  This webcast is a production of  Media Studies students from the SUNY College @ Old Westbury.

This week on the 'Digital Revolution' edition of  Global Media News:

"e-Commerce: Shopping Online"

•  Are We All Online Shoppers Now?
• E-tailing Fraud
• Amazon vs. the Little Guys
• Is Amazon the King of the E-Book?
• Tracking Shoppers
• Cyber Monday vs. Black Friday
• Holiday Shopping Online

See you next week for more news from the Digital Revolution!

Next on Global Media News:

Digital Economics 101: Can We Click Our Way to Prosperity?

Listen to our webcast streaming live on Thursdays @ 11am EST.

Can't listen live? Our next webcast will be posted by 2:00pm, Thursday, November 1, 2012.

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Travel to the Amazon....

No, not that Amazon.  More like Amazon.com.  What was once a small online store has since exploded as one of the internet's main shopping hubs. Amazon is the most visited online store and is ever expanding.  The company recently launched a series of tablets and e-readers under the name "Kindle." Users  can download books and apps directly to their device.  This has had a negative effect on the brick and mortar stores that sell hard copies. The Amazon Effect  Some book stores however are fighting back.  Barnes and Noble, developed their own tablet e-reader.  The Nook functions the same was as the Kindle, but purchases can help the company's bottom line.  They will still have the same amount of business. In an article in the New York Times by Julie Bosman she talks about "The Bookstores Last Stand."

As measured by numbers, bookstores are in inevitable decline, says Michael Cader, founder of Publishers Lunch, a digital newsletter. At the same time, he says, some "modestly sized, locally connected independent stores have found a successful formula" for surviving in today's market.

Bookstores will eventually be phased out, the only question is when.

Gamification: Linking Gaming and Marketing

    Online gaming has become part of many companies marketing plans.  Marketing once was based around clever slogans and memorable commercials is moving with the technology craze over online gaming.  The digital revolution is prevalent now more than ever before in the marketing world.  

    According to New York Times article “Axa Equitable Pitches in an Online Game” by Stuart Elliot “...online gaming or casual gaming, is becoming increasingly popular with marketers because it is becoming increasingly popular with consumers”.  An unlikely company to take part in the gaming boom is Axa Equitable.  This insurance company has posted a game called Pass It On, on their website axa-equitablepassiton.com. Pass It On is designed to encourage consumers to purchase life insurance.  The company has even given consumers and incentive to play the game and pass it along to friends.  This incentive is a sweepstakes with cash prizes of $25,000 and $15,000.  

    With life insurance sales an all time low Axa Equitable is using gaming to increase revenue and target the 11 million households with children under 18 who do not have life insurance.

    Axa Equitable is by no means the only company using gaming to increase revenue.  Hollywood is turning to gaming to build up a must see factor when marketing new movies.  The Hunger Games used online gaming to ensure the premier would be a box office hit.  A great New York TImes article, “How ‘Hunger Games’ Built Up Must-See Fever” by Brooks Barnes, gives a great description of the steps the Hunger Games marketing team took to make the movie such a success.

    Before the release of the Hunger Games, a new poster was released, but cut into 100 puzzle pieces.  The digital puzzle was given to 100 web sites and posted on their Twitter in lockstep. The idea of the puzzle was to make fans search twitter to find all the pieces of the puzzle. The puzzle could be assembled by either printing the pieces and putting them together, or using an online program like photoshop.  The Hunger Games puzzle was a great success and more is to come with online marketing. Lionsgate, the production company of The Hunger Games later released a Facebook game as well as a virtual tour of the Capitol ( the city in the movie) in a partnership with Microsoft.

    This is only the beginning of marketing and gaming joining forces.  With the short attention span of todays generation online gaming has proven to be a successful marketing tool.

    Companies like Kiip jumped on the concept of linking marketing to gaming.  Kiip is an app company based in san-franscisco.  They link gaming and marketing through iphone games.  When you play a game enabled game on your smartphone, your rewards are real world prizes.  If you were to win starbucks coffee Kiip would tell you where the closest starbucks is to redeem your reward.  To tell you more about the Kiip, watch ceo Brian Wong.  

Brain Wong has a great concept that appeals to both consumers and advertisers alike.  Personaly I would be more inclined to play a kiip enabled game if I knew I could win a free snack or cup of coffee.  Really... who doesn't want free stuff!? 

According to USA Today article, "Buisinesses Use Gaming Principles in Marketing" by Mike Snider, "gamification" is the future.  M2 Reasearch, a california based research firm has predicted that "Business spending on what has become known as "gamification" will increase from an estimated $242 million this year to $2.8 billion in 2016". The prediction that spending will increase tremendously is because gamification has been working and will continue to enhance gaming and marketing alike. 

Gamification has improved employee incentives, allowed small businesses to connect to consumers through location gaming apps and caught the interest of the consumer.  This gamification business model is they next big thing in Marketing. 

Mega Millions and the Media

This past March Mega Millions raised their jackpot to $640 as  a result there was a dramatic increase in ticket sales.  The cities in which these tickets was bought was able to benefit because they was able to collect this it in the taxes. This was reported by Matt Flegenheimer of the New York Times.

"Mega Millions announced Saturday that winning tickets for Friday’s record-breaking lottery were bought in those states, after a drawing that saw Americans spend nearly $1.5 billion on tickets. The numbers drawn were 2, 4, 23, 38 and 46, and the “Mega Ball” was 23. Winners in Illinois, Kansas and Maryland."

The shock here is that something like this did not happen sooner with the amount of people buying tickets for the lottery today. It is also interesting to see what is the steps that Mega Millions will take so this will not happen again in the future. It also looks like that one of the winners will have a bigger portion of the money then the other two. Most likely the other lottery companies will take notice of this and learn how to avoid and prevent this from happening to them. Like always there are more winners than usual and the amount of losers in this lottery. 

 

 

Global News and New York Times both covered this mysterious million dollar ticket sale from a normal news stand point. Global news video went into more detail into how and where the tickets were bought and even got some first hand information on where one of the winning tickets was bought in Maryland.  New York Times  did not go into as much detail as Global  News video but The New York Times was able to get a quote form the other two states that had the so called winning tickets.  

Global Media News Webcast #8: April 5, 2012

Listen Now! Global Media News #8

Global Media News is a weekly webcast covering media news from around the world.  This webcast is a production of  Media Studies students from the SUNY College @ Old Westbury.

This week on GMN:

• Advertising for Advertising on the Web
• eCommerce and Social Media:  Using Facebook to make sales
• The Trayvon Martin Story:  A social media tempest?
• Obama Mic Slip:  The perils of the presidency
• Twitter as a Programming Tool:  Nick polls the audience . . .
• Mad Ratings for Mad Men
• News Corp and Sports:   ESPN watch out!
• Animated Angry Birds Coming to a Screen near You!

See you next week for more breaking media news!

Listen to our webcast streaming live every Thursday @ 11am EST.

Can't listen live? Our next webcast will be posted by 2:00pm, Thursday, April  12, 2012.

Subscribe Now!

Apple the New Major Employer?

Apple has come under  increased scrutiny with figures and reports showing that Apple employs a great amount of their workforce overseas and not in the United States. According to the New York Times Apple currently employs approximately 700,000 people overseas and most of them located in China and other developing nations. Having employees in these nations benefits Apple as they are able to employ people in these countries much cheaper and enforce harsher conditions as these countries don't have the same standards as the US does in regulating safety, wages, employment and other key factors. As a result this drives the price down for Apple allowing for cheaper products.

However, Apple doesn't outsource all of their jobs and do keep jobs such as call centers in the United States to increase customer satisfaction despite an increased cost in doing so. According to Total Telecom Apple has stated, "Relocating our call centers overseas to places like India would reduce our costs by 50% or more," Apple said. "But we keep these jobs in the U.S. because it helps us deliver a better customer experience." Apple has stated they increased employment the United States in other ways not just through call centers.

According to Forbes a recent analysis commissioned by Apple has showed that it has helped create around 514,000 jobs in the United States alone. In the same article Apple has stated they have over 246 retail stores in the United States that employ around 27,350 workers. However, the overall number of 514,ooo that Apple released can be misleading as Apple counts anyone who has had contact and profited directly and indirectly from the product as part of the overall number. This will include people selling the items, people shipping the items, business sales, etc. A large number of this job increase by Apple is also based though the internet such as the "App economy.'' According to Forbes this number is large,

"Apple culled the app number from the TechNet study, which found there are now about 466,000 jobs in the “App Economy” in the U.S, up from zero in 2007. Instead of using TechNet’s total, it estimated that “45 percent of job postings in the app economy are specifically tied to iPhone and iOS, indicating that at least 210,000 jobs are driven by the iOS app economy."

The Wall Street Journal crew further explains the impact of Apple on the economy and it's supposed job creation:

Apple job creation 1

Apple is one of the United States biggest and most profitable corporations. Not only does it dominate domestic markets it also dominates foreign markets making it truly one of the most influential corporations on the world today.

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To Market: E-Commerce from Advertising to Online Shopping

E-Commerce from Online Advertising to M-Commerce

  Our sixth webcast of the season concerns the fast-paced world of  e-commerce.  Where are the advertising dollars flowing?   Here's the rundown of this week's show: 

• Online Shopping
• M-Commerce: Shopping with your mobile phone
• The Revolution in Consumer Apps
• Online Trading: The future of the stock market?
• Is the Future of Advertising Online?

Two Weeks from Now: At Play in the Digital World: Families & Children   

Listen to our webcast streaming live every Thursday @ 11am EST.

Can't listen live?   Our  next webcast will be posted by 2:00pm, Thursday, November 3.

Subscribe Now!