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Cup of Joe: Try A Piece Of Rotten Fruit

posted on August 21, 2010

The Annoying Orange (AO) is quite simply what the title says, and a whole lot more. Not only is it annoying, it is creepy, void of plot, horrible writing, and, quite frankly, pretty pointless. Therefore, it might surprise you to find out that by very conservative estimates, its creator has taken home close to $300,000 in ad revenue in under a year of the web series existence. It has amassed somewhere around 227,425,302 total YouTube views with around 1,100,095 subscribers.

This annoying piece of talking fruit has become a force to be reckoned with on the Internet. AO’s creator, Dane Boedigheimer, has quickly found himself at the center of a very popular, very odd, and very profitable web series. Which begs to ask the question, how the heck did he know that was going to be popular?

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Mafia Wars Marketing Stunt Angers City DA

posted on August 20, 2010

San Francisco City Attorney Dennis Herrera has made Zynga Game Network an offer they better not refuse.

As part of a marketing stunt for Mafia Wars, dozens of fake $25,000 bills were glued to the sidewalks around San Francisco. It was probably a hoot watching people bend down and try to pick them up but the Department of Public Works isn’t laughing. They say they had to steam clean the sidewalks costing them time and money. . . really money, not that phony stuff. The total cost is still being figured, said a spokesperson to SFGate, but you can bet it’s going to be high enough to prove that crime don’t pay.

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Bang! Pow! Could Digital Comic Books Pack Advertising Punch?

posted on August 20, 2010

Charles Atlas can make you a man! Sea Monkeys live, work and play in an undersea kingdom. Scare your friends with a life-sized Frankenstein Monster or get your own set of 100 army men for only a buck. In the past, comic book advertising was a lot like a circus sideshow. Lots of hype, lots of promise, but mostly a scam. These days, comic book advertising is the realm of the entertainment companies as they use the latest releases to hawk new movies, video games and music but still comic books themselves are pretty old school.

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Facebook Community Pages: Your Lurking Reputation Nightmare

posted on August 20, 2010

By Renée Revetta

It’s been over four months since Facebook launched Community Pages, and they’re still a big mess.  As users were originally told, Community Pages are NOT completely “dedicated to a topic or experience” but just pages created from everything that users list in their Info tab. Sure that might encompass topics or experiences, but, for example, Community Pages are automatically created for employers, colleges, high schools, interests and activities. With 500 million users on Facebook, those interests, employers and activities quickly add up.

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Marketers Struggle to Stay Ahead of Social Media Curve

posted on August 20, 2010

While it should come as no surprise that the rapid fire pace of social media change can be dizzying, it doesn’t make it any easier for marketers to stay ahead of the game.

emarketer reports on a study conducted with marketing executives asking just how tough it is to stay ahead of the social media wave. The study was conducted by The Creative Group and found that the majority of executives surveyed are being challenged by the pace of change in social media.

Honestly, I call BS on the 35% that said it’s not challenging. Why? Because no one knows everything about social media. I figure those are the folks that never admit anything anyway so they are more like outliers (or maybe just liars?) anyway.

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The Great “Will foursquare Survive?” Debate Is On

posted on August 20, 2010

Now that Facebook has officially thrown its really big hat into the geo-location ring it’s time to wonder, speculate and just plain guess about the future of location based services and the industry players. Because of their apparently awkward presence at the Facebook announcement the other day and the claims of Facebook founder Dennis Crowley (who is starting to get Biz Stone like Internet industry celeb status these days) that they didn’t get the Facebook ‘lowdown’ before anyone else, things are a little touchy.

The Business Insider reports from a Crowley e-mail to them where he seems more focused on his deal than Facebook.

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100 Million A Month Using Google Maps for Mobile

posted on August 20, 2010

It’s the “Year of Mobile” v. 2010 remember? Whether it is or isn’t officially is irrelevant. What is important is just how much mobile is continuing to influence the lives of many Internet users. While not as ubiquitous as many in the industry would like us to believe, it is still a very strong component of the online world and one that has seemingly limitless upside for years to come.

Evidence of just how influential the mobile world is comes from Google who announced that they have hit the 100 million users per month using Google Maps in some form. No matter who you are, that is a big number. From the Google Mobile Blog