GenDigital

AOL Releases Online Study Tool For Younger Set

To coincide with back to school, AOL is set introduce a new search engine specifically tailored for kids and tweens that is "pre-screened" by teachers and librarians. Dubbed StudyBuddy, the new search engine derives content from providers like the Smithsonian, NASA and the Library of Congress, among others. The base service is free to use, but there is also a premium service available for $4.95 a month that boasts additional resources. The new kid friendly search engine is the latest effort from AOL to boost its content and service offerings as it transitions from ISP to full fledged online media company.

Advertisers Passing On Latest Survivor Installement

Although I did not post about it last week (probably because you read about it everywhere else), the big media story last week focused on the CBS hit show "Survivor" and their risky decision to break up teams for the upcoming season by race. Why they decided to go this route is anyone's guess, but you just knew there would be some fall out from the announcement. Today's NY Times confirms that many of "Survivor's" long time advertisers (believe it or not this is the 13th installment of the reality series) including General Motors, Campbell Soup and Coca Cola, among others, have not re-upped with the hit show. Of course, when pressed by reporters, all of the respective company spokespeople said their decisions not to re-new with a show that draws an average weekly audience of 18 million viewers had "nothing to do with the new racially divided tribes" and that "the decisions not to re-new" were made months ago. Yeah right. If that's true, why didn't we know this three months ago? Regardless, I think the land of blue chip advertisers have spoken, and clearly they aren't into this new format. My guess is this will be the one and only time "Survivor" changes its format.

Measuring The Effectiveness In-Store Advertising

Today must be my lucky day, I've often wondered about the whole in-store advertising category, like how big it is, have there been many effectiveness studies released, etc. A story out yesterday, answered a lot of my questions. In the past year, several of our packaged goods clients have asked our opinions of the effectiveness of in-store advertising directed at youth market. For the most part, our response has been muted, since we just started asking the audience about in-store advertising earlier this year. Now, thanks to a new study out from Nielsen Media Research and SignStorey, at least we will have something to compare it to come later this year. Highlights from the study are based on ads that appeared in SignStorey's ad network of 1,300 grocery stores across the country. Their biggest finding was that 68% said in-store ads would sway their product purchase decisions. I wonder if I can get my hands on the full study.

Can SpiralFrog Take Share From iTunes?

According to research firm NPD, iTunes has a 67% share of the paid or legal digital music downloading category and according to our latest research, iTunes share of the category among teens and college students is closer to 77%. Regardless, as I've said many times before whether it was Urge or any other newcomer, breaking in to this category would be tough. A relatively new outfit, called SpiralFrog, has decided to skip the paid part of the downloading game all together and instead use an advertising-supported model. Pretty aggressive and pretty risky. Of course, you need a music company (ideally one of the big ones) to believe enough in the model to sign on as a distribution partner. Yesterday, the company announced its first big distribution deal with the world's largest music company, Universal. As you can probably guess, the terms of the deal weren't released, but I can't imagine any gigantic guaranteed payment to Universal, I think the music giant is looking at this as more of a test at this stage, regardless of the press hype around the announcement, which was enough to send Apple's shares down 2% yesterday, a bit of an over-reaction, in my opinion.

NBC Turns To Bebo To Promote "Friday Night Lights"

Sticking with my sports theme today, news is out today that NBC has partnered with up and coming social networking site Bebo.com to promote "Friday Night Lights," its new movie-inspired series about high school football in Texas. According to our Fall Television Preview report, "Friday Night Lights" received the highest individual rating from our male survey panelists, a good sign for NBC who only recently with hits like "The Office" and "My Name is Earl" began capturing Gen Y eyeballs after a two year hiatus. As part of the deal with Bebo, a "Friday Night Lights" microsite will be featured on the site allowing visitors to upload videos and photos and post blogs about their own high school football experiences. Visitors will also have the opportunity to win one of ten $5,000 scholarships courtesy of the peacock net.

ESPNU Launches Standalone Site

ESPNU, the fast growing college sports focused network extension of ESPN, the number one cable television network among teen and college males has launched a new standalone web site. The new site features expanded multimedia offerings including video clips from the ESPNU Recruiting Insider in addition to several podcasts from network personalities. The launch probably couldn't have happened at a better time. There have been a number of media properties pop up over the past few years bridging the gap between high school sports and collegiate sports the most recognizable being MaxPreps.com. In fact, as a possible acquisition target, I think MaxPreps as a would fit nicely under the ESPN franchise. High school recruiting has always been a big part of college sports with top schools perpetually vying it out with one another for the best of the best. Now, it seems as if a new "fan base" has evolved in the niche space, be it coaches, parents, or really the kids themselves, have all been active in following the action of recruiting.

Verizon Enters Gaming Market

Verizon Communications, the nation's second largest telecommunications company behind only SBC, announced a new gaming subscription service to highlight its high speed Internet service and possibly even attract some online advertising dollars. The new site is housed at games.verizon.com and offers visitors a variety of monthly subscription options ranging from $4.95 to $14.95 for access. The new gaming area features several community technology applications ike buddy lists and messaging under the PlayLinc platform. Back in May, Verizon announced it had a acquired a stake in SCI, the gaming software company responsible for creating PlayLinc.

GAO Says Anti-Drug Ad Effort Comes Up Short

Between 1998 and 2004, Congress, using taxpayer money, gave $1.2 billion to the Office of National Drug Control Policy to fund their national anti-drug media campaign. According to the Government Accountability Office, their billion dollar advertising effort has not worked. The report said "exposure to the advertisements generally did not lead youth to disapprove of using drugs and may have promoted perceptions among exposed youth that others' drug use was normal." Ouch. Of course, The White House disagreed with the findings saying that "teen drug use is down dramatically over the past four years in exactly the demographics targeted by the campaign." The report ultimately recommends that Congress limit funding until the Office of National Drug Control Policy "provides credible evidence of a media campaign approach that effectively prevents and curtails youth drug use." Sounds like an opportunity for me to pitch our custom research capabilities among teens. 

Rave Wireless Pitches Convenience and Safety

I first posted about Rave Wireless about three months ago when mentioning the wireless start-up lead by several wireless vets raised $12 million in venture capital to help execute their business plan of offering mobile applications specifically tailored to colleges and universities. In an era of all things mobile for the technologically savvy college student, it seems like an awfully strong value proposition. Today's online edition of USA Today has a nice little write up about the company and its offerings. The Rave mobile platform features a variety of alerts and messaging services as an alternative and complement to Internet postings and updates on the school's web site. But perhaps more important, the Rave mobile platform stresses personal security. The Rave Guardian feature allows a student to set a timer if he or she feels unsafe at any time. If the timer goes off (before the student turn its off) a call is automatically placed to campus security and they can automatically track the location of the student using the feature's built-in GPS capability. Rave currently has a small pilot program on 15 campuses this fall but according to the company's president, they expect to grow quickly and have relationships with 100 schools by 2007.

Jane Mag Enlists 29-Year Old Virgin To Fuel PR Engine

I've heard before that any press is good press, but I think this might move into the category of being tasteless and just flat out demeaning. In an ill-conceived effort (my opinion) to generate some buzz (and it already has) Jane Magazine who primarily targets women readers between the ages of 18 and 34, has enlisted the services of 29-year old Sarah DiMuro as she tries to lose her virginity before turning 30 on November 7th. As part of her arrangement with the magazine, Ms. DiMuro will update a blog on the mag's web site. People that visit her blog can send in their own recommendations of potential suitors for Ms. DiMuro as well as vote on a list of submissions received. Call me old fashioned, call me lame or whatever, but I don't think this is the greatest route to gain notoriety for Jane or Ms. DiMuro, who by the way, is a comic by trade. But I guess it really doesn't matter as long as the magazine sells newsstand copies and new subscriptions, right?