GenDigital

A Peek At The Scion FUSE

Toyota's youth-focused Scion brand let everyone take a look at their new concept car yesterday at the New York Auto Show. The new FUSE sports coupe is the latest addition to Scion's line up of vehicles. "The idea of the all-new FUSE Sports Coupe is a reflection of the boundless limits and creative envelope that embodies all the vital personalization components of a Scion product," said Mark Templin, Scion vice president. "Since the launch of Scion three years ago, designers have learned a great deal about what inspires and motivates Scion buyers through its unique vehicle lineup and instilled them into the FUSE." "The FUSE is a styling exercise that presents a discussion starting point for Scion owners and other Gen Y consumers with an eye towards a versatile sports coupe," said Templin. "Like previous Scion concepts, the FUSE delivers a unique statement about what the Scion brand is all about and where it is headed."

MSN Search Has Social Aspirations

Not to be left out of the online social networking party, Microsoft is focused on making MSN Search more relevant by incorporating preferences of like minded MSN Search users. The company expects to roll out a question and answer social search in the next few months. The feature will let users direct questions to a specific group of friends, rather than receive the typical automated results, which is so Web 1.0. Microsoft hopes the new tool will help in its battle to gain share in the search market from leaders Google and Yahoo. If Microsoft leverages their 200 million plus HotMail email users or MSN IM users, this could take off pretty quick as users are getting smarter and savvier when it comes to search.

New Cell Phones To Use GPS To Track Kids

Sprint/Nextel unveiled a new service that allows parents to track their kid's exact location. The service, dubbed "Family Locator," uses a global positioning system technology and a downloadable program. Here is how it works. Mom and Dad are worried that Junior is late coming home so, using Sprint's Family Locator, they hit the "locate" button and an electronic ping goes out to a satellite or cell tower to their child's phone. Once the cell phone is hit, a location pops up on the program. The service costs $9.99 a month and may be well worth it for the pre-teen and younger teen set. I don't think older teens and college aged kids are going to be to into it however. There is a catch for the kids, they have to "opt in" to be located. That said, if Mom and Dad are paying the extra $9.99 a month, and the whole purpose of using the service is for extra safety, I don't think the kids will have much of say in the matter. Is this one more thing over anxious, over bearing parents can do to stay on top of their kids, or is this a great safety mechanism in case of an emergency? For the younger set, I believe it is the latter.

Sephora Partners with J.C.Penney

J.C. Penney and Sephora, the specialty beauty retailer announced a new partnership where Sephora will open mini Sephora "stores within stores" later this year. This is good news for J.C. Penney who has lost teen and young adult shoppers over the past five years to the specialty clothing retailers like American Eagle, Abercrombie & Fitch and Forever 21, among others. Even though Sephora has only 120 stores nationwide, the stores are in major markets. Sephora and its associated brand equity is highly popular among teen and young adult women. The partnership should get some younger shoppers into J.C. Penney right around back to school time.

In Game Advertising to hit $1.8 billion by 2010

The CEO of Massive, the largest in-game ad network expects rapid growth in the market over the next four years capturing $1.6 to $1.8 billion in ad dollars by 2010 or about 3% of total media spending in the U.S. In-game ad networks like Massive work when users are playing video games online using services like Xbox live PS2 online. Pretty aggressive estimates for an industry that will only do about $150 to $200 million in sales this year.

Music Watch: Promoting Soon To Be Asian Hip Hop Stars

I saw this piece in the UCLA Daily Bruin, the unversity's campus newspaper. At the end of the day for Gen Y, it is still all about the music...don't believe me? Look at what's top of mind: American Idol, iPods, iTunes, CD burners, etc. I find the musical tastes of Gen Y to be very heterogeneous, one second they are listening to a jam band like Dave Matthews and then next second its rap from Jay Z. Bottom line, this is an audience segment that enjoys a wide variety of musical genres. Given the fact that Asian Americans have been pretty much absent from the hip hop scene, it was intriguing to see what one ambitious student at UCLA was doing. David "FD" Nguyen runs a site called Aznraps.com which promotes up and coming Asian American hip hop artists. The site has become more than just a grass roots success, he recently received an on air mention or "shout out" on BET's popular Freestyle Friday from hip hop artist Jin, who is also Asian. Just as Gen Y gets really into reggaeton or Latino style hip hop, one can expect the same thing to happen with Asian hip hop artists and you can refer to David Nguyen as the ambassador of the genre. The tenacious four year student at UCLA wants to own his own label, clothing line and all the associated goodies, right now I'd say, he's in a good spot to make those dreams become a reality.

Another Chance For 15 Minutes Of Fame

Comedy Central, the number three cable network among college students, announced a partnership with ifilm called "Comedy Central's Test Pilots," an online contest where users submit their own live action or animated show. The winner gets a development deal to produce a series for Comedy Central's broadband channel called MotherLoad. Over the course of the contest, three entries per week will be featured on the site and visitors can then vote for their favorite.

Teens With Cancer Hang Out Together Online

For all of you that complain your teen son or daughter spends way too much time Internet instead of working, studying or getting some exercise, here is one of the best examples I've seen so far of the incredible connectivity the Internet offers in helping an unfortunate disenfranchised segment of the teen population, teens diagnosed with cancer. There is an awesome story in USA Today about teens with cancer using the Internet to communicate with one another using sites like Teenswithcancer.org and Planetcancer.org. It is tough enough to be a teenager today, and if you are one of the 12,400 teens under the age of 20 diagnosed with cancer this year, life will not get any easier socially. Typically, the friends of the cancer patient aren't quite sure how to react while the patient is dealing with a world of emotions that really no teen should have to deal with at such a young age. Sites like Teenswithcancer.org allow teens to share stories, experiences and fears through blogs, bulletin boards and even podcasts. Chances are there aren't two teens with cancer in Anytown, USA so it would be impractical to think the kids could hang out each day after school (if they are even in school) and commiserate with one another. The Internet and these sites make that physical distance go away immediately. I guarantee these interactive support systems will help the psyche of teens who are undergoing treatment or have just been diagnosed. The whole success factor behind social networking sites like Facebook and Myspace is meeting like minded peers, and this is absolutely no exception for kids that are sick. Personally, I applaud what teen cancer community sites are doing and hope that every kid who gets the ridiculously unfair news that he or she has cancer can go to the sites and see there are 12,399 other kids in the country who are dealing with the same challenges.

More Online Innovations from ESPN.com

ESPN.com, the number one online sports site for teens and college students, continues to beef up and expand its already rich suite of offerings. The web site is launching ESPN.com PodCenter, a hub for audio and digital content that users can download or simply play on their computers. There will be up to 12 new podcasts including college male favorite 'Pardon The Interruption' as well as poker and golf content.

Get "Lost" Online For Free

ABC is about to run a very interesting test. Just as teens and college students who own iPods (which is more than one in three) are getting comfortable with the opportunity to download commercial free versions of shows like 'Desperate Housewives' (the number one show among college women) and 'Lost' (the number five show among all college students), now everyone with a computer can watch episodes online for free, the day after they air on the network. The only catch is that commercials will air during the streams, as opposed to the commercial free versions students could download for $1.99 on iTunes. I have to imagine the other networks with follow ABC's lead with testing the waters of full streaming episodes of network shows that are ad supported. For the teen and college set, The WB should test out 'Supernatural' and Fox should test 'The O.C.'  The ABC test gets underway next month.