When the dot-com bubble was mid-burst in 2001 or so, a friend of mine would ask me, “Do you still think the Internet is going to change the world?” As if some poor investments and a negative global economic climate were going to halt the transformation the Internet was bringing to our culture. “Of course,” I’d answer. It might be slowing down a little bit, but things are definitely going to change. Especially in my chosen fields of journalism, media and marketing. This graphic reflects that conversation quite well.

Infographic by the social media marketing team @ROI_Media

Via @lmayes and @mihow

chat roulette from Casey Neistat on Vimeo.

Via TBI

Via elsua.net

A few weeks ago, I got my husband to agree to cutting off our cable television service. See ya, Time Warner Cable. See ya, Time Warner Cable bill.

Reading about Fred Wilson’s thoughts on the subject (wow, that link is old and yet still valid), and hearing from @lieblink, it has long been obvious to me that the future of television-watching is digital and on-demand. Watching our household’s video viewing habits — a lot of Amazon On-Demand, some Netflix Instant Queue, a great deal of TiVo-ed kids’ programming, and some live TV here and there — I realized that, with just a few slight modifications, we could ditch the cable boxes and save $71/month.

The person for whom this poses the most difficulty (and he’s already asked me to call TWC a couple of times) is my husband. He’s fond of live sports and live sports news — some of which are actually available online, but he’s not accustomed to using these sources yet. For the kids and me, it hasn’t been a difficult adjustment, as there is still plenty of programming available with our new configuration.

Here’s our set up:

• Analog TV set (vintage 2004 or so).
  
• Digital to analog converter box
  
• Amplified indoor antenna (“rabbit ears”)
  
• Roku box for Netflix and Amazon On-Demand
  
• TiVo for recording broadcast TV and a little on-demand (Series 2)
  

I’d love to have Apple TV or some other way to watch YouTube, Hulu, etc. on our TV, but we are getting along pretty well just now. The most challenging part, thus far, is when we hear about some kind of news event — a plane and helicopter colliding over the Hudson, for example — and want to turn on CNN or NY1 for the on-the-scene coverage. We’re trying to train ourselves to find something acceptable online. Wish us luck.

Two FM authors — Asha from Parent Hacks and Mindy from The Mommy Blog — weigh in on how to talk to kids about the economy — on CNN. I think they both did a great job, and I’m impressed with the quality of the Skype video. It’s great to see such talented bloggers cross over to bring their brands to video so successfully, as they did here and as they’re doing at The Momversation.

I suspect more than a few folks are scratching their heads about the whole #motrinmoms scandal du weekend. As my friend @fuzheado said, the divergence in reaction might make a good Mars/Venus case study. He didn’t get what all the fuss was about, but his wife honed right in on the problem.

Not surprisingly, I’m with the wife. Like the super-vocal moms who took such offense, I immediately “got” the problem with the ad — its tone. As a mom with a 5-month-old, I “wear” my baby all the time. But it’s not because it’s “in fashion,” because it’s “supposedly” is a good bonding experience or because I want to look like “an official mom”, as the Motrin ad implies. It’s because it works. The kid doesn’t cry and I can do whatever needs doing. And of course it’s a bonding experience, because any time you meet your child’s needs that’s the case.

And, yes, sometimes my back hurts. Others out there are admitting this, too, even though the conventional wisdom is that babywearing doesn’t hurt if you’re doing it right. So, I don’t think J&J is far off in targeting moms who wear their babies. They’re just going about it wrong. (And let’s not dismiss this as a Twitter crisis. For everyone that’s tweeting about this, there are many others that are hearing about it, or just seeing the ads themselves and having the same reaction. Twitter is just surfacing the word-of-mouth that would have been happening anyway. )

But all is not lost for the brand. Right now, everyone’s saying they will boycott Motrin. This bodes ill for their product for adults and may also impact their product for kids, given they’ve now offended the target that controls the purse-strings.

The silver lining is that Motrin has gotten everyone’s attention. They need to grab this opportunity, while they’re in the online spotlight, to connect in a positive way. They need to apologize and retool their condescending message about babywearing. To make sure it gets seen, an ad spend on mommy blogs is in order. Motrin have shown that they’re not the experts on babywearing, but they can certainly get involved with and sponsor conversations on the topic — a topic that inspires an amazing amount of passion. Whaddaya say, J&J?

Other links:

Sarah Evans on Mashable has a prescription for Motrin, as well.

I loved Kent Nichols’ (of Ask a Ninja) explanation of what we at FM — specifically our salespeople — do. Paraphrasing here, but the moderator asked how AAN has been successful courting brand advertisers. The secret, Kent said, is “sweaty people who drink” — aka hard work building real-life relationships with agencies and advertisers, sometimes with the lubricating influence of alcohol. It’s the non-engineerable aspect of advertising, he said, and it requires the sweat of people who do “voodoo bullshit” and “close deals.”

This panel has completely rocked — best of the SXSW interactive conference so far — and Kent Nichols is a great instigator. He totally gets it, and he expresses it in a laugh-out-loud hilarous way.

Interesting approach. I like the idea, though the video itself seems a little slow. They’re distributing it on their own site, and promoting it in a media buy that includes BabyCenter (FM partner and J&J subsidiary).

Via the WSJ