Pass The Popcorn

Big news from YouTube this week - it was announced that the site will be launching a new section, dedicated to television episodes and feature length films. This is a huge departure from the user generated content model the site originally evangelized, including the 'Broadcast Yourself' tag line it still maintains. Given the fact that Google owns YouTube, coupled with the staggering traffic the site generates, we had to expect they would continue to innovate the monetization strategy.

This change will position Google to attract significantly more advertising dollars within the entertainment vertical. Google is also working with Universal Music to stream music videos from VEVO. It's reported the two companies will share ad revenue from this venture. As of now, Google hasn't indicated that users will have to pay for these services.

While the obvious driver behind this innovation is revenue, you can't argue that it's pushing the web in exciting directions. But you also have to wonder, if primary social media sites are eventually converted to brand channel sites, will the opportunity for consumer generated content diminish in the shadows of business plans? Twitter has yet to unveil their own revenue model - one way or another, the site needs to generate dollars, but hopefully, not to the detriment of the user base, who has found a tremendous freedom and community in it's application.

How Brands Can Wrangle Bad Press On The Web

Domino's Pizza was recently thrown into a media storm after two employees filmed themselves doing not so nice things with a food order being prepared for delivery. They posted the video on YouTube (no longer available) and it spread like wildfire. No need to explain how something like that can leave deep wounds in the brand impression.

To their credit, Domino's acted quickly. Within a few days (and over one million YouTube views later) the video was removed, the company created a Twitter account to address the issue, and they recorded and posted a message from its chief executive on YouTube.

Since any online consumer has the ability to discuss brands in the public realm, reputation management will become an increasingly growing area of practice. In the social networking space, reputation management is the evolution of traditional PR. What's most important is that brands find their voice. The recent Amazon ordeal resulted in the brand being harshly criticized because of their 'silence'. They remained quiet for days, with no response to the millions of comments being made online from their consumers.

We can't expect brands to be infallible, but we should expect them to participate in the dialogue in social media spaces. Kudos to Domino's for facing an embarrassing situation head-on. It will be interesting to see how brands perfect the art of reputation management in an uncensored online universe.

How The Web Makes The World Feel Smaller

It's interesting to take a step back and consider what the internet has done to the world. News travels at lightning speed, and there are no borders preventing the news from reaching far corners of the earth. We're all exposed to individuals and information we would have otherwise never known about.

A great example in recent days is Susan Boyle, the 47 year old, unemployed woman from a Scottish village, who made huge waves after some unexpected stellar singing on 'Britain's Got Talent'. Before she stepped onto that stage, she was, and likely would have remained, unknown to the world. Today, thousands of articles are being written about her - collectively, her videos on YouTube have been watched millions of times!

While this kind of fame may only last moments, it's still a special feeling to get a glimpse into the life of someone you previously didn't know existed. Susan Boyle may be in Scotland, but when you see her sing on YouTube, and you read her interviews on dozens of websites, it really does erase geographical borders, and the world feels that much smaller.