Another Queer Jewish Buddhist

The Best, Most Strategic Viral Web Copywriting You'll Ever Read...Today

Brian Barrett over at Gizmodo waxed rhapsodic over the "rant" in this online ad for an inkjet cartrtidge. And he wasn't the only one. As if it really were a Howard Beale moment in the world of copywriting. Really?

There's a process that we copywriters go through. Nothing is unmediated. Forget that things go past supervisors, account people. Let's just stop and notice all the spelling errors in this piece. It wouldn't get through proofreading.

I suspect this was an extremely clever viral strategy that everyone fell for. Because this has turned up all over the web today.

I can be certain this was a plant because way before the Internet became a public wall instead of a Defense Department tool I was living in Tokyo, where I worked as an English language copywriter at Japan's largest ad agency, Dentsu. And I created an ad for a very rare daring Japanese client who ran it knowing it would become a subject written about with humorous condescension in Tokyo's many English language newspapers.

If you follow sites like BoingBoing and Gizmodo, you will on occasion find hilarious examples of Janglish — that weird combination of Japanese and English that comes from either a misunderstanding or spelling errors. My client, the New Otani Hotel, had a steak restaurant on the premises called The Rib Room. In Japanese, the R and L sounds are very close, and the B and V sounds are very close. So a Japanese person, in trying to pronounce the English work Live might say, and for that matter, spell this word, in a way that a native English speaker might hear as Rib.

Taking out the copywriter tool box, which includes using familiar phrases and playing with them to make a headline more memorable, I wrote the ad you see below for the restaurant. I told the client that some in the local press and letter writers would make merciless fun of them for running the ad. And that others would recognize that the restaurant was in on the joke. But that it would be reprinted and talked about. It was.

I make no claims to this being award winning or wildly creative. When I was a 30 year old writer in Tokyo, I was proud to have found an opportunity to do something fun, and happy to find a client brave enough to play.

Today, the internet makes such opportunities both harder and easier to recognize. But when done well, and when picked up, the rewards can be a worldwide business bump, instead of simply a few more seats filled at The New Otani.

Mind you, the only reason there was an open position in Tokyo so that I got the job was that a writer before me had mischeviously written a headline for a now defunct Japanese bank that took advantage of the fact that the Japanese client didn't recognize the semi-salacious word-play.

The logo of the Dai-Ichi Kangyo Bank was a heart. So this writer's headline, which ran in the Japan Times and the other local English language papers was: Dai Ichi Kangyo Has A Heart On For You.

I don't get opportunities like this much anymore. My work does in fact go through account people, proofreaders, lawyers lawyers and more lawyers. So you might understand why I don't believe the ink cartridge ad was a real "rant." A great copywriter sees opportunities on match book covers if that's the media to work in (and that tells you how old I am!). 

The TV airwaves were licensed because they were a public trust: today they have been freed for Wi-Fi use

As broadcasters leave the airwaves, Wi-Fi providers are stepping in to the void to provide service across this spectrum that affords webcasting at a very high level.

The airwaves are a public trust. They are licensed and broadcasters pay for the right to use them. And they had to abide by fairness laws, and reserve time for educational, news and public service programming.

Now that this spectrum is being given over to webcasters (and you can be sure this means AT&T, Verizon and the rest) will they have to abide by laws updated for this technology? Because this is where net neutrality and Wi-Fi becomes a serious public debate.

Where does your elected representative stand on these issues?

Facebook, Gay Rights, Advertising, Political Organizing and Free Speech.

There are hundreds of Facebook groups organized around political principles and action. I belong to some of them. A couple of weeks ago there was another Facebook firestorm when the Boycott BP page lost admin privileges. Facebook said it was a glitch and the page privileges were restored. Not so for the Target boycott page — and the paper with the business scoop behind it is Washington D.C.’s MetroWeekly: Facebook will be selling gift cards in Target stores this fall holiday season, so enabling a boycott through their platform directly goes against their business interests. And lets not forget that Facebook is a business.

 The details were reported in USA Today:

 The social-network giant is getting into the gift card business, starting Sunday, with Facebook Credits cards. The new Facebook gift cards will be available in values of $15, $25 and $50 at all of Target's 1,750 retail stores and at Target.com. Two or three more national retailers will start selling the cards in coming months. This will be the first time Facebook has had any presence in a retail store. Facebook already has an arrangement with online-payment services PayPal and MOL to purchase Facebook Credits.

How big a business is this? In today's New York Times,  it is estimated that this year alone the  market in Facebook credits will reach $835 million.  

So it’s no surprise Facebook has disabled the administrative functions of groups that are organizing a boycott of Target in response to Target’s contributions to anti-gay politicians.

 The Internet is a friend of the corporate oligarchy.

 Facebook isn’t some non-profit service to the world community. Like Google, it is an advertising platform. Their value is in the private information they collect and use to help advertisers target prospects and customers.

 In the world of advertising, when an advertiser asks for personal information from a prospect or customer there is always something called a value exchange. The customer gives up some personal information in return for an offer, a discount, something useful. Think of it as a trade.

 Facebook is just such a trade — it has enabled half a billion people around the world to communicate in groups in ways that have never been possible. Of course, along the way, Facebook has collected enough personal information on all these people to make the secret police in any state quiver with desire. The Stasi would be envious of their info gathering ability.

Even without giving up specific information an MIT study last year demonstrated that Facebook friend connections could be used to determine with a strong degree of accuracy whether a man is gay even if he is in the closet.

An Unprecedented Level of Personal Information Given Freely Can Lead To Less Freedom

I am under no illusions when I use Facebook. Or Google for that matter. Just as I have given out information on this blog that could be used by a totalitarian government as evidence to imprison me for thought crimes and/or political beliefs, sexual practices, etc., my actions on Facebook and Google give corporations the information they need to imprison me in the net of the corporate oligarchy.

Remember, I’m an advertising executive. I like advertising. I believe it has a positive social role. I think the internet makes finding stuff I want amazingly easy — just last week I bought a book of Nepalese folktales from a publisher half a world away from their site. But search engines, or Facebook for that matter, like any tool, it can be used for ill. A hammer can be used to build a house or bash a head. And when you hold a hammer, you understand it’s possibility to do both those things.

 When you use Facebook, you may not think about how it can be used against you. Many young people have learned already that posting photos of drunken student antics have ruined employment possibilities. That’s because today, human resources departments don’t need to seek references — they can simply Google your name and see whatever might be online. This is not news. What was news the other weeks was when Google head Eric Schmidt joked about it suggesting people change their names legally if they wanted to hide their past internet indiscretions.

Facebook as a public utility rather than a business —  First Amendment rights should apply.

So Facebook has an economic interest in making sure Facebook users shop at Target. And they have an interest in making sure no one can use their service to spread information about a Target boycott.

However, when a service like Facebook becomes so ubiquitous as to have taken on the role as public square, we have to claim our role as citizens — not consumers. Facebook in fact is denying the right of free speech. Not unlike a shopping mall tries to deny political speech in mall common areas.

The public square, and the streets, as public property are protected by the First Amendment. Facebook however, is a corporation, and users give up their rights to use the service. This is the creeping danger of corporate media and the web.

Broadcasters, because they are licensed by the state to use the airwaves (how quaint a thought, airwaves) which belong to the public, must abide by certain rules — from providing community and educational programming as well as free advertising time for public service messages.

Webcasters like Facebook do not seem to have these restrictions — even though the infrastructure for the Internet was developed by the federal government. And while it has evolved far beyond that original infrastructure, the internet, like the airwaves, are a public trust. And corporate webcasters like Facebook should be subject to fairness doctrines just as broadcasters were — I saw were because if there were still a fairness doctrine Fox news would not exist. And while I don’t believe in censorship, I do believe that since Fox news is really propaganda and nothing else their license to broadcast should be revoked.  The fairness doctrine must be restored to broadcasting.

The internet, since it was developed by the government, is a public trust, and net neutrality must be maintained.

The internet, as a public trust, is also a place where the rights around public speech must hold.

These are bedrock principles we as citizens (and lets remember our role and responsibility as citizens instead of the role we have been assigned by the corporate oligarchy as mere consumers) must demand are enforced by our elected officials before they are completely bought out.

China, Sex & Censorship: Celebrating Gay Men in Beijing, Dealing with Discrimination in Ulaanbaatar

The big China story this week is Google blowing the whistle on cyberspying and censorship. This is of personal interest to me because I chat online with a gay Chinese man in Chengdu every week, and there are subjects he doesn’t know about, and things he doesn’t have access to.

Once I found myself cutting and pasting the sentences from a censored story into the chat window so he would know what I was writing about. But of course, this was risky business and he made it clear he didn’t want me to do that in the future — our conversation is simply about gay life in the US, since in Chengdu it isn’t anywhere near as open as it seems to be in Beijing, where this week, what is billed as an officially sanctioned male beauty pageant (you can see a video of these shirtless young men here). I suspect my friend in Chengdu can't get to this video link however.

Late Breaking Development That Should Be No Surprise: Police Shut Down The Pageant — Full Story Here.

That's a sea change from just a few years back when homosexuality was a criminal offense. Bu then, in a country where a one child policy and the preference for male children has led to a male/female ratio that makes it hard for a straight guy to find a wife, taking the pressure off gay men from marrying as cover just might help a little. In fact, it also helps take some pressure off the regime, since a country with several million frustrated young men has got to feel like a powder keg no matter who is in power.

I have no idea what's behind the ruling Communist Party easing up on things in Beijing, but it's still not easy if you're in the provinces. And I’m not just talking Chengdu.

Mongolia for example. If you're in NYC this month, stop by the LGBT Center on 13th Street — in the lobby there is an amazing exhibit documenting the lives of LGBT Mongolians living in the capital city of Ulaanbaatar.

Beyond the Blue Sky, created and produced by Brandt Miller, includes amazing portrait photography by Miller and Mareike Günsche and a film by Miller and Sean Devaney.

The photographs are intense and dramatic. While some of the men in these photos are shirtless, each of the subjects’ faces covered by a khadag — a ceremonial scarf made of a sacred blue cloth representing the eternal sky and used at funerals to wrap the head of the deceased.

Each photo is accompanied with an oral history — a life story of each subject, transcribed by Miller — that captures the universal longing all lgbt people feel, that all people feel: the need for love and intimacy that is not merely recognized, but celebrated.

Miller, who was in Mongolia on a Fulbright Fellowship, was a co-founder of the first LGBT Center in Ulaanbaatar.

The exhibit will be on view at the NYC LGBT Center on 13^th Street through April. If you go there regularly as I do, take some time to stop and see it all. If you don’t go to the Center, consider stopping in. There are so many groups that meet there, and social services provided, it can be easy to overlook the fact that the Center is indeed a central arts resource for the community too.

Here is a video interview with Miller, followed by the video documentary made with Sean Devaney:

 

'Behind the Blue Sky' - Short film from Ual Da on Vimeo.

'Beyond the Blue Sky' Interview with Brandt Miller from Ual Da on Vimeo.

Arising and passing away: The Bodhi Tree Bookstore in Los Angeles is closing.

I remember my first trip to the Bodhi Tree bookstore in L.A. — I spent an hour sitting cross-legged on the floor reading Bodhi Leaves, the thin chap books printed by the Buddhist Publication Society. I left that day with two shopping bags worth of books that I couldn't find anywhere in New York City. Even Weiser's the venerable occult book shop and publisher in NYC didn't have the titles I found at Bodhi Tree.

Today, Weiser's is long gone. And the Bodhi Tree has just announced that they will be closing after this year. Another victim of real estate interests.

Of course, business is off because many of the books sold there are now available at most Barnes and Noble stores. And if you can't find it brick and mortar, it's always found online. In fact, one of my favorite little chap books from BPS is now available free online, along with dozens of other Bodhi Leaves at the BPS website.

While I am happy that the information is more easily found by those who seek it, I will miss the community aspect of the store, where conversation with the owners and staff was always a doorway to a new discovery — and a heartfelt connection happening in the moment. And I am happy for the owners, who, faced with declining sales find that the property sale will provide for them now that they are in their 70s. Still, I find myself wondering about the future of the book community. And the future of browsing — since so many of my discoveries came from browsing titles and sitting cross-legged on a floor in a bookstore.

Then again, as one teacher of mine once said — you already have the tools, now you have to use them. So I guess I should be spending more time sitting cross-legged on the floor without a book. Watching phenomena as they arise and pass away.

Is Facebook Going Amazon On Us? Social Networking, Homophobia, Advertising and Censorhip

Gay activist and prolific author, Perry Brass, finds that his latest book, The Manly Art of Seduction, has been banned from advertising on Facebook. This is peculiar, since I've seen advertising for male "massage" therapists on Facebook who offer services that are not part of the licensing process. Not that I am in favor of FB posting those "massage" ads. If you're looking for that sort of think you know where to go. But Perry's book is not of that order. It's about how men connect with men — energetically, romantically, spiritually, physically, emotionally, sexually. And since you can buy it on the famously messed up for gay writers, Amazon, FB shouldn't have a problem with it. But they seem to, as noted here at Out In Jersey.

Meanwhile, if you're interested in learning some of these skills first hand, Perry's got a workshop in NYC on the 20th of this month at the Center. I imagine it will be a lot of fun — and enlightening on many levels. 

The Gay-O-Meter

What is the correlation between homophobia and attraction to men in the same person? This ad for a website in New Zealand makes the case that Max Blumenthal so eloquently makes in his book, Republican Gomorrah.

Sunday Morning Cartoon (sort of): Robot, Ninja & Gay Guy

How I have managed to miss this little internet oddity for several months I have no idea. The premise is explained very simply on their Facebook Fan Page:

"What happens when a gay guy needs new roommates and the only ones who respond to the Craigslist ad are a robot and a ninja? This..."

It's so geeky silly I just love it. Yes, I know it's not a cartoon, but it's about as cartoony as live action gets. And episode 5 takes place in a comic book store! The guys behind this have their own youtube channel with other regular video comedy postings, including a series called (and how I missed this is even more bizarre) Two Hot Guys in A Shower. Doesn't work as well for me. But what interests me is the way creativity and content continue to be democratized (though of course, the goal, you can be sure, for these guys is to "discovered" and make it big. So they can get their 8 million dollars a movie.

The fan page says that there are new episodes the 2nd and 4th Tuesday of every month. Since they started in August and we're in October, they aren't keeping to schedule otherwise there would be more than 5 episodes at this point. But I'm not arguing.

Sunday Morning Cartoon on Tuesday Afternoon: The Rights Five!

Can you imagine superheroes for lgbt rights in Colorado? If you can't, you aren't imaginative enough, because the GLBT Community Center of Colorado has just launched a website and a youtube cartoon featuring these spandex-wearing characters:

My only question is, where's Scoobie-Doo? There is also a full website where you can sign on for updates and take advantage of viral email to let other people know.

Which Muslim country is more curious about gay sex? Google knows...

An Australian news site reports that:

"Homosexuality, which is illegal in most Muslim and African countries, spurs much interest in Muslim Africa. While the search word "gay" is dominated by Latin Americans, it is mainly Filipinos and Saudi Arabians looking for "gay sex". The African "gay sex" list is topped by Kenyans, Tanzanians, Namibians, Zimbabweans and South Africans. In the francophone world, however, Algerians and Moroccans by far top the world's search for "la homosexualité". Algerians also by distance top the search for the "sexe gay", with the French and the Moroccans being somewhat more timid on the issue."

Of course, Saudi Arabia is no place to get caught gay. For that matter, neither is Zimbabwe (which is not a Muslim country, just simply in sub-Saharan Africa). Of course, Zimbabwe is not a place to be caught for any reason given the insane government. Must be all that pent up desire.