Digital Hive

Stop thief!! Being someone else while social networking

I found an interesting post from Piers Fawkes about a recent WSJ article (reg. req'd). Topic: identity theft on social networking sites. The twist: thieves aren't seeking money, it's cooler profiles they're after.

According to the WSJ "among the 125 million people in the U.S. who visit online dating and social-networking sites are a growing number of dullards who steal personal profiles, life philosophies, even signature poems...
A search on MySpace.com brought up more than 700 recent comments that accuse others of stealing headlines, user names, songs, background designs and entire profiles. In a recent survey of more than 400 online daters commissioned by Engage.com, 9% of respondents said they copied from another person's profile; 15% suspect their own words were stolen."

(click to enlarge the graphic and see one example of "profile theft" in action)

Hilary's brand problem

I had pretty much sworn off political coverage here but I did find a provocative post from the Managing Director of Landor's New York office, Allen Adamson, that I wanted to share.

Allen thinks Obama has the most effectively defined brand. "He’s identified the clearest, simplest brand driver of anyone running. His easily understood idea is sort of akin to Pepsi’s 'choice of a new generation.' And whether people agree with this choice of a new generation they’re in full agreement that everything he says and does is in alignment with his well-defined brand idea." I absolutely concur with Allen's assessment here. I think Obama has done a fantastic job evaluating the context of this election, and identifying widespread disillusionment with what hasn't been working. His positioning is genius because it lacks substance - it's all feeling. And what American doesn't want to at least hope for unity and progress?

This dog is pretty talented

The Oscar for best use of an almost-real canine in a hip hop production goes to this site, which allows you to direct a dog in an engaging session of beatbox. It takes a while to load, it's in Swedish, and it doesn't appear to deliver on a particular insight (except consumers' desire to have fun), but it's entertaining and worth reminding ourselves how much a smile is worth in today's turbulent times - brands everywhere take note!

Credit to Three Minds for surfacing this one.

What cognitive science tells us about PPT

Thanks to Gareth Kay at Brand New for calling out this interesting post on i09 about cognitive scientist Stephen M Kosselyn's recommendations about how PPT can be tailored to the way the human brain processes information.

According to Kosselyn (as quoted on io9) the four rules of PowerPoint are: The Goldilocks Rule, The Rudolph Rule, The Rule of Four, and the Birds of a Feather Rule. Here's how they work: