BIG IDEAS

This is an ad sent to me from a friend who lives in Singapore. Who would have thought the “morning zoo/crew” radio format would go any further than the States?

A list of thoughts while watching this, the least of which is hunger.

A sad goodbye to yet another favorite. This time, Conde Nast’s business magazine, Portfolio. After 21 issues as the Vanity Fair of business coverage, the title has bitten the proverbial dust, something many people thought would not happen because it was very much a point of pride for Conde Nast chairman SI Newhouse. Then again, it was bleeding money and likely was related to the reason Conde Nast mags DOMINO and MEN’s VOGUE got the ax first.

Some people will get upset about this usage of the President’s image. Me? I think it’s absolutely hilarious. Here’s the press release:

Murray’s Pomade has brought its brand and its mission — a great product at a great price – to the table to celebrate the Obama election and to help people to create change in their community.

The concept is simple: Murray’s for Obama collectible pomade tins are now available at www.Murrays4Change.com with a portion of the proceeds (up to 25% of the product cost, depending on the details of the purchase) going to a worthy non-profit. The community gets to cast its votes, on the site or in the Facebook group by the same name, for which non profits take home the money.

Say it ain’t so. And since it’s April Fool’s Day, maybe it ain’t, but according to a number of sources, and second-hand via GAWKER, KING Magazine, that brash bastion of booty has folded.

Count me as one who will mourn. That Stacey Dash cover from last year is still under a sweater in my closet. But (and that’s a Big Butt!), all the complaints about its objectification of women aside (and what magazines, including women’s magazines, don’t objectify women?) KING was actually quite enjoyable as a page to page read.

I was never into the acquisition of depreciating toys and goodies, so the whole rims and sneakers fetish thing was lost on me completely. But I could still appreciate the magazine’s appeal to the people who were, and I was able to enjoy it as well.

From a Black media perspective I tend to take the stand that every Black publication, website, radio station, whatever, that helps validate the Black community as a viable consumer market helps everyone in the Black media space, and the loss of any publication that effectively made that case is a loss worth worrying about.

if you notice these kinds of things - and I do - it’s been very interesting to see the fairly consistent level of sophisticated design taste that has been used on Obama-inspired campaign material, official and unofficial.

Whether buttons, banners, stickers, t-shirts, posters or unauthorized graffiti, people with high design values and very good style seem to be inspired by or attracted to Obama as their muse of sorts. Smart backdrops colors, modern yet presidential font choices, forward but still tasteful uses of color, it really is amazing to see.

Design sounds like a small thing in politics, but if you have ever driven by a yard sign for a local election and realized that you could not read it until you were two feet from it, that’s a result of poor design. It would not be hyperbole to say that at least by some measure, a number of campaigns may have been lost due to ill conceived visual presentation.

Design communicates all kinds of messages, and in a campaign where you need to show strength, trust, vision and intelligence, these subtleties can be crucial.

Clearly a lot of other people have been thinking about this as well.

Designers for Obama

Chicagoist

Newsweek

NotCot

As long as we’re doing inside baseball, might as well continue with last week’s uprootings at Washington.Newsweek Interactive (WPNI). Not that anyone really cares, but to the extent that The Washington Post and the New York Times tend to be bellwethers for the media industry it’s kinda interesting. More so if you factor in that WPNI is the parent company of The Root.

In a nutshell, WPNI’s CEO, Caroline Little, has resigned or, more accurately was resigned to the fact that her position would no longer be necessary in the company’s transition to the new “Washington Post Media”, which is led by Washington Post Chairman Don Graham’s niece, Katherine Weymouth. Washingtonpost.com was the last real holdout in the bid media web space in the rush to “integrate” its print and online functions.

Whether this is a good thing or a bad thing remains to be seen.

Here’s what good can come of it:

1. Caroline Little is out. A good dealmaker but less than a visionary. Even though the web is more than a decade old, it still requires visionaries to move it forward. It’s way too early in the game for bean counters and office politicians.

2. Because washingtonpost.com has been the chief breadwinner, Little’s style was to give substantially less resources and attention to serious growers like Slate and fewer marketing dollars behind  new offerings like the green site, Sprig, ReadExpress.com and The Root. If former WPNI VP Liddy Manson can be convinced to come back in the CEO gig, expect her to figure out how to leverage the smaller sites and for Slate and The Root to get much more visibility.

But here’s the bad:

1. With all that focus on integrating the web and print operations of The Post, The Root may (just like Sprig) get lost in the dust where resources are concerned.

2. Print folks just don’t get the web. Despite all the clamor to integrate over the years, washingtonpost.com was best when it was the most separate. You need freedom to promote creativity. A more newspaper-focused website will mean less innovation across all the WPNI sites, including The Root.

3. WPNI going corporate means even less ethnic diversity at the top. The new mixed entity creates a whole new layer of upper aristocracy from the paper, fundamentally lowering the profile of the (very) few minority folk in leading positions, such as new General Counsel Shereese Smith and editor Ju-Don Roberts.

Okay, no more media insider stuff, except for this next one on Rushmore Drive. Sorry.

A buddy of mine just sent a note around that he was accepted as a Fulbright Scholar, and will be assigned to teach in Russia starting 2009. Very very cool (no pun intended). We shared a laugh last night that, predictable, sistas started calling him immediately after that e-mail warning him that he (a Black man) better stay the hell away from them devil Russian (i.e. white) women.Which all reminded me of this old commercial from Wendy’s called “Russian Fashion Show” - one of my favorites. For most of the 20th century, this was the image we all had of women from the Eastern bloc - steroid-taking, husky freaks of nature who ere really men and that was why they kicked our butts in the Olympics.

Then Ronald Reagan came along, yelled “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down that wall”. And what came stepping through?

Anna Kournikova, that’s what. And Petra Nemcova. And if the AVN Convention that was next door to the Consumer Electronics Show was any indication, the entire cast of the adult film industry. Actually, even before all that, during the Cold War 70s, when the Olympics were really billed as serious nation vs. nation competition, there was Ludmilla Tourischeva, every fanboy’s secret crush until Olga Korbut opened the door of the gymnastics world to underfed dwarfs.

So why the disconnect from media perception to reality? Well, if you can define a people’s standard of beauty you can influence others to despise them, right? I mean, nobody respects a race of people who the word calls ugly, right? Right?

Hmm. Sounds oddly familiar.

The blog We Are Respectable Negroes offers up the Top 5 Phrases that Respectable Negroes need to stop using. I’d have to add “Let’s conversate” to the list, but I suppose it’s not about bad grammar.

The folks at Jack and Jill Politics say (rightly) that Black folk need to put a line in the sand on unfair drug sentencing and Hilary Clinton is on the wrong side of that line.

VH-1 Classics give us a taste of Busta Rhymes in more innocent days before beating up brothers in the club.

Great new movie coming out starring Robert DeNiro, Al Pacino and … 50 Cent? Come again?

If a tree falls in the forest, and then all the deer become strippers and give lapdances, will anyone hear it? No, but we have videotape.