Straight-up Snark

Straight-up Snark

What’s Davos done for you lately?

The efficient market hypothesis isn't so efficient and the rich are getting richer.
Now what?

February 1st, 2011 by Andrew Swenson
William H. Gates

image credit: World Economic Forum / photo by Moritz Hager

Nothing.

Davos has done nothing for you lately. Unless, of course, you’re one of the global elite who managed to snag an invite.

This assertion should be met with fierce resistance from the political right, especially given their penchant for the liberal economic model (in classic sense) formed most recently by Ronald Reagan. After all, it’s this approach that suggests wealth will trickle down from those Davos-going plutocrats (from Francis Fukuyama’s excellent essay in The American Interest):

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Straight-up Snark

10 Steps to Writing a Popular Blog Post in no Time Flat

February 19th, 2010 by Andrew Swenson

In a recent email, someone accused me of not being snarky enough lately. HA! You asked for it:

Here they are, 10 steps to writing a popular blog post in no time flat:

  1. Spend 2 minutes on Twitter and find a popular blog post on a hot-button issue.
  2. Open your blogging platform and start ranting in response. Logic here: rant = passion and passion = popular.
  3. If possible, make some audacious claim about Gen Y, or Gen X, or whatever generation you happen to be from. The more it inspires warm fuzzies or outright anger, the better.
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Straight-up Snark

The words “social media” make me gag: a rant of sorts

December 4th, 2009 by Andrew Swenson
visalog

Image Credit: visalog

Face it, we’re officially, unabashedly obsessed with “social media.”

As an advocate for social business, I don’t have a problem with using the communication channel we commonly refer to as “social media” to effectively engage customers, but I am sick of the seemingly magical properties some ascribe to it and our sloppy distinction of what actually happens through the media channel.

First, the facts

MarketingProfs just posted the findings of a StrongMail study that reported that 59% of marketers plan to increase social media spending in 2009.

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Straight-up Snark

CMOs: “Social Media is Better In-House”…DUH

October 26th, 2009 by Andrew Swenson
Some things are just painfully obvious.

Some things are just painfully obvious.

When a group of CMOs were asked which group was best equipped to help them with social media, a recent post on Business Week reported the following:

65.6% In House
15.6% Interactive Agency
9.4% PR Firm
9.4% Social Media Agency
0% Creative/Ad Agenc

I may anger some of my friends in the agency world (I know, I was there once too), but I firmly believe social media MUST come from inside an organization in order to be credible. I think this is best illustrated in a quote from one respondent:

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Straight-up Snark

Against pronouncing email, blogs “dead”

October 23rd, 2009 by Andrew Swenson
Are email and blogs really dead?

Social Media Killed the Blog Star?

To get straight to the point, I believe email and blogs are not dead, and I’m tired of the countless articles that say they are.

Oh sure, it’s easy to jump on the email/blogging-is-dead bandwagon, but declaring these modes of communication as dead doesn’t accomplish much. Those who are ready to pronounce the death of email and blogging often justify their arguments in one of two ways: (1) with anecdotal speculation, or with (2) a bogus game of semantics.

Both of these arguments aren’t particularly helpful, and here’s why:

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