Strategist Joe Trippi nearly kicked the bucket this time around on the election trail leading the campaign for John Edwards. Why? Because Trippi has diabetes and he runs himself into the ground every time he gets a campaign. While that may be the sign of a true warrior it was rather unfortunate to see Edwards suspend his efforts early to give way to Clinton and Obama.

Trippi is the real deal. A kingmaker amongst men. He does however have one major weakness as a political operative and it is that he staunchly believes in democracy. He chooses to work with specific candidates for who they are. As such, the talent pool tends to dither down to those with less political power tilting more towards heart.

Rewind to the last Presidential election cycle and you might remember Trippi as one of the influencers behind the historical Howard Dean campaign, until of course the devastating and infamous “Dean Scream”. The Deaniacs couldn’t reverse the flow of a media-driven assassination which was once again led by the mighty Right Wing.

Question for Obama supporters: don’t you think the same thing is going to happen to Your Man? After all, a free ride in the media only lasts as long as the Right Wing declares it to be so. I’m afraid we might even have to coin a new term to describe Swiftboating. Let’s hope that Obama supporter John Kerry warned him. You might remember Kerry as the guy who lost to Bush in 2004. Must have been a difficult election to lose but he still managed it. But I digress.

The reason I’ve mentioned Trippi here is that I’ve been following him on Twitter virtually since the start of the election cycle. To my knowledge he has yet to endorse anyone but knowing his long-running dislike of Clinton might suggest that is leaning towards Obama.

Here are a few choice Tweets from Trippi in the last couple of days. Please read carefully:

Last day of vacation going home tomorrow. Anyone know of congressional races might need someone like me? about 24 hours ago

Change politics and launch new government funded by the people and only the people. Obama — challenge Clinton and McCain to do that pledge 10:58 AM February 18, 2008

Why doesn’t obama do real public funding in general? Accept nothing over $250. 10:18 AM February 18, 2008

Knowing that this will be the last time top down has a chance. My thanks to those who helped me through the darks 03:08 PM February 14, 2008

Much more at peace than I was after Dean. Watching bottom up politcs grow stronger this cycle. Knowing the ok 03:06 PM February 14, 2008

On beach in sun. Making democracy work better on hold for a few more days on my priority list 11:23 AM February 13, 2008

Here are my observations:

1) Trippi challenges Obama to fight for public campaign financing. You might remember Obama campaigning for public financing (even McCain called him out on it) but he seems to have changed his mind now that the coffers are being filled with thousands of micro-donations. Interesting flip-flop. Power often changes the game.

2) Is this really the last time that “top down” politics has a chance? The world is banking on that coming true but we can’t ignore the traditional power structure. One might assume that Trippi knows someone that we don’t.

3) Trippi is “more at peace” than post-Dean campaign. That might just be the glow of Bush leaving office, but nonetheless I agree that the youth is rising and that a new generation is surfacing. All of the social corruption of the 80s and 90s has served to create a free-thinking movement. Given that apathy is always around the corner we should still be weary of this crazy Obama train.

I’m with Trippi for the most part here but at what cost? Obama comes out of left-field to take down the Clintons? Not very likely without a silent push from the Right Wing. But of course, I wouldn’t want to stray beyond what the mainstream is currently saying. Not worth the attacks from Obamas disciples.

Filed under: Rants, Politics

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But here’s the real nugget:

“Forty million fans were coming to our door, and we let Ticketmaster have their addresses and e-mail,” says Live Nation CEO Michael Rapino. “That’s ludicrous.”

Spot on. Data is gold in the new economy.

Filed under: The Future, Measurement, Music Industry

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This year, I’m getting an unusual amount of calls from other networks that want to sell advertising to my company Fixion Media. No need to remind them that I’m a network that specializes in selling advertising, not buying. This leads me to the simple conclusion that many companies are facing problems in filling their inventories.

Why? I believe because there are 80 billion web sites out there with far too many ad spots per page. As the global web population continues to grow, so does the volume of page views and ad views.

While many still claim that the online ad business is recession-proof, it will only be so to networks that focus on specific niche communities, interests, or site genres. “Channels” are too vague for horizontal networks to claim as targeting.

Nonetheless, it is clear that this year will be an over-the-top and aggressive experience in the ad world. This suits me fine. I suppose we’ll be able to better reflect about the losses and victories that are sure to follow.

Filed under: Vertical Ad Networks, The Future

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I just think that AOL is a bit misunderstood. Maybe a bit shy too. It must be blowback from years of screeching modems and the ominous litany of “WELCOME TO AOL” intros.

But memories aside my mission is here is to espouse the virtues of AOL’s new sense of self. To me, it nearly begins and ends with Platform A. The acquisitions of TACODA, Third Screen Media, Lightningcast and ADTECH along with more recent deals the likes of Buy.at and Goowy have put AOL on a firm path. The shedding of AOL’s dial-up business will concretize the situation enormously. Also noteworthy of course are such offerings as TMZ and other digital real estate.

Microsoft’s failed bid for AOL [correction: I accidentally reported AOL, I really meant Yahoo!. Corrected at 12:17 AM Tuesday Feb 12th, 2008] was interesting. Now there is already talk about Yahoo! getting into game. While I understand the corporate need for consolidation, I think it will only hinder AOL’s recent progress. Yahoo!’s public brand doesn’t even exist to anyone under 30. Semantics aside, at some point we’ll find the need to curtail these big-name mergers for the very sake of preserving the function of branding.

Let us be realistic: most people like to shop at big box stores. Even if every local business went down tomorrow I guarantee that a segment of the population would drive to the next town over for a humane shopping experience.

I can already feel the Google fatigue. Can you feel it too? Yahoo! was exhausted long ago. I used to love them. While behind many of these names there is an apparatus far more serious and complex than the public often sees or understands, sometimes it is best to let that go for the sake of 98% of us that are chipping up to these guys.

I’ve chosen to mention AOL above because it derives from a personal and business perspective in that Fixion Media (my company) employs ADTECH’s services. (ADTECH is an arm of Platform A.) While I realize that Yahoo! buying AOL would help access to new markets, this situation runs of risk of hindering a sense razor-sharp focus that AOL has been giving off for months now. It is one of the main reasons we signed with ADTECH. In fact, we did more research on the parent companies of the major ad platforms than we did on ADTECH itself.

While aggressive posturing might be a sign to the industry that AOL is ripe for the taking, sometimes it disappoints me that most corporations are innately lazy, thereby lacking the will to completely flip a company into what it could and should be.

See AOL. (Maybe.)

Filed under: Publisher Side, The Future, Adtech Helios IQ, Branding

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Tip ‘o the hat to Mitch Joel for this video.

Fans of Jimmy Kimmel will get the joke:

Filed under: Video, Funny

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