Archive for the ‘Uncategorized’ Category
When you sell ads you need to give your customer some idea of who will see the results of their investment. That explains this rather odd partnership of two sister companies: Erudite Inc., who makes tracking and security devices for shipping containers, and GBoards Inc. who is selling advertising on those shipping containers. In a promotion related to the 2008 Olympics, the companies have created the China8 Project. In May a dragon-headed ship will sail to China carrying humanitarian aid and merchandise giveaways. The trip will test out Erudite’s tracking and be, literally, an advertising vehicle. According to the Puget Sound Business Journal, offshore cell phone provider SeaMobile has signed on as the first advertiser. A 40-container advertising package is $1.2 million and the plan is to place the ad-covered containers in various locations in Shanghai and Beijing for 180 days.
In 2000 McDonald’s decided to diversify and bought the Boston Market (Chicken!) chain. The same initiative spurred investments in Chipotle Mexican Grill Inc., Donato’s Pizza and Fazoli’s Italian fast-food. But now the company is refocusing on its core burger business and Boston Market has just been sold to Sun Capital Partners who had also picked up the Fazoli’s stake. Chipotle was taken public in 2006 and McDonald’s divested its investment. Donato’s was sold back to its founders in 2003. Sun Capital Partners is a private investment firm whose other food holdings include Hickory Farms.
The Minnesota bridge tragedy prompted several Seattle locals to put fingers to keyboard and compose Letters to the Editor regarding our aging infrastructure. The list of expensive endeavors and proposals whose dollars are cited as being better spent on things like the aging 520 bridge and Alaskan Way Viaduct include: light rail, free health care to the children of illegal immigrants, “President Bush’s recent gift of $250 billion of our tax money to the richest 8,000 families”, the $30 million parking garage at Woodland Park Zoo, bicycle paths, a new arena for the Sonics, and, of course, the war.
In 1997 I was working for a little games company called Purple Moon, spun out of Paul Allen’s Interval Research. Our target market was girls aged 8-12. Those of us on the website team who’d already been interacting online for years saw and realized the potential for the community website that we were building, though much of the company’s marketing and mindshare was spent on computer games and merchandise. By the time the company went under there was a healthy community of young girls busily exchanging postcards and electronic treasures on purple-moon.com. Yesterday I got acquainted with Facebook, the community site that these same girls are likely using nowadays, and I found a delightful surprise. There’s a small Purple Moon group on Facebook. These young women, now of high school and college age have remembered the site as a significant enough part of their lives to form and find a group devoted to it. I joined the company hoping to make a difference in girls’ lives and never really believed I had done so, until now.
I’ve been a fan of the SimCity series ever since I found a copy of an original SimCity on a Macintosh I inherited at work in the 1990s. Creator Will Wright had trouble finding a publisher for SimCity back in the 1980s as the game was an oddity with no win-or-lose goals. He and Jeff Braun eventually founded Maxis to release SimCity. The Sim-franchise grew, reaching a pinnacle when The Sims became the best-selling PC game ever. The people-oriented Sims continues to grow with expansion packs and spin-offs. And now Will Wright is occupied with the ultimate life simulator, Spore. To continue SimCity, Maxis’ parent company EA (who acquired them in 1997) decided to hand the reins over to Tilted Mill Entertainment, creators of Caesar IV.
Tilted Mill took to heart the criticism that the SimCity sequels had become increasingly complex. They wanted to keep fun heart of the game while adding a new twist. But advance word of their reworking, called SimCity Societies, received profoundly negative reactions from SimCity fans. The problem? SimCity Societies is a “social engineering” game, not a city simulator. Gone are the planning of zones, laying of pipes, stringing of electrical wiring. Instead of watching buildings being built, you place them yourself and pick different “social energies” that guide how the city and its inhabitants develop. SimCity traditionalists would likely prefer that the game was just called SimSocieties. I wouldn’t mind if EA released the same ol’ SimCity gameplay with better graphics every few years, as unexciting as that may be for the marketing staff. SimCity Societies is scheduled to release in November. Even if the city simulator fans shun it, it could still find an audience in the vast Sims fanbase.
Friday Youtube 1980’s flashback fun (well, it’s not exactly the 1980s this time): In 1999 BBC2 broadcast a programme (that’s the British spelling) of their Songwriters Circle series featuring Graham Gouldman (of 10cc and numerous hit songs), Neil Finn (of Crowded House), and Roddy Frame (of Aztec Camera and, well, Roddy Frame!). With the help of acoustic guitars and each other, they served up a selection of their hits. And hopefully the BBC won’t yank them offa the Youtube.
Martha Stewart’s Turkey Hill residence, which featured prominently in her magazine and original TV series, finally sold in June after a year on the market. The four acres in Westport, Connecticut went for $6.7 million, asking price was just under $9 million. Meanwhile Stewart’s partnership with builders KB Home is turning out very well. The Twin Lakes development of Martha Stewart branded houses in Raleigh, North Carolina is selling faster than other neighborhoods. 800 people put their names on the waiting list after the original announcement. KB has 11 other communities in the area which average 6-10 homes sold each month. Twin Lakes is averaging 25 a month.
Speakers playing KING-FM, the local classical music station, are being installed at the Tacoma Mall Transit Center to reduce disorder at the covered bus stop. If drug dealers and loiterers are indeed less inclined to gather there, we may hear KING-FM piped at more bus stations in the area. The alternative would be to remove the covered stops, allowing Seattle weather to be a natural deterrent.
Seattle area residents have the Seafair airshow to look forward to this weekend, along with several I-90 bridge closings Thursday through Sunday to accomodate the Blue Angels. Following the crash and loss of Lt. Cmdr. Kevin Davis at an April airshow in South Carolina, the Blue Angels grounded themselves for 9 days and canceled a May appearance in Nebraska. They returned 3 weeks after the incident to perform in North Carolina on May 12. The solo position Davis held has been filled by a former member of the squad, one who holds a special fondness for Seafair. Lt. Cmdr. Craig Olson calls Kirkland, WA home and his local connection was always noted by the media in past appearances. The cause of the crash is still under investigation.
Jasper Fforde‘s latest releases are now available: “First Among Sequels” the next Thursday Next, and the trade paperback of “The Fourth Bear” nursery crime. For Seattle folks, he will be reading and signing at Third Place Books today. Megan of Not Martha was sweet enough to mail me a teaser packet she got from Penguin Books a few months back along with a copy of “Over Easy.” Fforde fills my sadly empty Douglas Adams humor gap, though they have very distinct styles.