I think this is probably my favorite story of the week – this homeless dude has been collecting money at some intersection in Ohio with a sign saying that he has “the God Given Gift of Voice.” Apparently he’s a former radio/voice-over guy who hit hard times with drugs and alcohol a couple of years ago, but has been trying ever since to get his life back. Well, a photographer from the Columbus Dispatch shot a video of him one day, the video ended up on YouTube, and within a matter of days the guy’s life has flipped 180 degrees…
Some 14 million views later, Ted Williams spent the last half of this week making appearances on TV, radio, getting reunited with his 90 year-old mother, and after a flood of job offers, last I could follow it sounded like he was going to take a job announcing and doing other work for the Cleveland Cavaliers, who offered him a full-time job and a house! The videos are numerous at this point, but he’s just such a humble guy – talk about a nice, feel-good story to kick off the new year!
And it was all thanks to the Internet – who knew?!
…
That said, the only negative thing to say about this story is that the Columbus Dispatch made a really bonehead move as far as this video was concerned because about three days after it went viral and had millions of hits, they filed a DMCA claim with YouTube to have it removed for copyright infringement. The video above is actually a repost that they did on a newly-created channel of their own, and I guess my big beef with the whole thing is just how out of touch is proves that at least one person in their newsroom is. I’m not debating their right to remove the video – that’s certainly how copyright works, but doesn’t necessarily mean that it was the right thing to do.
Notice how the “official video” only has a couple of hundred views, tops … whereas the original video had upwards of 14 million. Now I’m sure what happened here is someone from the Dispatch saw those numbers and said, “Why aren’t we getting any of those hits?!” Even though the video listed them as the creator and even had a link in the description, they probably figured that it would better affect them if the video was on a channel of their own instead of the random guy who ripped it from dispatch.com. As a result, however, not only was the huge view count and all of the comment history lost when the original video was removed, but it also killed all of the links that blogs and various news organizations had been linking to, thus making it harder for people to find the actual story.
Sure, their claim was that they had no intention of preventing people from seeing the video, but their short-sightedness resulted in just that nonetheless. Because let’s face it – this video didn’t go viral by people flocking to dispatch.com to see it … it exploded when somebody posted it to YouTube – a site with a little more global reach than a newspaper’s website targeting Columbus, Ohio! Had they pulled this stunt earlier, it may not even had made its rounds at all, and Ted Williams would still be out panhandling instead of getting the second chance that he deserves. On top of that, now the video has been copied more than ever on YouTube and they’ve got a whole slew of angry commenters pointing out the arrogance of their decision.
I guess it’s just disappointing that amidst this great round of publicity that the Dispatch could brag they started (which apparently they have been doing anyways), such a knee-jerk reaction proves just how bad old media still doesn’t get how popularity works on the Internet. You don’t get to pick what’s popular on the Internet – all you can do is be thankful when something appeals to the masses, and if you try to interfere with that process the Internet, it will bite back. Of course, if they had been on the ball and posted their content to YouTube in the first place instead of keeping things on their little newspaper website like every other old media company…
One Block Off the Grid: Bulk solar, tell your friends
http://news.cnet.com/8301-11128_3-10450956-54.html
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704541004574600381410694794.html
I enjoyed this story for a couple of reasons: a) I enjoy hearing executives talk like morons; b) I’m not an AT&T customer!
I mean, really, what better way to embrace this exciting, always-connected world than by saying, “Hey guys, we’ll make it worth your while if you could just go play in the park or something…” Not for nothing, but how can you be in a pissing match with Verizon right now about who has better coverage and the best network when you’re also asking people not to use yours?!
I guess this shouldn’t be too surprising because in the same quotes they’re also vehemently denying tiered pricing while simultaneously mentioning “incentives” for customers to use less data. Unless they’re giving away kittens to anyone use stays under 500 MB, regular pricing less discounts for minimal usage is the exact same thing as tiered pricing in my book.
P.S. Bonus points to the Wall Street Journal for having the most asinine filtering methods ever – I just love how clicking the link above will take you to a preview / Subscribe Today! page, while typing “AT&T to Urge Customers to Take Data Traffic Off Wireless Network” into Google and following that link gives you the full article. But Rupert hates him some Google for stealing his revenuez…
Fox to Remove Special Features From Rental DVDs
http://www.slashfilm.com/2009/03/12/fox-to-remove-special-features-from-rental-dvds/
One thought – why???
Clearly it can’t save them any money, and will in fact no doubt cost more because now they have to have their facilities crank out two different copies of each disc – one for retail and one for the rental market. And they’re not saving cash by only kinda filling the actual discs.
Simply put – this is a ridiculous plan and after enough fan outrage / bad press / further declining sales as a result, whoever is to be blamed for this brilliant idea will get fired.
Or possibly promoted, if past experience is any guide… 
And the funny part is, I doubt very many people actually even watch special features anymore – it’s just that this is going to generate bad press anyways because I’ll guarantee that they aren’t planning on cutting prices to make feature-less DVDs more affordable to the rental outlets to help “save” the rental industry!
One Tank of Gas Costs Spokane Man $81 Billion
http://www.curiousread.com/2009/03/one-tank-of-gas-costs-spokane-man-81.html
I don’t know if it’s funny or scary that the very first person who he talked to didn’t question that $81 billion was a bit too much to pay for pretty much any consumer transaction, as if they see charges in the 11-figure range go through every day! Go go, customer service…
LOL – it gets even better!
http://blog.chryslerllc.com/blog.do?id=566&p=entry
Somebody at Chrysler must’ve said, “We have to respond to all of this Internet criticism – get the PR people on this immediately!“
Unfortunately, what followed is the typical we’re not actually responding to your comments, corporate-type response that you would only expect from a company who doesn’t want to admit that they’re out of touch. “Thank you for your interest in our Company…” says it all.
This is why dinosaurs shouldn’t try to get involved with online media unless they truly understand it. At least with their ridiculous newspaper ad or even a press release, they could send it out and forget about it. Blogs warrant comments, and these cats clearly aren’t very good at thinking on their feet…
Chrysler probably made a mistake by posting their “thank you” note to the company blog and then opening the post up for comments.
http://blog.chryslerllc.com/blog.do?id=564&p=entry
I’ve got to say that I share the sentiment because I own a Chrysler car myself and after all of the nonsense that I’ve gone through begging them to cover something under their factory warranty (which they never ended up doing – the car is still malfunctioning), it’ll be the last Chrysler vehicle that I ever purchase. I’m sorry if it affects a lot of jobs, but this is a company that deserves to fail because of a poor business model, a horrendous lack of customer service, and a downright arrogant attitude across the industry as a whole.
I think I liked the comments requesting for the resignation of their senior management the most. Granted, it’ll never actually happen, but if you had to hold somebody accountable for horrible business practices, that’s probably the best place to start.
Thief Gets His Own Billboard After Robbing Advertising Agency
http://arbroath.blogspot.com/2008/11/thief-gets-his-own-billboard-after.html
Where’s the Pets.com Sock Puppet’s Bailout?
http://www.boingboing.net/2008/12/01/wheres-sock-puppets.html
American Airlines Now Charging Fees to Non-Passengers
http://www.theonion.com/content/news/american_airlines_now_charging
