The Digital Branding Iron: The Advertization of Me! Pt. 3

Part 3: “Me Today, Brand Tomorrow?”

“Playtime in the Playpen”

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There is no commercial message etched on our hearts, minds or digital DNA… yet. The situations and online contexts we find ourselves in, whether we acknowledge it or not,  subtly change our digital psyche.  The interspace of digital life stretches beyond our own digital reflections of ourselves.

It is impossible to be precious about our digital “selves” in the Me-Zone; all digital property and content is open to use by all and sundry, regardless of what the law may say. Our spiel,  in videos, words, sounds and pictures, reverberates and bounces off the social media/network walls on an endless journey of communal montage and re-use. However, this “commune” activity belies the fact that we’re intimately hooked on the exchange of direct transmissions. This “tiny” addictive detail is the Achilles heal of those would-be evangelical ad-messengers; plaguing them with an “ugly appendage” that alerts us to their “interventionist” shenanigans. This  “ugly appendage” is a price tag that shouts to us “gimme your cash!” and this message has unsurprisingly fallen on deaf ears; it’s obviously not the way to win “friends” and “followers”.

Traditionally, “commerce” just talks “at” us which used to be called “engaging with your audience”. Times and mediums have changed. “Commerce” has a serious vested interest in infiltrating our social circles and “socialising” with us but it needs a “vehicle” to do so. Marshall McLuhan‘s well worn motto “the medium is the message” still stands in the digital age with one significant difference in application; the message is interactive. Thus in order to harness the power of the digital age the “interactivity” of the “medium” has to be  exposed and exploited to produce the message; seemingly a concept more easily said than understood in the the commercial world of would-be ad-messengers.

What does it mean to let us be “interactive” with the message?  It means giving us a caged playpen to “interact” with and “play” in.

The Digital Branding Iron: The Advertization of Me! Pt. 2

Part 2: “The Quest for the Golden Ticket”

“Friends, Followers and sheeple, lend me your mouth…”

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Every avenue of communication is infiltrated by an annoying breed of particularly ugly  and insistent marketeers/advertisers; email with spam and social media with  Me-Zone career “personalities”. These Me-Zone attention-grabbers are the self-appointed equivalent of c-list celebrities. They loiter at every Me-Zone portal doing an oily “meet and greet” on the unsuspecting visitor to the chattering society of social media. One inadvertent, innocent click and before you know it you’re a “follower” listening to their incessant  verbiage;  the BS that’s disguised as “helpful” or “interesting” that drowns their screams of  “look at me, look at me!”.

These primping vanity cases are really just empty ad-space and their digital noise is a signpost to their “cuddly” cry for digital dollars. You’ll momentarily forget that these noisy billboards have no standards and you may as well be the lowest scum on earth. After all, they deny no one the “privilege” of listening to them; you’re only there to swell the ranks of their  “friends” and “follower” lists. These Me-Zone career “personalities” have “no choice” but to prime us and aggrandize themselves because they’re desperate. They need to “look popular”, it’s their job; a prerequisite for readying their nest for business, as they lay in wait for the corporate golden egg to splash down for  on-message capital delivery. After all, it’s just a numbers game; if they aren’t perceived to have a “big”  audience the juicy digital dollars are unlikely to follow. Eddie Bernays wouldn’t be surprised, as nothing much has changed since his time (and death) despite the world going digital. Even in the 1930′s, Bernays was busy manipulating the public and public opinion by the indirect use of third parties and third party “authorities” to deliver the spun message. The only thing that needs to settle down is who is going to be that “third party”; every marketeer, ad/pr agency/consultancy, geek, groupie and conceited human being is seemingly trying to win that golden ticket.

Me-Zone: The Hive-Mind of Digital Community

What am “I”?

Becoming “Me” in the Me-Zone-

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“Me” is on the mind of the “online” everyone. What does it mean to be “me” in the “Me-Zone”; the emergent “cloud-space” of TwitterFeed, MyFace and Youoogle etc? Maybe we’ll StumbleUpon it and Digg it? Maybe not. The Me-Zone quest is founded on our phenomenal ability to get outside ourselves and point at ourselves;  all we do is ask “Is that me? Is this me?” The age of mass comparison breeds a congenital dissatisfaction; a lack of “feel-good” about ourselves from birth; no one can be all things to themselves. Thus, we have “community”.

“I” have become the universal singular collective that everybody knows, wants to talk to but doesn’t understand. I am the new digitally social “me” and my “Me-Zone” desperately needs borders; hive mind “click-fit” identity needs to be defined, owned and signified. Why? Because we need it to function. It is “me” and I need it to shop, talk about shopping and then put down  hard earned cash and talk about what I’ve bought, so others can purchase too… but, of course, most of all I need it to “share” myself generously with the “huggy-world” community of everyone else. It is my passport into the “Me-Zone” of communal consciousness.

I am vicariously, through a fragmented digital “me”, being distributed, stored and accessed by others via servers across the world.  Each facet of “me” is expressed through mashup widgets that pipe “me” in to the Me-Zone; the more widgets connect me, the more the Me-Zone knows “me”.  The digital “me” is shared around, and

The Digital Branding Iron: The Advertization of Me! Pt. 1

Part 1: “Youoogle, MyFace & Me”

A Minor Prelude

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Have we fallen in love with the sound of our own “twittering”? Is digital communication becoming a way to avoid meaningful communication? Are we evolving into networked communities of narcissists; oozing self-promotion, self-publicity, reeking of advertising greenbacks and consumed with a zombie-hunger for celebrity. Are we witnessing the rise of the “vacuous online charlatan” ramming their self-interest down our throats with a brat-arrogance that screams for gratitude?

Who are these people that invade our space with the stench of their rotting conceit; the latest eau de parfum by Youoogle. Oops.. it’s us. It’s the “us” that wants to get on, who is dying to be a paid mouth piece or face of Greenbacks Inc. Okay, we’re prostituting our body parts in a less traditional way, but have we “rented” or “sold” out? How far do you go sticking your butt in the air before the logo is on your ass; permanantly branded (like an animal) and belonging to the company (that does no evil)?

But… what’s wrong with that?

Everybody’s got to make a living.. yeh, of course, but, surely, we don’t all need to be in advertising, pr and marketing. Are we becoming the networked communities of social advertisers to each other? Are we projectile vomiting at each other every time we speak because each word of value is laced with an ad/pr/marketing message? It seems the two are becoming one, we will “communi-advercate”, avidly read “advert-newsments”, get a university “edu-dorsement” , enjoy streaming “advertainment” and intimately “public-relate”? Will all our communication be accompanied by a “para-text” of advertising/pr? Are we moving from “pop culture” to a pr-primed “ad culture”.  It’s a fun idea to run with but more likely it’s just a phase we’re all going through; advertising is unlikely to evolve in quite such a blantantly entertaining fashion; the ad/pr/marketing savvy boys and girls aren’t that daft… but they’re not necessarily genii either..

The question is “how smart are we and what do we want?”… collectively.