Tag Archives: entertainment

Will Hollywood Be the Next Industry Consumed by the Internet?

As someone who recently turned the big 4-0, I can say that I have seen a lot of technology come and go in my time. I remember the days when families used to gather around a black and white TV, and you had to get up to change the channel. The stations would also shut off at night leaving you with the much-maligned test screens.

I am sure this sounds prehistoric to the YouTube generation, but it show how much things have changed in the past few decades. One of the biggest changes in the media industry over the past 20 years has been the radical reshaping of the music industry.  I have seen many changes in this medium over my life. I grew up with the record player and used to enjoy and cherish the artistic designs on those huge album covers. I then progressed to the tape, and watched the boom of portable music with the Walkman.

Watching technology change, reminds me of how each technological advancement has its own flaws. Continue reading

Media Disasters Prove that PR Professionals are Needed

Business man sitting before documents and phoningI often say that no one understands why a media relations representative is important until they are in the middle of a PR disaster. This realization is something that might be going through the mind of rap musician Wacka Flocka.

Mr. Flocka has recently become an Internet cause célèbre because of his less than inspiring interview on a BET show. During the show, Flocka stumbled and mumbled through his way through an interview and then dropped this gem. When asked about the November elections, he said, “Voting cool, voting good, … but I don’t know nothing about that s***!” (His words, not mine.)

There are so many things wrong with this media disaster. First of all, didn’t anybody prepare this guy for his interview, and didn’t anyone ask the interviewers what kind of questions they were going to focus on? And why would the interviewers ask a rapper, who can barely string together an intelligent sentence, what he thinks about the upcoming Mid-Terms? That’s like asking a vegan for directions to a good steak house. Continue reading

Bringing Back CB Slang: A short history of “What’s Your Twenty?” (and why you should care)

What’s your 20? I’m sure you’ve heard it a thousand times before – if you’re in the entertainment biz, you likely say it all the time – and if not, well, I bet you’re jealous of those of us who do. (In that “I want to feel like I’m on the Dukes of Hazzard!” sort of way….). It’s a cool phrase that’s part of American English and the name of my walkie-talkie rental company.   When I was researching its cultural history, I discovered a really interesting parallel between the language and traditions that grew out of CB radio culture and those that we are creating now as we navigate social media’s explosion.  While platforms change, our culture’s tendency to [r]evolve following the introduction of each new technology remains the same and is limited only by technology itself. Continue reading