AAN News
Summer Movies Include Drama Set in Baptist High Schoolnew
One of this summer's new movies is Brian Dannelly's "Saved!", which is about a girl's self-defeating attempt to seduce her gay boyfriend into being heterosexual. East Bay Express reviewer Melissa Levine describes the film as "an amusing if facile comedy about a good Christian girl gone wrong." Although the story fell flat for her, it inspired Scott Martineau of Boston's Weekly Dig. He calls "Saved!" "a brilliant satire of evangelical Christians" and "an extremely smart film." Read different takes on films by reviewers at alt-weeklies across the U.S. and Canada in the Movies section of AltWeeklies.com.
Report: TV Advertising Doesn't Worknew
In a study sure to be controversial, Deutsche Bank says TV ads don't work for mature package good brands. The study, released on the eve of the TV buying upfront, examined 23 household, personal-care, food and beverage brands using customized marketing-mix analysis from Information Resources Inc. It found only 18% generated a positive return on investment (ROI) in the short term (a year or less) from TV advertising. Less than half (45%) saw their TV investment pay off long term.
Advertising Age |
05-28-2004 11:04 am |
Industry News
Help Wanted Index Dipsnew
The Conference Board reported Thursday that its help-wanted index dropped one point for the month of April to 38. The index for March was 39. For the same period last year, the index stood at 37.
Editor & Publisher |
05-28-2004 10:49 am |
Industry News
Columnist Says Editor's Move to Tabloid TV Is Perfect Mergernew
Outgoing Cleveland Free Times editor-in-chief David Eden used to work for Barney, the purple dinosaur, Connie Schultz reports in The Plain Dealer. Schultz takes issue with reporting in the alt-weekly's "The Nose," which Eden described to her as "a snarky gossip column," and with news coverage at Channel 19, where Eden will soon become managing editor. But, she writes, "a guy who used to cavort with Barney can't be all bad."
The Plain Dealer |
05-28-2004 8:56 am |
Industry News
Experimental Composer's Music Released 30 Years after His Deathnew
In 1974, obscure composer/performer Rodd Keith fell to his death from an L.A. freeway overpass in a drug-addled haze. Tzadik Records has just released "Ecstacy to Frenzy," a compilation of Keith's previously unreleased studio tracks. One track is like "hallucinogenic funeral-parlor music," Sara Bir reports in the North Bay Bohemian. She recommends the intriguing release for "complete music dorks only." Read this and other reviews of the works of musicians both famous and obscure in the Music section of AltWeeklies.com, the Association of Alternative Newsweeklies' new Web site.
Chef Boy Ari Covers Unexplored Aspects of Foodnew
Julia Child never took aspiring cooks to the places where Missoula Independent food columnist Chef Boy Ari, aka Ari LeVaux, does. Here he speaks of his guide to finding morels, Black Dog: "He flipped to a photo of a sinister looking blood-red bolete. Boletus satanas. He looked at me and raised his eyebrows. ‘Would you eat that?'" Discover Ari's column, "Flash in the Pan," in the Culture section of the Association of Alternative Newsweeklies' new Web site, AltWeeklies.com.
The Boston Phoenix Offers Text-Messaging Flirtation Servicenew
The alt-weekly has been advertising a text-messaging application known as txt2flirt, which is intended to appeal especially to young adults, Jennifer Saba reports in Editor & Publisher. Those who register can ask to be matched with someone else nearby and then tap out messages to communicate with a prospective friend or date. Each message costs 50 cents to send, and a share of the resulting income goes to the paper. The company that develops and handles the technology, g8wave, is a division of Tele-Publishing International, which is a division of Phoenix Media/Communications Group. The group owns The Boston Phoenix.
Editor & Publisher |
05-26-2004 10:33 am |
Industry News
Columns in Alt-Weeklies Range from Haiku News to Techsploitsnew
At Metro Silicon Valley, Annalee Newitz writes her Techsploits column on the way technology affects society. In a recent column, she notes the trend of going into security work, which calls to mind engineers' rush into the defense industry in the 1980s. At NUVO in Indianapolis, managing editor Jim Poyser condenses the week's news into manageable 17-syllable haiku. And Bill Cope, in his One Angry Man column for Boise Weekly, heaps contempt on whatever gets in his way. Find links to some of these writers' recent columns in the Opinion section of AltWeeklies.com.
Big Advertisers Now Tuning Out TVnew
The new reality of TV is that many of the country's biggest advertisers, including Coca-Cola, General Motors, and Procter & Gamble, are finding alternative ways to put their goods and their messages in front of consumers, and they're doing it with some of the money that used to pay for prime-time television commercials. Revlon is running minimovies in theaters, American Express airs short films on its Web site, and General Motors' Hummer H2 gets almost as much face time as the crime specialists on CSI: Miami . In a March survey of the Association of National Advertisers, more than 40 percent of those asked said they planned to move part of their next-year ad budgets to other outlets, such as the Internet, outdoor advertising, product placement, cable, and special events.
U.S. News & World Report |
05-25-2004 9:13 am |
Industry News
Ad Industry Recovery Now in Full Swingnew
Marketing budgets are finally showing signs of life as the economy rebounds
San Francisco Chronicle |
05-25-2004 9:03 am |
Industry News
More Men Flocking to Women's Footballnew
Now that there are 37 teams in the National Women's Football League, the sport is attracting a larger audience, 45 percent of it male. Cleveland Scene's Rebecca Meiser follows the Cleveland Fusion team and talks to the women's fans. Hers is one of the recent stories posted in the Culture section of AltWeeklies.com.
Athens Weekly News Becomes Free Tabloidnew
Last August, the former executive editor of Flagpole Magazine, an AAN member paper in Athens, Ga., started a subscription-based newsletter. That fast-growing newsletter, the Athens Weekly News, just made its re-debut as a free weekly tabloid. Editor and publisher Brad Aaron announced the change in his op-ed column May 21. The Weekly News will continue to concentrate on local news but will also offer more in-depth news stories, a bigger opinion section, an expanded events calendar with music listings, arts coverage and a classified ads section.
Athens Weekly News |
05-24-2004 7:28 pm |
Industry News
Tags: Brad Aaron
Artvoice.com Distinguishes Itself with Media-Rich Content
When he decided to upgrade the Web site of his Buffalo, N.Y., alternative weekly, Artvoice publisher Jamie Moses pulled out all the stops. The result is not a simple Web version of the paper, spiced up with a few online gimmicks. It's a media-rich environment, where visitors can watch interviews of the top players in local disputes, check out the latest songs by Buffalo area musicians and get a glimpse of the restaurants they might want to patronize. Artvoice.com debuts this week.
(FULL STORY)
Amy Souza |
05-24-2004 12:07 pm |
Industry News
Networks Debate Age Groups' Value to Advertisersnew
The difference between 18- to 49-year-olds and 25- to 54-year-olds is much more than just a few years. The conventional wisdom in the advertising and television industries is that 18-to-49 is the "money" demographic; that they're the viewers that advertisers want most to reach because they have disposable income and are not yet locked into product loyalty. They are also the hardest to reach, in that they -- particularly young men -- watch less television. For years, NBC -- thanks to "Friends" and other youthful comedies -- has owned the 18-to-49 demographic. But now CBS, which steadily has been eating away at NBC's lead among younger viewers, is making the case that slightly older viewers actually are more important to advertisers. Not surprisingly, CBS has long held the lead in the 25-to-54 age group.
Washington Post |
05-24-2004 11:53 am |
Industry News
Ad Biggies Embrace New Magazine Researchnew
Media shops handling the two biggest print advertisers--General Motors and Procter & Gamble--have quietly signed up to use controversial new magazine audience research that will tell them not just how many people read the magazines they plan and buy, but also what their emotional connections are with the titles and their content. The research is controversial because some of the biggest magazine publishing groups are concerned that the data may destabilize the dominant market positions their publications have enjoyed on the basis of the traditional magazine industry currency, Mediamark Research Inc.'s (MRI) audience estimates.
Media Daily News |
05-24-2004 11:44 am |
Industry News
