Featured Writers

Since 2010, I have been speaking about what I see as three new consumer economic trends that will alter consumer behavior in the developed countries of the world. A number of aligning forces are significantly increasing the influence and impact of these three trends. In a recent column, I wrote about Conscious Capitalism, one of Continue Reading →

Everywhere I look, Millennials are under attack. A recent front cover of ‘Time’ magazine declared Millennials the ‘ME ME ME’ generation. The writer, Joel Stein (a Gen Xer), notes that the Millennial rate of narcissistic personality disorder is nearly three times higher than the generation 65 or older. Then I stumbled across a column by career advice expert Continue Reading →

The broadcast and cable TV networks have wrapped up their spring narcissistic extravaganzas that try to seduce TV buyers to invest their ad dollars in programming that will appear next fall. The upfronts are a buggy-whip-technology-like annual ritual that each year are variously predicted: 1) To be the last upfront we’ll ever see, 2) to Continue Reading →

Every marketer is looking for the secret sauce that will help them create buzz. “The pressure to create ‘viral’ advertising, the urge to get more views online, that leads people to push the envelope,” said the president and chief creative officer at Grey New York in a recent New York Times article. Only a few fortunate Continue Reading →

Allow me to start with a personal declaration: As a media researcher who has tracked the word of mouth generated by many advertising campaigns, I am excited by the impending launch of social TV ratings. Slated to come on stream in Q4 this year, social TV ratings should catapult the concept of TV audience ratings Continue Reading →

In Shelly’s awesome post on 3D printing,he hints at a future where spare parts will live on files and not shelves. It completely upsets our notion of manufacturing, where commodities are tangible objects. Physical would become virtual. The question would then become: open-source or closed-source? What’s the Difference? Open-source software and application-development tools are available Continue Reading →

If you want someone to reply to your email, make it sad. According to a recent study by Contactually, a software firm, people respond to depressing emails at a high rate. Ones with an upbeat or neutral tone? Eh, who needs ‘em? Emotion aside, solid email etiquette is invaluable for young professionals. How we handle even the Continue Reading →

Futurist Paul Saffo may have been the first to proclaim the PC dead back in 1991. Six years later, PC Week editor John Dodge refuted Saffo’s position, claiming the PC was not dead and that it “will be with us a long time.” Ironically, these two were on the front lines of a more than Continue Reading →

After months of people yelling at them to increase security, Twitter finally began to roll out two-step verification for its accounts on Wednesday. To ensure that your account is protected, you should enable two-step verification immediately. It only takes about two minutes, and all you need is a cell phone. What is Two-Step Verification? Two-step Continue Reading →

During sales training with Procter and Gamble many years ago, my trainer told me to “shut up” after asking for the order. I remember thinking that it sounded simple. But when the person across the table from me sat quietly after my next presentation, the silence was painful. I broke down after about 30 seconds Continue Reading →