April 2008: Latinos

websites to watch - latinos

Latino.Myspace
The year-old MySpace Latino has largely been a translation of MySpace's English-language site into Spanish. Beginning in April, MySpace will unveil content geared to one of the fastest-growing groups online and expand its offerings for Latinos, adding eight bilingual communities focused on bands and celebrities, soccer and other interests.

MyGrito
MyGrito.com, the fastest growing Latino social networking site has turned one. MyGrito.com is a bilingual online center of communication, information and entertainment for the Latino community. It is the only Latino social networking site that embraces three languages effectively: Spanish, English and Spanglish.

Impre
Traditional media publisher, ImpreMedia this month announced the launch of impre.com, a portal it hopes will become the number one destination for the 44 million strong Latino market. The impre.com site will bring together ImpreMedia’s portfolio of publications, including La Opinión, La Vibra and the United States first Spanish language newspaper El Diario La Prensa.

 
websites to watch - general

Muxtape
The digital equivalent of the bulky mix tape from the late 80’s and early 90’s. Touted by users for its ease of use and simple outlay, the site is rapidly gaining a devoted following.

Flickr
Flickr is not new, it has been a virtual repository for digital photos since 2004 – hosting more than 2 billion photos. But the site has recently added digital video uploads and looks to future entrench itself as the go-to destination for personal archiving.

Social Thing
This new application enables users to stay on top of all their online social networks via one portal. While it's certainly not the first such aggregator, tech experts are calling it the best in its class.

 
blog trends

Videogum.com
Videogum.com is the new companion site to Stereogum, the blog founded by Scott Lapatine in 2003. While Stereogum is devoted exclusively to music, Videogum offers commentary on movies, TV, original Web programming, viral videos, games, and other things you watch on a screen.

Presidential Watch 2008
Presidential Watch 2008 is a non-partisan website that tracks public consciousness via the blogosphere. The site includes a map that identifies the 292 most influential sites in regards to the race, as well as a blog that periodically uses tracking and stats from across the web to offer analysis of the candidates' current standings.

 
technology trends

Intel Makes a Push Into Pocket-Size Internet Devices
Intel plans to proclaim Wednesday in Shanghai that the next big thing in consumer gadgets will be the "Internet in your pocket." more info

Camera Translates Foreign Text in Photos
Nokia has just showcased a nifty mobile translator cameraphone application called Shoot-to-Translate. The intent is to ease the lives of busy travelers trying to read signs and news in foreign lands. You see a sign or other text in Chinese, take a clear picture, and presto! you've got the English version.

Univision / CNET Tecnologìa
CNET, where people go to discover the latest in technology and consumer electronics information, and Univision Online, Inc., the interactive division of Univision Communications Inc., today announced a new Spanish-language technology mini-site available at Univision.com (keyword: Tecnologia). The new partnership provides users with hundreds of product reviews, breaking news about technology, and original videos that help Spanish-speakers navigate and learn about today’s digital world.

 
marketing - latinos focused

Latino DVD Market Poised for Growth
Nielsen Media Research says one in five Latinos in the United States is under age 12. The heads of Latino households are generally younger than those of non-Latinos. And for three straight years, the number of foreign-born heads of Latino households has declined. Marketing Latino DVDs is definitely becoming a different ballgame. more info

Research: Report: McD's, Pepsi Score Best With Young Hispanics
Gen Y Latinos Prefer Brands that Cater to Their Dual Cultures
To reach Hispanic Gen Yers, marketing strategies should reflect their "bi-dentity," according to a new report. One in five U.S. teens is Hispanic, but despite that size, the ethnic audience often proves elusive to many marketers. more info

New Tool Gauges Hispanic Ads’ Effectiveness
Univision Communications on Wednesday unveiled a new research tool that it developed in conjunction with Nielsen, which it plans to use in this year's upfront to sell advertisers on the benefits of advertising on its Hispanic broadcast network. more info

A Marketing Puzzle In Any Language
Media Companies Use English, with a Spanish Accent, to Reach a Growing Bilingual Audience
Eighteen-year-old Brian Morales represents a growing segment of America that baffles advertisers, broadcast networks and cable channels. The Santa Monica College freshman listens to Metallica and Linkin Park on his iPod. He also likes rock en espanol such as La Ley and Mana. His favorite TV show is the sci-fi drama "Heroes" on NBC and he tunes in to Univision to watch news and soccer with his dad. He's equally at ease in English and Spanish. "My culture is not ordinary. It's mixed," Morales said. "I am Hispanic but I do have my American culture." This cultural fusion is becoming an increasingly typical demographic. more info

 
interesting articles - latinos

Are Chicanos the same as Mexicans?
A brief introduction into the various terms used to designate the greater Latino population and their political and social inferences. more info

U.S. Latino Population Projected To Soar
Forecast Predicts Tripling by 2050
The number of Hispanics in the United States will triple by 2050 and represent nearly 30 percent of the population if current trends continue, according to a report released yesterday. more info

 
interesting articles - general

Is the Ad a Success? The Brain Waves Tell All
Never mind brainstorms. These days, Madison Avenue is all about brain waves. That may be overstated, but it is no exaggeration that agencies and advertisers are growing more interested in neuroscience in their never-ending efforts to improve effectiveness. The ardor of the ad business to adopt the technical tools of biometrics — measuring brain waves, galvanic skin response, eye movements, pulse rates and the like — is increasing as consumer spending, the engine of the American economy, slows. more info

'Green Gridlock' at Trademark Office
Eco-Friendly Brands Become a Hot Commodity
Getting ready well in advance for today's Earth Day events, marketers bombarded the Patent and Trademark Office last year for green-themed marks, leading to a 10% spike in trademark filings over 2006, according to a report released by the law firm Dechert. more info

Marketers Find a Sound That Draws a Crowd
In cartoons, the Road Runner goes “Beep, beep.” On Madison Avenue, the popular onomatopoeia is pronounced “Bleep, bleep.” Advertisers are winking at the contentious issue of content regulation by using bleeping sounds in commercials and video clips. The bleeps mimic how television and radio obscure bad language in live news coverage or taped reality shows. Many times, the bleeps heard in commercials are covering actual expletives, which are written into the scripts solely to be censored. more info

Ahead of the Trends
In the Internet era, keeping up - with the Joneses, the news or whatever else - is a lot easier than it used to be. But staying ahead of the pack, at a time when bloggers and social networking sites can spread word of a trend in Buenos Aires to Boston or Bangkok within minutes? That is the new challenge more info

Intel Makes a Push Into Pocket-Size Internet Devices
The New York Times
April 2, 2008

Intel plans to proclaim Wednesday in Shanghai that the next big thing in consumer gadgets will be the ''Internet in your pocket.''

The challenge for the giant chip maker will be to prove that it is not too late to a market that has rapidly become the hottest spot in the consumer electronics business in a post-PC era.

At a developer event in China, the company, based in Santa Clara, Calif., will display a range of wireless Internet devices that Intel believes will fill a gap between smartphones and laptops. The company is hoping to capitalize on the success that Apple has had with its iPhone, which is one of the most popular mobile Web smartphones.

Intel is calling the new computers Mobile Internet Devices, or MIDs, and claims that it will have a significant advantage over makers of chips for cellphones because the Intel version will be highly compatible with the company's laptop and desktop processors for which most Web software is written today.

The first generation of Intel's MID technology will be aimed at data, not voice communications, leaving the company out of the market for smartphones. That has not damped the enthusiasm of Intel executives who foresee a proliferation of devices ranging from advanced ultracompact laptops to small, tablet-size devices that will be used for browsing the Web, navigation and Internet chat, rather than voice communications.

''What enables the innovation is the ability to bring over all the existing PC applications,'' said Anand Chandrasekher, general manager of the company's Ultra Mobility Group.

The weak link in the Intel strategy is that voice communication remains a significant factor for consumers choosing to buy hand-held devices.

Intel backed out of the cellphone market two years ago when it sold its Xscale microprocessor business to the Marvell Technology Group. Intel then set out on an ambitious redesign project for ultralow-power versions of its PC-oriented X86 chips. The current system requires two chips, one for the processor and one for peripherals. It will take the company another technology generation to place everything on a single chip.

That leads some analysts to believe that the company's real breakthrough will not come until 2009 or 2010, when a new processor, now code-named Moorestown, arrives.

''We're pretty bullish on it with some qualifications,'' said Van L. Baker, a research vice president at the Gartner Group, a market research firm. ''We don't believe they get there in a significant way until the next generation of technology.''

Meanwhile, Intel's strategy is moving the company toward a direct confrontation with Qualcomm, the San Diego-based chip maker that is also trying to deliver the wireless Internet on hand-held devices. The company, which refers to its strategy as ''pocketable computing,'' is offering a competing chip that offers lower power consumption and which is aimed for devices that blend voice and Internet data.

''We need to deliver an Internet experience that is like the desktop,'' said Sanjay Jha, Qualcomm's chief operating officer. ''People are used to the Internet, and you can't shortchange them.''

The new Intel mobile Internet strategy takes advantage of the company's Atom microprocessor, which was announced in early March. The Atom will have performance roughly equivalent to laptop computers introduced four years ago, but will use little more than a half-a-watt to two-and-a-half watts of battery power. That is significantly lower than the 35 watts of power consumed by the company's state-of-the-art microprocessors in today's laptops.

The new MIDs, which are scheduled to begin showing up in consumer electronics outlets in June, are the clearest evidence to date of the effort that Intel has made since its chief executive, Paul Otellini, set the company on a low-power strategy in 2005. In interviews, Intel executives said that the company was slightly ahead of the commitment Mr. Otellini made to bring out a line of lower-power processors before the end of the decade.

Complicating life for Intel is the fact that the chip maker is locked out of the low-power cellphone and smartphone marketplace, which today is entirely based on microprocessor chips made by designs licensed from the British design firm ARM Ltd. to companies like Qualcomm.

More than 10 billion ARM chips have been sold by more than 200 licensees, and ARM now says that more than eight million chips a day are being used in cellphones, smartphones and a wide range of hand-held consumer products.

Until recently, early efforts by the PC industry to create so-called palmtop PCs, such as the Microsoft-inspired Ultra-Mobile PCs, have failed to find a broad consumer audience. Indeed, the entire P.D.A., or personal digital assistant, market is all but dead as many of its functions were overtaken by the smartphone.

However, the category showed renewed signs of life last year when Asus, a Taiwanese equipment maker, made a name for itself by introducing the Eee PC, a two-pound Linux-based laptop that sells for $400.

Now many of the mainstream PC makers are rushing to introduce similar laptops that fall well below the traditional PC laptop price, but allow Web surfing and many basic computing tasks. There is also renewed interest among consumer electronics makers in devices that are neither laptops or cellphones.

Introducing products at the Intel event in Shanghai will be Asus, BenQ, Clarion, Fujitsu, Gigabyte, Lenovo, LG-E, NEC, Panasonic, Samsung, Sharp, Toshiba, WiBrain and Usi. Intel has also distanced itself from its traditionally close relationship with Microsoft and Windows by striking up a new partnership with Ubuntu and Red Flag, two distributors of Linux software for consumer markets.

"Think of it as, 'honey I shrunk the PC,'" said Richard Doherty, president of Envisioneering, a consumer electronics market research and consulting firm. ''Intel is betting that this will be a win in China, which already has the world's largest mobile phone market and therefore influences the rest of the world market.''

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Latino DVD Market Poised for Growth
Home Media Magazine
April 8, 2008

Nielsen Media Research says one in five Latinos in the United States is under age 12. The heads of Latino households are generally younger than those of non-Latinos. And for three straight years, the number of foreign-born heads of Latino households has declined.

Marketing Latino DVDs is definitely becoming a different ballgame.

Studios, filmmakers and consumers gathered April 8 for Home Media Magazine’s Fifth Annual Latino DVD Conference to discuss the challenges and opportunities in Latino entertainment.

“Basically, we’re looking at half the population (being) ‘Spanish dominant,’” said, Doug Darfield, SVP of multicultural measurement for Nielsen Media Research, referring to the main language spoken in the household. “In 14.1% of households in the U.S., only Spanish is spoken.” The top five markets for Spanish-speaking households are Los Angeles, New York, Miami-Ft. Lauderdale, Houston and Chicago, he said.

Latino households in the U.S. are a bit behind the rest of the nation when it comes to DVD-player penetration, but ahead of non-Latinos when it comes to owning video games, Darfield added. Latinos lag behind non-Latinos in using the Internet, but rent more DVDs and subscribe to video game services more than non-Latinos.

That’s just some of the data studios and independents need to have at the ready when marketing to Latinos, Darfield said.

“When a Latino film comes out … I see it almost as reintroducing ourselves to the market,” said David Hernandez, director of multicultural marketing for Warner Home Video.

Content owners need to think hard about their Spanish-speaking audience when it comes to marketing a DVD, panelists agreed. What works for the large Mexican population on the West Coast may not work as well with Puerto Ricans on the East Coast.

“It’s also diverse in age,” said Monica Ricardez, director of market and business development for Laguna Productions, adding three generations of Latinos often have to be considered. “It’s not just diverse in culture. You sometimes need to separate different types of (product) when doing marketing.

“Act national, but also as regional as you can.”

Getting Latino content to Latino consumers can be a challenge, however, especially when retailers largely treat Latino DVD as a stepchild to mainstream theatrical and TV DVD.

“That’s one weakness they have,” said Haydee Rios with Xenon Pictures. “They’re not promoting their Latino sections yet.”

“They are evaluating the Latino section they created a few years ago,” said Victor Elizalde with Maya Entertainment, of one of the major chain retailers. “They’re asking ‘Are you holding your own with this space? If not, we’re going to take it out.’”

Which makes the idea of releasing Spanish-language films on Blu-ray Disc an even riskier idea, panelists agreed. “Doing something BD is not inexpensive, for us or for the retailer,” Warner’s Hernandez said.

If the big-box retailers aren’t giving Latino DVD its due, smaller brick-and-mortar stores and digital distribution channels are the way to go for now.

“Mom and pop shops have a lot more movies that you won’t find in the big stores,” said Ruby Cardenas, a consumer who shared her thoughts on Latino DVD with the audience. And with the Latino population in the United States getting younger and more tech-savvy, it may be only a matter of time before they start looking for their Latino content mainly through the Internet and video-on-demand.

“We’re looking at a generation of people …. who are growing up with the Internet,” said filmmaker Anayansi Prado. “The Internet, it’s the next wave for distribution for really getting the work out there.”

But getting a Latino-centered digital distribution model set up is proving more difficult than for mainstream films. A bilingual movie Internet site, www.butaca.com, is launching in May, but the kinks are still being worked out, said site co-founder Pedro Alonzo.

“Really what we’re trying to do is create a sustainable model to wait it out while the consumer (catches on),” he said. “If you look at what Comcast delivers (on demand) in Spanish, it’s a joke.

Starrett Berry, VP of distribution for bilingual LATV Networks said: “We don’t look at it as the Latino market. We look at it as a segment of the youth market.”

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Research: Report: McD's, Pepsi Score Best With Young Hispanics
Gen Y Latinos Prefer Brands that Cater to Their Dual Cultures
Brandweek
April 21, 2008

To reach Hispanic Gen Yers, marketing strategies should reflect their "bi-dentity," according to a new report.

One in five U.S. teens is Hispanic, but despite that size, the ethnic audience often proves elusive to many marketers.

Unlike previous generations, today's young Latinos "literally have one foot in each culture," describing themselves as Hispanic (56%) versus Latino (19%) or American (11%) because "Hispanic" seems more modern and relevant, per the study. More than 1,000 Hispanics ages 14-24 were polled online and in-person between Nov. 30 and Dec. 20.

"It's a mix-and-match lifestyle . . . It's the same as the person who orders a hamburger, but with jalapeños," said Christy Haubegger, brand manager at Creative Artists Agency, Los Angeles, which co-authored the report with The Intelligence Group, a research firm in New York.

The brands "that do the best job of creating products and services for Latinos like me" include McDonald's, Pepsi, Univision and Rocawear (see chart).

Pepsi, for example, has made a significant push in music programming since it's such an integral part of the Hispanic and youth cultures, said Martha Bermudez, senior manager of multicultural marketing at Pepsi-Cola North America, Purchase, N.Y.

Earlier this year, Pepsi partnered with Yahoo! Telemundo to launch PepsiMusica, a bilingual entertainment program.

"It's important for us to reach young Latinos with messaging that is relevant and authentic because obviously they are the future for us," said Bermudez.

Fifty-eight percent of respondents said they have a strong connection with Latino culture. Making family proud (84%) was the top life expectation followed by excelling at my career (83%).

When asked what percentage of the U.S. population is Hispanic, Latino youth participating in the study overwhelmingly said 40%—the figure is closer to 15%, according to the U.S. Census. "Culturally they feel like they are responsible for 40% of America," said Haubegger. "That's a great opportunity for marketers because young Latinos feel influential. Let them be influencers. "

Hispanics are especially interested in having their voices heard online. MySpace and YouTube were voted the hottest brands. The vast majority (88%) have a profile at an online networking site.

Another trend is the emergence of neo-feminist Latinas. Many of today's generation are the first young women in their families to have careers, not just jobs, Haubegger said. "For marketers, there's an opportunity to tap the young empowered Latina with messaging that recognizes this potentially lucrative market . . . This is not your mother's Hispanic market."

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New Tool Gauges Hispanic Ads’ Effectiveness
Hollywood Reporter
April 9, 2008

Univision Communications on Wednesday unveiled a new research tool that it developed in conjunction with Nielsen, which it plans to use in this year's upfront to sell advertisers on the benefits of advertising on its Hispanic broadcast network.

Called the Nielsen Homescan Fusion Project, data from the service, which will be made available to all clients, aims to show how spending ad dollars on Hispanic television can improve an advertiser's return on investment.

"We are hoping this will be a tool to bring new advertisers in," said David Lawenda, president of advertising sales and marketing for Univision Communications. "For any brand sitting on the fence or on the sidelines, this is the silver bullet. There is a misperception that if advertisers want to reach younger American-born Hispanics, they can do it best through English-language television. This research tool can prove that this is not true, that the best way to reach the Hispanics they want to target is through Hispanic television."

This fusion service was developed when Ceril Shagrin, executive vp corporate research at Univision Communications, approached Jon Mandel, CEO of NielsenConnect, to discuss the possibility of merging the data gathered by Nielsen Homescan and Nielsen Media Research. Homescan is a service of Nielsen where panels of consumers in various cities are given a home scanner and log in every purchase they made through the bar codes. This product-specific purchasing data can then be broken out by person and their demographics. Nielsen Media Research people meter TV viewing data in that same market can also be gathered by demographics. And under the fusion service, it can then be matched with people of similar demographics in that market based on their TV viewing patterns.

For the coming upfront, Univision will use only fusion data from the Los Angeles market, because it is the only market in which Nielsen Homescan has a representative number of Hispanics on its panel. But Shagrin said the Los Angeles market data can be used to sell advertising nationally, because its panel has sample that reflects the Hispanic population nationally.

She said Nielsen is in the process of expanding its Hispanic representation on its Homescan panels in other markets and expects that by January, data from the Top 20 markets will be available for use.

In one example of fusion data that Univision released, an unidentified cola brand targeting heavy users of its product found 39% of those users were Spanish-speaking dominant Hispanics, but only a fraction of its ad budget was being spent targeting that audience.

Nielsen is also working on fusing its American Moviegoing Study with its national TV ratings sample. Shagrin said this will show that Hispanics are prime targets for Hollywood studios because they see movies sooner, attend movies as an entire family and are less likely to complain about price.

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A Marketing Puzzle In Any Language
Media Companies Use English, with a Spanish Accent, to Reach a Growing Bilingual Audience
Los Angeles Times
November 23, 2007

Eighteen-year-old Brian Morales represents a growing segment of America that baffles advertisers, broadcast networks and cable channels.

The Santa Monica College freshman listens to Metallica and Linkin Park on his iPod. He also likes rock en espanol such as La Ley and Mana. His favorite TV show is the sci-fi drama "Heroes" on NBC and he tunes in to Univision to watch news and soccer with his dad. He's equally at ease in English and Spanish.

"My culture is not ordinary. It's mixed," Morales said. "I am Hispanic but I do have my American culture."

This cultural fusion is becoming an increasingly typical demographic. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, 1 in 5 U.S. adults ages 18 to 34 is Latino. Garcia and Rodriguez are now among the top 10 most common surnames in the nation. At least 50,000 Latinos in the U.S. turn 18 each month, UCLA demographer Leo Estrada estimates.

Despite the economic clout such figures represent, media companies and advertisers are grappling with whether to reach this growing audience in Spanish or English. Most efforts to date have been focused on Spanish. Six years ago, NBC Universal spent nearly $2 billion to buy Telemundo; Time Warner's HBO created HBO Latino, where it airs Spanish-language movies; Walt Disney Co. created ESPN Deportes and Fox initiated Fox Sports en Espanol for Latino sports lovers. Comcast Corp. launched CableLatino, which offers a package of Spanish-language channels, on its local cable systems.

Traditionally, television advertisers and networks have believed that if they were not reaching Latinos through the two major Spanish-language networks, Telemundo and Univision, then they would connect with them through mainstream shows that have proved popular with young bilingual audiences such as "Ugly Betty," World Wrestling Entertainment's "Raw," and "American Idol."

Some believe that those strategies miss the sweet spot because they fail to recognize that the majority of Latinos living in the U.S. are bilingual and speak predominantly in English, while at the same time retaining their cultural roots.

"There is still a wide-open space for entertainment targeting Latinos who live in English and Spanish," said Antoinette Alfonso Zel, former senior executive vice president of strategy for Telemundo. "That is the opportunity that may well be filled by the Internet unless the networks commit to this audience."

Hoping to tap that rich, dual cultural vein, four fledgling networks are feeling their way to this elusive audience by targeting Latino viewers in English rather than Spanish. The biggest players are Mun2, operated by NBC Universal's Telemundo unit; and MTVTr3s, owned by Viacom Inc.

Two other English-language networks, SiTV and LATV, have been targeting the Latino market, but both lack the backing of media giants. LATV, which started as a Los Angeles station in 2001, earlier this year rolled out to more than a dozen markets in the U.S. by striking deals with local TV stations that will carry LATV programming on their digital channels. SiTV began as a producer of Latino programming in 1997 before morphing into a cable network in 2004.

"We chose English-only for one simple reason: We live in America and it's the language around these kids," said Michael Schwimmer, head of SiTV. "There is a big difference between speaking Spanish and watching television in Spanish. The 18-to-34-year-olds are watching TV in English."

Launched in 2001 from Miami, Mun2 initially skewed toward young males of Puerto Rican and Dominican heritage. But that proved to be too narrow a focus, and in 2005, Telemundo relaunched Mun2. Now based in Los Angeles, home to the largest segment of the nation's Latino population – Mexican Americans – Mun2 has broadened its appeal with females by creating new programs such as "Vivo," a music show featuring Spanish- and English-speaking acts such as Juanes and Mana.

MTVTr3s, pronounced "MTV tres," was launched only last year. Like Mun2, it targets young adults 18 to 34 through a mix of music videos and live shows such as "Mi TRL," the Spanglish offshoot of "Total Request Live," a signature program on MTV. Documentaries dealing with such key issues as immigration and a Latino outreach component modeled after MTV's Choose or Lose campaign are also part of the mix.

Establishing a connection with the viewer who lives equally in both the Latino and Anglo cultures is essential for the channel's success, MTV President Christina Norman says. The "audience needs to know that this is being made for them and influenced by them. This isn't your grandmother's Spanish-language TV channel," she says.

Some advertisers may finally be tuning in. Within the last year, Mun2 has added 18 new major advertisers such as Microsoft's Zune, XM Radio and Colgate, as well as studios including Sony Pictures and Lions Gate, according to Alex Pels, general manager of Mun2.

"Six years ago, when Mun2 was launched, there was not a clear picture of what this bicultural audience was," Pels said. "What we have seen in the last few years is that advertisers are realizing that it's not enough to do mainstream Spanish-speaking media. To think that you can only target Hispanics by speaking in Spanish is not logical and not real."

Because Mun2, available in 17.2 million households, and MTVTr3s, available in 31.9 million households, are in their infancy, revenues are still minuscule compared with figures for older, established targeted channels such as BET or Lifetime, for example.

Neither of the networks will disclose financial details, but according to media research firm SNL Kagan, Mun2's net revenue in 2007 will grow almost 14% to $21.2 million, up from $18.6 million last year. MTVTr3s's revenue this year will jump 23.5% to $12.1 million, up from $9.8 million last year, SNL Kagan said. By comparison BET, launched in 1989 for African Americans, is expected to generate $519.1 million in net revenue this year, estimates SNL Kagan.

Mun2, MTVTr3s and other English-language, Latino-oriented channels face far greater competition for advertisers and viewers than BET did when it began almost 19 years ago.

In addition, the government-ordered conversion of broadcast stations to higher-capacity digital transmission, which must take place by February 2009, will increase the choice of channels and further fragment the market. "It is a tough time to get in the market," said Deana Myers, senior analyst for SNL Kagan.

Even Morales admits he is a tricky customer to reach. He is a member of MTVTr3s's focus group called the Cooltura Panel, which includes about 100 young Latinos from a variety of U.S. cities and backgrounds, who tell executives at MTVTr3s what trends are happening in their communities and what issues are important to them. "There is already so much to choose from. . . . It wouldn't hurt to put more out there but it would have to be really, really good to draw from shows that we are already watching," he said.

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Are Chicanos the same as Mexicans?
clnet.ucla.edu

Here is a "taxonomy" that may be a useful reference for this topic:

"Spanish people"
This term is used frequently in the United States to refer indiscriminately to any person that speaks Spanish. As such, it is imprecise and often inappropriate in that it includes people from more than two dozen countries, spanning all of the American continent, the Caribbean and Spain. The term does apply specifically, however, as the proper name for the native people of Spain, and for this reason it is as incorrect to use it to refer to any and all Spanish-speakers as the term "English" would be to refer to citizens of New Zealand, Australia or the United States.

Hispanics
This term is often used to refer collectively to all Spanish-speakers. However, it specifically connotes a lineage or cultural heritage related to Spain. As many millions of people who speak Spanish are not of true Spanish descent (e.g., native Americans), and millions more live in Latin America (cf., "Latino" below) yet do not speak Spanish or claim Spanish heritage (e.g., Brazilians) this term is incorrect as a collective name for all Spanish-speakers, and may actually be cause for offense. Latino
This term is used to refer to people originating from, or having a heritage related to, Latin America, in recognition of the fact that this set of people is actually a superset of many nationalities. Since the term "Latin" comes into use as the least common denominator for all peoples of Latin America in recognition of the fact that some romance language (Spanish, Portuguese, French) is the native tongue of the majority of Latin Americans, this term is widely accepted by most. However, the term is not appropriate for the millions of native Americans who inhabit the region.

Mexican
Specifically, the nationality of the inhabitants of Mexico. Therefore, the term is used appropriately for Mexican citizens who visit or work in the United States, but it is insufficient to designate those people who are citizens of the United States (they were born in the US or are naturalized citizens of the US) who are of Mexican ancestry. The various terms used to properly designate such people are described below, however, it is important to explain why these people feel it is important to make such a distinction. US citizens who are troubled by this often point out that most immigrants do not distinguish themselves by point of origin first, (i.e., German-American), but simply as "Americans" (another troublesome term, but we won't get detoured by that here). Here are some reasons why many US citizens of Mexican extraction feel that it is important to make the distinction:

*Not "Americans" by choice
A scant 150 years ago, approximately 50% of what was then Mexico was appropriated by the US as spoils of war, and in a series of land "sales" that were coerced capitalizing on the US victory in that war and Mexico's weak political and economic status. A sizable number of Mexican citizens became citizens of the United States from one day to the next as a result, and the treaty declaring the peace between the two countries recognized the rights of such people to their private properties (as deeded by Mexican or Spanish colonial authorities), their own religion (Roman Catholicism) and the right to speak and receive education in their own tongue (for the majority, Spanish) [refer to the text of the treaty of Guadalupe-Hidalgo]. Therefore, the descendants of this population continue to press for such rights, and many hold that theirs is a colonized land and people in view of the fact that their territory and population was taken over by military force.

*Mexicans first, "Americans" second?
Another and more numerous class of US citizens of Mexican extraction are either descendants of, or are themselves, people who conceive of themselves as temporarily displaced from Mexico by economic circumstances. As opposed to the waves of European migrants who willingly left their countries due to class and religious discrimination, and sought to make their lives anew in the "new world" and never to return to the "old land," these displaced Mexicans typically maintain strong family ties in Mexico (by visiting periodically, and by investing their incomes in homes or kin in Mexico), and usually intend to return to Mexico provided they can become economically secure. Therefore these people maintain and nurture their children in their language, religion and customs.

However, There is great tension within this population between those of Mexican birth who conceive of themselves as temporary guests in the US, and their descendants who are born in the US, are acculturated with the norms of broader US society in public schools, and are not motivated by the same ties that bind a migrant generation of Mexicans. This creates a classic "niche" of descendants of immigrants who are full-fledged US citizens, but who typically do not have access to all the rights and privileges of citizenship because of the strong cultural identity imbued in them by their upbringing and the discriminatory reaction of the majority population against a non-assimilated and easily identified subclass. This group of people feels a great need to distinguish itself from both its US milieu and its Mexican "Mother Culture," which does not typically welcome or accept "prodigals." This is truly a unique set of people, therefore, in that it endures both strong ties and strong discrimination from both US and Mexican mainstream parent cultures. The result has been the creation of a remarkable new culture that needs its own name and identity.

Mexican-American
This term is commonly used to recognize US citizens who are descendants of Mexicans, following the pattern sometimes used to identify the extraction of other ethnic Americans (e.g., "African-American). This term is acceptable to many Mexican descendants, but for those who do not identify with a Mexican heritage, but rather with a Spanish heritage, it is unacceptable (cf., "Hispano," below). Also, for those who do not view themselves as "Americans" by choice, this term is problematic, and for others the implication that the identity of the bearer is unresolved, or in limbo, between two antipodal influences, belies their self-concept as a blend that supersedes its origins and is stronger, richer and more dynamic than either of its cultural roots.

Hispano
This term is preferred by that subpopulation, located primarily in the US southwest, who identify with the Spanish settlers of the area, and not with the Mexican settlers (specifically, the Creole Spanish-Native American race). There is in fact an important number of these people located along the Rio Grande Valley of New Mexico and in the northern Sangre de Cristo mountain range of the same state. This group has been traditionally a very closed and conservative one, and recent evidence provides important explanations for this: they seem to be descendants of persecuted Jews who fled Spain during the 16th and 17th centuries and sought refuge in what were then the farthest reaches of the known world. They survived by minimizing their contact with outsiders and by hiding or disguising their religious and cultural identities as much as possible. Historical researchers call them "cryptic Jews."

Chicano
A relatively recent term that has been appropriated by many Mexican descendants as unique and therefore reflective of their unique culture, though its first usage seems to have been discriminatory. The most likely source of the word is traced to the 1930 and 40s period, when poor, rural Mexicans, often native Americans, were imported to the US to provide cheap field labor, under an agreement of the governments of both countries. The term seems to have come into first use in the fields of California in derision of the inability of native Nahuatl speakers from Morelos state to refer to themselves as "Mexicanos," and instead spoke of themselves as "Mesheecanos," in accordance with the pronunciation rules of their language (for additional details, refer to the file MEXICO on this same subdirectory). An equivocal factor is that in vulgar Spanish it is common for Mexicans to use the "CH" conjunction in place of certain consonants in order to create a term of endearment. Whatever its origin, it was at first insulting to be identified by this name. The term was appropriated by Mexican-American activists who took part in the Brown Power movement of the 60s and 70s in the US southwest, and has now come into widespread usage. Among more "assimilated" Mexican-Americans, the term still retains an unsavory connotation, particularly because it is preferred by political activists and by those who seek to create a new and fresh identity for their culture rather than to subsume it blandly under the guise of any mainstream culture.

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U.S. Latino Population Projected To Soar
Forecast Predicts Tripling by 2050
The Washington Post
February 12, 2008

The number of Hispanics in the United States will triple by 2050 and represent nearly 30 percent of the population if current trends continue, according to a report released yesterday.

The study by the nonpartisan, Washington-based Pew Research Center also found that nearly one in five Americans will be foreign-born in 2050, compared with about one in eight today. Asian Americans, representing 5 percent of the population today, are expected to boost their share to 9 percent.

Blacks are projected to maintain their current 13 percent share. Non-Hispanic whites will still be the nation's largest group, the report says, but would drop from 67 percent of U.S. residents to 47 percent.

Overall, by 2050 the U.S. population is projected to increase by 47 percent, from 296 million in 2005 to 438 million. Newly arriving immigrants would account for 47 percent of the rise, and their U.S.-born children and grandchildren would represent another 35 percent.

Authors of the study, which roughly tracks similar analyses by the Census Bureau and other sources, cautioned that their findings are projections based on immigration and demographic trends that may change.

Nonetheless, the report offers an intriguing picture of the possible long-term effects of the immigration surge that began after 1965, when Congress abolished a quota system that had nearly ended immigration from non-European countries since the 1920s.

Because of a declining birthrate among U.S.-born women, immigrants and their U.S.-born children and grandchildren already account for most of the nation's population increase over the past several decades. The study projects that by 2025, the foreign-born share of the population will surpass the peak recorded during the waves of immigration that occurred between 1860 and 1920, when foreign-born residents represented as much as 15 percent of the U.S. population. But the study's authors said that immigration will do little to offset the more than doubling of the nation's elderly population as baby boomers age. By 2050, people older than 65 will make up 19 percent of the population, compared with 12 percent in 2005, while the share of working-age people will shrink from 63 percent to 58 percent.

This translates into a sharp rise in the "dependency ratio" of working-age people, compared with the number of young and elderly. Today, there are about 59 children or elderly people per 100 working-age adults. By 2050, that figure is expected to increase to 72 dependents per 100 working-age adults.

Though advocates of immigration have suggested that the newcomers can help offset the pressure boomers put on Social Security, the report indicates that even if immigration were reduced by 50 percent, the dependency ratio would change only from 72 dependents to 75 per 100 working-age adults.

Those who oppose allowing immigration to continue at its current pace interpreted the findings as vindication. "These numbers underline the fact that immigration is not a solution to the aging of the population," said Mark Krikorian of the Center for Immigration Studies, which favors further limits on immigration. "And then we need to ask ourselves if we want the 100 million more people immigration will bring. Do you want 80 million more cars on the road, or 40 million homes occupying what's now open space?"

At a news conference to announce the report yesterday, co-authors D'Vera Cohn and Jeffrey S. Passel declined to draw policy conclusions. They also noted that even if their projections are accurate, the social implications may be different by 2050: Given the high rate of intermarriage between Latinos and members of other ethnic groups, many descendants of today's Latinos may not even identify themselves as such.

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Is the Ad a Success? The Brain Waves Tell All
New York Times
March 31, 2008

Never mind brainstorms. These days, Madison Avenue is all about brain waves.

That may be overstated, but it is no exaggeration that agencies and advertisers are growing more interested in neuroscience in their never-ending efforts to improve effectiveness.

The ardor of the ad business to adopt the technical tools of biometrics — measuring brain waves, galvanic skin response, eye movements, pulse rates and the like — is increasing as consumer spending, the engine of the American economy, slows.

In other words, in hard times ads must work harder to move the merchandise.

“Instead of hypotheses about what people think and feel, you actually see what they think and feel,” said Joel Kades, vice president for strategic planning and consumer insight at Virgin Mobile USA in Warren, N.J.

“I’m not such a huge fan of ad testing,” he added, but measuring biological responses is “absolutely useful.”

The curiosity about neuroscientific ways to determine how ads work — or fail to work — will be on display this week at the 54th annual convention and exposition of the Advertising Research Foundation. The agenda for the conference is filled with presentations on better methods to determine how consumers engage with ads (and vice versa).

“In many ways, we’re testing advertising the way we were testing advertising when I was at Procter & Gamble 22 years ago,” said Frank Stagliano, executive vice president for the Nielsen Entertainment Television Group in New York, part of the Nielsen Company.

Neuroscience can provide “a more accurate way to understand what consumers really like,” Mr. Stagliano said, which helps to produce ads and programs that “break through the clutter” rather than contribute to it.

Last month, Nielsen bought a stake in NeuroFocus, a company that specializes in brain-wave research and works for clients like Scottrade, the brokerage firm.

“We measure attention, second by second; how emotionally engaged you are with what you’re watching, whether it’s a commercial, a movie or a TV show; and memory retention,” said A. K. Pradeep, chief executive at NeuroFocus in Berkeley, Calif.

A company that competes with NeuroFocus, the EmSense Corporation, hopes to demonstrate such usefulness in a discussion on Monday at the research foundation’s convention.

Executives of EmSense, which also tries to measure consumer response to ads through biometric techniques, will present the results of a study of how award-winning ads.

For the study, EmSense surveyed 200 people, ages 18 to 54, in New York and San Francisco. The study measured their biosensory responses to 19 commercials that won awards last year at the International Advertising Festival in Cannes, France, and ads that won Effie Awards last year from the New York the American Marketing Association.

The study looked at spots like a commercial for Apple with characters playing “PC” and “Mac”; the “I Feel Pretty” spot for Nike, with Maria Sharapova, and a commercial for Tide with a talking stain on a man’s shirt.

On Madison Avenue, Cannes awards, known as Lions, are usually perceived as honoring creativity and Effie winners are typically deemed to reward effectiveness. The EmSense study sought to weigh the value of those emotional and cognitive approaches.

Some findings reinforced the conventional wisdom, said Elissa Moses, chief analytics officer at EmSense in Westport, Conn., which works for clients like Virgin Mobile USA and Coca-Cola.

Winners of Effies “tend to be a little less emotional and use rational claims a bit more” than winners at Cannes, Ms. Moses said, and ads that won Lions tended to be much better liked than their Effie counterparts.

But surprisingly, “there are very important similarities” between the two types of winners, she added, which can help guide future campaigns.

Fifteen of the 19 Cannes and Effie winners engaged consumers faster than average spots, Ms. Moses said. “Typically, a spot engages with viewers in 5 to 7 seconds. The Cannes and Effie ads engaged, whether emotionally or cognitively, in 1.5 seconds.”

Whichever award the commercials won, they had an equal effect on purchase consideration and on brand favorability, Ms. Moses said.

Although winners of Lions are replete with emotional appeals meant to engage viewers, they also use what Ms. Moses called a “cognitive jolt,” a twist or surprise, to earn interest.

For example, viewers were startled by a car crash in a Volkswagen spot and by a dropped call in a Cingular ad.

Some consumer advocates question the role of biometrics in ad research. They worry that blending “Weird Science” with “Mad Men” will give marketers an unfair advantage over consumers.

“The role of neuromarketing is to understand how people feel and react,” Ms. Moses said. “It in no way sets out to meddle with normal, natural response mechanisms.”

Her opinion was echoed by Robert E. Knight, the director of the Helen Wills Neuroscience Institute at the University of California, Berkeley, who is also the chief science adviser at NeuroFocus.

“We’re not trying to predict an individual’s thoughts and actions and we’re not trying to input messages,” Dr. Knight said.

Before Nielsen teamed up with NeuroFocus, Mr. Stagliano said, “we were concerned how people would respond,” but after a test at the CBS Television City research laboratory in Las Vegas, the reaction was “overwhelmingly positive.”

“Respondents didn’t feel like they were being probed or anything,” Mr. Stagliano said.

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'Green Gridlock' at Trademark Office
Eco-Friendly Brands Become a Hot Commodity
Ad Age
April 22, 2008

Getting ready well in advance for today's Earth Day events, marketers bombarded the Patent and Trademark Office last year for green-themed marks, leading to a 10% spike in trademark filings over 2006, according to a report released by the law firm Dechert.

Words most used in trademarks within the green branding space in 2007*:

Term Occurrences
• Green 2,400
• Energy 1,200
• Clean 900
• Earth 900
• Eco 900
• Organic 700
• Environment 450
• Planet 400
• Friendly 180

*Numbers are approximate

According to the annual report "Trends in Trademarks," filings for new trademarks last year topped 300,000, setting a record buoyed by interest in environmentalism. The previous record was 289,000 filings, set in 2000 during the internet boom.

'Green gridlock'
The surge led to "green gridlock, with multiple companies filing for almost-identical marks at nearly the same time," wrote Glenn Gundersen, chair of Dechert's trademark practice, in the report. "Clearly, it's not easy being green, since a trademark by definition is a distinctive term. ... Many of these me-too filings will either not merit legal protection or will be very weak trademarks."

Applications for everything from the obvious ("Eco-Friendly," "Go Green") to the slightly more creative ("Green Is the New Black," "Red States, Blue States, Green States") flooded the trademark office in 2007.

"Green" was the most popular word among marketers, with applications more than doubling from 1,100 in 2006 to 2,400 in 2007. That follows a 23% increase in applications in 2005 and a 37% increase in 2006.

Eco-mania
Trademarks with the prefix "eco" were just as hot, also more than doubling, with nearly 900 new applications in 2007. Products ranging from an Eco-Brella to an EcoCoffin were submitted to the trademark office. Mr. Gundersen provided a tongue-in-cheek assessment, noting that "if all the new eco-branded products filed in 2007 actually came to market, an Eco Citizen could buy an EcoHouse in EcoTown from an Eco Realtor."

"Clean" was also in demand, paired with everything from "green" to "fuel" to "power." And trademarks using the word "friendly" saw an 88% increase, while filings using the word "energy" jumped 25%. Interest in the word "organic" was also at an all-time high, with filings using the word increasing 57% over 2006.

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Marketers Find a Sound That Draws a Crowd
New York Times
April 9, 2008

In cartoons, the Road Runner goes “Beep, beep.” On Madison Avenue, the popular onomatopoeia is pronounced “Bleep, bleep.”

Advertisers are winking at the contentious issue of content regulation by using bleeping sounds in commercials and video clips. The bleeps mimic how television and radio obscure bad language in live news coverage or taped reality shows.

Many times, the bleeps heard in commercials are covering actual expletives, which are written into the scripts solely to be censored.

For instance, in a commercial for the New York Film Academy, a crude word spoken by the filmmaker Brett Ratner is bleeped.

“We were playing poker and he lost and I said, ‘Instead of giving me money, why not do a commercial for me?’ ” said Jerry Sherlock, director of the academy. “So we made it into a whole joke.”

In a video clip for Bud Light, titled “Swear Jar,” that appears on the bud.tv Web site and sites like YouTube, cast members curse a blue streak.

The plot spoofs a demand for linguistic purity in a large office. When employees learn that the quarters deposited into the jar will go toward buying beer, the 4-, 7- and 12-letter words fly freely. The video was created by the Chicago office of DDB Worldwide, part of the Omnicom Group.

“We’ve had about 12 million viral views of it that we can track,” said Robert C. Lachky, executive vice president for global industry and creative development for Anheuser-Busch in St. Louis, the brewer of Bud Light, “and 2.7 million have been on YouTube alone.”

Sometimes, there is nothing blue or objectionable about the words being hidden. Rather, consumers are being encouraged to jump to the conclusion that they are being protected from something crude.

That was the case with commercials for McDonald’s franchisees in metropolitan New York, which promoted a giveaway of items on the chain’s Dollar Menu.

A four-letter word — free — was bleeped in the spots to help make a point that the promotion was, as one character put it, “so good, it’s obscene.” The commercials were created by Arnold Worldwide, part of the Arnold Worldwide Partners division of Havas.

As a device to draw the attention of a bored or distracted audience, bleeps are an updated version of tried and true tactics like loud sound effects or laugh tracks.

For example, in a video for Bodygroom, a body hair trimmer sold by Philips Norelco, an actor’s discussion, laced with double entendres, is interrupted by a bleep when he mentions a particular body part.

“We did that to resonate in a humorous way with our target audience, men between 20 and 30, maybe up to 33,” said Arjen Linders, senior director for shaving and beauty at the Stamford office of Philips Norelco, part of Royal Philips Electronics.

“If you look at the results, they’re pretty strong,” Mr. Linders said, citing data showing that “four million people have visited the Web site (shaveeverywhere.com) and their average stay is four to seven minutes.” The video was created by Tribal DDB Worldwide in New York, part of DDB Worldwide.

Bleeping can also serve as a comment on the debate over what constitutes indecency in popular culture. The Federal Communications Commission has levied large fines recently against broadcast networks for program content deemed inappropriate.

Concerned about the possibility of repercussions, some TV stations rejected a campaign for Citizens United Reciprocal Exchange, which sells automobile insurance under the Cure name, said Allen Kay, chairman and chief executive at the Cure agency, Korey Kay & Partners in New York.

The stations objected to a talking blue circle in the commercials, he said, which twice utters a word that is bleeped.

“They said bleeps are inappropriate and they bleeped the bleeps,” Mr. Kay complained. “It’s a little blue cartoon head that’s not being allowed to swear.”

The indecency rules that govern broadcasting do not, however, apply to cable TV, satellite TV, satellite radio or the Internet. That makes bleeping more common in those media.

For instance, Serena Software in Redwood City, Calif., uploaded to youtube.com video clips filled with scores of bleeps, part of a campaign carrying the theme “Just @#$% it.”

The bleeps mask the word mash, as in “Just mash it,” which refers to a software product Serena sells for creating the Web applications known as mash-ups. The clips can also be watched on the company’s Web site (serena.com).

And the Travel Channel cable network, to promote a series called “Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations,” runs commercials that feature excerpts from episodes in which Mr. Bourdain curses. The words are bleeped in the spots, as they are in the series.

“Tony calls it like he sees it,” said Pat Lafferty, chief creative officer at the Travel Channel, part of Cox Communications. “It’s who he is and it’s what the show is, so we extended it into how we promote the show.”

“Certainly, you can take that too far, if it’s just sensational,” Mr. Lafferty acknowledged, so the network tries to make sure that the commercials are “not distracting or overdone.”

And in scheduling the spots to appear on other networks, “we may ask that they run after 9 or 10 p.m.,” he said.

Mr. Lachky, of Anheuser-Busch, said the company and DDB Chicago always intended that “Swear Jar” run only online.

Although “it’s very much reflective of today’s society,” he added, it is also “very much over the top.”

“At no point had we considered it for television, because it just isn’t right for that,” Mr. Lachky said. “When you’re one on one, in the online space, and the viewer is seeking you out, that’s the proper place.”

The line between bleep and blunder is a fine one, as McDonald’s and Arnold learned. Some viewers complained about the Dollar Menu commercials, because they inferred that the bleeps were covering up a lewd word.

So the spots were unbleeped to make it clear the actor was saying “free” rather than something beyond the pale for a family-friendly fast feeder.

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Ahead of the Trends
The International Herald Tribune
January 7, 2008

In the Internet era, keeping up - with the Joneses, the news or whatever else - is a lot easier than it used to be. But staying ahead of the pack, at a time when bloggers and social networking sites can spread word of a trend in Buenos Aires to Boston or Bangkok within minutes? That is the new challenge.

''Everything is so well connected now that it makes this job a lot more difficult,'' said Reinier Evers, founder of Trendwatching.com, an Amsterdam firm that tries to identify new directions in the consumer economy. Consumer goods companies rely on insights from Evers and other trend spotters to develop new products, while advertising agencies use them to inform the creative content of their campaigns.

Before we chalk up the demise of another media profession to the democratizing power of the Internet, it is only fair to put trend spotters' predictions to the test. This is the time of year when they look forward to the new year.

Some predictions do indeed have a familiar ring to them. Several trend spotters, for instance, said 2008 would be a year in which marketers rolled out more and more ''premium'' products and services - from airline tickets to laptops to toilet paper - in order to satisfy status-hungry consumers and to take in a bit more from the transaction.

A number of trend spotters also agree that women will continue to gain more clout in the economic, political and professional spheres. The cellphone will become ever more capable and indispensable. Consumers, not corporations, are now in the driver's seat.

But a few nominated trends for 2008 do stand out. What follows is a short list:

Blue is the new green. So says Ann Mack, director of trend spotting at JWT, an ad agency owned by WPP Group. In marketing circles, as well as the broader consumer consciousness, the environment was certainly one of the defining issues of 2007. Now, she said, ''Some eco-fatigue has set in.''

''The idea of green has been so overused and misused that it has ceased to mean anything,'' she said.

So in 2008 marketers increasingly will link environmental messages with the color blue rather than green, Mack said. This is more than just a superficial rebranding, she insisted. The issues associated with what Mack called ''environmentalism 2.0'' - climate change and access to clean water - are more clearly signaled by blue, the color of the sky and water, than by green, which many people associate negatively with ''tree huggers and sandals,'' she said.

The data-awareness era. That is how Ben Hourahine, futures editor at Leo Burnett, part of Publicis Groupe, refers to what he sees as an emerging trend in Internet users' approach to privacy. Until now the disarming novelty on social networks like MySpace and Facebook has generally overridden concerns about the potential hazards of full disclosure.

Hourahine said that could change this year. High-profile data leaks like the British government's recent loss of computer discs containing child benefit records have raised awareness of privacy issues. As more employers and university admissions officers troll social networks for potentially embarrassing revelations on candidates, users may decide that it is better to leave those Saturday night snapshots in their mobile phones.

''If 2006 was about user-generated content and 2007 about social media, then 2008 is about the conversation.'' So says Paul Kemp-Robertson, editor of Contagious, a magazine with headquarters in London that identifies marketing innovations. In other words, brands will have to steel themselves to the idea that marketing is a two-way street, not just a conduit for directing their messages toward pliant consumers.

To ingratiate themselves with consumers, he said, marketers increasingly will have to provide useful services for them, rather than simply advertising wares. Kemp-Robertson cited a recent initiative by STA Travel, a travel agency for students, to provide fun downloadable software like a desktop vacation countdown clock.

Yes, marketers have been talking about ''engaging'' with consumers for some time. But in 2008, Kemp-Robertson said, this trend may reach a critical mass, at least as far as many ad agencies - often still oriented toward expensive television commercials - are concerned. ''From an industry perspective, this is when the agency structure really starts getting questioned by big clients,'' he said.

''Status despair.'' Trend spotters like to create buzzwords and phrases to identify the mood of a certain year. This one was coined by Trendwatching.com to describe the feeling when, say, the owner of a puny Gulfstream private jet takes in the sight of Prince Alwaleed bin Talal of Saudi Arabia barreling down the runway in his ''flying palace,'' the customized, double-decker A380 he has ordered from Airbus.

Because the consumption stakes have been raised so high, more people in 2008 are likely to feel status despair, Evers said. Some, particularly in developed countries, will divert from the consumption-as-status pattern and seek consumer gratification in new ways - by counting the number of views of their page on the photo-sharing site Flickr, for instance

In a year when China will play host to perhaps the highest-profile marketing event of the year, the Summer Olympics, developing countries will seize the baton of conspicuous consumption, Trendwatching.com says.

Which of these predictions will turn out to be true? In keeping with the spirit of the times, we'll let you decide. After all, you may not have read them here first.

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