Market Research

Last week, as I was in the middle of cooking something or other, the phone rang. Because I was distracted, I let the market researcher talk for a few minutes, forgetting even to ask why he was calling someone on the "Do Not Call" list. His company was doing market research on a new TV show, he explained. Would I be willing to watch a pilot and answer a few questions about it? Sure, I replied. I mean, we all know how much I love crappy TV.

I was told the DVD would arrive Monday, October 13, and that I had to watch the show Monday, October 13 for whatever reason. UPS dutifully delivered a package to my door yesterday afternoon. It contained a DVD, instructions, and two sealed surveys. I was told to open and complete the first survey before watching the pilot. I figured this would contain questions about my demographic profile and about what shows I currently watch and enjoy. I guess I'm just a naive idiot; it was a survey asking me about my brand preferences for such things as canned tuna and fabric softener.

Because the survey contained no words, just photographs of various name brands (I put a check next to the photo of my favorite brand in each category), the good news was that this took up only approximately 43 seconds of my day. Time to watch the pilot. Judging from the clothing and horrible "jokes," I'd say that this pilot was shot approximately 10 years ago. There's a reason why it was never picked up: it sucked. It sucked with an awfulness apparent even before the end of the opening teaser. I was asked a total of five questions about the show, which I answered within two minutes of pushing "play."

In order to ensure "the complete attention of the viewer" the DVD's rewind and fast forward features had been disabled. I soon discovered the real reason these features had been disabled: this pilot came complete with commercials, so many commercials that it's length was about 40 minutes, rather than the 30 minutes running time of a network situation comedy. Of course, I couldn't skip these commercials. And yes, the ads were for many of the products that had been featured in the pre-show survey.

After I was done folding laundry and brushing the cat the show was over. Time to fill out the post-viewing survey. It was the same as the pre-viewing survey. Exactly the same. I filled it out with exactly the same answers. What was the purpose of this exercise? It appears that the market research company is trying to find out how effective these commercials are. Would my preference for Downy change to a preference to Bounce after watching an ad? Did the happy family scarfing down Ortega tacos entice me to switch my allegiance from Old El Paso?

At least that's the only sense I can make of the whole thing. That, or there was no ulterior purpose and it was just a way of getting a bunch of unsuspecting Americans to forcibly watch some commercials. The market research company is calling me at 3:30 this afternoon to ask me some questions about the "pilot." I can't wait to talk to whoever is assigned the task of calling me. I have some questions of my own, after all. How much did each advertiser pay for this? Is this the most cost-effective way of marketing? What percentage of participants see through this charade? What percentage of those who see through it are angry? Aren't I on the "Do Not Call" list? Does this mean that television as a medium for delivering commercial messages as we now know them is dead? If we go entirely to product placement and "branded entertainment," what happens to the 30-second commercial? Is this what happens to it?

Bring it on, market research company. I can't wait to talk to you some more.

Beast Without Burden

Even as the economy continues to tank, the business of business rushes onward. Perhaps you've heard that Tina Brown's website, The Daily Beast, launched this week. Can the magic that she worked on Vanity Fair and The New Yorker (and even the short-lived Talk) be translated to the Web? Follow the link and check it out for yourself.

The Daily Beast isn't quite a full-fledged webzine. It's an aggregator, meaning that the editors cull content from all over the web. Although the site contains some original content, as well as blogs, it's main focus is distilling what's news and buzzworthy onto a easily navigated homepage and providing links to those stories.

There are other aggregators out there. Some, like Digg, are reader-chosen; the stories most often "digged" by readers top the list. Others, like Huffington Post and Daily Beast, are "curated" by editors. I go to the Huffington Post not to see what's popular on the web, but to see what's new in liberal politics, just as I would go to Drudge to see what's new in conservative politics. Most curated sites cater to particular sensibilities, particular audiences.

I'm not sure what niche TDB is meant to fill or who it's intending to reach, but in its first week, the editors undoubtedly don't yet know what it's niche will be, either. Right now, it appears mainly to be a destination for people who like Tina Brown, which I guess means people like me, in that I have always enjoyed her publications. I sense it will be a place for me to go when I don't have the time to read longer-form content in Slate or Salon, and am interested in news beyond the narrowly political, financial, or gossipy. I'll give it a shot, in other words. It beats watching my net worth disappear day by day.

Since it's new, TDB is also currently ad-free, which is refreshing. It's design is clean, and right now it can be enjoyed free of clutter. Oh, and one feature really worth checking out: the Video Cheat Sheet, an accumulation of must-see clips from around the Web. It's worth a visit just to find the view-worthy in one place. Why watch the Dow plummet when you can catch Bill Murray's SNL cameo from last night instead?

Another Day, Another Dollar Lost

I'm beginning to wonder why I read the paper every morning. The fact that there's no good news is both cliche and, well, a fact. I suppose I read the paper because it's hard to believe just how bad things have gotten and I need a daily reminder of all the bad news. Six months ago my main worry was the price of grain, while these days I worry that we'll all end up in one bread line or another.

I no longer open my monthly statements sent from the places that are tending to my net worth. I don't know if I have any net worth anymore, come to think of it. I'm no economist, but I do know that something is "worth" only the amount someone will give you for it. It doesn't matter what my car is worth on paper; if someone will give me $20K that's what it's worth, and if I can only get $9K for it, then that's its value.

So, if investors are scared of the market and are selling, rather than buying, stocks, what are my stocks worth? What happens, in other words, if we get to the point where no one wants to buy my holdings? Do they then become worthless? Can the Dow reach zero? If nothing is "worth" anything, what happens? These are honest questions. I hope to never have practical answers to them, but every day the paper makes me worry just a little bit more.

Rock, Meet Hard Place

Here's a real-life political question. You live in a small city with depressed property values that has been almost entirely built-out. Tax revenue holds steady, while the cost of services continues to rise. With no new revenues, the only way the budget can be balanced while retaining necessary services (fire, police, street cleaning and maintenance) is to increase taxes every year.

The state has a program to encourage development in distressed municipalities. If voted for, it eliminates all state and local taxes for new or adaptive reuse projects in certain zones. On the one hand, passing these tax breaks is a way of encouraging redevelopment in the urban core, and when the breaks sunset promises the potential for increased revenue to the municipality. In 2011. On the other hand, for the 2009 budget to be balanced, both property taxes and earned income tax must be increased for the rest of us.

Do you support this program? Do you give tax breaks to developers while taxes go up for the rest of us? Or do you say no, and hope that developers will undertake projects in your city nonetheless? I'm completely on the fence on this one.

Why I Don't Have a Rec Room

I wish I liked football. I do like tennis and baseball, so it's not an aversion to sports in general, and I've tried to like football, I really have. I can watch a game on occasion, but I just can't get into it. I wish I liked football because it seems like a nice way to take up a fall Sunday.

If I liked football, I could hang out in bars Sunday afternoons. I'd have an excuse to drink beer and eat chicken wings. Or I could sit in a rec room somewhere with a bunch of guys drinking beer and discussing all the mistakes the coaches are making. If I liked football, I could eat a lot of chips. Nachos, even. If I liked football, I could wear a team jersey and scream at the TV.

Football games are now played a bunch of nights each week. If I liked football, I could sit in bars Sunday, Monday, and Thursday nights, chugging the Coors Lite pint specials. If I liked football, I could hate Tom Brady. Or I could love Tom Brady. If I liked football, I could care one way or another about Tom Brady rather than sitting here wondering what all the fuss about Tom Brady is about, anyway.

If I liked football I could care about the weather in Chicago and Green Bay. I could buy a foam finger. I could tolerate John Madden. If I liked football I wouldn't mind having to watch parts of games every Sunday evening waiting for 60 Minutes to finally begin. I would never point at my TV and exclaim, "Why are you showing the overtime of this stupid game! Get to the Condoleeza Rice interview already!" On the other hand, if I liked football maybe I'd never have to suffer through Andy Rooney again.

Most importantly, if I liked football I'd have something in common with what feels like 85% of this country and 99.8% of the guys I know. If I liked football, I'd automatically have something in common with nearly every other American. Ultimately, if I liked football, I'd be qualified to be Vice President.

It Figures

My car came with a four-year warranty (Did you know that this is the correct spelling, rather than "warrantee"? Neither did I), which expired on September 29. Monday. When I started the car Tuesday, both headlights burned out and the check engine light went on. Are manufacturers really that smart? And if they are that smart, why are automakers losing money left and right? That's all I have to say today.

Party Like It's 1959

Enough of politics (although I'm really looking forward to tomorrow night's debate). The most exciting news I've had in a while is the fact that Revolutionary Road has finally been made into a movie, directed by Sam Mendes and starring Leo and Kate Winslet, no less. Yates' is, I think, the best novel of the 1950s, of suburbia and conformity; it out-Cheever's Cheever. It's filled with bleakness, drunken-ness, and all around bad behavior, which perhaps explains why it's taken 45 years for it to be adapted for the screen. My assumption is that the success of Mad Men led the studios to think the time was right for this particular period film.

If you're not familiar with Richard Yates, he served in WWII, had TB, wrote a couple of great, minimalist novels and some of the best short stories of the 20th century, was an accomplished creative writing instructor, and drank himself to death. Read his collected stories and see that Raymond Carver didn't come out of left field. In fact, just read his collected stories; many of them are truly wonderful, ultimately better than any of his novels.

Revolutionary Road is the story of April and Frank Wheeler. Frank works in PR; he and April meet at a party in the Village, fall in love, marry. Despite their "artistic" leanings they move to the suburbs. They are predictably unhappy. They talk and talk to each other, drunkenly and manicly trying "communicate," to work through their angst. They decide that if they move to Paris everything will be different. They never make it to Paris. I'm not giving away the ending, just read the book for yourself. The title is, of course, ironic.

In times of trouble we long for the safety and certainty of the past, or yearn toward the better times of the future. We watch period dramas secure in our hindsight; we know better than the Wheelers, we know their plot has nowhere to go but to grief, we feel definite that we're smarter now. But are we? How many dreams were sublimated into mortgages during the past decade, how many aspirations swallowed by consumerist desires? We still want what everyone else has, we still need at the same time to feel different.

The Wheelers' story unfolds on the cusp of cultural, political, and generational change, a cusp we are today similarly balanced upon. We smoke and drink less, we no longer wear fedoras or girdles, we believe we are more enlightened about sexual and racial politics, but underneath the song remains the same: the more we strive, the more we compromise.