BeanCast 495: Blocking The Blockchain

Date: 15-May-2018

Input sound file: 0495_The_BeanCast_Marketing_Podcast_Blocking_The_Blockchain

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This episode of the bean cast is brought to you by flava nostrils, see for yourself, what a super burst of flub animals can do for your brain and physical health. Good. If love inaugurals dotcom and use the offer code Bob for 20% off your first order band with provided by recursive squirrel, interactive transcription services provided by transcribe, be dotcom visit them on the web@transcribed me dotcom slush being cast for up to twenty-five percent off. That's transcribe me dotcom episode 400

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ninety-five blocking the blockchain. For Monday may 14 2018 it's time for this week's addition of the being cast a weekly

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discussion about the news and issues facing marketers. Today, I'm your house. Most Bob normal. Thanks for joining us. If you listen to the press, you think widespread use of blockchain solutions is a foregone conclusion. And yet besides the known issues, there are also indicates that the underlying tech may not be as reliable as we believe.

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Should we trust. It will discuss also the rising creation of virtual influencers. The next big advancement invoice platforms, the rise and fall of clo- plus the sweets at fell far. That's the lineup. Lets me tonight Powell. Thanks for joining us for this week's been cast on Bob north

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and with me on the panel for this evening, we start with the chiefs strategy officer at rocks and mister. Ian bear is here. Ha, I over one. Well, also with us, we are the founder of the antipathy in advertising technology and production consultant MS Michelle excel. Hi, Michelle. Hi pot. That should be back. Glad to have you with us. And finally, we have a co founder of the social media club. Adjunct professor in Colombia's master's program

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in non profit management mister Howard green Stein. Hi Howard. Hi by ab- hybrid Betty, how are you tonight doing well, hey, we've could topic that, I think is just perfect for this particular group because I know you all have a little bit of technology mindedness, and you're going to be able to delve into this an interesting way. I'm hoping I'm hoping because it's a tough technology concept. Blockchain enthusiasts have always seemed to be hyping the trust aspects of the technology

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and in truth, the decentralized structure of a blocking solution should offer a foolproof means of ensuring the legitimacy of any transaction from a purchase to a vote to in an ad that served to an individual. And yet even the granddaddy crypto currencies don't rely entirely on the system itself to ensure transactional legitimacy. They employ 3rd party trusted partners to ensure that fraud is not a part of the picture. So Michelle

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are either flaws to the blockchain solutions that people are now considering. And if so, what does it mean for the future of the attack? Watch your opinion personally first before you get into all this, what's your opinion personally about crypto and about the block churn in particular? I'm I'm glad you asked that fast [laughter]. My opinion is that I feel woefully uneducated about this. Even though it's been around for quite some time now. I know what you mean because

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out of all my friends, you know, I'm probably the most knowledgeable and this is my immediate circle friends. I'm probably the most knowledgeable person I've met on this subject and I am completely anonymous, terrible on the subject. I mean, I know a lot about the the limitations on the promises, but I still couldn't tell you how the blockchain actually works. I'm not a tech guy. It it I have watched some any instructional videos. I have taken the opportunity to ask every single one of my

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friends whose even mentioned that they know anything about it. Every single time we meet. And I I feel like something hasn't quite click yet, that that's going to enlighten me. But. But I've I've watched a couple of really good on video always recently, I actually I don't know if anyone on this session went to collision contracts. It was a New Orleans recently collision and web summit, which isn't Lisbon every year run by the same by

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the same company. And I went to whip summit in November. I was watching a really great video from collision and this morning that was trying to in layman's tens. Explain some of what you're talking about with this. This question that you've raised about the that, you know, is it fundamentally flawed. Let's put it that way, and I'm going to relay as much as I can even feather in layman's tens about what I want to grasp in this video, which is blocked

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chain in and of itself. It is is the underlying technology is chain, but there are a lot of other transactions that happen around it to support transactions. What about things that happen around it spoke transactions, and that's accessing your wallet, actually authorizing transactions. And and that's what is exposing a lot of vulnerabilities I end, and he added that. The speaker likened

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it to. When we added s. L t. H t. T p. but we had a secure sit if it gets to the web and web pages and transactions that happened on those web pages. Or when we realized that we needed additional security on wifi after after we launched WI fi. And so how he was describing it was really educational to me because he was explaining why some of these thunder abilities where and why some of these talks were

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taking place. And there was some things like, you know, when people were accessing their wallets in the same way that people can steal your identity. You know, people were able to add break in that way and access you will it take your wallet or attack during some of the mining practices. But there was an instant swear. A particular group of people were able to 900 times faster than it should have been humanly possible. And so they were able to in a

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very short space of time. Take a lot more money from that particular particularly atom currency. So I think that that made sense to me. It made sense to me to have launched something new and it's still relative l days and that we need to get better at understanding all of the different ways and things that support at blockchain technologies, whether it's a currency or. What is that the article aren't be article I read was was just

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filled with stuff that made me think for a second time about this particular technology and maybe rethink the way that I'm embracing it because I've been a big fan of the the trust element inherent in the blockchain yes, there is some technical problems with the fact that for the the blockchain to work, every single computer in the chain means to have the exact same file and the more transactions that you adds that filed a bigger that file guts, and it gets it just slows

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the system down there. That's an a funny note. That scale ability, right? There's a family, not a problem with it, but I think the bigger issues were about the contracts. You know that for a contract to get done, even the best of the exchanges don't work with these. These electronic contracts, you know the- the- they do broker transactions, they put humans in the mixed. Because they don't trust the system to work as advertised, and I think one of the you know, when you talk to a blockchain

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enthusiasts, the first thing that they say the first thing that get excited about his all, the different use cases. One of them being voting. And this article was pointing out that it it really doesn't stop a government from adding lots of false voting records and populating the entire blockchain with lots of false voting records. And it doesn't stop individuals from. You know, potentially stealing identities and going out. And with someone else's password voting in their name, I

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mean there's so many different problems in her it with the technology that enthusiasts are not really addressing when they talk about it. Howard, I think you are going to say some somebody. Yeah, yeah means not magic fairy dust trade, it's database effectively. It's a three part economics. I got three party counties and we have to part accounting where you journal. Something back, if you've done the wrong thing, you don't just to lead a transaction. You were it, you accrue, or you do things like that. This is a a 3rd way of doing it, which is where the transactions are

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all out in public. And that's, you know, that's a great thing. It's really no positive in. There are specific tech solutions, like voting where if you knew that everybody had a particular identity and you could verify everybody's identity. They could vote and no one could take back the vote and say, oh, I didn't vote that way. Cause you can. Cryptographically prove you can mathematically calculate that Bob voted this way because this is could only have come from Bob's I d from Bob's computer. The problem

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is just like any other computer system, the world garbage in, garbage out. So if if Bob Michelle wanted to take that Bob Indians votes were for candidate accents at a candidate, why? And she had access to their systems or somehow hacked their systems. It would definitely look like a came from that person from that identity from that computer. But it doesn't mean it's the right vote. I heard another example recently, someone wanted to document child

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soldiers on a blockchain and I said, well, that's great. That means that you know, once you put that person's name in, they can never grow out of having to in kidnapped and forced to be a child soldier. That sort of ab- stain on their life will follow them for the rest of their lives. There are lots of reasons to use block chains, but it's not the solution for everything. Just like in nineteen Ninety-six Howard web page wasn't so solution. Broward lemmings stuff you for a second because what you said, you're also breezes red flags in

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terms of the right to be forgotten, which is a European law. I mean, does blockchain actually run afoul of European law in some instances because there's always going to be a record of every transaction, and there is no way for you to be forgotten in the blockchain. That is, that is a really true. The other thing that I think. You know, there's not a lot of or I haven't seen a lot of an Africa. I will admit like Michelle that I spend a lotta time reading about this, but I have not

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I cannot call myself anything other than in a somewhat informed novice. I don't know how you take back mistakes. And we've seen lots of instances where bitcoins for example, have been stolen, or there was this ethereous them hack where someone created a smart contract and managed to steal a bunch of money. And it was not really a hack. It was they created. They followed the rules. They created a thing that said, transfer me money. And the system said yet, this is a valid thing. I'm going to do that. I'm going to transfer you the

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money, and they actually had to write something to try to get the money back for people. This sort of permanence is a great idea until someone makes a mistake. And frankly, we're all human except for the computers, and they're gonna be a lot of mistakes. I'm that's so that everything needs to be blockchain thing. That's the big thing for me. That's the big problem. I mean, you know it's not the blushing doesn't represent a lot of advancements that are important for us and thin potentially solves a lot of problems. But.

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In the end, it's just creating a host of new problems in if if it's just another currency in the end, that requires. Human intervention, insecurity on top of this system. It's it's not really solving any problems in the end that are that are tangible to us. I mean, we should be clear about blockchain verses crypto currencies, which are just a use for the blockchain. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, that's what I'm talking about. I mean, it's from a standpoint of you

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know, vertical take voting for instance, since we're talking about voting with voting, you already have to have real life inspectors. You already have to have verifications of records your y- you can't just leave that up to some user created user monitored, wild west system and trust that it's going to work not to mention the the biggest problem with the blockchain, which is that the technology we really don't.

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No, what can a back doors may have been put in or may not have been put him because it was created as an open source solution. Obviously a lot of experts swear up and down that it safe, but how safe do we really know it is? And I don't mean to be alarmist here, you know, because I've been nothing but an advocate for the blockchain, but this article has really made me think, again about how am perceiving the blockchain and whether or not it's a smart solution to

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put in play to solve all the world's problems. I don't think that it is. I think that it may need to be more territorial judicious about it. At the at that article was, it felt like it came from a place of somebody who is struggling is hearing every day from people who think that it is a solution for everything. And so I can understand that it came down a little hot, but it did. Subscribe to to make everybody question, whether it was

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this golden ticket at everybody, thinks a lot of people think that it is and philosophically I think that is an evolution of the way that we record in transact. And I think that that is. At important I was I think it is still very early days and that some of that, the massive problems that we hadn't tried in hacking and vulnerability and general instability. Many systems that we have seen come into into daily use

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in the last 30 years that we've had at the grown with on, they become stabilize the time, and I think it's a leap forward. I do. I think that it's it's definitely different enough than what we already have that it's still vulnerable to the same issues that we have with many other systems, the existing banking system, existing security systems, even I haven't really talked to you about this off line, so I'm not really sure how comfortable you are on the subject of blockchain and howl, knowledgeable your on the subject. But

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what's your thoughts here? Are there some legitimate use cases that mitigate the problems? Are there? Thing do do the positives of the blockchain outweigh the negatives that we're talking about here. Well, let's start with this. I think I've become more knowledgeable the subject as a result of being on this is being guests [laughter]. I'm glad at least the religious service respective for me.

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It's become in the world of of marketing agencies. It's one of those things that everyone feels they have to drop into conversations. I mean, you know it agencies are are talking about it as something that will empower so much of what we do, especially in in the ad trading ad buying space. So I get exposed with more in that environment. And of course, every one's of burning curiosities about

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cyber currency, and we're going look points that. That Howard and showed both brought up regarding these are the early days, you know, I think there's a lot of exuberance now around blockchain treating it as something that is more advanced and bullet proofed. And it actually is. And I think if we recognize there's more that will be exposed, that will learn from, you know, there's going to be a to data on a three days ago.

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Just like there has been with every major step forward in technology. And we would just be foolhardy to to look at it as flawless because it's controlled by computers and robots. I mean, Bob, as as you pointed out and really almost all tech platform, that at least begin with a very significant human component. That's what we're seeing. Its, it's neither a cause for alarm or or caused a

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quiet restaurant, anyone's laurels at this point. It's a fascinating discussion in your in your right. I mean, every time I open up this subject on the show, it feels like slow stumble into lucidity in terms of her understanding blood chain immune. So few of us really understand the implications of intellect. Think a lot of the enthusiasts out there, especially in the marketing world, are coming at it from a periphery. They're they're coming out from a standpoint of like, this is really cool

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and trusting that the technology, because people tell them that it's safe and it's verifying that. You know, it must be a true solution to a host of problems in terms of verification, entrust an identity. But there are some significant questions, and I think that that means not to throw all this out and say, no, it's not safe. It's more about we got to be careful about the implementations and judicious about how we employ it. Howard, any

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less thoughts in terms of. How you would use a obliging solution? I mean, there are there. Are there use cases that mitigate the problems, a Jewish, or what would you say? I mean, I you know, I I was spending little time today on IBM's website, and they're looking at things like of financial applications, supply chain applications, and identity applications. And I've seen, you know, from the nonprofit world, I've seen things like using

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blockchain related identification to identify refugees and camps, give them currency to be able to stand in the camps to obtain food and other needed services. And if you get moved to another camp because typically these people by definition are homeless, which is just horrible. They actually can take their stuff with them. If they happened to move across a border, they still have a currency that works for that may. And in that situation, it's a very, very good

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and useful thing. Do I think that that's bulletproof? Or do I think that that's a hundred percent secure? Or what if you forget your password? I'm really not sure of the full implementation details, but I'm willing to suspend disbelief and think that people are going to come up with good usable solutions for this because there's a lot of money and a lot of time and a lot of effort being put into this. I just think that we don't need to. Say, okay, that's it. We don't have to develop anything else because everything's going to be on the blockchain going forward. And

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if I need an ice cream cone, I'm going to need to, you know, get my eyes can come from the blockchain. It's not going to happen. There's just it's going to be a a development, a tube when a 3 point out just like in said, and we'll all get more used to it, and it'll be like, we'll be talking about TCP IP 20 30 years ago. Everything was on T c. guy p 20 30 years. But now we don't think about the fact that all of our web traffic and all the things go on a protocol. It just a protocol. We take it for granted bitch, blockchain will get to that point over the next couple of years, and it'll just be

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the base technology that will build on. Well, we got to move on and I'm going to talk next about virtual influencers. Seems almost like an oxymoron, but will get to that in just a minute. First, I've got a bitter sweet add, read the do for you. Not not just bitter because it's dark chocolate and not just sweet because it's chocolate [laughter]. It's because this is my last add that I'm going to be reading for and natural that I went you all to pay attention to this because this is a truly amazing product. I have been

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I've said that every week of run the sad, but these things are delicious. It's amazing. You gotta you gotta get a chocolate out in the mix every once in a while. Well, influence or marketing is an undisputable champion among marketing tactics, recommendations from people you trust, simply carry more weight. We all know that it's just common knowledge, but what about in Instagram or who isn't even a real person in an effort to get all the value from influence or marketing without any of the

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liabilities? And we know that they are when you have somebody that you're working with, who does something foolish brands are turning to 3d characters who look real, but are completely controllable by the brand. My question in as a strategist is whether an influence her is still an influence or when they are branded fabrication, isn't this just an ad and not an influence her or my missing something? Well, but like so many things, I think it it goes down to have you use the

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word. The other certain words, Bob, like were jujubes using chocolate, where if I say that word, everyone else gets something different in their head. You one person making chocolate bar, one person may think chocolate cake, one person may think chocolate labrador retriever, right? So this very precious definition of what is an influences that somehow requires defence that lost on me. An influence, sir can

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be a celebrity who endorses a product openly on a paid basis. It can be somebody who cultivates a very organic following around their January, the opinions of of brands of products and services. And by the way, fictional characters have been influencing purchases. For decades upon decades, I think about c- a Chesterfield cigarette cartoon ads featuring Fred Flintstone and Barney rubble from the nineteen

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sixties. So as long as as you're not trying to pretend that it's something it is it it's a fictional character right now, not necessarily be the the spokesperson for grand, although I know Prada seems to have some sort of relationship with a prominent virtual influence or right now. But the reality is these personas are

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fictional characters that. May take the form of performance art. They may have strong political views. They may not. And in that respect makes them no more or less volatile. Then a quote unquote, legitimate. Influence or or legitimate celebrity but let me ask you to me, is it let me ask you this because you know what you're describing to me still sounds like a lot like an ad in

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a influence, or if we use the term influence or marketing as it was intended to be used the way it was always sold. To me, it's this authentic, authentic recommendation coming from somebody who is influential among an audience. It may include some free product that may include some some monetary, Rick recompense for the recommendation, but it comes across as this authentic recommendation or endorsement from somebody who actually has an

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audience. And what I'm concerned about with this virtual influence or type market is. Whether or not this is a creation by the brand or whether or not this is just a virtual creation by a 3rd party who has real life. Opinions and his putting forward real life. Types. I don't know what I'm. I'm trying to say here, I mean, it really comes down to is this a controllable branded asset which makes it

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an ad or is this something truly controlled by somebody outside the brand's control and is an authentic recommendation? And if it's the latter, its influence, and if it's not it's an ad and I d- I don't understand why we're even having this conversation. If it is just a brand controlled asset. Well, as you pointed out it sometimes it's an ad. Sometimes it's somebody's creation. Look how much do we know about

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Bank CIE? As an actual human being and Bank, see as a performance art. Persona has a lot to say out there. I just see the lines as being very, very blurry. I think you always want to be aware of where you're taking your recommendations from. Look, if you win a celebrity goes on a talk show, and Jeff happens to slip the

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name of a product into a funny story. They're telling you about something had happened to the monoplane while a lot of is no that that person was probably paid to drop that brand name into that story. That makes it. No, more or less legitimate least in my mind because the fact is. You know, there's gotta be a an element of let the buyer beware and all this. I mean, we're not talking about, you know when WalMart created fictitious loggers a bunch of years

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ago and purported to be real people Russia's campers, right? They they were going camping in places, right? There was a family. There was a teenage girl. They had created a bunch of personas. We're going back over a decade to when this happened. So as long as you're being authentic, nobody is looking at at any of these. Virtual influencers, if you want to call them that as be re- they're they're to me a former performance art.

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They do have a place in the commercial world. They don't take the place of getting an opinion from somebody you trust. What do you think coward instinct in a lazy faire type attitude, and I I can totally see his point. Do you agree or disagree? I think these virtual influences are very much like bitcoin. You know it's out there. You know it's got some value. You know, the value can get artificially pumped

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up or at. But at some point that values gonna crash in, someone's can be left at a loss, right? What's gonna crash the value of a virtual influence her? If you discover this, this one that you put out in the article was called little Michaela, and apparently she is in favor of the black lies matter movement. That's great. But a virtual influencers never going to a protest. They're never going to get worried about being pulled over while driving or any other scenario that could actually happen to a real person in that scenario. And

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so she may be able to inspire others to go out and and push for that cause. But if the brand behind her dozen have credibility in the black lives matter, community or worse has negative credibility. At some point, this can be a huge backlash and. You know, putting that out there without knowing who's behind this virtual influence there is to me is is super risky if you're gonna put your brand behind that. Yeah, there there are a

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lot of positives I see in in doing virtual influences are working with virtual influencers in the most. The the most obvious one is the fact that you don't have to worry about your virtual influence or going out and killing three people because they were drunk driving. I mean, you don't have to worry about that kind of association with somebody agency behind that virtual influence or goes out and does a campaign that's completely off your brand. And and suddenly suddenly decides that, you know it's a horrible idea. Well, we're

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still real people behind it. It's still it's it's a team, presumably. Or the agency or something like that. So it's it's still fallible. People can still make mistakes. They can still. Put out the wrong message at the wrong time and upset particular nation. Audience says it's. But the rest vulgar does reduce the risk to a certain extent. It reduces it to the level of any other ad. And that's why I'm saying this is more like advertising than it is about influence or marketing because

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influence our marketing is a huge risk. You go out and you. You put product in the hands of somebody and you ask them to do something, but you really have no control over what they're saying or what they're doing. All you have is a little bit of. A little bit of a dare I say, influence with the influence or but you don't have any kind of real control, whereas with any kind of ad program yet, some rogue employee can always tweet out something that you don't want them. The tweet out. But

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essentially, there are processes of checks and balances in place with an ad program with creative to make sure that the message is on target and on Brandon effectively achieving the objectives that the ad campaign comes out with. And that's what this sounds like. It sounds like brands exerting control. And if that's the case, I mean, that's fine. This is a perfectly legitimate tactic, but why are we even calling it influence or marketing? Why even bother to do that at that sounds like smoking

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mirrors and it sounds like we're trying to do brands into. We're trying to do people into believing that this is truly is. The same thing is influence or marketing when it's not it's the brand not taking it real. It's a marketing is the is the flavor of the month. Bob [laughter]. Not getting is a lot more structured. I think in many cases, not an old Dan, Dan, perhaps you'd you'd think on the surface based. Primarily on some of the LA definitions of it

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and Halley characterizes employments or marketing largely because these personas or using Instagram. Yeah, and that the place where people cultivate and monetize social influence, but. That doesn't necessarily mean these people are influential. Versus just what one thing we've seen consistently is there is little to no correlation between liking social media content,

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whether it comes from a brand or from an individual and acting on it commercially. So just because we see you know a bunch of of followers or likes. Doesn't necessarily mean anyone's making money off it yet. We don't really know. It's almost to me like the definition of an influence, her. It is, you gotta be influencing some body. And at this point, I haven't seen a

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case presented. That show these characters, wheeled actual influence. To me, I'm still treating them like performance art until loans. There have been cases of influence or marketing actually delivering results on a program, especially when you're talking about direct marketing results, you you give someone an offer code, you said specific global, absolutely. Yes. Laurie I was speaking specifically to these virtual influence. I hadn't seen a business case proving out their

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value. No, I'm a big fan of influence or marketing was. One of the first to help get brands into it. I hate the extent to which is losing authenticity out there because they think more and more consumers have become aware. And that's why that's my big problem that that that element of losing legitimacy is one of the most taking offence. Sad, when people call a virtual creation and influence or I mean it's

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okay to say, this is our in a virtual Instagram personality, and we're going to use this virtual Instagram personality to promote our product, or we're going to use somebody elses virtual personality to promote our product. But it's still just a promotion. It's not really an influence or by calling it an influence or were just continuing to. To basically denigrate this very effective means by watering it down this very effective means of

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marketing by watering it down with a virtual Chretien it it doesn't make any sense and it feels like smoke and mirrors. Howard of my overreacting [laughter]. No, no, I think I think you're I think you're spot on Bob. This is, you know this. This is one of those things where. Yes, sort of metaphors or mixing or or conflicting with each other, right? There's this idea of influencers and certainly there are influencers. These you know that for every DJ

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Khalid and and Kim kardasian you also have people who are influential in their nieces and who are actually working with brands and beat to your beat, ac- spaces, and they're doing good things for those brands and potentially for themselves as well in their disclosing. During all the things that the F c. F t. C wants you to do great, but to call these virtual characters influencers versus what they are, which I think you're being clear about as there, they are themselves ads. And

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we should, as marketers be clear about that so that we're not infusing clients and others who might get confused by the terminology. Agreed. Wholeheartedly. Agree while moving on at their big Idaho conference Google showcase the next generation of their voice assistant that could actually managed complete conversations with real people to do things like set up a restaurant reservation over the phone of you've why haven't watched the video. It's well worth your time. It's a pretty

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cool use of the technology yet at the same time pretty darn creepy. What I wonder Michelle is whether brand should be looking to take advantage of this attack are playing things a bit more cautiously, at least that the onset with basically virtual assistance carrying on conversations with real people who may not know that they're carrying on conversations with virtual assistance. I I love the videos. I think that they were they were really

00:38:29

great at it. It's a little crazy when they saying with program to them to be able to have human reactions, like say things like that, necessarily associate with thoughts, which which is pretty cool. Brands be jumping on board, and I think that brands already use watts in so many cases that we probably not already. Oh, probably not aware of already

00:38:59

from a lot of initial chats that we do on websites and customer service too. I'm assuming at automated systems and things like that. And this is a little more creepy because we're hearing it with a voice. But this is. It was pretty impressive that the the scenario is that they gave the restaurant booking in that making addressing heck had appointment, where very relatable. And I think that they pick those typically has. It's quite easy to see.

00:39:29

Like I was saying for he sat at the school, you know, I I went. Very much like to take some of this busy work off my plate during the day. I'm very excited to see how the scholars because if I can get a eventual assistant to some of these things, it would be great. Something that brands should definitely definitely be looking at. I'm a huge advocate of of using. Thoughts on site, we've actually talked about this on previous being costs. Yeah, I mean,

00:39:59

I just wrote of the heavy lifting. Yeah, out of some some real people. In some cases. I just wrote a a whole article, the blow out a comment, but we discussion, we held on a show a couple of shows back about voice, and it was all about how brand should have their own voice that were giving away all the brand value of putting skills on Alexa to a lesson Amazon, by putting it in her voice as opposed to putting it in the brands voice.

00:40:30

And for me for me, I'm looking at this and I'm saying this completely enables. That kind of technology, this is the kind of thing that. Really elevates the experience of interacting with a brand on line into a relationship. That could be meaningful and powerful. I mean, think about it. When you walk up behind a friend and you say, it's me, they know who you are because of the the tenor in the emotion in their cadence of your rhythm. And. You know,

00:41:00

all these vocal qualities, it makes it enjoyable to like giving getting personality to about whether it's written all devil. Is something that I talk a lot about when I'm when I'm wet shopping, this stuff with creative teams. It's one of the first. Tips that I provide to create a teams and give something a personality. If you are going to Canada, if you are. Going to, you know, had this logic train it, you can ask somebody to interact with a message about or voice spot. Whatever it might be, give it a personality because we

00:41:29

immediately become more interested. We immediately become more giving when you're issues. If we think we're talking to a pest nowadays rather than a literal robot or a thought, and you'd have to sit at the same at the same at the same time. You know, I liked the idea of personality. I liked the idea of having a distinctive voice that people can relate to, but I don't agree with situations where. This voice

00:41:59

doesn't self identify, I think that, you know it's a box, right? That's. At that, this is raising a lot of questions exactly and has branded activations. I think it's fantastic. I think it's something we should all be playing with and trying. But yeah, you're right when we don't know that we're talking to a by I mean, we we wait, wait, inherently, hate getting those. Canned functions writes a pre recorded script. To ensure you to somebody, but that's. That's not that's not listening to you. That's not

00:42:30

tricking you into thinking. It's a real person at that's your dad, making a stupid voice mail message or something like that, right? We we know immediately. It's pretty cat. Yeah, I would feel very uncomfortable if I was laid down a path by a brand, certainly where I didn't realize that it was about that. That's a breach of trust, a Sheila and nothing to disclose. Oh, I think it's something that that brands will have to disclose going forward. You know,

00:42:59

my role on on creepy. And look, the reality is what I do for a living is, is used data and technology to create customer experiences. So the creek factor is always. At the very least bottling just below the surface. My rule of thumb is it's. It's not creepy if it's helpful, and that's not just my opinion as a marketer that actually the voice of the customer reflected back

00:43:29

consistently. If you'd use technology. Egypt's data used artificial intelligence in such a way that it makes my life easier or better. Or give me a faster 1 1 way to do something that I've traditionally done it in the old model. Then people don't mind the creep. A don't mind the use of their personal permission data. It's really a matter being helpful and and

00:43:59

being honest, yes, disclosure is absolutely going to be important, but the more helpful. These types of voice box become and Bob, I absolutely love your idea that brands need to develop their own boys the way they have a logo in a musical sting absolutely as a brand market or makes all the sense in the world, but people are going to get a lot more comfortable with this. The more they see it solving problems for them. Both you want to read the article or anybody wants to read the article, its on media. Males have put him

00:44:30

on my blog on my website, so definitely check it out, but we got to move on to the last topic real quick before we run at a time. Finally, I want to talk about this clown announced on Twitter, that they will be remembered clout with a k- those of you know, maybe you're too young to remember cloud [laughter] but cloud announced on malaria cloud announced on Twitter that they will be shutting down at the end of the month. Howard, there was so much bugged around the social

00:44:59

reputation engine when it first launched word, they ultimately go wrong. You know, Bob, as the person with the highest clout score on this side. Glad that you know that my clefts cruises way higher than yours. So it's crazy. But you do have one of the top what point? One percent of people in social media and one of the top point, one percent of people in advertising and marketing influence on this call, advertising marking being in and social

00:45:29

media being myself. But I I always thought was an interesting idea with a flawed premise. About how to capture influence at the start, and they did try to evolve it, but it was never really anything other than a number. They know it can really make sense of I mean, if you remember at some point you're cloud score could get you like a free hotel room or prizes Olivia, let me charity. No Howard. Let me caveat that. If you were in the top like one percentile like have you heard like 95 or above on your

00:46:00

clouds score, then you got free stuff like hotel rooms and cars and everything. Everybody else from 94 down Godfrey burgers at McDonalds. I mean, it was just completely leader. You won't give me my free drinks. Do you know what my cloud score is? I know. I mean there you know it. It's it's funny though in the fact that Bob has a lower clad score than I do on things like marketing is, is just a joke Bosnian doing a pod

00:46:30

cast for more than nine years, and I stopped writing about marketing topics. For ink four years ago, so that's just sort of laughable. They really they didn't follow this. Up in in a way that they gone, there are companies that are trying to track the level of influence of an influence there, but they're taking data now from both. The centers and the people who received those in that information. People owe companies like hyper brands, little bird before it was bought for sprinkler. I don't know what they're doing these days. They did

00:46:59

different kinds of tracking an- an- an- frankly, it makes sense for marketers are brands to try to understand who has influence. Why am I what topics? But clout I just don't think they found the magic combination of those factors that determine influence in a way that keeps it justified to continue running. In what areas in a one stop shop well say, no there. There are multiple different tools. You know, I'm in some cases, like even with picking influence is now there are a couple of

00:47:29

Delacroix networks that you can. If you want to become an influence or paid influence, you can sign up to and they always give you like a portfolio site like a be Hans set aside for for yourself and influence that doesn't just plug in your number as a follow is lousy to serve shallow ranch and show some of the web that you have done, which is really great. And you're right unit like systems like sprinkler in and many at that. His other on social media management tools have had at a quiet different unknown at like listening and reputation and sentiment

00:47:59

analysis and influence of individual people and bundled them up into their platform. But we never just use one. You know that and I think with clout. It gave you a squad and I'm sure that there were some of the tools that it included as well, but it was never just it was never going to be it was going to always be one out of many the tools that we would use. And after a while, I think it is sort of the kinda parody of itself will look a bit in the mystery behind it. I think really there was just no often his city, right it. I think a lot of us cloud first

00:48:29

long flat on my God. This is great all in one place, but then the more you realize that the algorithm was just something to be gained. It wasn't actually towers and point a measure of hamlet belittle somebody was in a certain sphere. I gotta be honest. I have no idea what my cloud spores look at. Your clouds guards 52 and your you're influential by the way about t- as well as television Iowa's football, cybersecurity,

00:48:59

comedy and celebrities in in addition to things like advertising and marketing. So ooh. Ooh. Do me next [laughter]? Overshoes tells you that this plot [laughter]. Oh, my gosh. Well, you never said the research, Bob. I am. I know this is fantastic. Well, in one less thought from you, I mean, obviously you're

00:49:29

doing a lot of influence or programs, or at least you've been active in creating influence or programs on behalf of brands. W- w- I think clout was there to give advertisers the opportunity to see who was the most influential and give them a cheat sheet on who'd actually connect with in the community. That was the ultimately the business model. You school. So obviously influence our programs are still getting done without clout. How are how are you getting it done in

00:49:59

w- why was clout not a consideration in terms of actually choosing an influence or for any programs that you did? While cloud never clearly presented itself as a connection to monetize in influence or base. It it's this odd compendium that seemed to put a lot of emphasis on Twitter and puts equal when Twitter was up when Twitter was down, it seemed like the influence on the cloud score

00:50:29

was the same. So it there was never anything there that we could use to understand the value of either a large influence or based or more near. We're dealing with micro where something like this score that compares you to the rest of the universe is really not as interesting as how influential you are among, for example, you know nursing students in the southeast, right? I'm just

00:50:59

picking a random. So I clout was never authentic or relevant enough, and you could never follow a threat to the money. My my favourite cloud story was always the fact that I knew somebody who is a social media wonk online and she came on line Monday and said, you know, I know cloud doesn't work because my social media clout is bigger than Oprah's and I'm just like when he know that a person with 3000 followers from Minnesota has a higher

00:51:29

cloud score than Oprah Winfrey you know that the system of fundamentally flawed while without adversely clouds should have been spelled with a lowercase cave that [laughter] well, it's time for the ad fell five but before we get to that segment of the show, I do want to take this quick opportunity to thank my guess again and allow them the each to a shameless plug starting with Ian bear. You can find him@rock Sadat comets are a u x, a dotcom really cool name. I always forget where they came from, but I'm sure he'll tell us, tell

00:51:59

us what's going on in your world, and what would you like to promote? While all start by answer your question Chatillon four madness [laughter]. Perfect. Love love that are found or came up with that name nineteen years ago. I'm actually use my shameless plugged to shamelessly plug. Two of our clients were both in the not for profit space and celebrating extraordinary anniversaries this year. It's the

00:52:29

25th anniversary of the United States holocaust. Memorial museum on the National Mall in Washington D c. it's also the 65th anniversary of keep America beautiful who most people know for creating one of the most iconic t b EDS in history. Back in the seventies and crying and on the weird new absurd the weeping native American, correct. Yeah, the politically incorrect named the crying Indian. So we

00:52:59

are actually now in post production on. The 65th anniversary P s. A and really the the next national s a campaign to follow in those footsteps. And it's such an amazing cause because it's all about cleaning up the parks and beaches and playgrounds that our families use every day. And so I'm super proud of the work we're doing to support those causes and and wishing him well on their anniversaries. I think the funniest

00:53:29

thing about that is that the native American featured in that I had was not a native American [laughter]. Although he wasn't accepted by the native American community, he was not native American, which I think is historical. I won't be these actually Italian American. I think he was now next up Michelle excel. You can find her at the antipathy indict U s. I'm not going to spell it for you. You can find it on the website. Tell his what's going on in your world, Michelle, what would you like to promote? I

00:53:59

have been going to so many conferences around a mess have technology recently, and I finally also settled upon using the 10 in this technology when talking about an exile, all of that sort of staff. So I'm hoping to be speaking not confirmed yet, but I will let everybody know if I do. I'm full. I only on LinkedIn finally on LinkedIn Anta Michelle excel. At the upper limit, the RX conference is coming up soon on my my focus recently has been around

00:54:31

helping companies brands and agencies to understand the value of a mess of technology and try and find at first pilot project to get them going. Because typically, once people start to wear at Admiral than they say, it's transformative ability at, you know capabilities and and I'm a I'm a really big advocate of the I in the right cases, Emily doing some incredible whack and volumetric right now and in an hour and

00:55:00

just some really, really cool things. So I would love to talk to anyone in everybody around how we can find something meaningful feta tests.net fest project, or to change what you're already doing. Because I thought some amazing tightness and I wept clips and Michelle was a lovely person to do business worth. So you definitely wanna can reach out to her and work with are so give her a call last but not least. We have Howard green steam. You can find him@har brook.com. That's the website I have for years. Correct or incorrect. Okay. I that

00:55:29

use to work. So I'm privileged to be speaking and also part of the team running the propeller fi- innovation festival in Hoboken New Jersey on may 17th which is this coming Thursday based on the data were according to spot cast. And as a member of the team, I get to offer all the being cast lesters a $99 ticket for free. That's absolutely $0. Use code being cast eighteen capital, be capital C

00:55:59

eighteen. When you're checking out for the propelled by festival. All day on the Hoboken waterfront this Thursday may 17th in the weather report, knock wood keeps getting better. And in previous years it's been a beautiful day to spend looking at New York City in the background while learning a great deal about innovation. Entrepreneurship and everything from having a drone races with your friends to meeting other influencers

00:56:29

and and other people who are creating companies and who are doing innovative stuff in corporations. Lot of marketing lot of some VCR's and a are some day. I kind of stuff happening this year, and I'm excited to be on a panel talking about the future of people like an age R muttering and h r panel with some h. Our leaders who are some really amazing women. So moving forward to this, and I hope that you'll join me there. Let's let's sounds great. And for those of you in Manhattan, it's steps away from

00:56:59

the dock. So it's easy to get through its it. The the the ferry or the path train will take you right there. It's in fifteen minutes. It's pretty amazing. As for me for more information about me or the show visit, the being cast dotcom there, you can find a complete shore five you can find out how to consult with me. You can even find out how to advertise on the program. So check it all out@the being cast.com. Don't forget transcribe me.com/being cast will give you a special offer because they are official transcription partner.

00:57:29

Yes, we offer transcriptions now, so definitely checked them out and offer them your help. And if you're in Manhattan next, the two weeks from now Wednesday, the 23rd doing an event with fresh books here in the city with love for you to check it out. Definitely reach out to me. If you want more information, I'll go hook you up with a registration code. But now it's time for the ad fell five or run down of the lowest moments in advertising marketing and public relations from the last week. And first up. Rudy

00:57:59

Giuliani continued his campaign to completely screw up the White House, pure messaging as if they needed any help with that for his claiming on national television. That Trump scuttled the eighteen team merger with Time Warner, and then walk that back in when he apparently realized how legal that action by a sitting president would [laughter]. I first of all, I love that our president is is waning all of Giuliani's.

00:58:29

Outbursts as you know, he really doesn't know what he's doing yet [laughter]. Okay. At what point after how many positions of national influence will he know what he's doing? Yeah, I don't know how much to say about. Rudy I'm I'm going to try to lead my personal politics out of this, but have you noticed physically she started to resemble those for too [laughter] I know everybody's been doing that recently. That's pretty

00:58:59

funny. Well, I want to go there next one Google announced new functionality for its clip cameras. Saying it would be better at automatically taking pictures of special moments, Michelle, like kissing so when you're kissing someone in the future, all you have to do is know that your cameras taking pictures of it. I guess your fewer cheater. You've been warned dried [laughter]. I think at least I doubt thing and entering a bunch of other things. I mean, I think if you're if you're

00:59:30

if you really can't bring myself to take a photo of your loved ones, all your friends consensual a or at the time when something cool happens. Any spike in your own house? Cool, it's going to be really helpful play. I just died as failed Saint point. I Gillis us. Well, mixed up is new luxury lying savage, ex frontier or savage by 50 unless her how to pronounce it went on line this past week. Of course, no one could

00:59:59

actually see any of it. Howard, since the site with load. You know, it seems like here we are in 2018 you should expect when a major celebrity launches, the clothing line that they might have a traffic spike, and you might have to make sure your server traffic is able to up the server band with his able to handle the traffic. I mean, this seems like a one on one drop rea- girl have your people call me [laughter] seriously cloud flair.com. There are or anything else. There are so many

01:00:29

companies that will do a balancing loading, all those kinds of things. It's almost inexcusable to have a large launch that won't work. I'm just, you know call Amazon co Google if you really wanna. Microsoft, somebody will put up your website for you. Please the those kind of surprising that that would happen next up researchers at Berkeley of shown that all those voice activated device is Ian can be fooled to do anything simply by playing a subliminal audio command under a regular

01:00:59

audio file. So right now, if I serve like a little message playing in the background same by Bob, something from his Amazon wish list. I'm actually going to make that happen race [laughter]. Yeah, I don't know why I can't wait to see what people do with that. That to me, the the content that should spawn and the voice box pranks will make it all worthwhile. I don't. I don't

01:01:29

worry a lot about the practical application words. Subliminal scares the heck out of everyone. I still when I meet people and tell him that I work in advertising. I can't believe how many people asked me about subliminal messages and ads and I've been doing is 31 years. And I had never even see a subliminal message opt into an ad. So it it sounds a little evil, but I think it's actually going to make some great pranks. And last, but not least mobile ad fraud doubled in

01:01:59

2017. I don't think we have to make any comment about this. I just think that it's just terrible that this problem continues to grow, and we continue to raise money. We'll have something to add to this list or just want to discuss it on online used the hash tag Advil fell five that's pound. Add fell in the number five. Well, that does it for this week's show if you'd like to subscribe to this pod cast visit our website out the being cast dotcom and click on the subscribe link. If you're an I tunes listener, we've also

01:02:29

provided a direct link to the eye teens. Music store were just search for the being cast in the pod guest rectory vitamins and whichever pod guests director you use when you subscribe. Please leave us a review. Got a comment of a question. We'd love to hear from you. Just send your emails to being cast a female dotcom opening theme was performed by Joe soluble closing theme by C jacks. Thanks for listening. I'm Bob nor p- we'll be back again next week. Hope you'll join us then.

01:03:15

It's

01:03:33

exactly.

01:04:25

Cool beans.