Daniel Dessinger

Month: January 2007

  • Living Beyond the Marketing Hype

    There are times when learning cutting edge marketing techniques enhances one’s skill set. Then there are times when you’ve got to step away from all the marketing buzz or you’ll lose your soul. It pains me to say it, but marketers like me often fall into this category beyond businessman and just shy of prostitute.

    Strong words, I know, but we face a necessary evil. We help businesses fight for visibility amidst the throng of thousands of other voices. Still, there are timeless truths that one must choose to hold onto or else risk drowning.

    “Stay away from the love of money…Be content with the things that you have.”
    “Be true to yourself.”
    “Write your first draft from your heart. Write your second draft with your head.”

    A writer faces certain dilemmas during the developmental stages of his career. What path will i take to success? Will i insist on staying true to my art? Will i write anything to get attention? Where do i draw the line between pursuing success and insisting on authenticity?

    Search the Internet and you will find a thousand ways to leverage yourself to gain visitors, clickthroughs, and, in the end, popularity. You can follow a dozen formulas or create your own hybrid. Make thousands of dollars or simply become known as the authority on a subject.

    Some of you will inevitably try all of these things and finally come to the conclusion that it’s not worth that feeling of losing substance on the inside. Sure, you could make the money if you want to. You could gain the popularity if you wanted to. But you stop because you realize you don’t really want to. You discover that even the uncomfortable obscurity you’ve lived in for years is preferable to a life focused on the bottom line.

    They are the rough seas we must all navigate to the best of our abilities. Some will sink. Some will swim. Some will float helplessly. Some may even walk on water.

    Which will you be?

    Shoot, which will i be?

  • Social Media Marketing

    We just got back from the DFWIMA meeting on marketing and social media. Some guys from Yahoo! shared statistical findings about “Brand Advocates.” They define an advocate as someone who researches extensively before purchasing and also recommends their products. They compared behavior between Advocates and Non-Advocates.

    The end result is that we were all encouraged to pursue a working understanding of social media and to locate the Advocates online who might best respresent our clients or our own products. Not enough was said about practical applications, but it was worth attending simply to receive the reinforced knowledge that Advocates take pride in promoting their purchases through blogs, forums, online communities, photoblogs, and online videos.

    Social media is exploding as people seek to voice their opinions and experiences. Everyone wants to be heard. Not everyone chooses to use web 2.0 tools to do so, but it is the age of information sharing and popularity plays a big role in whose voice is heard.

    Now the question is: who are the popular Advocates, how did they become so popular, and is it better to create our own advocates or harness existing talents to do the work for us?

  • Children of Men – Movie Review

    Children of Men is a powerful film. Two days later, I am still reeling from the sense of “lostness” I felt during as the characters fled for their lives in a lawless, futuristic England.

    It is 20 years in our future, and most of the world has been devastated. England alone survives in tact. For the past 18 years, no child has been born. Theories abound over the cause of infertility, but no one can say for sure which manmade technological evil was precisely the cause. Perhaps most touching is one woman’s recollection of seeing miscarriage after miscarriage until no new babies were being born in her hospital.

    Clive Owen delivers another quality performance. He’s a more rugged and less obvious choice for a Hollywood leading man, but he delivers better than most of the pretty boys Hollywood used to favor. More so than many other actors, Owen seems like a real man. The audience can really identify with him. He could just as easily be a fisherman at the docks as a secret agent. He’s got the grit to be a laborer and the finesse to be a stud. The best way to describe Clive Owen is to say that he brings realism to the film. You don’t expect him to be bullet proof. He’s not the bronzed Achilles-like Brad Pitt. He could very well die in the film and you suddenly realize that you have no idea what could happen.

    Michael Caine delivers a wonderful performance. He’s a pot smoking dissident, living in obscurity and caring for his disabled wife. He brings a fun, lighthearted and irreverent rebelliousness to the film without which the storyline would fall into such dark and dismal scenes that one would never hope to recover.

    The plot revolves around this illegal immigrant who is miraculously pregnant. She is the first known pregnant woman in over a decade. Owen’s character vows to protect her after his ex-wife dies trying to do the same. He learns that his ex-wife’s political/military allies actually plotted her death and he flees with the woman in a desperate attempt to help her reach a secret group of scientists who will protect her and the baby.

    On the whole, Children of Men is powerful. No other word describes it better. Watch it if you can stomach war violence. If you have delicate sensititivities, wait a few years for the television cut (if they ever play movies on television anymore).

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  • The Little Ball of Hate is My Biggest Fan

    It would appear that Jennifer Engle, a.k.a. The Little Ball of Hate, is my biggest fan. I can’t imagine that there are that many people out there who listen to her morning talk show on 103.3 fm ESPN who then feel the need to search for her on Google, Yahoo, MSN, or AOL.

    Yet somehow CultureFeast receives more referral links to this site for Jen Engle than just about anything else. I picture her sitting at her computer at work, searching her own name every day on all the major search engines, hoping to find some really cool articles about herself. Who knows? Maybe Nasty Boy or Taylor does the searching for her. Regardless, it’s gotta be someone on the show with an inflated ego.

    Seriously, this is only the second time I have written anything about Jennifer Engle, yet I receive anywhere from 5-10 visitors daily from various search engines for her name or nickname.

    Don’t get me wrong; The Little Ball of Hate Show is interesting enough to listen to. The Randy Galloway Show (a.k.a. GAC) is by far the best sports talk show on the radio, but there really isn’t anyone else I care to listen to except for Jen. So she deserves some props. She’s working hard with her column writing and daily sports talk show.

    I just wonder how she finds the time to search her name and visit my blog five times a day.

  • Radiant Rocks Times Square on New Year’s Eve

    Dallas-based band Radiant rocked New York on New Year’s Eve. They won the Pontiac Countdown to One contest and were selected as the best unsigned band in America. They played live in front of nearly a million people in Times Square, opening for P.O.D. and My Chemical Romance.

    Follow this link to check out a video of the New Year’s Eve Radiant Concert in Times Square.

  • FenceSitting

    we sat upon the rickety fence
    the one up town beside the old fish market
    we sat and looked from side to side
    peering up at steady streaming traffic
    and down the empty, windswept alleys

    we sat and chose a course of action
    for none had seemed so obvious til then.
    the street so full of cars looked burdensome
    and the alleys whispered promises of fun
    so we jumped down and ran until we found the alley’s end.

    so strange it seems to see it now
    that dead end where our hell began
    would that we were back at that old fence again
    still sitting, still full of possibilities
    and i would not be here alone.

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  • Top Ten Hollywood Actresses

    It wasn’t easy to narrow down my list of best actresses, but since it must be done for the sake of a Top Ten, here they are, from least to best:

    #10 Kate Hudson – best films with Kate Hudson include How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days, Raising Helen, Almost Famous, and The Four Feathers. Kate is still building a decent portfolio, but she’s definitely on the right track. She brings a level of sophisticated hip wit to both dramas and comedies that are unique for her age group.

    #9 Diane Lane – Diane Lane deserves her own spot within the top ten for her class and style. If she never made another decent film, Under the Tuscan Sun has immortalized Ms. Lane in romantic comedy history.

    #8 Winona Ryder – Winona was excellent in Edward Scissorhands and decent in Reality Bites. I don’t know why she doesn’t make more films. More recently, she did well in Autumn in New York, Girl Interrupted, and Simone. Honestly, Ryder could have ended up much higher on the list if she hadn’t disappeared from my radar for so many years.

    #7 Kristin Scott Thomas: I cannot picture a better tragically romantic character actress than Kristin Scott Thomas. My favorite films with her in it are The English Patient, Life as a House, and The Horse Whisperer. In each role, she mastered the art of shame, disappointment, and desire.

    #6 Gwyneth Paltrow – While it’s probably true that Gwyneth owes her celebrity to Brad Pitt, she has still made quite a stir on her own in Hollywood. She won the Academy Award for Best Actress in 1998 for her role in Shakespeare in Love – one of my top 20 all-time favorites. She starred opposite Pitt in the instant cult classic film, “Se7en.” From there, she won the hearts of millions of female fans for her starring role in Emma. Sliding Doors was her next major film, which didn’t see as much success for some reason. Gwyneth came roaring back with a vengeance with a powerful performance in Great Expectations, one of my Top 5 movies of all-time. Hush and A Perfect Murder were so-so films. Yet again, Gwyneth proves her ability to rule the silver screen in The Talented Mr. Ripley, Duets, Bounce, Shallow Hal, Possession, Sylvia, and Proof. She really enters into her own with Proof. No one can doubt that she is a serious actress, completely deserving of the acclaim and attention she has received. Lucky for us, Gwyneth appears to be keeping a busy acting schedule.
    #5 Cate Blanchett – Blanchett got my attention with Elizabeth back in ‘98. I still remember exactly where I saw that film. It was a two movie special – I watched Stepmom and Elizabeth back to back. Roles in Pushing Tin and The Talented Mr. Ripley were just fillers until her stellar performance as a psychic on The Gift. She was sufficient (though not extraordinary) in The Lord of the Rings trilogy. Her most recent successes (which I haven’t even seen yet) are Charlotte Gray, The Shipping News, Veronica Guerin, The Aviator, The Good German, and Notes on a Scandal. I really haven’t seen enough of her, but she has a reputation which earns her this spot.

    #4 Susan Sarandon – my favorite Sarandon film was Stepmom. It was a warm and unforgettable piece. Though she hasn’t played any extremely memorable roles recently, she has done very well in the past and will likely do so again in several of her eight upcoming projects. Sarandon was celebrated for her role in Dead Man Walking, but I prefer her in films like Anywhere But Here, Cradle Will Rock, The Client, and, of course, Thelma and Louise.

    #3 Nicole Kidman – Nicole really didn’t arrive until Far and Away. She and Tom Cruise both delivered incredible performances in that film. She seemed to go downhill with To Die For. Moulin Rouge and Eyes Wide Shut were big films for her, but they were definitely not for me. The Hours is the film where Kidman earns the respect of her peers. Cold Mountain and The Interpreter were both solid performances. Honestly, she wins major cred for her fole in Far and Away. She just doesn’t seem to get the right roles very often.

    #2 Meg Ryan – There is no single actress that can draw me to a film like Meg Ryan. She is the queen of the romantic comedy. She’s cornered the Hollywood market on cute and witty. Her best films include Sleepless in Seattle, You’ve Got Mail, French Kiss, I.Q., Addicted to Love, City of Angels, Proof of Life, Kate & Leopold, and Hanging Up. Meg is not limited to comedy, as we see in City of Angels, Proof of Life, and In the Cut. She may not be the most diverse actress, but nobody nails her genres like Meg.

    #1 Jodie Foster – My favorite Jodie Foster films include Panic Room, Little Man Tate, The Silence of the Lambs, and Nell. Second tier includes Candleshoe, Contact, and Maverick. She is obviously one of the most intelligent and well-rounded actresses ever. She can do comedy, tragedy, suspense, family, sci-fi… you name it – Jodie Foster can do it. There is no one who can do it better.

  • Working from a Massage Chair

    There’s not much more to be said. I am sitting here with my laptop, working from an iJoy 300 electric massage chair. This sucker’s bad to the bone! I can type on my laptop while the chair slowly works on the sore spots.
    It’s great therapy after having been sick for more than a week. Anything helps. The chair was really meant for my wife, but since she’s not here, it’s fair game!

  • A Severe Case of Jacques Itch

    Two months ago, I felt a strange burning sensation that I couldn’t quite place. I was compelled to search for the cure, and it came in the form of three Jacques: Jacques Derrida, Jacques Maritain, and Jacques Ellul. The jacques-itch seemed incurable. The lack of college level reading material in my life left me feeling somewhat dull. I can only handle so much exposure to uneducated authors.

    Derrida left a few scars, so I’ve not turned to peer again in his direction as of yet. Ellul, on the other hand, has provided just the relief I was looking for. Of course, I had to use interlibrary loan to get ahold of Ellul’s book, The Meaning of the City, and then I had to return it before I had the chance to finish. Luckily for me, my mother-in-law ordered a copy of it for me through Amazon and it should be arriving in the next few days.

    There are some radical and insightful ideas in Ellul’s book about the formation, meaning, and purpose of cities. More to come on the subject once my copy of the book arrives. I also received a copy of his meditations on Ecclesiastes for Christmas. I’m really looking forward to that one as soon as I finish the first.

    Happy New Year! Remember, if you begin to feel that uncomfortable burning sensation known as jacques-itch, I can refer you to a specialist!