Media, Advertising & Marketing

Today's topic is advertising. I recently watched the documentary The Greatest Movie Ever Sold (by Morgan Spurlock), which focuses product placement, advertising and marketing.
I'm not gonna say if it was a good or bad movie, but I want to talk (or, better, write) about it in related to media and technology.
What I think is definitely true is that we're living in a world surrounded by advertisment. It doesn't matter if we live in a big or small city. Just stop for a moment and think about a typical day of yours. There're products ads and bills all around you. In the newspaper or magazine that you're reading on your way to work by metro/bus (yeah, look up and you're probably gonna notice some ad or flyer of some kind). Public transportations, buildings, magazines and newspapers, etc. It is all around you, either you like it or don't.
How is that possible? In my opinion the answer is one: T-E-C-H-N-O-L-O-G-Y.
Media have been having a key role in the marketing process since the "beginning". Let's think about the media we know and we're probably using every day (right know I'm using one to write this post and you're doing the same as well if you're reading it).
Radio, TV, printed press (newspapers, magazines, etc.), computers (and the role of the Web!) and nowadays the latest innovations such as smart phones, iPads, etc. These are all channels that can be used in order to reach the right addressee and deliver the message that could make him/her go and purchase a product of some sort.
In The Greatest Movie Ever Sold  it's shown how the city of Sao  Paolo (Brazil, one of the largest cities of the west emisphere) has changed after the passing of a bill that forbids to put any kind of "outdoor advertising". In other words it's not allowed to put billboards or similar to builduings, public transportations vehicles, etc. It's amazing how the city changes!
To me it seems pretty obvious that most of these advertising and marketing processes are thought and created thank to the latest technological innovations.
Of course we still have the liberty to choose  wheter to buy a product or not (or at least I like to think so), but it's a fact that the "world of marketing and advertising" surrounds us and tries to reach us with a message of some kind.

NOTE: the purpose of this post is NOT to advertise the documentary or other, but to discuss about some topics that have also been analyzed in the movie.

Project: "The Internet as a platform for musicians"

During my last semesters at university I started to work on the relation between music and technology. To be more specific I focused on how new technological innovation have shaped (and still shaping) the music world.

The thesis Internet As A Platform For Musicians can be found here: https://docs.google.com/open?id=0B_f1ULrY_RHLNDA1ZTA3YmQtYjYwZC00YzExLWIwNGEtY2RkMWQxZmYyMGEw

The project is divided in 4 sections:

1) The Invisible Good analyzes the social uses of music and how it has become "untouchable and immaterial"

2) The Ab-use Of Music focuses topics like illegal downloading, online piracy, peer-to-peer application, i-Tunes, etc. and it also discusses how music has come (and still coming) into our homes, our pc and mobile devices (this part contains a short "history of portable devices", from the walkman to the iPhone

3) Social Networks And The Internet As A Virtual Stage discusses how these technologies has changed the music business. This section talks about websites, MySpace, Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, Newsletters, Forums and Blogs.

4) Conclusions: Best Practices is the final part of the project that talks about how to use these new communication and promotion channels in an effective way.

What made this thesis something unique is how it has been made. Not only I read books, magazines and similar sources to obtain some of this work's information, but I also interviewed musicians! Members of the music business, small independent "troubadours", soundtrack composers, radio show hosts and producers are some of the main characters that helped me putting together this innovate insight on the relationship between music and technology. The complete interviews can be found at the end of the thesis as attachments.

This is the complete list of the interviewees (last names in alphabetical order):

• Marcel "Jimi" Aeby (More Experience vocalist & guitarist)
  
• Roy Bennett (singer & bassist)
  
• Judy Carmichael (singer, pianist, radio host and producer)
  
• Daniele Dreier (guitarist of Denis Angelucci and Lucilla Sky)
  
• Nick Fyffe (former Jamiroquai bassist and currently playing in Thenewno2)
• Luis Landrini (singer-songwriter and guitarist)
• Jan Laurenz (guitarist, "stick" player and active independent musician)
• Xavier Longchamp (drummer of reggae band ZonaSun and funk group Brainless)
• Janis Moisejs (Latvian jazz singer and songwriter)
• Xra Nov (independent musician and multi instrumentalist)
• Nicki Parrott (jazz bassist and singer-songwriter)
• Christian "Zodiac" Schwarz (performer and producer under pseudonyms such as Zodiac Project and Tracelements, as well as soundtrack scores)
• Matthew Shilling (jazz and brass band saxophonist)
• Sam Totty (drummer of indie rock band Mata León, previously known as Overview)
• David Werlen (multi instrumentalist)

NOTE: the permission to add the names into the thesis has been given directly from the artists.

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