Volkswagon's going philosophical

Volkswagon Sweden has devised what they call “The Fun Theory”, which states that the easiest way to change people’s behaviour towards something for the better is make that something “fun”.

For Volkswagon, that particular “something” is the environment. Whether it’s getting people to recycle, not to litter, or to take the stairs rather than the escalator, Volkswagon is asking people to submit videos that act as “evidence” for the theory.

But this is really a “viral” marketing campaign to promote Volkswagon’s new environmentally friendly “BlueMotion Techonology” which is now put into their cars.

According to our handy Whipple book, viral advertising is any Internet-driven promotion, such as video clips, which get passed on from one person to another, spreading like a global infection (Kind of like the ad version of swine flu. In which case this post is the equivalent of an uncovered sneeze and now, my dear reader, you’re infected. Sorry.)

Dove’s Evolution commerical is one example of viral advertising; The Fun Theory from Volkswagon is another.

In an interview with the L.A. Times, DDB Stockholm deputy manager Lars Axelsson said that “by making driving and the world more fun, we turn the VW brand into a hero. Our experiments and our Fun Theory films make the world a better and more fun place to live.”

I’ll admit – the videos are entertaining, and the ideas that people come up with are really quite innovative. But as soon as I see the Volkswagon logo with the words “An initiative of Volkswagon” at the top of the webpage, I become a little more uninterested.

Maybe I’m just being cynical, but to me, it’s like thinking you’ve finally found someone who genuinely cares about making the world a better place without standing to gain anything from it... and then, to quote Luke Sullivan, "the salesman pops out of the closet in his plaid coat".

Does “The Fun Theory” make Volkswagon a hero? Maybe, if people’s behaviours and attitudes towards the environment are changed for the long-term. But how long will it be before the novelty of piano key staircases and acade game recycling bins wears off?

Although I just might change my mind if Volkswagon can meet my challenge: how can we make streeters fun to do?

Tips for the new (Citytv) blogger

News of Creative Communications students writing blogs has successfully diffused out into the "real world": local media station Citytv shot a news segment in our PR class today to explore this wondrous new genre of college homework.

If you've stumbled across this blog after watching that segment, welcome, and thank you for reading.

It's mid-semester at the college, and after eight weeks of this ongoing assignment, I have some advice for those who are thinking of setting up their own blog:

1. Write for your readership: this is one of the standard rules we are taught in CreComm. Know your audience and shape your writing and ideas accordingly.

After all, unless the blog is acting as an online diary, the purpose of posting your writing online is for others to read it. Sometimes your topic will dictate your audience; other times, choosing your audience will determine which topics you should pursue.

2. Find your "niche": is one of the suggestions our PR instructor, Kenton, gave us when we first began our blogs, and it's a good one. Narrowing down what you talk about to as specific a topic as possible (but still broad enough to ensure you have enough to write about) not only helps you as a writer, but it also helps your readers.

The task of sitting down and writing your next post is daunting enough, never mind having to choose from your wide variety of interests. If you set guidelines for yourself in terms of topics, you'll be better able to focus your creative energies on writing, rather than brainstorming. Even better, if you have a topic in mind, you'll know what to keep for your ears open for, idea-wise, when you're not blogging.

Narrowing down a topic also does your readers a favour. There are a billion blogs out there where people post their thoughts on "random stuff", which, to be honest, is not that fascinating because anyone can have an opinion on anything. Having a blog with structure makes you stand out from this crowd. If someone wants to know what's happening in a particular sphere of the media, like punk music, and you've got a blog on it, they'll know where to go and not have to worry about sifting through stuff they don't want to read to get to the stuff they do.

And similar to what I said above, narrowing down your to topic will help you focus your thoughts, delve deeper, and maybe take a particular angle or touch on things that others have not.

The only problem: finding your niche is difficult to do.

I've tried to center my blog around communications (which is an extremely broad topic in itself), but with a focus on advertising, public relations, journalism, and broadcast media because these are the communication sectors I'm being exposed to in college, so I'm already in the habit of applying what I learn to "the real world".

Even focusing on these four sectors alone is quite broad in itself, but I'm working on narrowing my blog down as I come closer to deciding in which area I want to specialize in my second year.

3. Within your niche, have a "unique selling proposition": I borrowed that phrase from advertising, but it's just as applicable to blogging. Write about something that not a lot of other people are writing about.

Like I said before, anyone can have opinion on anything. Make yours unique. This does not mean you have to go searching for the rarest of the rare of news. If there's something that everyone is talking about, and it interests you as well, then by all means blog about it - but take a different angle.

If everyone's talking about Kanye West and what a jerk he is after the MTV awards, don't fall into the same trap of reiterating everyone else's comments in your own words. Try and approach it from a different perspective, such as whether it was good publicity or bad publicity. Even better - how would you help Kanye save face if you were his public relations person? Or would you?

4. Experiment with blog sites other than Blogger: Although Blogger has the cool techonological-age look that is associated with blogging, it is not without its glitches.

Odd spacing issues, font re-sizing of its own accord, suddenly erasing your entry before you post it, and my personal pet peeve, not being able to copy text from word processing programs, or even from other areas within the same post, into Blogger (this seems to be an issue for Windows PCs only, which makes it difficult when I want to publish a post from the college computers).

Buyer Beware: Debbie Meyer Green Bags

In the age of health conscious living, there has never been more emphasis on eating fresh fruits and vegetables. But the trick is to make sure those fruits and veggies stay fresh for eating.

In 2007, Housewares America, Inc. came out with Debbie Meyer Green Bags, which claim that they will prolong the life of your produce for up to 30 days by absorbing and removing ethylene gases which accelerates the ripening process.

As good ol’ Debbie will tell you in her infomercial, Green Bags will save you money by eliminating waste.

Sounds too good to be true? Yeah, we thought so too.

Emelia Nyarku, Kristel Mason, Deborah Remus, and I decided to take Housewares America, Inc., and Debbie Meyer herself, up on the claims they made. Should consumers pay $14.99 for 20 Green Bags when they can just as easily get 50 Glad bags for a third of the price?

The Experiment

Over a time period of eight days, we tested the effectiveness of Green Bags against the more common means of food storage: Glad bags, grocery store bags/boxes, and on the counter, or in the fridge.

We put bananas, mushrooms, and strawberries, which tend to spoil quickly, into each test condition, and examined them daily for firmness, odour, weight, size (in diameter, specifically for mushrooms), spotting, and mould.

The instructions on the Green Bags packaging stated that produce stored in the bags must be kept as dry as possible, and to wipe away any moisture which formed in the bags. To be consistent, we applied this instruction to the other storage conditions too.

The Research

While our experiment was in progress, we gathered secondary research from scientists, supermarkets, culinary institutions, and consumer testimonials on the Internet. Here’s a sample of our significant findings:

Rick Holley, a professor from the University of Manitoba’s food science department, admitted that the Green Bags just might work. The presence of moisture is one of the main factors that induces food spoilage, and zeolite, a porous material that is supposedly in the bag, could act as a moisture absorbing compound.

Holley advised, however, that simply adjusting the temperature of your fridge could produce the same effect. Setting your fridge temperature at around 6 degrees Celsius, he said, would probably improve the shelf life of produce by 50 per cent.

To clarify the properties of zeolite, Ernest Prokopchuck, who teaches chemistry at the University of Winnipeg, said that it is anadsorbent material, which is different from absorbent. For instance, water can absorb into cloth, but zeolite absorbs materials to itself, similar to the attraction of metal to magnets.

That being the case, Prokopchuk said that spoilage-causing ethylene gases will not actually be removed completely, as demonstrated in the Green Bags infomercial. Rather, some ethylene will escape out the bag through the zeolite, and some will flow right back in.

Conclusion

Overall, Debbie Meyer Green Bags underperformed when compared with other food storage methods.

Although Housewares America, Inc. claims that Green Bags will “dramatically” extend the life of your fruits and veggies, their performance in our experiments was not exceptional.

Glad bags retained produce freshness just as well as Green Bags in 3 out of 4 experiments conducted on mushrooms.

(Glad bag mushrooms; Day 1 (left), Day 8 (right))

(Green Bags mushrooms; Day 1 (left), Day 8 (right))

In 3 out of 4 experiments conducted on bananas, and 2 out of 4 experiments conducted on strawberries, Glad bags actually performed better than the Green Bags.

(Glad bag bananas; Day 1 (left), Day 8 (right))

(Green Bags bananas; Day 1 (left), Day 8 (right))

(Glad bag strawberries; Day 1 (left), Day 8 (right))

(Green Bags strawberries; Day 1 (left), Day 8 (right))

Housewares America, Inc. also claims that by absorbing and removing ethylene gas, Green Bags will delay the natural ripening and rotting process.

However, 2 out of 4 experiments found mould forming on the stems of bananas in Green Bags before it formed on those in the other test conditions.

One experiment found mould on strawberries in the Green Bags, but not on those in the Glad bags.

(Green Bags strawberries)

What You Should Do

If you’re looking for ways to increase the amount of time your fruits and veggies stay fresh, save that $14.99 you set aside for Debbie’s Green Bags. We recommend trying other storage methods or even altering your food purchasing habits before purchasing Green Bags:

1. Buy local and in-season produce. Fruits and veggies shipped across the country and around the world are often harvested early, and begin to ripen en route to the consumer. There is also the potential that the produce was exposed to less than ideal shipping conditions, such as poor temperature, which will decrease the quality of the produce once you get it. Buying local and in-season produce ensures maximum freshness and quality (not to mention supporting your local farmers).

(Karl Oman, instructor, Culinary Arts program, Red River College)

2. Set your fridge to 6 degrees Celsius. This is the temperature that will encourage maximum shelf-life in most produce.

(Rick Holley, professor, food science department, University of Manitoba)

3. Don’t put your mushrooms in plastic. Mushrooms need proper air circulation to breathe. Plastic inhibits air flow, and can cause harmful bacteria to grow on the mushrooms, which can be poisonous for humans. Plastic also makes them slimy - scrap the plastic and use paper!

(Karl Oman, instructor, Culinary Arts program, Red River College)

The bottom line: Debbie Meyer Green Bags may prolong the life of certain produce, but not “dramatically”, as claimed. In the majority of tests we conducted, Glad bags were just as efficient. So the question remains: $14.99 for 20 Green Bags, or $4.99 for 50 Glad bags? It's a tough call!

You say global warming, I say climate change

Today's PR class assignment called on me to take hold of a particular silent rage and release it on the public - look out Globe and Mail.

This past Wednesday, columnist Margaret Wente published an article on the lack of concern for environmental issues due to what she says is the "apocalyptic language of environmentalists."

Apparently, the latest public poll states that the general public is "cooling" on "global warming", and Wente thinks that pessimistic word choice is to blame.

She may be right, but that's not the point of my letter to her editor.

Her choice to use the term "global warming" in her article when what she is really referring to is "climate change" reflects a common trend that illustrates a lack of understanding about what impending environmental change - whatever you want to call it - really entails.

NASA has posted an article on their website that addresses this very topic. They clarify that the term global warming is used to specify surface temperature increases only, while climate change refers to any long-term changes in the Earth's climate that will result from an increase in greenhouse gases, which includes global warming.

How many times have I heard Canadians joke that global warming may be a good thing for us frozen northerners?

I hate this joke, but I will give them the benefit of the doubt and say that maybe (just maybe?) they don't fully understand the climactic changes to come.

Climate change means, among a vast list of changes, an increase in the amount and intensity of natural disasters, the invasion of exotic species into vulnerable habitats, and the endangerment and extinction of many animals. It does not mean that our poor driving habits and gas-guzzler SUVs will turn Winnipeg into a future balmy sun-seeking destination.

Proper terminology is necessary if we are to turn public indifference into public concern for an issue that deserves more attention than any economic recession. (Hey, even if I don't get into the Globe and Mail, I should at least score points for ranting in rhyme.)