Couple hypotheticals…
If you’re interested in reading a summary of completely asinine insights, check out this August 21th post on the NY Times’ Freakanomics blog, The Plight of Mixed-Race Children.
Right off the bat, the whole premise of the paper is baffling to me. Plight? Really? A mixed race kid might become our next president. How ‘bout we turn this study on its head and call it “The Opportunities of Mixed Race Children.â€
Two, the research completely oversimplifies the issue. Take, for example, their first finding:
To my mixed-race middle-class eyes, this finding seems really skewed. Where did they find the households surveyed? In only inner-city neighborhoods? Also, this study should have been broken down by the race and nationality of each parent. (White mom, Black dad / Black mom, White dad / country of origin of each parent). I’d love to see some takeaways from such research – and I’m sure they’d show some rich results. Or at least some believable results.
I remember learning of Barack Obama’s Iowa win via text message. A bunch of my old school friends were in town, and the news made an already tasty night even sweeter. Learning of the win “on location†(i.e. at the bar) gave us the opportunity to celebrate night right: we toasted, hugged, bounced around the restaurant excitedly and talked politics for the rest of the evening.
My generation texts everything, because texts cut the crap – good ones are short, easy to follow and, most importantly, informative. Receiving a text that says “what up†is seriously wack. But give me some news or update that I really want, and I’m all over it. I’m hungry for it.
As a digital marketer, I see corporations starting to understand the real opportunity that text messages present. Mobile coupons, text-to-wins, updates – it works if it’s done right. But so many companies are really scared of new media. They don’t trust it
So yesterday I was a bit stunned upon receiving this e-mail from Obama campaign manager David Plouffe. My thoughts went a little something like this: “Announce the VP choice via text and e-mail? Seriously? He’s crazy. Oh, and that’s so ridiculously awesome, I gotta go sign up right awayâ€
The choice that the Obama campaign made is daring, that’s for sure. They’re putting tremendous faith in new media. But it’s funny, by using new media—my media—and as the only platform to announce such important news, I feel as though the Obama campaign is tremendous faith in me as well – which feels really good.
Because you and I both know that when I receive the VP text, I’ll shout it out all over the bar. Apparently the Obama campaign knows that too.
Related:
Washington Post: Obama Nearing a Veep Decision?
Originally posted on Ryan Barrett’s blog Cheap Thrills .
