Archive for January 25th, 2011

My GE roller-coaster … the Immelt appointment.

January 25, 2011

OK, the stock got a bump on Friday thanks to a sweet earnings report … and, perhaps, thanks to Obama naming CEO Immelt to head up his recovery board of advisers.

I’m conflicted, for a couple of reasons.

First,  GE stock  has steadily lost value during Immelt’s tenure … which started in 2001.

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Yeah, there was 9/11 and the financial crisis, but the rest of the world – measured by the S&P 500 has pretty much gotten back its losses. 

 GE is still down 50% from when Immelt took over.

But, it makes you wonder: why didn’t Obama pick a CEO with a record of success?

Say, like Immelt’s predecessor –- Jack Welch – who knows how to cut costs and drive innovation.

I guess Obama wanted somebody he could count on to support his healthcare and cap & trade initiatives.

FoxNews has taken to calling GE “Government Electric”  because it yapped the TARP program, it takes a heavy dose of government contracts, and its media outlets (NBC and MSNBC) cheerlead for Obama..

There are a few companies on the Obama corporate A List – Democratic patrons Google and Goldman Sachs both turn up again and again at White House functions and for special recognition – but no company seems to get the VIP treatment that General Electric receives.

While most corporate leaders have taken a wait and see approach to Obama’s occasional overtures to the private sector, G.E., along with Google, Goldman and few others, have backed him to the hilt.

Whether it is pushing the president’s plan for global warming fees in order to create demand for his “Ecomagination” line of windmills, solar panels, etc., boosting the president’s national health-care law as part of an effort to sell more medical equipment, or enthusing over the Obama strategy of making loans available for industrial exporters, Immelt has been an Obama stalwart all along.

Immelt has also consistently argued to shareholders that there is big money to be made in advancing the Democratic agenda, in huge government contracts,   subsidies and incentives.

FoxNews.com, Obama Teams Up With GE, January 21, 2011

That raises some major angst for me – my political philosophy is on one side, and my wallet is on the other.

Oh my.

Posted in Politics - General, Stock Market | Leave a Comment »

A man who walked the talk … bye,bye Jack LaLanne

January 25, 2011

Fitness guru Jack LaLanne passed away on Sunday  … at the ripe old age of 96.

Nice article in the Wash Post touting the man …

Jack LaLanne was … a fitness pioneer!

He inspired us to get off the couch and do jumping jacks.

He once swam the length of the Golden Gate Bridge while toting 140 pounds of equipment!

And, on television, he encouraged us to engage in manageable fitness — or at least to buy a juicer!

Jack LaLanne was a hero for people like me.

The world these days is more polarized than ever. The Fit People meet up once a year, slather their bodies in oil, and march around in swimsuits lifting refrigerators with their teeth. They jog distances traditionally associated with announcing that the Greeks are victorious and then dying on the spot.

The Fat People meet up every day at Chili’s and order platters of things slathered in other things that you wouldn’t think were a good combination unless your goal was to singlehandedly consume more calories than the entire population of a smaller first-world country like Liechtenstein.

There are the rest of us. We just sort of muddle along. Every year we resolve to go to the gym and lift things and jog on the machines and maybe use those giant inflatable balls for whatever it is they’re supposed to be used for.

Jack LaLanne wasn’t about just the fit people — or just about the Fat People.

During his years on television, he encouraged everyone to work out, not just the people with buns of steel or buns of cinnamon.

I’ll miss Jack LaLanne.

Washington Post, This is why we’re fat: Missing Jack LaLanne, January 24, 2011

Posted in Health & Nutrition | Leave a Comment »

Wait a minute, you’re not a TV program … you’re a commercial.

January 25, 2011

TakeAway: With the proliferation of DVRs such as TiVo, building awareness for products and services through TV commercials is more challenging than it used to be.

To get viewers to stop skipping through the commercials, advertisers are starting to make commercials look like the shows they interrupt.

It’s tricky but effective.

* * * * *

Excerpted from NPR, “‘Podbuster’ Ads, Calculated To Make You Hit Pause,” by Neda Ulabe, January 12, 2011

Call it smart advertising — or bad boundaries. You may have noticed a spike in the number of TV commercials designed to look and feel like whatever show you’re watching. They’re called podbusters, DVR busters or interstitial ads, and they’re designed to remove viewers’ fingers from the fast-forward button during blocks — or “pods” — of ads.

The advent of TiVo and similar devices can be thanked for the rise of the podbusters. About 40 percent of households have DVRs — meaning 40 percent of households can easily zip past commercials. Think of podbusters as speed bumps for ads.

Media consultant Dan Portnoy got caught while watching … the AMC drama Mad Men. That evening, he was speeding through the commercials as usual when he saw guys in ’60s fashions in a familiar-looking office, and he thought the program had started again. So he stopped fast-forwarding. What he saw looked like Mad Men. It sounded like Mad Men. But it was an ad for shampoo. …

He’d been caught by one kind of podbuster: a commercial that looks like the show. Bravo’s Top Chef employs a different variety: brief, vacuous outtakes from the real show, slotted in between commercials to make you think the program has started up again. …

There are other kinds of podbusters, too. Both Glee and 30 Rock are punctuated by commercials featuring actors from the shows. When you see Tina Fey in an American Express ad as it whizzes by on fast-forward, it’s easy to mistake it for 30 Rock — and so you stop to watch. …

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Posted in Mktg - Advertising | Leave a Comment »