DFM Episode 5: Ad Busters | Robot Humans | Dark Design

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TRANSCRIPT:

Hey! It’s another episode of Disruptive FM – the Culture of Business … coming to you live from the 21st Annual Surf Industry Manufacturers Association Summit in Los Cabos, Mexico. I’m Geoffrey Colon – your host and audio guide for the next quarter hour as we dissect what's happening at the intersection of business, tech, media and popular culture. Kick it!

 Ad Busters

 I’m recording this particular episode from the Surf Industry Manufacturers Association aka SIMA Summit in Los Cabos Mexico because they asked me to come speak to them about how to market in a post-advertising world. Prior to flying down here, I was in San Diego a few days to speak at The Unconference on brands being more human and less ad-driven and I also spoke at the Medical Developers conference on the same topic. The theme at all three of these events is that advertising is no longer a way to reach people. And it’s not because people don’t pay attention to advertising. Rather, they loathe it so much based on context that they block it. That’s right. Ad blockers are on the rise. Right now in Asia, more than 60% of mobile users under the age of 35 have an ad blocker enabled on their phone. And the numbers the next five years are only going to rise. So what are brands to do? So many lack loyalty from customers they are becoming worried if they have no way to communicate via advertising. So I turned to our contributor at large to DFM, that’s right, the great Cheryl Barbee for some points of view on what this means and why it’s happening. Let’s take a listen to what Cheryl had to say on this ad busters world.

 -Cheryl Barbee interview-

That was Cheryl Barbee, our contributor at large for DFM and senior director of strategy at Accenture Interactive earlier this week via Skype.

Robot Humans

Last week at Google IO, their annual developer’s conference they showcased an assistant that can make phone calls for you to schedule hair appointments or get you a reservation at a restaurant. So what’s so weird about that? The assistant isn’t human yet sounds like one. That’s right, the pauses, the ums and ahs and everything else the assistant did made it hard to hear that this wasn’t an acutal person speaking but you couldn’t tell the difference.

So what does this mean? Many things and some of them good, a lot of them possibly “evil.” If people don’t know they are talking to a robot, what does this mean if someone identifying themselves as the police or possibly a journalist uses the technology?

To better understand what the ethical ramifications are for this we need to start asking these three questions:

1.  What could you do with this technology if it wasn’t to book a haircut, but hack a system to make someone who is your enemy look like they did something?
2. Should these digital assistants come with a disclaimer? Should it say, “Hi I’m Geoffrey’s digital assistant, I’d like to book an appointment for him?”
3. With so many saying, phone calls are dead, does this usher them back in? And if so, will most of that landscape now be taken over by these human sounding bots? Could this turn into a Cambridge Analytica scenario in one of the next big state or federal elections?

One thing is certain. Google isn’t asking these questions. They should but they aren’t. And it’s up to computer scientists, developers, designers and marketers to act as the voice of reason here. I’m no luddite, but certain technology has to have checks and balances. Just because we can build it should we? IT’s not that we can do something, it’s that we can do something evil that wasn’t originally intended by the developer. This is what happened with open APIs on Facebook and could happen to our voice telecommunication systems.

 Dark Design

So your buying plane tickets. And right before you can buy, the airline in question asks if you want an upgrade. So you click yes. And before you know it, you’ve spent $99 before you realize it for your seat. You have just been coerced by what is known as dark design patterns.

The topic of ethical design was all over the news this year, and with good reason. Many of us have seen technology as agnostic, as potential, and not political. Ethics lie not in systems but in individuals. But is that entirely accurate? We’ve read about the attention economy, rapid proliferation of fake news, and charges that data-obsessed social networks place business models over the individual and democracy, and should be regulated.

What are the consequences of our actions? What ethical considerations should designers and creators weigh when they develop a new product? Many of us are in conflict with executive strategies we are asked to implement on the job, that we feel we cannot influence or change. With whom does the burden lie for what we create and how it is used?

How do dark patterns do this? They use color, button placement, and vague or confusing language. Some default-select checkboxes on screens that automatically subscribe users to services they didn’t want. Many of these interactions force careful users to examine the screen for hidden costs, deselect items automatically added to baskets — essentially, they take advantage of the fact that people don’t naturally shop online on the defensive to complete a simple task.

Some companies remove dark patterns in response to customer complaints. The power of customer complaints can contribute to shift the balance of dark in favor of light patterns.

But what are these light patterns? Designers can influence strategy and style of a brand to move it away from the dark side and call for designers to celebrate good UX and usability that embody light patterns that emphasize empathy, usability, and ethical design.

Everything Is a Remix!

The first computer generated Instagram Influencer with over 1 Million Followers.

Miquela Sousa, better known by her Instagram handle @lilmiquela, appears to be your run-of-the-mill influencer. The 19-year-old, Los Angeles-based, Brazilian/Spanish model and musician fills her Instagram feed with an endless stream of "outfit-of-the-day" shots, featuring Chanel, Proenza Schouler, Supreme, Vetements and Vans. She shares pictures of herself attending events like ComplexCon with fellow influencers and celebrity friends, along with memes and inspirational quotes. She even uses her platform to support social causes including Black Lives Matter and transgender rights. Her Instagram followers, which currently number over 535,000, are dubbed "Miquelites." Her debut single "Not Mine" reached number eight on Spotify Viral in August 2017. There's only one thing — she's not real, or at least not what we used to call real.

Real or not, "virtual celebrities" have been around for years, first emerging in the late 1960s with the best example being “The ARchies” and their song “Sugar, Sugar.” The ARchies were a cartoon band that virtually existed and yet had a chart topping single. This again remixed itself in the late 1990s when musician Damon Albarn and artist Jamie Hewlett founded virtual band Gorillaz — a band whose visual identity consisted of four animated characters (2-D, Murdoc Niccals, Noodle and Russel Hobbs) that rose to critical acclaim and went on to win a Grammy Award in 2006.

And now we’re here in the early 2020s with Miquela. If I were Kylie Jenner I would be very afraid.

ON THE RADAR

Blips on our screen we’re keeping an eye on and you should too. Want to hear more Disruptive FM in between our long weekly shows? Join us for our daily briefing on your Amazon Echo, Echo Dot, Echo Plus, Echo Show, Echo Spot or Echo Look. Simply say, “Alexa, Enable Disruptive FM Daily.” Then when you want to listen say, “Alexa, what’s in the news.” Our 2 minute flash briefing will make you feel like you’re taking a steroid for your mind.

$30,000 Sneakers?

Sneaker swapping from Sneakerheads got its start with people posting on simple sites like craigslist. Now the trend is creating physical stores in cities around the world and new online destinations. Old sold out sneakers that may have been sold for as low as $50, can now go for $25,000 depending on the supply and demand of those shoes. The point isn’t utility as much as identity. Look down at your shoes. It says a lot more about you then you realize. Cashing in on this trade is Stadium Goods, a physical retailer giving Foot Locker a run for its money and GOAT, a ship to verify model where the seller sends the sold sneakers to them to verify their authenticity before shipping to the buyer. This prevents price gouging which took place way too much on sites like eBay. This is a huge area to watch for both fashion and retail. Why? Because the fashion industry still thinks new is the best way forward. But what we can learn from the sneaker swapping craze is that re-used and old goods can find new life which makes sense in our everything is a remix world. The second learning is could this model live on Amazon? Based on most buyers and sellers that answer is no. Physical shops that are boutique and lifestyle driven are a big corenerstone to the model. And verification like GOAT provides is a huge part of the model. It’s not simply about ordering and shipping. If this trend takes off in other areas, it could easily derail many fashion and retail brands alike. More on this in a future episode of DFM.

85% Original Content for Netflix

In case you had any doubts that original content is a big priority at Netflix, Chief Content Officer Ted Sarandos estimated that 85 percent of the company’s total spending is going to new shows and movies.

That’s according to a report by Variety, which reported on Sarandos’ remarks today at MoffettNathanson’s Media & Communications Summit 2018 in New York. He also said Netflix has a 470 originals scheduled to premiere between now and the end of the year, bringing the total up to around 1,000.

It’s probably not surprising that the service is prioritizing originals. After all, Netflix seems to be highlighting a new one every time I open it up, and competitors like Apple, Amazon and Hulu are ramping up their own spending.

But the depth of Netflix’s library, which is achieved by licensing content from others, has always seemed like a strength — in fact, a recent study a recent study found that licensed content generates 80 percent of Netflix viewing in the United States.

Part of the context here is that many of the studios that have sold their content to Netflix in the past are now either saving it for their own streaming services or looking to raise their prices.

AR Ads hitting tipping point

For all the bleakness in Snapchat’s first-quarter earnings call on May 1, there was one shining ray of hope: The platform saw a 16 percent year-over-year increase in the number of augmented reality lenses sold. The same day, Facebook had its own slew of AR news. At its annual F8 conference, Facebook announced AR features it would bring to advertisers, including AR ads on Instagram.

Ad buyers aren’t surprised. AR and VR are slowly moving mainstream, but while the majority of marketers foresee an uncertain future ahead for VR ads, they aren’t saying the same about its slightly less technical cousin — AR ads.

Ad buyers say they are seeing increases in spending when it comes to AR ads, and with new AR features coming from Facebook, they believe budgets will only expand.

Okay, that's gonna do it for another episode of DFM ... As always, thanks for hangin’ with us. Participate with us on social media by following me on Twitter or Instagram @djgeoffe. Follow DisruptiveFM on Twitter or Instagram @DisruptiveFM. You can read more in-depth content via our sponsors – brandingstrategyinsider.com and Microsoft.com/stories.

Until next time, I'm Geoffrey Colon... We’ll catch you next week.