Spock is Dead

Spock is dead. Long live Spock
Is Instagram the world’s most powerful platform?
If we’re gonna be on Insta, let’s do it right!
Apple watch…to buy or not to buy
Sony’s Apple blues
Uber bests Yellow in NYC
Microsoft’s project Spartan Goodbye to Internet Explorer?
Target cuts jobs to invest in Digital and Mobile on major mobile gains
China’s Desktop Weaponization

Bonus!: Pharell Williams interviews Leonard Nimoy. Fascinating!


- Last month, the digital/geek domain lost a true master, Leonard Nimoy. Known for his iconic role as Spock, he was a gentle and thoughtful man who strove throughout his life to rise beyond Spock as an artist, photographer, poet and director. But he had created a character so vivid, that when his bright light went out, it left an indelibile impression burned into our collective consciousness. I was a fan so I'm happy to be able to take a moment to remember him and say thank you. Check out the bonus link to an interview of Mr Nimoy conducted by Pharell Williams.

- A couple of months ago, I mentioned on my monthly call that FB had paid a $Bn for Instagram and that that may have been the deal of the century. Well, with a new study out this week from L2 saying that the photosharing app may be worth as much as 35x what FB paid, the acquisition looks more brilliant every day. It's the fastest growing social platform with 200 Mn users and with Engagements rates that are 80% higher than Twitter and 15% higher than Facebook, consider that around 3 Mn teens have fled FB since 2011, but FB is still in touch with them because they're all on Insta! And they consider it their most important social network. It's becoming the same for Brands which are posting more on Instagram now then they are on Facebook. That's probably because, for now at least, there's the possibility of 100% organic reach on Instagram whereas only 6% of Facebook messages reach the end community. Facebook is forcing brands sto pay for access to their own communities. Today's teens are tomorrow's decision makers. So as we relaunch our brand let's think about whether it makes sense to get in front of this audience with our End to End health messaging which study after study shows they are receptive to.

- And if you're chasing likes on Instagram, here are a couple things to keep in mind. According to the Content Standard Web site, Images with Faces get 32% more comments, Real customers using real products, 30% more likes, Likers prefer light images over dark images by 24%, photos versus video by 26% and bluer images over redder images by 24%.

- The Apple watch announcement on March 9th introduced the Cupertino Giant's first all new product since the debut of the iPad almost exactly 5 years ago. Hard to believe iPads have only been around 5 years. And like that launch, this one was accompanied by many reviews predicting that it would fail for one reason or another. I personally wouldn't buy a first generation one, even if I was an Apple acolyte rather than the Android person I am, but I know better than to bet against Apple. They'll sell tons of these, and probably even a lot of the crazy $10k gold plated ones. And they'll keep getting better and better, driving innovation across the competitive set. You can stand on line to preorder your Apple Watch on April 10th or Stand on line to get one on April 19th.

- With success like Apple has seen, there are bound to be losers and the big loser of late has been Sony which is hardly even an electronics company anymore. The most profitable division at Sony is now their Financial Services Group, which most people don't even know they have. It's been bleeding money from it's mobile division for years in a world that has become a game of iOS with 42% of the market revenue and Android with 53%. That doesn't leave much room for anyone else and the once great gaming and computer giant has been relegated to a supplier of components for Apple.

- We've talked before about digital disruption: The NYC Taxi and Limousine commission announced last week that there are now more Uber drivers registered in NYC than Yellow Cabs. Yellow Cabs still give more rides overall than Uber, but it's still a big indicator of major shakeup of an established industry.

- Microsoft is hard at work on it's next generation browser which will debut with Windows 10. Which will have a name other than IE in order to put decades of IE problems behind them. But they assure us that it's not the death knell for IE 'so that companies who limit themselves use it can still use it.

- More evidence that conversion rates are better on mobile than desktop. Target has seen that clearly, releasing a report this month showing a 69% increase in mobile conversion on a 44% increase in mobile traffic year over year. They have announced they'll be cutting jobs to invest more in Digital and mobile.

- China has effectively weaponized all the computers in the country. When a chinese citizen tries to access a banned site like Facebook or Twitter, the Great Firewall of China automatically redirects them to another site. They have been experimenting with directing all traffic to random sites and crashing them with the traffic overload like a denial of service particle beam.