ColemanMedia Report

A study released earlier this morning by the U.S. Department of Labor revealed that from Wednesday, March 17th to Tuesday, March 22nd, the total hours spent filling out and monitoring progress of NCAA Tournament brackets in the workplace outpaced the actual hours of work.  According to the study, approximately 752 million man-hours of work were dedicated to NCAA pools, while a total of 62 hours were dedicated to actual work duties during the same time period.  ”While the numbers may seem shocking out of context,” said researcher Richard Lafever, who oversaw the study, “they’re really nothing to be worried about.  We see the same thing every year: worker productivity always takes a nosedive during the first week of March Madness.  What’s shocking about this year is that Kansas didn’t even make it into the Sweet 16.  If they had won out, I’d be a lock for the Xbox 360, but instead I have to rely on Kentucky beating red-hot Cornell in order to even have a prayer of beating Jim in Finance.”

The keynote address for the MOMMA Global conference held last week in San Francisco was nothing but a very thinly-veiled sales pitch for the speaker’s company, according to several witnesses who attended the event.  AntEye Social Chief Marketing Officer Randall Smugfellow’s 45-minute speech reportedly focused on the growing importance of Social Media in the overall marketing mix for approximately 4 minutes before launching into a 41-minute “advertisement” for his company’s services, complete with a 32-slide PowerPoint presentation.  According to witnesses, Randall stressed how critical it was for all brands to speak with him out in the lobby to discuss next steps.  ”This is bullshit, man,” said one attendee.  ”I take a day away from the office to get some insight into my industry, and it’s nothing but another sales meeting.  I wonder when they’re gonna offer the timeshares in Boca Raton.”

A small, public funeral service for Advertising As We Know It was held Tuesday morning at the Evergreens Cemetery in Brooklyn, NY, just five days after it was officially declared dead by SocialLiscious VP of Sales Glenn Schtick at the Digital Social Maven Conference last Friday.  The service, which was attended by 120 friends, family members, and advertising interns, was described as a small, quiet, and somewhat confusing affair.  Many in attendance were still in shock that Advertising As We Know It had finally died.  ”People have been saying that Advertising As We Know It is dead for years,” said junior media planner Seth Epstein.  ”I always assumed it was just pompous ad execs trying to sound smarter than they really were.  But I guess now every time some guy in jeans and a black blazer gets up on a conference stage and makes an edgy blanket statement, we have to assume it’s true.”

Further escalating the three-year copyright dispute between the two media stalwarts, search giant Google publicly announced late last week that they “are like rubber” and characterized adversary Viacom as “glue,” adding that “everything they do bounces off us and sticks” on Viacom.  The statement, issued late last week by Chief Playground Officer Susie Derkins, capped allegations by Google that Viacom committed the very copyright violations it accused Google of perpetuating.  ”Nuh-uh,” said an attorney from Viacom, who refused to be identified.  ”They started it.”  ”Did not,” countered Derkins. “Did too, quitsies,” said the Viacom lawyer.  ”Did not, double quitsies,” said Derkins.  ”Did too, triple quitsies, times infinity!” said the Viacom lawyer.  Judge Wormwood, presiding over the case, declined to comment on the latest accusations, saying only: “Thank God I only have five years to retirement.”

Digital location-based service and annoyingly popular social media networking tool of the moment Foursquare revealed that co-worker Skip Dangley interviewed at rival agency Dimm, Wittedt & Thicke while on his lunch break Tuesday afternoon.  Dangley, a self-professed “addict” of Foursquare and acting “Mayor” of Louie’s Sub & Pub on Pico Blvd., inadvertently revealed his lunch plans when he “checked in” to the DWT Los Angeles office.  ”When Skip left, we assumed he was running out to Louie’s to grab a hoagie,” said Dangley’s direct supervisor Jed Lewis.  ”But when I saw his post on my BlackBerry that he was ‘about to unlock the Better Job Badge at another agency,’ I knew something was up.  So we went ahead and packed up all his stuff so that when he gets back to the office he can ‘check out’ of his current job that much easier.”

A report released by the Center For Pretentious Trade Jargon Monday morning revealed that LBC, the acronym for “location based services” earned the honor of becoming the 7 millionth advertising acronym to be officially accepted by the larger advertising community.  The acronym, which only recently came to fruition, is used largely to confuse and belittle those in the industry who have yet to catch on to the latest flavor of the month.  ”Acronyms are an integral part of the media and marketing world,” said Leo Burnett Chief Jargon Officer Mikeal Nakovbievokov.  ”Without them, we wouldn’t be able to trick clients into buying into high CPM ROS buys that really don’t deliver a tangible ROI.  Our B2C clients would probably see right through the GRP numbers we report on our DRTV buys, and we wouldn’t be able to charge nearly as much for our OPM services.  At the EOD, we’d be SOL.  Or OOW.”

The Federal Communications Commission confirmed early Tuesday that Yonkers, NY resident and iPhone user Kevin Strumbacher successfully completed a 22-minute mobile phone call on his Apple iPhone 3GS.  According to records released by AT&T, the 25-year-old Public Relations assistant spoke, uninterrupted, to his friend Jimmy for 22 minutes and 31 seconds about whether or not Brooklyn Decker is hotter than Marissa Miller.  ”This is clearly a red-letter date,” said Brock Lichtenberg of mobile data tracking company SmartPhones, DumbUsers.  ”We haven’t recorded an iPhone call longer than 7 minutes in well over 3 years.  And to see a call longer than 20 minutes being ended voluntarily by the user, well, I’m just speechless.  And to think that an iPhone call ended with someone saying ‘Later, man’ instead of ‘Hello?  Hello!?’ makes my year, frankly.”  Unfortunately the long calls did not last.  Records show Strumbacher’s subsequent 256 conversations ended prematurely.

Just a week and a half after convicting three Google executives on violation of privacy charges, an Italian criminal court has convicted talk-show host and parasitic comedian Jay Leno to six years in prison for embezzlement, theft, and comedic tyranny.  The verdict, which was issued in absentia by Judge Giovanna Magiocelli, stems from Leno’s widely-publicized ousting of perennial underdog Conan O’Brien from NBC’s The Tonight Show in February.  The case has media and legal experts perplexed.  ”I realize that everyone wanted to punch Jay Leno for getting Conan fired,” said attorney Martin Venable.  ”But for the Italians to assert their jurisdiction over this one is even more confounding than NBC’s decision to move Conan to