The Cocoon Of Ignorance At Cannes

For sheer stupidity, it's hard to beat Keats' famous assertion that...

Beauty is truth, truth beauty...
But Yahoo ceo Marissa Mayer took a nice swing at it at the Cannes egofest this week by asserting that...

"Art is advertising and advertising is art."
Apparently Ms. Mayer hasn't visited her website recently. As I write this, here's the "art" that is on display in the upper right quadrant of

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Online Usage Has Dropped 7 Times Faster Than TV

I'm getting a little tired of doing the TV industry's work for it.

Over in the UK they have Thinkbox which seems to do a very nice job of representing the TV industry's interests with relevant material like this.

Over here, the TV industry seems to be DOA and very happy to have online advertising eat its lunch.

Which brings us to today's sermon.

A few weeks ago I wrote that online usage was

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GENRE SPOOF COMPETITION (Free entry!)

In association with Bookmuse, and a departure from Words with Jam's usual first page and short story competitions, this time we’re looking for a condensed spoof of your favourite genre, up to 1000 words. See examples below.

Entry is FREE and our favourites will be published in a Bookmuse Reader’s Journal later this year, which will include review templates, quotes, to-be-read record pages and more.

Prize

All published entrants will receive a complimentary copy of the journal, and the overall winner, chosen by the Triskele Books team, will receive a £30 Amazon voucher.

Closing Date

30th September 2014 (winners announced by 31^stOctober 2014).

To Enter

Simply send your entry as a Word Doc to submissions@wordswithjam.co.ukwith the subject ‘Genre Spoof Competition’ and include your name, address and phone number in the body of the email. 

Read the rules and more about the competition here.

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7 Things I've Learned From Blogging

I've been writing this blog now for almost 7 years. My blogging experience has taught me a few things about social media and online marketing. Here are seven of them:

1. Social media can be effective
It's a slow build and it takes a great deal of effort, but...if you know what you're doing; you are willing to invest a lot of time and effort; you are a small brand; and you have something

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Fear Of Selling

I don't want to be a salesman.

I want to be an artist. I know it's not easy, but it's what I want.

If I can't be an artist, at least I want to be helpful. I want to change things.

I've seen the damage that crass consumerism can do. I don't want to be a peddler.  I am nobler than that.

You know what I mean, right? You agree, right?

Well, here's the thing. If you're in advertising, you're a

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Fact-Free Research

While I am fond of calling advertising pundits, trade press reporters, and marketing gurus morons, nitwits, and cement-heads, the truth is many of them are pretty smart.

So how can it be that they have been so wrong about so many things over the past 10 years? For example, we've been told for 10 years that TV was dying when in fact viewing has reached record highs. How can this be?

Part of the

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10 Dreadful Clichés The Ad Industry Should Euthanize

Intelligent people talk in simple clear language. Dimwits talk in dense jargon and mind-numbing cliches.

The marketing and advertising world has devolved into a cesspool of dreadful clichés, jargon and meaningless buzzwords.

Here are 10 bullshit ideas and phrases that advertising needs to jettison.

1. Native advertising
Code for ads disguised as editorial perpetrated by integrity-free online

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