DDO Roundup - Soap, Global Warming, BrickBreaker, and Oil
* The brands "Dove" and "Axe" are both made by Unilever; one postures as though it respects women, the other objectifies them. This analysis by a clever marketer should get you thinking:
Dove is a Unilever brand. But guess what? So is Axe. Uniliver's Dove celebrates women by encouraging them to take pleasure in their individual beauty. Unilever's Axe portrays women as a ditsy, sex crazed collective. Same company. Two worldviews. Or at least, that's how they present themselves to us through their marketing. Truth be told, as consumers, we really have no clue. So pardon the cynicism, but Unilever, therefore, is not being authentic. But here's the question: Do we care?
As long as consumers remain oblivious to the man behind the curtain,
I'd say the answer is no, but time and the spread of information would
likely cause the Dove buyers to shun the product. Ask a woman in your life what she thinks; anecdotal evidence via email is welcome. I make the bold
prediction that Axe buyers won't care no matter what the details are.
* I watched Al Gore's An Inconvenient Truth a few weeks back. He reflects on losing the presidency, growing up on a farm, and lots of artfully presented graphs. The way I see it, whether we elect a Democrat or Republican to the presidency in 2008, the country is almost destined to have a dangerous nut pursuing some quasi-religious crusade, for "democracy" or the "environment," so buckle up. Canada is starting to sound like a great idea. I am reminded of this as several friends recently pointed out this caption to me, from IBD:
A tractor clears snow Wednesday on the White House grounds. The snow was from a massive storm that shut down parts of the country, including where a House hearing on global warming was postponed due to inclement weather. A Tuesday screening of Al Gore's global warming movie "An Inconvenient Truth" at Washington Maryville University in St. Louis was also canceled on account of snow.
* I used to think I was a loser for the amount of time I spent playing BrickBreaker on my BlackBerry; now I realize I'm just CEO material. For the uninitiated, BrickBreaker is the mindlessly addictive game that comes pre-installed on RIM Blackberries. The WSJ reports several cases of CEO addiction:
When Richard Fuld, chief executive of Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc., couldn't control his addiction, he took drastic measures. In October, he had the game BrickBreaker taken off his BlackBerry. [...]
Richard Handler, a former bond trader and now CEO of brokerage company Jefferies Group Inc., says he is constantly trying to beat his high score. He plays in elevators and on the way to meetings, or even in meetings.
* I was glad to hear in GWB's State of the Union address that the
energy conservation message has finally hit home. If you recall, I
ranted about his trope, "America's Addiction to Oil" in June of 2006, where I called it "misapplied victimology that is completely inappropriate as an official position towards energy consumption." So, Bush now asks for the US to cut gasoline use up to 20% by 2017. It's a start.
* Oil plunges below $50 in January, Jim Rogers calls $150 per barrel "someday." Here are the details from Bloomberg:
Oil will resume its march toward $100 a barrel after a "correction," said Jim Rogers, who predicted the start of the commodities rally in 1999. "I'm just not smart enough to know how far down it will go and how long it will stay, but I do know that within the context of the bull market, oil will go over $100," Rogers said in a Tokyo interview. "It will go over $150. Whether that is in 2009 or 2013, I don't have a clue, but I know it's going to happen." [...]
Rogers, author of "Hot Commodities", has said oil will keep rising because there hasn't been a major discovery for 30 years and economic growth in China and across Asia is driving up demand. [...] The Rogers International Commodity Index, which more than doubled in the past five years, has dropped 13 percent in six months on a total return basis. "When you have big bull markets, 50 percent corrections, or retractions, are normal," he said in an interview yesterday.
The red line in the graph below is on 1/18/07, the day this news appeared on Bloomberg:
Mr. Rogers certainly has an uncanny sense of timing. I'm sure the comments were actually made a day or two prior to their appearance on the wire. - Ed
