Google Plus is about to turn three: will media remember the hype?

As Google Plus nears yet another anniversary—I believe it’s its third next week—it’s interesting to reflect back on the much-hyped launch. Or, more accurately, on the number of people who drank the Google Kool-Aid and believed this would be the biggest thing since Facebook. Have a glance at the cheerleading: a handful of links I […]

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Ikea tries to shut down its biggest fan site, showing us how the company thinks within

In an age of social media, you would think it was the most stupid thing to try to shut down the biggest online community you have.    Ikea has done just that, on IP grounds, against Ikea Hackers, by getting their legal department to send Jules Yap, its founder, a cease-and-desist letter after her site […]

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A tribute to Massimo Vignelli

The below ran in Lucire today, though it is equally suited to the readers of this blog. RIT Massimo Vignelli, who passed away on May 27, was a hero of mine. When receiving the news shortly before it hit the media in a big way, from our mutual friend Stanley Moss, this title’s travel editor […]

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The religiosity of the superbrands

Another friend asked the Windows laptop v. Macbook question on her Facebook today.    You can predict what happens next. The cult came by. As with the last time a friend asked the same question.    The cult always comes and proclaims the superiority of the Apple Macintosh. And it is a blinding proclamation, of […]

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This week it’s the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit models; what’s next for our destination marketing?

In Lucire’s publication history, more Americans than New Zealanders have read from the title. Online, that was always the case, as we started off in 1997 with a 70 per cent US readership, which has dropped to around 42 per cent with other countries catching up with web browsing over the last 16 years.   […]

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MG SUV soon a reality: good

I have to admit I get a bit bored of those crying foul now that MG will launch an SUV, one which seems to have some parallels with the Ssangyong Korando C (left).    They say that MG should have made sports cars as part of its revival, and that the brand should not adorn […]

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Joan Rivers had better facelifts, but it’s the future of the black cab

Part of me admires Nissan for going after the taxi market in a big way in New York and London.    Another part of me wonders why on earth the London Hackney Carriage solution is so ugly.    I think Nissan should have asked Mr Mitsuoka for advice on how to Anglicize one of its […]

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Open the shop and strip away the jargon

I’ve been reading this Grauniad interview with Rory Stewart, MP, referred by Jordan McCluskey. I’m told that Stewart, and Labour’s Frank Field are the two worth listening to these days in British politics. On Stewart, someone who can speak with a Scots accent and has lived in Hong Kong must be a good bloke.   […]

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Flip-flop again: GM deems Chevrolet Europe strategy a failure

GM has changed its mind again: Chevrolet will not be its global brand.    The strategy, where Daewoo was rebadged Chevrolet in western Europe at the beginning of the century, has been deemed a failure, and GM will withdraw its core Korean-made models such as the Spark, Aveo, Cruze and Malibu, by 2015. It will […]

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Business etiquette 101: don’t threaten lawsuits against a customer proposing an idea which you later adopt

Interesting to spot this link. When I started Autocade in 2008, I approached Haymarket, letting them know I was a Classic and Sportscar reader since it began in the 1980s, and I was inspired by the Sedgwick guides that it ran then. Autocade was to be an online cyclopædia that would use a brief format, […]

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