Mobile is Changing Everything – Except the Direction of Where Donations Go

In January 2010, a devastating magnitude-7 earthquake struck the Caribbean island of Haiti whose epicenter lay just west of its capital, Port-au-Prince.

Within hours, photos and videos of the devastation – entire neighborhoods wiped out, mangled bodies everywhere, a partially-collapsed Presidential Palace and so on were the main story for the world’s news media.

Yet soon after, a second news media narrative began taking shape and this one far more positive. Within two days of the crisis, Americans alone had raised $5 million for the Red Cross’ relief efforts in the Western Hemisphere’s poorest country…by sending in small donations via text message.

At the time I praised the work of relief agencies and felt that if there was any relative “good news” (a very relative term considering the level of disaster) it was that Haiti, possibly for the first time, and without question on the largest scale to date, demonstrated to the world the power of mobile giving and how millions of SMS messages containing $10 donations added up. One week after the quake, the Red Cross had raised $22 million through texting alone.

But as the Atlantic hurricane season began unfurling its wrath late last week with tropical storm – now Hurricane – Isaac, media briefly returned to the impoverished land and beamed back disturbing images. In the 959 days since the historic temblor, as the world has been consumed by an onslaught news both serious and silly, I was disturbed to learn that some 400,000 of Haiti’s 9.8 million citizens remain in abysmal tent cities and unimaginable squalor following the quake – not to mention the island nation’s non-earthquake-induced entrenched poverty.

Images like the ones we’ve been treated to again cry out for an answer: why do we as decent, caring and law-abiding citizens allow such poverty to exist? Why can some buy iPads or microwave frozen dinners and why must others survive in shantytowns and consider electricity a “luxury?” More pragmatically, the still-battered landscape and still-battered people deserve another question answered. Where was all that money spent and what good has it done?

Thankfully, all is not bleak. Objective new reports have repeatedly found that much good has come from the relief effort and the money raised. In January of this year the Huffington Post produced an excellent infographic that broke down the numbers. Here are some big ones as of that article’s writing:

• 50% of earthquake debris has been removed and 20% recycled
• 100,000 received homes from the Red Cross
• Of the $4.6 billion pledged by donors, only $2.38 has been spent

This all suggests significant improvement. But the article was equally quick to point out that millions of dollars alone were also spent on advertising campaigns “telling people to wash their hands.” Other news outlets like Global Post attributed the siphoning of funds to Haiti’s notorious black market, proving once again that for many, crime pays. So for all the good mobile donations have done, it seems it did very little in changing human nature, and if anything, exposed in all its gruesomeness, how a survival of the fittest mentality can take on such inhuman qualities.

Two years and seven months after the Haiti earthquake a new threat from Mother Nature is bearing down on New Orleans –a city once brought to its knees by hurricane Katrina. You can be sure as in Haiti, mobile donations will figure prominently there too. But perhaps, we can all learn an important lesson. Money coming in via text, like a torrent flood water, must be controlled so that rather than inundating areas in confusing, haphazard (and dangerous manners) it flows to where it’s needed most, giving government and watchdog organizations time to monitor those who seek to game the system.

Here’s a suggestion: what about SMS giving integrated with social media and photo identification – someway to demonstrate that money that was texted actually goes to a specific person, city, town, or group?

Is this a bulletproof idea? No. But at least it proves that we’re trying and that we’re continuing to find new ways to use new technology. Levee-like controls on mobile giving are a good way to start, even if such safeguards have done little to help Haiti’s 400,000 virtual homeless. But as hurricane Isaac sets course for the Crescent City, another real-world test might be hours away.

Louisianans and Haitians both deserve we get this right, finally.

When Big Brother Watches YouTube With the Rest of Us: Digital Divide 2.0

Ahhhh, technophobia! No, I didn’t make this term up nor is it an irrational fear of a certain musical genre that will remain nameless (though obvious). Technophobia as defined by dictionary.com is “an abnormal fear of or anxiety about the effects of advanced technology.”

With this definition in mind, tech journalist Bill Robinson, a friend and colleague of mine, in his recent Huffington Post column, raised alarm over what he calls the new “digital divide.” No longer is the digital divide over the technological haves and have nots – those who have computers and Internet access versus those who don’t – but rather between those who have become outright addicted to our anywhere and everywhere gadget-gorged world and in so doing, are dividing themselves from the shrinking percentage of those who are living slightly off the digital grid, achieving that increasingly lost something we used to call: balance.

While some might say Bill is off his digital rocker, a real-life “Mike Mulligan and His Steam Shovel,” (Google that, if you don’t know what I’m referencing) I do not. Besides, anyone who was a true technophobe in keeping with the spirit of the definition that framed this piece, would not be posting their thoughts on the Huffington Post.

That said, Bill’s concerns that just maybe we’re all a little too linked, synched and wired is more than a just his conclusion. To buttress his argument, Robinson sites a recent survey by Morgan Stanley that found that 91 percent of Americans have their cell phones within reach at every moment of the day. Just to clarify, that means every 86,400 seconds that make up a 24-hour day. (And yes, I used a Blackberry app to calculate that) The study also found that our collective time spent with our glowing gadgets is outpacing the time we spend asleep.

What a sad bunch of folks we are.

Bill isn’t a technophobe any more than I am. We’re both realists. As a public relations professional and journalist, we interface with the latest and greatest technology on a daily basis. Not only that, but very often communications technology, increasingly in the form of mobile and smartphone adoption, is at the core of what we do.

Navigating this new digital divide successfully doesn’t require an online search engine. All it requires is a dose of common sense, and the recognition that being a hopeless technophile – the opposite of the definition that opened this piece, is just as detrimental as the technophobic response.

To be sure, changing habits takes time and marketers from every corner continue to promote technology’s hyperactive presence. But tonight, when you’re finished reading this post off what will still likely be your Blackberry, Android, iOS device or laptop, remember to power down, turn off, or put your gadgets to sleep and join the remaining 9 percent of Americans that presumably do not have their mobile phone in constant reach. I have a sneaking suspicion that doing so will not only recharge their batteries, but it’ll recharge yours as well.

Sweet dreams.

Holy Talking Vajayjays! Summer's Eve Scandal: Too Much, Not Enough, or Just Right?

Is it possible to go too far with damage control? Summer's Eve hit the news again last week when it pulled the "controversial" Hail to the V campaign promos after the ads were called racially insensitive. While talking-vagina hand puppets will certainly get tongues wagging on their own, it wasn't Summer Eve's creative representation of the “V” that led to a wave of criticism. As if a company still associated with woefully old-fashioned (if not dangerous) douching doesn't have enough PR hurdles to begin with.

For those of you unfamiliar with the "V" campaign, it consists, consisted of three videos with three apparent audiences – and those audiences appeared to be neatly divided by race and their stereotypical interests - the white girls are the gym bunnies; the Latina punctuates her rant with an “ay-yi-yi.” When Huffington Post polled their readers, 56.14% responded that the ads were “offensive!” 43.86% disagreed, choosing “nothing to see here.” Personally, I'm more offended by Fox's assault on my intelligence than these videos.

PR executive of Richards Group Stacie Barnett told Adweek that the ads were pulled because "Stereotyping or being offensive was not our intention in any way, shape, or form. The decision to take the videos down is about acknowledging that there's backlash here. We want to move beyond that and focus on the greater mission."

The response, however, has me wondering if they should have handled the damage control without yanking the campaign offline. Taking them down was not only an acknowledgement of backlash but also guilt of racial stereotyping by poll, and failure by client pressure. The client saw the ads, everyone agreed they were edgy - so why take them down? Only the week before, The Richards Group defended their videos, doing a much better job of explaining their (albeit poor) campaign-planning process. Talk about flip-flopping.

Now I'm not saying the ads weren't questionable, but audiences were split on whether or not they were actually racist – while Summer's Eve vehemently stated that that they weren't. Pulling the ads prolonged coverage of an overall lackluster campaign whereas an explanation or simple mea culpa could have done a better job of righting wrongs than simply removing the campaign.

In fact, a recent study in 2011's Retail Consumer Report shows that companies willing to interact come out ahead – they don't necessarily need to pull products or ads. 61 percent of consumers in the study said they'd be “shocked” if a company responded to criticism online. Upon receiving a response, 33 percent of reviewers would go back and post a positive review, and 34 percent would delete their original negative review. If nothing else, it certainly makes a case for a well-worded apology.

Creative agencies should stand by their work, even if they need to apologize for it later. If not, they risk being relegated to order-takers and compromise-driven lackeys. I’d rather see work that is controversial and has people engaged in discourse rather than homogenized “creative” that appeases the masses and skirts around “private parts.”

Let Them Eat Cake

I want to support bloggers, really I do. After all, their time is money and their contributions are valuable. They feed the content beast - never mind that we also need them in PR circles.

Like the HuffPost bloggers, I contribute to a number of online publications - MediaPost and Mobile Marketer being the most prominent - and I know that my columns attract decent attention most of the time. And like the HuffPost bloggers, I also entered into an "unwritten" agreement with these publications that my contributions would go unpaid. In return, I would receive increased recognition, credibility and traffic to my site.

Sounds like a rather fair and attractive deal, doesn’t it?

It was for the Huffpost blogger army (who very happily contributed and blogged and posted for FREE), until Ms. Huffington scored a massive payola from AOL earlier this year. Since then, the unpaid contributors have decided that their arrangement wasn’t such an attractive and good deal after all.

So what’s the first thing you do in the United States when you think you’ve been untreated fairly - or change your mind, or find an ambulance-chasing lawyer? File a class action law-suit of course!

Whether the unpaid bloggers “revolt” and $195million class-action lawsuit will gain any more traction remains to be seen. I personally find it ridiculous that the bloggers feel they are entitled to part of AOL’s payment for the Huffington Post. Ego-tripping more like.

Whilst I haven’t heard Arianna scream out “let them eat cake,” yet, sounds to me like they want their cake and to eat it as well.

Good luck with that.

When No News is Better Than This News....

It must have been a REALLY noneventful weekend to have Sarah Palin's boobs (and the question of whether they are real or not) make it into the headlines.

Boobgate? The Huffington Post?

C'mon guys, what the hell is wrong with you!?