Everything Braden: Smooshing traditional media and putting it on the web.

When I was a small boy the cool thing to do was sag your pants. (And FYI I was pretty darn cool) If I wasn't showing my undies I might as well have slit my wrists because I would be the biggest loser that ever lived.

(That's me on the left.. Cool huh!)

Sagging your pants was just one of those things that came and went with the 90's along with:
-Walkmans
-VCR's
-Sega's
-Light up shoes
-Corded phones
-dial-up internet
-etc

I no longer sag my pants. Why? It's not cool anymore. That time period has phased out. Times have changed. My originally formed concept that sagging my pants is cool, is no longer true. If someone tried to sell me a VCR or a Walkman I'd slap them in their face for being stupid. (Don't worry they deserved it). There is no way I would spend money on those because they are useless. There are better substitutes available now. I can do it all with my iPhone. I can play movies and music, search the web, call people and play games. Those old things have become obsolete.

(Now in their defense, light up shoes are still cool and I have no idea why they went away. If you tried to sell me some, I would buy them. Light up shoes are TIMELESS) #Fact

One of my favorite brands is Volcom. Their slogan: "The only constant is change" could not be more true.

Every time I go to a business and they don't take credit cards I fall to the floor in disbelief. How long have credit cards been around? The only people I can think of that carry cash are drug dealers and strippers. Is that really the kind of people you want coming to your business? Get a freakin credit card machine!!

If I started a business and told you that as payment I only accept bartered goods I would expect to be out of business and filing for bankruptcy before I even opened my doors... "But think of all those hunter gatherers and fur traders that were very successful with their lives!" you might say. Yes, I'm sure they did fine with their lives, but that was like a MILLION years ago. Times change. I don't want your corn meal and spoiled meat.

In a round about way this relates directly to social media. People that think traditional media is going to live forever are crazy. Any marketing professional will tell you that if you don't keep innovating and changing the way you do things, even if you have a good base service, you're going to go out of business fast.

The world is changing rapidly and if people hold on to their traditional views they are going to get left behind.

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The Wall Street Journal and other news agencies have started integrating with facebook. They tweet. They get their news out through more ways than just the paper. Why? Because that is where people are getting their news today.

Twitter in particular has changed the news world completely. People know news on twitter faster than any paper or website can post an article about it. Usually by the time something is posted people already know the story. The crazy thing? It's all legit news. With minimum searching you know what news is legit on twitter and surprisingly most of it is now.

In my professional opinion I would say if you don't change your traditional views, you're going to get smooshed like a bug. (This isn't cartoon land. You can't just get someone to scrape you up and fix you. Getting smooshed hurts!)