FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: HENRY JAMES DAHL BORN NOVEMBER 16th

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

HENRY JAMES DAHL BORN TODAY!

Karen and Brian welcome newest member to their fabulous family;

World now officially on notice that this kid is freakin’ awesome.

Boston, Mass. – Friday, November 16, 2007 – Brian Reich and Karen Dahl became proud parents today.  Henry James Dahl was born at 11:20am EDT at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston.  The baby weighed 7lbs, 8oz and measured 19.5 inches at birth.  The baby is healthy, happy, and beautiful.  Ten fingers and ten toes were counted.

“It’s the most incredible experience of my life,” said Brian Reich, the baby’s father. “I couldn’t be more excited.”  Henry was born with a full head of red hair, matching his mother Karen, and big, bright blue eyes (though experts says the eye color of the baby won’t be fully defined for several weeks). The baby’s mother, Karen Dahl, added “He’s perfect – and I am not just saying that because he is ours.”  Doctors and nurses at the hospital have independently confirmed Ms. Dahl’s conclusion that the baby is perfect.

The couple is making phone calls and sending emails to family and friends today.  “We encourage you to help spread this happy news” said Reich, “and I promise to send photos and additional information soon.”

The family will remain at the hospital through the weekend and will be back at home in Cambridge, MA early next week.  Mom, dad, and baby are gladly accepting congratulatory phone calls, text messages, emails, wall posts, pokes, tweets, phone messages and even snail mail.  People interested in scheduling a visit, or who have additional questions, may contact mother or father via the information listed below.

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Contact: Brian Reich & Karen Dahl
Phone: (xxx) xxx-xxxx & (xxx) xxx-xxxx
E-mail: breich (at) gmail.com

Two New Articles…

I published two articles this week:

1) I wrote a cover story for iMedia, a trade publisher and event producer serving interactive media and marketing industries, about how corporations can effectively integrate cause marketing into their efforts to engage audience online.  You can read the article here.

2) I posted to Billy-Ball, an absoutely terrific daily baseball newsletter written by my good friend and baseball savant, Bill Chuck.  My article focuses on home-field advantage and the stadiums that will hold games in this week’s American League and National League Divisional Series.’  You can read the article here.

Let me know what you think.

Vote for my panel at SXSW?

I’ve submitted a panel idea for the upcoming SXSW conference taking place in March 2008.  It’s a panel concept that ties together my work and the upcoming launch of my book, Media Rules! (Wiley & Sons, November 2007). 

My plan is to assemble a strong group of folks to discuss and debate the ways that using social media to promote serious issues differs than traditional online marketing and engagement.  I have some good folks in mind, including representatives from UNICEF and MySpace for starters.

Here is the description:

“Organizations have both a need and an opportunity to talk about serious issues — to be authentic, transparent, and sustainable in their operations and communications. This panel will discuss what drives success in the serious issues space and the lessons all organizations can take from that.”

Sound interesting?  Want to see it?  You can show your support here.  Thanks!

Age of Conversation

Today marks the official release date of “Age of Conversation.”

What is that? It is a collaborative effort of 103 bloggers and online types – a book that we all co-wrote and are now beginning the effort to co-market.  It is also an experiment in distributed media, a test of whether a group is really more powerful than the individual.  The goal was painfully simple:

- Pull 100 authors together on a single project 
- The overriding topic was “The Conversation Age” — where you take it is up to you.
- The items are short - one 8.5″ x 11″ page — it can be words, diagrams, photos (again up to you).  If it is words - about 400, give or take a couple.
- We write it quickly and get it out there. We publish electronically.
- We make it available online for a small fee and we donate 100% of the proceeds to Variety the Children’s Charity — which serves children across the entire globe

It all started with an off-handed remark on a blog post and grew from there.  The credit for both launching and facilitating the project goes entirely to the editors, Gavin Heaton and Drew McClellan.  I have never met either, but I was honored and flattered that they would let me participate.

All signs in this suggest that this crazy little experiment will be an overwhelming success… Age of Conversation is an interesting book and will get significant attention, hopefully driving good sales. 

More information, and the option to puchase the book, is available at www.ageofconversation.com.  Go buy a copy!

Brian in Billy Ball

I got a mention in today’s edition of Billy-Ball…

…But as Lowell would soon learn, this was not Japan, Toto, in the big leagues there are two pitchers in each game and the best may not be from Japan. As I was heading to the game last night I was talking with FOB-B, Brien Reich (the humping for his new book has officially started). Brian had the misfortune of attending Opening Day and watched his Mariners get creamed. Our conversation alternated between what a stiff Jeff Weaver is and what a treat it will be for me to see Felix Hernandez pitch. Oh yeah, everybody seems to have forgotten that the Mariners decided to contest the game last night and actually throw a pitcher against Dice-K, the Red Sox, and their doting fans. FOB-B, Bob of the women’s boutique “Float” who loves his Sox and knows his baseball seemed wary of Hernandez as well as we talked amidst the swarms in front of Fenway.

Billy-Ball is one of the most in-depth and entertaining newsletters/blogs devoted to baseball.  Its written by my friend, Bill Chuck, who is, among other things, a certified baseball genius.  You should subscribe today (and I am not just saying that because I was mentioned).

My Article in iMedia Connection

I had an article published in the iMedia Connection Entertainment Spot today. 

Interactive Power Plays from SXSW
By Brian Reich
iMedia Connection - Entertainment Spot
April 3, 2007
 
The three big lessons he learned from the interactive conference of this year’s South by Southwest Festival.

Each year, thousands of interactive, film and music professionals and their groupies (yes, interactive folks have groupies too) gather in Austin, Texas for the South by Southwest Festival (SXSW). The music festival hosts nearly 1500 up-and-coming bands, all looking for a label to sign them. The film festival serves as one of the major domestic launching points for new independent films. That leaves the interactive conference, now in its 14th year, which has become one of the industry’s proving grounds for new technology innovations.

Marketers come from all over the world, and particularly Silicon Valley, with hopes of learning how to make the leap from venture-funded darling to mainstream power player in their industry. The dominant theme this year was mobile, with services like Twitter and Mozes attracting attention and running up SMS charges for attendees. At the same time, there were as many Hollywood types trying to understand how the internet was changing their business model as there were programmers and designers looking for some much needed natural sunlight.

Click here to read the whole article.

My Article in Politico about SXSW

I wrote an article about my SXSW experience that appeared on www.politico.com today. 

Candidates, Choose Your Campaign Gadgets Wisely
By: Brian Reich
Politico
March 26, 2007

The recent South by Southwest Festival welcomed thousands of interactive, film and music professionals to Austin, Texas, to explore and test new innovations in marketing, technology and communications.

Much of the focus was on how to use the latest innovations for creating and distributing new albums or films. But the entertainment industry isn’t the only field that survives on buzz. At the beginning of the 2008 election cycle, the political world is also clamoring for what’s new in information gathering and dissemination. The question is whether campaigns will understand how to use these technologies to exceed their supporters’ online expectations. Here is a rundown of a few of the cutting-edge tools we can expect to see in the 2008 campaigns:

You can read the whole article here.

My SXSW Coverage in ClickZ

I wrote an article for ClickZ…

Mobile Was the Message at South-by-Southwest Fest
By Brian Reich
ClickZ
March 23, 2007

Mobile was the medium everyone was buzzing about at the South-by-Southwest (SXSW) Interactive conference in Austin, Texas last week. Panelists speculated about the changes that the mobile platform would bring to movies, television, and video games. Meanwhile, vendors promoted functionality in hopes of getting their big ideas funded.

Much of the innovation discussed at SXSW was focused on the 1,400 bands, and online services supporting them, that were descending on Austin for the SXSW Music Festival, which followed the interactive event. The highest profile of those services was Mozes, which lets users create and manage text message-based mobile campaigns so brands, bands and fans can be connected. Fans can send messages to artists through Mozes, creating an interactive mobile community for each artist.
You can read the whole thing here.

Announcement in the Holmes Report

The Holmes Report, an influential trade publication for the PR industry, wrote up my arrival at Cone.  Here is the blurb:

Cone Hires Reich as Director of New Media

BOSTON—Cone has expanded its interactive capabilities with the addition of Brian Reich as director of new media.  In this newly-created position, Reich will work with each of the agency’s disciplines (brand marketing, cause branding, crisis management and corporate responsibility) to develop new media strategies and programs for clients and will also play a key role in the development of proprietary Cone products and services.

“What we know about how today’s consumers use technology to get and share information, communicate with each other, and engage brands has changed—and continues to change—dramatically,” says Cone executive vice president Bill Fleishman. “By effectively leveraging new media, companies can energize and build loyalty with key audiences and drive action that increases awareness and sales.”

A key element of Reich’s role will be to identify, monitor, and create opportunities for clients to leverage emerging technologies to execute campaigns on leading-edge communication channels with consumers and other stakeholders. He will also help expand Cone’s user-generated media product offering and identify new resources and positions regarding best practices in online measurement of public relations activities.

Before joining Cone, Reich was senior strategic consultant and director of Boston operations for Mindshare Interactive Campaigns, where he helped many of the leading corporations, nonprofits and government entities worldwide leverage the communications opportunities created by technology. Earlier, he ran his own consulting business, Mouse Communications, to help political and non-profit organizations use new technology to improve communications and was Vice President Gore’s briefing director in the White House and during his 2000 presidential campaign.

Google CEO says Internet is key to campaign win

Google CEO, Eric Schmidt, told Republican governors yesterday at the internet was going to play a big role in politics.  More importantly, Schmidt gave some examples of cool ways the internet was already changing politics.  One example from overseas:

Schmidt said the Gulf kingdom of Bahrain got a taste in the run-up to its elections last weekend, when someone used the Google Earth satellite mapping feature to photograph the ruling family’s lavish houses, and posted them on line, juxtaposed next to the homes of ordinary citizens.

The government tried to censor the photos, which instantly boosted their popularity, he said.

He also said that Google was taking steps to limit the effectiveness of ‘Google-bombing’ - a tactic of manipulating search results to promote a specific topic.  Some bloggers used this tactic to help promote flattering news about Democratic candidates and unflattering news about their Republican opponents during this past Election cycle.

You can read the full article here.

On a related note, Mindshare (where I work) released a white paper last week about the impact that technology had on this past election cycle and how candidates should use interactive techniques in the future to win elections.  I hope you will download and read it.