Author: Kevin Evers

The Harlem Shake. Charlie Bit My Finger. These viral videos spread like wildfire, and there are plenty of others like them. But can the makers of viral sensations like these actually turn their insta-fame into financial gain? Brad Tuttle, in this Time piece, asks the same question, and his answer, except for a select few, isn’t promising.

Let’s start with some good news. The creators of the Harlem Shake should see some cash in the near future because, as Tuttle points out, they’ll receive a portion of the ad revenue that’s been generated by their video on YouTube. Tuttle also cites as a success story the Charlie Bit My Finger video, a short clip of a baby biting his older brother’s finger. Doesn’t sound too extraordinary, does it? The video, no joke, has received over 515 million views. The family’s gain: $150,000. But let’s not confuse these exceptions for the rule. Most viral hit makers, Tuttle reminds us, don’t hit it big, or even close — in fact, they’re lucky if they make even a few hundred dollars from their 15 minutes of fame.

MAYDAY! MAYDAY!

Why It’s Extremely Difficult to Right a Company’s Ship (Kellogg Insight)

This one may come across as common sense: Companies who are struggling financially have a tough time recruiting great talent. Professors Jennifer Brown and David A. Matsa calls this the Sinking Ship Effect. No one wants to be a crew member on a sinking ship, it seems. The kicker: companies can’t solve the problem by offering higher salaries. In fact, in most cases, companies don’t get a chance to do so. Why? The applicants studied, as Professor Brown is quoted as saying in the piece, “weren’t interested enough to create even the possibility of getting a job offer at a distressed firm. They just didn’t apply.”

LISTEN UP

It’s Time to Kill the Email Signoff (Slate)

Slate writer Matthew J.X. Malady argues for a ban on email sign-offs — everything from the disingenuously warm (XOXO) to the inappropriately formal (Yours truly, Sincerely, Respectfully yours,). When you send and receive hundreds of emails a day, he says, just a name should suffice. As someone who once accidentally signed an email to a colleague Love, A, I’m tempted to adopt the policy. Though if Malady is aiming for brevity, perhaps he could drop one of the middle initials from his byline too. — Alison Beard

BONUS BITS:

The Tribe Mentality of Cute Babies

Babies Display Schadenfreude Too (Popular Science)
Is Stress an Overblown Phenomenon? (New Republic)
Why Amazon Prime Could Soon Cost You Next to Nothing (Wired)

I think my dream online-shopping scenario would go something like this: I need a new pair of jeans. Search. Click. Buy. Wait a few hours. Answer the doorbell: my jeans.

In an effort to gain a competitive advantage, writes Marcus Wohlson at Wired, big online retailers — Amazon, Walmart, eBay — are experimenting with making our La-Z-Boy dreams a reality. But are most of us willing to throw down extra cash for instant gratification? Probably not. According to a new survey by Boston Consulting Group, which Wohlson cites, less than 10% of 1,500 respondents said they don’t give a second thought to same-day delivery when online shopping. The one exception, though, is “affluent millennials” who live in big cities, and their enthusiasm could be enough to keep same-day shipping profitable.

So what do most of us value above all else? Free shipping.

MORE RESEARCH NEEDED

The Problem of Reproducibility in the Social Sciences (Pacific + Standard)

One could argue that we’re in a Golden Age of research. Top academic journals, especially in psychology, seem to be publishing new discoveries all the time. But since there’s a publishing bias for new research, writes Kayt Sukel, too few scientists are trying to replicate past studies. In other words, everyone’s chasing the next big thing and more checks and balances are needed. That’s why Brian Nosek, a psychologist at the University of Virginia, launched the Reproducibility Project. Since its launch last year, he’s recruited more than 100 colleagues to try to reproduce a study published in a high-profile journal.

WINNING!

Researchers Use Internet to Find New Drug Side Effects (New York Times)

We know that prescription drugs can cause a long list of side effects, but the Food and Drug Administration doesn’t always catch all of them. There is a system in place to find and record previously unknown side effects, but it’s limited in scope. Good news: a team of researchers from Microsoft, Stanford and Columbia found a cool workaround to the problem: they created an automated data-bot that mined millions of web searches (think about how often you type your symptoms into Google) and they discovered new side effects that were unreported in the F.D.A’s warning system.

BONUS BITS:

Bigger is Better

Big Data in the Big Apple (Slate)
The Best Reason to Raise the Minimum Wage (The New Republic)
Stop Calling Student Loans a Bubble! (Time)

There are a ton of dating apps on the market, but they all fail to please a pretty important demographic: women.

The main issue for women, suggests Ann Friedman at the New Yorker’s Culture Desk blog, is a lack of control. Since men are more active users in dating apps, women are often bombarded with a high-volume of messages and requests. The consensus: it’s a lot of work to scroll through the list of e-suitors, and some of the messages are kind of creepy.

Friedman says developers still have a lot of work to do because mobile dating is still a “weird” experience for many women. “And it’s likely to stay that way until a start-up comes along that manages to make mobile dating not weird by offering women — and the men they want to meet — control, incredible filters, and clarity of mission. Until then, [women are] left to scroll through page after page of unappealing options.”

TURN THAT FROWN UPSIDE DOWN

The Health Benefits of Smiling (Wall Street Journal)

I tend to take the Rooney Mara, less-is-more approach to smiling — that is, I only smile when I really mean it. Well, it looks like a change in strategy may be in order. Smiling, it turns out, can reduce stress, at least according to new research published in Psychological Science. When participants smiled (the researchers asked them to hold a pair of chopsticks in their mouth), they reported feeling less stress after performing a difficult task. Why? There’s just something about smiling that makes our heart rates go down. But there’s a catch. Some experts believe that these effects only take place when a smile is the real deal. You have to mean it. No faking.

GLORIFIED WATER

Why Are American Beers So Weak? (Slate)

Some angry beer drinkers, you may have heard, are suing Budweiser and Michelob for watering down their beers, which as everyone knows, are pretty weak to begin with. This begs two questions: why are the most popular American brews so light in alcohol content, and why do they dominate the market? Brian Palmer at Slate provides us with some clues, and he says “corporate trickery” and “market manipulation” have nothing to do with Big Beer’s success. Mild beers, you see, became popular in the 1800s as an alternative to whiskey (wince), and they “simply beat other styles of beer in the American market. Mass-marketed lagers were the first beers to truly catch on in the United States, and they have never relinquished that position.”

BONUS BITS:

Finally! An Answer!

Why Cable Has So Many TV Channels You Never Watch (The Atlantic)
5 Workers Who Can Ruin Your Day (Inc.)
Disappointed? Unhappy? Embrace Pessimism (National Post)

One would think — i.e. me — that attempting to cure one’s sadness with shopping isn’t the best strategy. Dog sick? Buy a Snickers. Rough day at work? Buy a watch. Just doesn’t seem right, does it? Well, according to new research by Scott Rick and Katherine Burson of Michigan’s b-school, I may be wrong — in fact, it looks like retail therapy is the real deal.

Here’s the rub. In one study, the researchers showed a sad video to participants, and then offered them a snack to buy. The snack buyers reported lower sadness scores — after the video — than those who chose not to buy a snack. In a second experiment, the researchers tested the effects of buying versus browsing: the buyers, it turns out, reported lower sadness scores than browsers. So why the changes in sadness? Buying things, the researchers suggest, can help to restore our sense of control. “Shopping is a natural, easy vehicle for choice,” Rick says. There are other situations that afford opportunities to choose and restore personal control, but they may be less tempting and harder to find than the mall.”

YOU GO GIRL

Microsoft is Getting Its Groove Back (Reuters)

Microsoft, when compared to, say, Apple, may not be hippest brand in the world, but things are looking up for the software giant. According to a new Reuters/Ipsos poll, 50% of respondents — young adults between the ages of 18-29 — said Microsoft was a cooler brand than it was a year or two ago. For comparison, 60% said Apple had increased its cool, 47% Twitter, 42% Facebook. One reason for Microsoft’s rise in the cool poll is their recent marketing push (blitz?) around its new Surface tablets, suggests Gerry Shih. But will “coolness” actually translate into sales? Hard to say, but Microsoft has a tough hill to climb: iPads outsell Surfaces by tens of millions, and Google owns about 70% of global smartphone market. Yet, Microsoft, or at least its marketing department, has a lot to look forward to. The increase in coolness shows their marketing efforts are working.

COLD FEET

Why Our Fear of Unhappiness Hold Us Back (Psychology Today)

Our brains are ill-suited to entrepreneurism. We’re programmed to choose safety, even at the expense of joy. That means we’re far more likely to focus on the potential perils of failing than we are the happiness and financial freedom that might accrue to us if we were to take the plunge and start a new business, writes psychologist Ryan T. Howell. Unless we can learn to train our brains to evaluate risk and reward more realistically, we’ll remain trapped in a life of risk-aversion that keeps us from taking the steps that might make us happy. For more, check out this HBR article from the March issue.

— Andy O’Connell

BONUS BITS:

Stop Saying “I’m Passionate and Hard-Working”

How To Fix A Personal Brand That’s A Total Cliché (Fast Company)
Breaking Through a Growth Stall (HBS Working Knowledge)
Sexy Celebrity Ads Aren’t Good for Sales (Business Insider)

James Altucher wears many hats — he’s built 20 companies, he’s written nine books — but in his own eyes, he’s a mediocre person. But he’s totally cool with that. We can’t all be Zuckerbergs, he says, or really anyone even remotely close. In his great essay at the Rumpus, Altucher says we should embrace our mediocrity. Here are two of his tips (out of seven) for making the best of your lack of genius and drive:

(1) Procrastinate: It’s your brain’s way of telling you to slow down — and there’s probably a reason it’s doing so (i.e. maybe your idea is bad, or maybe it needs fine tuning). Or, maybe you just need to take a break.

(2) Fail: Since mediocre entrepreneurs fail much more often than they succeed, they learn the true definition of persistence. They understand that “persistence is not the self-help cliché ‘Keep going until you hit the finish line!’ The key slogan is, ‘Keep failing until you accidentally no longer fail.” That’s persistence.

BUY A CALENDAR

The Secret to Happiness (Barking Up the Wrong Tree)

There’s a lot to take away from this interview with Stanford professor Jennifer Aaker, especially with regards to scheduling our time. As Aaker’s research has shown, “people who spend more time on projects that energize them and with people who energize them tend to be happier.” Of course, that’s easier said than done at work, but when it comes to our free time, most of us are pretty dreadful at scheduling time to do the things we actually enjoy doing. Aaker’s workaround? Be all business about your free time. Schedule it in a calendar. My thoughts? Screw spontaneity — it’s overrated.

PUT SOME FEELING INTO IT!

Stop Writing Bad Job Descriptions Already (Inc.)

If you’ve been job hunting recently, you’ve no doubt come across plenty of job descriptions that read like they were written by robots. Long lists of qualifications, duties down to the finest detail. Note to hiring managers: don’t do that. Some tips: First, try your best to lend a human voice to the description. Second, be as concise as possible — we’re talking 400-800 words here. Last, keep the application instructions as simple as humanely possible.

BONUS BITS:

This Steak Tastes Like Rubber

Why Beef Is Becoming More Like Chicken (Slate)
The Crisis in American Labor (Jacobin)
Can Boosting Immunity Make You Smarter? (Discover)

Everyone seems to be selling some form of success potion these days. Want to be successful? Network. Prioritize. Lead like Steve Jobs. Fake it until you make it. Tired of it? Check out this refreshing and totally quote-worthy piece at Brain Pickings about British-born novelist Amelia Barr. Her rules, which date back to 1901, are less about making it to the top than persevering, and quelling your fears — good stuff, all.

The best bits:

“No opposition must be taken to heart. Our enemies often help us more than our friends. Besides, a head-wind is better than no wind. Who ever got anywhere in a dead calm?”

“Everything good needs time. Don’t do work in a hurry. Go into details; it pays in every way. Time means power for your work. Mediocrity is always in a rush; but whatever is worth doing at all is worth doing with consideration. For genius is nothing more nor less than doing well what anyone can do badly.”

MAYBE?

Is Car-Sharing in Your Future? (Christian Science Monitor)

Services like Zip Car are a godsend for car-less city dwellers because they are a cheap and easy way to run a quick errand. And because fewer and fewer young people are buying cars, the market has opened up for other services as well. RelayRides, for example, helps cars owners loan out their wheels to renters for an hourly fee. Rachel Botsman, an expert in collaborative consumption, thinks there’s a shift taking place. Many of us, she says, prefer to “pay to access goods, whether that’s books, music, films, or cars, versus physically needing to own them outright. We don’t want more stuff, but we want the experiences it [allows].”

THE HOUSE DOESN’T ALWAYS WIN

Peer Effects at the Casino (Ross School of Business)

Casinos are masters at separating us from our cash, but their insights about our decision making get a bit more clouded when we bring some friends along. According to new research, our friends can reduce our spending in subtle yet dramatic ways — which is good for us, but bad for casinos. Say a friend receives a random promotion, but you don’t. If this happens, you’re likely to spend significantly less money than you would have normally. Even more problematic for casinos? People like me who tag along with friends, but don’t gamble.

BONUS BITS:

Dawn of a New Man

I’m a Dude, And I’m a Homemaker Too (Slate)
Viral Marketing is a Myth (Sloan Management Review)
Should Sports Arenas Buy Back Scalped Tickets? (Time)

Sitting at your desk all day isn’t healthy. This is why some of us try to mix it up a bit. Take standing desks. A bunch of my colleagues use them, and I totally get the appeal. But if this piece at MarketWatch is any indication, the ergonomic fad — treadmill desks, anyone? — has reached the point of satire.

People are falling. People are spraining knees. Even stability balls aren’t safe. A data-scientist, who’s quoted in the piece, says he hasn’t fallen off his orb at work per se, but he’s come really close. Be careful out there.

But don’t worry. Management has it under control. When workers at the University of Kentucky requested treadmill desks, their bosses “brought in specialists from different departments — occupational health and safety, risk management, workers’ compensation and legal — to devise rules for the equipment’s use.” Take note: (1) don’t wear high heels and (2) walk slower than 2 miles per hour.

A RIVER OF PENNIES

As Music Streaming Grows, Royalties Slow to a Trickle (New York Times)

For consumers, streaming sites such as Spotify and Pandora are great services. For musicians? Not so much. As Ben Sisario explains, musicians receive only a fraction of a penny every time a song is played. That’s right: a fraction of a penny. Sure, these services are a step up from Napster, but the question is whether “these micropayments can add up to anything.” So far the answer seems to be no — or at least not much. Take Zoe Keating, a cellist, whose music was played 131,000 times last year on Spotify. Her net? $541.71.

ARE YOU NOT ENTERTAINED?

The Right Way to Create a Superbowl Ad (HBS Working Knowledge)

The cost of a 30-second spot during the Super Bowl on Sunday is $3.7 million. The advertising game plan: catch our attention in an entertaining fashion, and then hit us with the brand message. Makes sense, right? Well, according to new research by Thales S. Teixeira, advertisers should do the reverse: “If you want to persuade consumers as do Pepsi, Skittles, and Coke, it’s about getting people to associate your brand with fun… But you have to show the brand and then entertain. That’s when the conditioning occurs. The other way around — entertain then brand — doesn’t work as well.”

BONUS BITS:

Cases in Point?

20 Most Effective Super Bowl Ads (Daily Beast)
Love, Analytics and the Biology of You at Work (Sloan Management Review)
NYC Wants Health Start-Ups to Shake Things Up (Inc.)

Coca-Cola, you may have seen, is running a new ad campaign that touts the company’s efforts to reduce obesity. Wait. What? Coca-Cola, the world’s #1 soda king, is waxing about the healthiness of its product line? Yes. Yes it is.

The critical consensus: the ads are well-produced (and almost creepily convincing) but they completely sidestep Coca-Cola’s role in the obesity epidemic.

In an op-ed at Forbes, Rick Berman agrees that the ads are misleading, but he has some pointed words for anti-sugar activists: if they want to counteract Coca-Cola’s campaign, they need to stop suggesting “draconian proposals” such as bans and taxes, and focus more on outreach. Berman, serving in the role of Executive Director of the Center for Consumer Freedom, says change should be driven by — no surprise — the choices of consumers. After all, that’s why Coca-Cola has released healthier products to begin with: the company responded to the demands of more health-conscious consumers.

WHAT THE DICKENS???

Facebook Chatter Is More Memorable Than Lines from Literature (ScienceNOW)

Researchers have found that people are more likely to remember Facebook status updates than great quotes from literature. Poor novelists: it’s not like novel writing is a lucrative craft these days, and now this? But while novelists (and this writer) assume the fetal position, advertisers should take notice because there may be something to learn here. “Effortless chatter,” the researchers say, “ is better than well-crafted sentences at tapping into our minds’ basic language capacities — because human brains evolved to prioritize and remember unfiltered information from social interaction.”

HUMAN AFTER ALL

The Age Of Big Data Demands Real Criticism (The Awl)

“If you think of all the information encoded in the universe from your genome to the furthest star, from the information that’s already there, codified or un-codified, to the information pregnant in every interaction, “big” has become the measure of data.” So begins Trevor Butterworth’s piece at the Awl about Big Data. His main point is that people often miss one crucial point: Big Data has actually increased the need for humans. After all, as Butterworth (great name) puts it, “Computers cannot discern by themselves.” We need people who can direct attention and interpret results.
—Tim Sullivan

Good Intentions Gone Bad

Who in Hell Invented the Cubicle? (Hbr.org)
Hollywood Cashes in on the Lance Armstrong Drama (Hollywood Reporter)
Obama’s Message to America: Work Harder? (Jacobin)