filchyboy

Sean Boone Interview

This is the second interview in my project on the Dr. Pepper/Seven Up blog marketing initiative for Raging Cow. Sean Boone is one of the teenagers involved in this project. Please note I have edited some punctuation, spelling, and syntax in selected spots. It is all incidental and improves the readability.

Me - How did this Raging Cow project come to you? How did you meet the folks at Richards Interactive?

Sean Boone - I've been friends with Nicole (sparkley.net) for months now. She recommended me as a candidate for the project. They reviewed. They approved.

Me - Did you know her offline before you met in Texas?

SB - No. But, we've been online friends for about six months now.

Me - When did you first start publishing online? Can you tell me about how you started using the net and how that has changed since you started?

SB - I remember the day my parents brought home our first computer with the internet about 6 years ago. I started with the infamous Angelfire.com, their basic page builder in which you typed in a box where you wanted your favorite links, of course nobody came to my site... ever. I was big into gaming and I was a part of an online squad for a game called Delta Force. We were one of the best and had a big website. From there I learned what FTP was because I had to upload some photos and what-not. I experimented around and found out how to use stuff.Ê Eventually I found free hosts which had FTP options and started making my own pages with notepad and such. I taught myself everything I know, guess and check and learn from your mistakes. I can't count how many free hosts I've been through, and the countless hours experimenting with HTML. I got really good with Paint Shop Pro and started making my own graphics and really getting into graphic design which seperated my website from a lot of others.

I bought Italianize.com two years ago. From there hits came like rain. From seeing other 'cam sites' I learned how to control my site and create content and what-not. I made a daily blogg and people loved it. That is where I am today.

Me - Was there a computer in your house growing up?

SB - We've always had an old MACINTOSH sitting around, but it wasn't until that day 6 years ago we actually had the internet. I didn't even know what the internet was.

Me - How do you make a living?

SB - Right now being 17 I work a part-time job at a corporately owned restaurant [redacted] with my 6 best friends. We practically run the place. At almost minimum wage its not much but its a good experience and a fun place to work.

Me - How has been your experience with Richards Interactive?

SB - When they first contacted me about being on the project I thought it was another spam mail or a joke. I almost deleted the email until I read further. I would never have thought an actual company would ever recognize my website, not to mention the biggest independent advertising company in the nation. It was a really big thing for me. I was probably the most excited I've ever been. They treated us with such a great deal of courtesy, professionalism and luxury. Really great people and I'm glad to be working with them.

Me - How has the process worked? Did they build out the website for Raging Cow and then asked you to give your opinion? Or did they build the website with you guys from the very beginning?

So far things are going along as planned. The website was presented to us and then asked for opinions, yes. We all gave great suggestions and they took every one into consideration.

Me - What were your parents reaction to this whole project? Have they been supportive?

SB - My parents have always worried about who I talk to and what I do on the internet. When I told my dad about this project of course he was skeptical. Of course, after talking with the Director of Richards Interactive and going over some questions that my dad had, he was just as happy as I was. My mom, who works as a buyer for a computer company here was also impressed.

Me - How often do you post to your site with your cam? How did you get into cam culture? And who are the cam girls which you like the most?

SB - I post a new cam image maybe once a week. I got into the 'cam culture' when my uncle sent me a webcam for one christmas and I just decided to post some pictures. I like camgirls that are intelligent, have good content, and don't obsess about cam-listings and porn clicks.

Me - Do you see your experience with Richards Interactive influencing your future career goals?

SB - Absolutely. After being in the Richards Group headquarters in Dallas I knew this is where I wanted to be. The professional level they are at and the creativeness and fun they have are definitely things I want to be doing, not to mention my involvement in this project will look good on future applications and job opportunities in the same line of work.

Me - Okay one last request, please give me links to your 3 favorite sites and a bit about why you like them. Please don't make them any of the folks involved in Raging Cow.

SB - amorphism.net >> run by this incredibly intellectual girl Anush, i read her blogg everyday, her way with words just keep me coming back, shesaidnothing.com >> apple, just another girl with great opinions that are a lot like mine, invincibl3.com >> eric, a 15 year old kid with the coolest bloggs. he and i are a lot alike.

Textism on Raging Cow

It just feels right.

Textism on Raging Cow

It just feels right.

Sean Boone Interview

This is the second interview in my project on the Dr. Pepper/Seven Up blog marketing initiative for Raging Cow. Sean Boone is one of the teenagers involved in this project. Please note I have edited some punctuation, spelling, and syntax in selected spots. It is all incidental and improves the readability.

Me - How did this Raging Cow project come to you? How did you meet the folks at Richards Interactive?

Sean Boone - I've been friends with Nicole (sparkley.net) for months now. She recommended me as a candidate for the project. They reviewed. They approved.

Me - Did you know her offline before you met in Texas?

SB - No. But, we've been online friends for about six months now.

Me - When did you first start publishing online? Can you tell me about how you started using the net and how that has changed since you started?

SB - I remember the day my parents brought home our first computer with the internet about 6 years ago. I started with the infamous Angelfire.com, their basic page builder in which you typed in a box where you wanted your favorite links, of course nobody came to my site... ever. I was big into gaming and I was a part of an online squad for a game called Delta Force. We were one of the best and had a big website. From there I learned what FTP was because I had to upload some photos and what-not. I experimented around and found out how to use stuff.Ê Eventually I found free hosts which had FTP options and started making my own pages with notepad and such. I taught myself everything I know, guess and check and learn from your mistakes. I can't count how many free hosts I've been through, and the countless hours experimenting with HTML. I got really good with Paint Shop Pro and started making my own graphics and really getting into graphic design which seperated my website from a lot of others.

I bought Italianize.com two years ago. From there hits came like rain. From seeing other 'cam sites' I learned how to control my site and create content and what-not. I made a daily blogg and people loved it. That is where I am today.

Me - Was there a computer in your house growing up?

SB - We've always had an old MACINTOSH sitting around, but it wasn't until that day 6 years ago we actually had the internet. I didn't even know what the internet was.

Me - How do you make a living?

SB - Right now being 17 I work a part-time job at a corporately owned restaurant [redacted] with my 6 best friends. We practically run the place. At almost minimum wage its not much but its a good experience and a fun place to work.

Me - How has been your experience with Richards Interactive?

SB - When they first contacted me about being on the project I thought it was another spam mail or a joke. I almost deleted the email until I read further. I would never have thought an actual company would ever recognize my website, not to mention the biggest independent advertising company in the nation. It was a really big thing for me. I was probably the most excited I've ever been. They treated us with such a great deal of courtesy, professionalism and luxury. Really great people and I'm glad to be working with them.

Me - How has the process worked? Did they build out the website for Raging Cow and then asked you to give your opinion? Or did they build the website with you guys from the very beginning?

So far things are going along as planned. The website was presented to us and then asked for opinions, yes. We all gave great suggestions and they took every one into consideration.

Me - What were your parents reaction to this whole project? Have they been supportive?

SB - My parents have always worried about who I talk to and what I do on the internet. When I told my dad about this project of course he was skeptical. Of course, after talking with the Director of Richards Interactive and going over some questions that my dad had, he was just as happy as I was. My mom, who works as a buyer for a computer company here was also impressed.

Me - How often do you post to your site with your cam? How did you get into cam culture? And who are the cam girls which you like the most?

SB - I post a new cam image maybe once a week. I got into the 'cam culture' when my uncle sent me a webcam for one christmas and I just decided to post some pictures. I like camgirls that are intelligent, have good content, and don't obsess about cam-listings and porn clicks.

Me - Do you see your experience with Richards Interactive influencing your future career goals?

SB - Absolutely. After being in the Richards Group headquarters in Dallas I knew this is where I wanted to be. The professional level they are at and the creativeness and fun they have are definitely things I want to be doing, not to mention my involvement in this project will look good on future applications and job opportunities in the same line of work.

Me - Okay one last request, please give me links to your 3 favorite sites and a bit about why you like them. Please don't make them any of the folks involved in Raging Cow.

SB - amorphism.net >> run by this incredibly intellectual girl Anush, i read her blogg everyday, her way with words just keep me coming back, shesaidnothing.com >> apple, just another girl with great opinions that are a lot like mine, invincibl3.com >> eric, a 15 year old kid with the coolest bloggs. he and i are a lot alike.

Todd Copilevitz Interview, Part 2

Several days I wrote up some information about the Raging Cow blogging initiative. During the course of this I posted part one of my interview with Todd. In the next day or so I'll post some of my own thoughts about all of this along with more annotation. Here's part two:

Me - First a clarification: You wrote, "But to your point, no we did not
focus on any one community or publishing platform. And realize, this
group is only the start. We plan to invite hundred more into the
project. If they want in, we'll find them a place."

Are you saying that you have plans to have a specific number of 100
more bloggers on this project, or did you intend to write hundreds as a
generic "as many as we can get or are interested"?

TC - We have stated publicly that we hope to involve hundreds of bloggers to
the project. Obviously we have a deliberate plan for picking them, but
it's up to the blog community as to how many ultimately want to join in.
For that matter, it's up to the bloggers themselves if they want to join
in through us, getting sample product and all, or simply buy it and
comment on their own.

Either way is valid, which is the point.

Me - It is rather obvious that you had a professional artist/designer/copy
editor involved in the production of the Raging Cow site itself. Are
the project bloggers you brought in involved in that sites content? Is
it a multi-author log? Or do you have someone on staff who is writing
that?

The notion of having a cow keep a journal is rather witty. The
additional "characters" outside of the teenagers & the cow though seem
grafted on after the fact. Can you give me some feedback on the
genesis of the additional individual characters and how they relate to
this project?

TC - Both your other questions really go into strategy and tactics, which I
can't go into that much. But I will share this with you. We believe
brands have a distinct personality, and that's obviously true when you
look at Raging Cow. So there is a full document that outlines the cow's
personality. And that goes for the other characters in the blogs. For
the sake of consistency there is a primary writer on each character, but
obviously the process is collaborative.

The other bloggers we work with were not involved in the development of
the site, although they offered some great advice after it launched.

The cam shots, on the other hand, tend to be a bit of comedy by
committee.

Me - You bring up cam girls and well to be honest that opens up my next
question.

To be a bit, well, aggressive here I am fascinated by your choice of
cam kids for this project. I realize that cams are very very popular
with your target demographic but since the cam girls, no matter how
clean they present themselves, are almost always one click away from
adult entertainment it seems a curious choice to me. I was struck
immediately that your stance is almost like that of briar rabbit when
you say we wanted to choose bloggers who would stay away from content
"that would be inappropriate for our client's product to be in proximity
to, such as porn links, etc." Since in choosing to plug into
the cam girl culture you bring into the situation a lot of "potential"
baggage which may undermine your efforts.

I would like to hear your opinion of all of this keeping in mind that
you obviously will not reveal your strategy to me in detail.

TC - I think you've hit on a very interesting point. The whole "cam girl"
issue has some unique subtext. Here's something to ponder: Are
stereotypical cam girls linking to porn because they want to, like the
money, or want the traffic those sites drive to their site?

To be sure there are people online who have no concern for the image
they project and the digital company they keep. But we've seen this
pattern before. Think back to the personal home pages of the mid-90s,
when suddenly everyone wanted to run a banner ad on their site to make
money, no matter what the banner said.

We won't even try to take credit for it, but I think what we're doing is
at the leading edge of a new chapter for blog sites. Now it is possible
to gain credibility, and ultimately be rewarded in some fashion, without
having to accept every porn-portal link offered to you.

In this chapter blogs will be the smallest of niche entertainment sites,
true reality programming if you will. They will develop loyal followings
who tune in regularly. Inevitably that will attract the attention of
people trying to market products to that audience. So the question
becomes what is the right way to incorporate that marketing? What should
the line be between advertising and the content? For that matter, what
obligation do any of these bloggers have to disclose anything?

Our approach here is not much different than a traditional sampling
event. You've seen these where crews hand out samples of product,
stickers, coupons, etc. The goal there is to get people to try your
product and hopefully they'll tell their friends. That is the core of
our strategy, we're doing sampling. But we're doing it with people that
have much bigger groups of friends than I ever had at that age (or now
for that matter). Bloggers we choose to work with get the product, some
free swag like shirts and stickers, and a handful of coupons. They get
exactly what they would get if they encountered a sampling crew outside
some stadium.

As for our blog, its just there to tell a story. Someone posting to your
site actually said it better than I can:

I read through that raging cow fake blog and I thought it was funny

>>*shocked*. Somebody somewhere with talent wrote that and I think they
were genuinely trying to entertain me more than they were trying to sell
a product and Dr. Pepper paid for that guy to entertain me even though
he wasn't all in my face with a product.<<

That made the day for a lot of people.

Me - Can you give some examples of other web centric initiatives, outside of
your own firm, which have set the bar for such a branding story in your
intitiative?

For instance a few years ago the "Blair Witch" project was a big
success for building a branding story for a commercial property.
Please give me a list of successful projects your staff found valuable
to learn from and conversely those which you felt bombed and you
learned what not to do.

TC - To be honest, the spark of this story came very early one when our
creative director suddenly speaking as if he was the cow, lamenting the
morning ritual of the milking machine. At that point we knew there was a
story to tell, the only question was where?

As for earlier initiatives by others. I think the AI fiction web spun a
couple years ago was pure genius. It probably was better than the movie
itself. If I stretch way back there was a great attempt at an online
soap opera in the early days of the web. It was called The Spot, kind of
a Real World online.

I would be very interested in seeing that kind of "programming" making a
return to the web. It seems to me it would be far more interesting here,
where people can interact with it, rather than on television.

Me - I notice that you brought the bloggers and their parents to Dallas. If these bloggers are 18+ why were parents involved?

It would seem, from my limited understanding, that this relationship between Dr. Pepper/Seven Up and the bloggers leaves someone open to some liability. While a paid trip and some swag may not constitute an employee relationship it does seem to render the firms involved beholden in some fashion to these teenagers/young adults safety in all of this. Can you give me a bit of background on this and talk a bit about how this was discussed with the bloggers?

TC - How about I answer the first part. The second part is legalese, and
that's not my cup of tea.

We asked for their parents to attend because we wanted to go the extra
mile to assure everyone that we weren't trying to take advantage of
anyone. It was an amazing weekend. Only one of the bloggers couldn't
make it. Two came w/o parents by choice. But all the bloggers had known
each other online for more than a year. It was like watching a class
reunion, except these are people who had never met.

I caught part of the conversation the parents were having. For them it
was like a support group, parents of bloggers.

The truth is we could have started the project without the meeting. But
it proved enormously educational for all of us and probably the client.
We spent a lot of time asking questions and listening to make sure we
weren't going about this the wrong way.

Along these lines, let me take a swing at something one of the people on
the comments board here said about all this. <>

>>...The people behind this scheme may even have wanted bloggers with integrity to write about their products, but their lies the Catch 22: once you have bribed somebody to write about your product, their integrity is compromised. And in some shape or form, these bloggers have been bribed - whether with flattery, money or material goods... <<

I'd suggest to you this is a dichotomy that goes well beyond our piece
of the world. A TV reporter wants to interview you about the wreck you
just saw. Does the presence of a TV camera make you an eye-witness? Or
does the now detailed enhanced version you recount qualify you?

Back to bloggers, there's no doubt someone will work on a project like
this somewhere and go overboard. At that moment the horse that brought
her to glory will crumble into dust. The readers are gone, the links
worthless.

If you're looking for the mother lode of freebies, keep on moving.
There's nothing here. The key to integrity is articulating what you
stand for, understanding how the translates into the decisions you make,
and possess the piece of mind that comes from doing the right thing.

We can pass out hundreds of sampling backs to bloggers, ask them for a
link or even a fan sign. But it is a certainty that one of those
bloggers isn't going to like the drink. I would be stunned if that isn't
documented well on the site.

If we wanted anything else we'd have a slick shot of some farmers
daughter reclining on a seldom used tractor and draining a carton of
Chocolate Insanity. Instead we have a raging cow, complete primal moo
that will shake you from any sleep, racing across the country, and soon
across many of your favorite web sites.

But that's another issue.

Todd Copilevitz Interview, Part 2

Several days I wrote up some information about the Raging Cow blogging initiative. During the course of this I posted part one of my interview with Todd. In the next day or so I'll post some of my own thoughts about all of this along with more annotation. Here's part two:

Me - First a clarification: You wrote, "But to your point, no we did not
focus on any one community or publishing platform. And realize, this
group is only the start. We plan to invite hundred more into the
project. If they want in, we'll find them a place."

Are you saying that you have plans to have a specific number of 100
more bloggers on this project, or did you intend to write hundreds as a
generic "as many as we can get or are interested"?

TC - We have stated publicly that we hope to involve hundreds of bloggers to
the project. Obviously we have a deliberate plan for picking them, but
it's up to the blog community as to how many ultimately want to join in.
For that matter, it's up to the bloggers themselves if they want to join
in through us, getting sample product and all, or simply buy it and
comment on their own.

Either way is valid, which is the point.

Me - It is rather obvious that you had a professional artist/designer/copy
editor involved in the production of the Raging Cow site itself. Are
the project bloggers you brought in involved in that sites content? Is
it a multi-author log? Or do you have someone on staff who is writing
that?

The notion of having a cow keep a journal is rather witty. The
additional "characters" outside of the teenagers & the cow though seem
grafted on after the fact. Can you give me some feedback on the
genesis of the additional individual characters and how they relate to
this project?

TC - Both your other questions really go into strategy and tactics, which I
can't go into that much. But I will share this with you. We believe
brands have a distinct personality, and that's obviously true when you
look at Raging Cow. So there is a full document that outlines the cow's
personality. And that goes for the other characters in the blogs. For
the sake of consistency there is a primary writer on each character, but
obviously the process is collaborative.

The other bloggers we work with were not involved in the development of
the site, although they offered some great advice after it launched.

The cam shots, on the other hand, tend to be a bit of comedy by
committee.

Me - You bring up cam girls and well to be honest that opens up my next
question.

To be a bit, well, aggressive here I am fascinated by your choice of
cam kids for this project. I realize that cams are very very popular
with your target demographic but since the cam girls, no matter how
clean they present themselves, are almost always one click away from
adult entertainment it seems a curious choice to me. I was struck
immediately that your stance is almost like that of briar rabbit when
you say we wanted to choose bloggers who would stay away from content
"that would be inappropriate for our client's product to be in proximity
to, such as porn links, etc." Since in choosing to plug into
the cam girl culture you bring into the situation a lot of "potential"
baggage which may undermine your efforts.

I would like to hear your opinion of all of this keeping in mind that
you obviously will not reveal your strategy to me in detail.

TC - I think you've hit on a very interesting point. The whole "cam girl"
issue has some unique subtext. Here's something to ponder: Are
stereotypical cam girls linking to porn because they want to, like the
money, or want the traffic those sites drive to their site?

To be sure there are people online who have no concern for the image
they project and the digital company they keep. But we've seen this
pattern before. Think back to the personal home pages of the mid-90s,
when suddenly everyone wanted to run a banner ad on their site to make
money, no matter what the banner said.

We won't even try to take credit for it, but I think what we're doing is
at the leading edge of a new chapter for blog sites. Now it is possible
to gain credibility, and ultimately be rewarded in some fashion, without
having to accept every porn-portal link offered to you.

In this chapter blogs will be the smallest of niche entertainment sites,
true reality programming if you will. They will develop loyal followings
who tune in regularly. Inevitably that will attract the attention of
people trying to market products to that audience. So the question
becomes what is the right way to incorporate that marketing? What should
the line be between advertising and the content? For that matter, what
obligation do any of these bloggers have to disclose anything?

Our approach here is not much different than a traditional sampling
event. You've seen these where crews hand out samples of product,
stickers, coupons, etc. The goal there is to get people to try your
product and hopefully they'll tell their friends. That is the core of
our strategy, we're doing sampling. But we're doing it with people that
have much bigger groups of friends than I ever had at that age (or now
for that matter). Bloggers we choose to work with get the product, some
free swag like shirts and stickers, and a handful of coupons. They get
exactly what they would get if they encountered a sampling crew outside
some stadium.

As for our blog, its just there to tell a story. Someone posting to your
site actually said it better than I can:

I read through that raging cow fake blog and I thought it was funny

>>*shocked*. Somebody somewhere with talent wrote that and I think they
were genuinely trying to entertain me more than they were trying to sell
a product and Dr. Pepper paid for that guy to entertain me even though
he wasn't all in my face with a product.<<

That made the day for a lot of people.

Me - Can you give some examples of other web centric initiatives, outside of
your own firm, which have set the bar for such a branding story in your
intitiative?

For instance a few years ago the "Blair Witch" project was a big
success for building a branding story for a commercial property.
Please give me a list of successful projects your staff found valuable
to learn from and conversely those which you felt bombed and you
learned what not to do.

TC - To be honest, the spark of this story came very early one when our
creative director suddenly speaking as if he was the cow, lamenting the
morning ritual of the milking machine. At that point we knew there was a
story to tell, the only question was where?

As for earlier initiatives by others. I think the AI fiction web spun a
couple years ago was pure genius. It probably was better than the movie
itself. If I stretch way back there was a great attempt at an online
soap opera in the early days of the web. It was called The Spot, kind of
a Real World online.

I would be very interested in seeing that kind of "programming" making a
return to the web. It seems to me it would be far more interesting here,
where people can interact with it, rather than on television.

Me - I notice that you brought the bloggers and their parents to Dallas. If these bloggers are 18+ why were parents involved?

It would seem, from my limited understanding, that this relationship between Dr. Pepper/Seven Up and the bloggers leaves someone open to some liability. While a paid trip and some swag may not constitute an employee relationship it does seem to render the firms involved beholden in some fashion to these teenagers/young adults safety in all of this. Can you give me a bit of background on this and talk a bit about how this was discussed with the bloggers?

TC - How about I answer the first part. The second part is legalese, and
that's not my cup of tea.

We asked for their parents to attend because we wanted to go the extra
mile to assure everyone that we weren't trying to take advantage of
anyone. It was an amazing weekend. Only one of the bloggers couldn't
make it. Two came w/o parents by choice. But all the bloggers had known
each other online for more than a year. It was like watching a class
reunion, except these are people who had never met.

I caught part of the conversation the parents were having. For them it
was like a support group, parents of bloggers.

The truth is we could have started the project without the meeting. But
it proved enormously educational for all of us and probably the client.
We spent a lot of time asking questions and listening to make sure we
weren't going about this the wrong way.

Along these lines, let me take a swing at something one of the people on
the comments board here said about all this. <>

>>...The people behind this scheme may even have wanted bloggers with integrity to write about their products, but their lies the Catch 22: once you have bribed somebody to write about your product, their integrity is compromised. And in some shape or form, these bloggers have been bribed - whether with flattery, money or material goods... <<

I'd suggest to you this is a dichotomy that goes well beyond our piece
of the world. A TV reporter wants to interview you about the wreck you
just saw. Does the presence of a TV camera make you an eye-witness? Or
does the now detailed enhanced version you recount qualify you?

Back to bloggers, there's no doubt someone will work on a project like
this somewhere and go overboard. At that moment the horse that brought
her to glory will crumble into dust. The readers are gone, the links
worthless.

If you're looking for the mother lode of freebies, keep on moving.
There's nothing here. The key to integrity is articulating what you
stand for, understanding how the translates into the decisions you make,
and possess the piece of mind that comes from doing the right thing.

We can pass out hundreds of sampling backs to bloggers, ask them for a
link or even a fan sign. But it is a certainty that one of those
bloggers isn't going to like the drink. I would be stunned if that isn't
documented well on the site.

If we wanted anything else we'd have a slick shot of some farmers
daughter reclining on a seldom used tractor and draining a carton of
Chocolate Insanity. Instead we have a raging cow, complete primal moo
that will shake you from any sleep, racing across the country, and soon
across many of your favorite web sites.

But that's another issue.

Do Ya Think?

Raging Cow has just updated with the usual nonsense. No acknowledgement of any recent reactions. If it were a real and genuine blog, there would at least be mention, wouldn't you think?

Do Ya Think?

Raging Cow has just updated with the usual nonsense. No acknowledgement of any recent reactions. If it were a real and genuine blog, there would at least be mention, wouldn't you think?

Cam Girls & Milk

Obviously I am very interested in marketing. And the subject of the role of PR or marketing in blogs certainly falls into not only my skill set but also my concerns since I do make a bit of money from my sponsors. My plan is to someday make a lot more.

I have a passion about what I do in this writing space. I would like to someday be able to do it full time. I think I can see a way to use this web site as a source of both income and pursuing my passion.

There is much to be discussed and thought about.

I'm exploring the idea of using comments to work on text inline. This is the first usage of this technique. This works very well when used in conjunction with Archipelago.

Email from Customer Service:

Thank you for contacting Dr Pepper/Seven Up, Inc. Your comments and
inquiries regarding Raging Cow are appreciated because they provide
valuable feedback about our brands.

Raging Cow is one of our new products. It was introduced to the market
03/01/03. The Raging Cow blog is a Dr. Pepper Promotional Blog. The
Raging Cow blog website is just temporary.

Dr Pepper/Seven Up, Inc. is proud to be the largest non-cola and third
largest soft drink manufacturer in the United States. We produce
solely the flavoring concentrates from which various brands of soft drinks
are made. These concentrates are then sold to independent franchised
licensed bottlers who produce and distribute the finished soft drink
product to retailers for sale to consumers.

We appreciate your comments and hope you will continue to select and
enjoy our soft drink brands. For more information about our company and
our entire line of soft drinks, please visit our corporate web site,
www.dpsu.com.

Sincerely,

Consumer Relations
Dr Pepper/Seven Up, Inc.
1-800-696-5891

I have updated and added an interview to the piece I did a couple of days ago on the launch of Raging Cow.

Part two of the interview will follow in the next day or so.

Cam Girls & Milk

Obviously I am very interested in marketing. And the subject of the role of PR or marketing in blogs certainly falls into not only my skill set but also my concerns since I do make a bit of money from my sponsors. My plan is to someday make a lot more.

I have a passion about what I do in this writing space. I would like to someday be able to do it full time. I think I can see a way to use this web site as a source of both income and pursuing my passion.

There is much to be discussed and thought about.

I'm exploring the idea of using comments to work on text inline. This is the first usage of this technique. This works very well when used in conjunction with Archipelago.

Email from Customer Service:

Thank you for contacting Dr Pepper/Seven Up, Inc. Your comments and
inquiries regarding Raging Cow are appreciated because they provide
valuable feedback about our brands.

Raging Cow is one of our new products. It was introduced to the market
03/01/03. The Raging Cow blog is a Dr. Pepper Promotional Blog. The
Raging Cow blog website is just temporary.

Dr Pepper/Seven Up, Inc. is proud to be the largest non-cola and third
largest soft drink manufacturer in the United States. We produce
solely the flavoring concentrates from which various brands of soft drinks
are made. These concentrates are then sold to independent franchised
licensed bottlers who produce and distribute the finished soft drink
product to retailers for sale to consumers.

We appreciate your comments and hope you will continue to select and
enjoy our soft drink brands. For more information about our company and
our entire line of soft drinks, please visit our corporate web site,
www.dpsu.com.

Sincerely,

Consumer Relations
Dr Pepper/Seven Up, Inc.
1-800-696-5891

I have updated and added an interview to the piece I did a couple of days ago on the launch of Raging Cow.

Part two of the interview will follow in the next day or so.