Also this week, Twitter released a new version this week.  The trick to get the new look and functionality? You had to download it to your Android or iPhone first.

The quality of the ads we’ve seen during the Superbowl in the last few years has been dodgy, at best. If this is indicative of the quality of the ads we’ll see this year, it may not be so bad. Enjoy!

Marketers and advertising agencies certainly think so. A recent study by psychographic ad targeter, Mindset Media, outlines their “consumption personality predictor” theory. The agency analyzed self-reported data from about 25,000 TV viewers across more than 70 TV shows to find out what personalities are attracted to what shows. The results revealed some strikingly similar personality traits among a show’s viewers. For example, if you’re a fan of AMC’s Mad Men, you’re a creative type. Love Family Guy? You’re likely to be a rule-breaker or a rebel. Are you a Gleek? According to Mindset Media, you’re very open to new experiences and are now classified as a so-called “experientialist.” (For a more in-depth analysis of personalities by TV shows click here.)

But are people’s media consumption choices clear indicators of their personality? More often than not, our personalities are unpredictable, consisting of multiple angles and hidden motivations. A person who tunes into WWEs RAW may also tune into PBS Masterpiece, resulting in a conflicted “consumption personality predictor” forecast. But a good research analyst knows that simplifying someone’s mindset is diving into dangerous territory. Still, this new psychographic predictor trend appears to be gaining momentum among advertisers who often approach the study with enough caveats to remain wary but enough fortitude to push forward. Mindset Media plans to continue analyzing consumers TV personalities in 2011, so if your favorite show was neglected (Big Love anyone?), then maybe you’ll get diagnosed next time ’round.

Interestingly, the app is not intended to serve as a digital form of the magazine, but as a new way for consumers to engage with the brand. Given Gourmet’s dedicated following and the widespread disappointment with the magazine’s cancellation, repackaging the magazine in the form of an app appears to be a brilliant move. Not only will the app reintroduce a trusted brand in an entirely new way, it will fill the void for dedicated readers who have yet to find a satisfactory substitute. In addition, the app well help the brand reach a younger, tech-savvy audience. The trick will be keeping the content fresh enough to attract new readers and familiar enough to satisfy older fans. With Gourmet’s culinary legendary expertise and reputation, balancing old tastes with new textures should be as easy as cooking “Easy Seafood Paella“.

Since everyone else seems to be talking about this spot, I figured I’d throw my two cents in. If you haven’t seen it yet, it’s simple…Tiger stares into camera. Tiger’s dead father provides the voiceover. Cameras flash. Simple.

Most of the comments I’m seeing are critical, to say the least. Take this New York Times article:

“Did you learn anything?” Earl Woods asks. A valuable question, and one that his son has attempted to answer in his no-questions news conference in February; his brief interviews with ESPN and the Golf Channel last month; and his pre-Masters news conference on Monday.

But the answer to the father’s question appears to be that serial philandering and addiction rehab can be positioned as a commodity — and that you can roll it out in phases leading to the Nike amendment to the 12 steps: a TV commercial.

Personally, I like the spot. It’s an apology, a glimpse into Tiger’s conscience, and a return to the spotlight all rolled into one. When I read the criticism, I have to wonder what people expected. Short of keeping one of their marquee endorsers on the bench, or cutting him loose altogether, this was the only thing Nike could do.

Nike frames him as the fallen hero. Anything else would have been an outrage.

“I found one remaining box of comics which I had saved. When I opened it up and that smell came pouring out, that old paper smell, I was struck by a rush of memories, a sense of my childhood self that seemed to be contained in there.” Michael Chabon

Until recently, the most accessible and practical means of cataloguing memories was through photography. Pictures became the medium through which we told stories about our past and thus became our most cherished possessions.

The irony is that the amateur, point-and-click photographer in all of us is not very good at taking pictures. Our natural impulse is archival rather than expressive. Our subjects are often posed and detached from the experience, as if they are taking break from the moment to stand and smile. Only a rare photographer can capture the depth of emotion that happens in a given moment and tell a story that exists outside of the frame.

Thus, pictures are a starting point for memories, a prompt for thinking about our past. Our strongest memories are actually associated with our “chemical” senses, taste and smell. Our sense of smell is overlooked, but the human olfactory sense is controlled by the limbic system, the part of the brain also responsible for emotion, memory, pleasure, and motivation.

This is the Scenter, a project of the Kawamura-Ganjavian architecture and design studio. It stores smells in tiny cartridges and releases them when the bellows are squeezed.

We tend not to notice our sense of smell except in cases when an odor is surprisingly strong, pleasantly or unpleasantly so. But there are also moments when a scent is so familiar, so close, that you feel as if you are experiencing something again.

The Scenter is a remarkable achievement then: a sensory device that can capture a tremendous part of our daily experience where technology of the pixilated sort cannot.

“They said, ‘how about prime time?’ I said, ‘that will never work.’ No, no, we want to put you on at 10:00. We have done focus groups. People will love you at 10:00. Look at these studies showing Jay’s chin at 10:00. People will go crazy.”

Now I don’t want to pile on NBC and obviously I have no idea how extensive the research was, but this seems like a potentially good example of placing too much weight on a research study instead of utilizing research as a component of an overall decision making process.  Let’s hope that NBC didn’t make a decision with hundred of millions of dollars worth of consequences based on a couple of rounds of focus groups.  But feel free to mention this example the next time someone complains about a product launch not going as well as the research predicted.  Below is a link to the article with more quotes from Jay Leno.

Jay Leno Tells All About NBC’s Dysfunction

Sports Illustrated and Wired also proposed e-magazine concepts recently, but the BERG/Bonnier concept seems to take a best of both worlds approach and suggests ways in which this approach can be easily adopted. The interactive control features and the modern take on presentation of content really add to the reader’s experience – hinting at engagement beyond mere push-button page flipping, pdf scrolling, zooming, and flash animation.

Related links:

BERG article
Bonnier’s MAG+ Blog Post

In this new, digital world, we’re beginning to move beyond this. Record companies have been pushing for more tiers of pricing on iTunes. Some television shows are free on Hulu. Some only show on premium cable and DVD. Once you eliminate the physical product, distinctions between perceived quality are able to be made.

It’s no longer about supply, demand, and the price of paper. It’s about quality and creativity.

Anyway. This article is worth reading.