english
nederlands
Indymedia NL
Independent Media Centre of the Netherlands
Indymedia NL is an independent free communication organisation. Indymedia offers an alternative approach to the news by using an open publishing method for text, images, video and audio.
> contact > search > archive > help > join > publish news > open newswire > disclaimer > chat
Search

 
All Words
Any Word
Contains Media:
Only images
Only video
Only audio

Dossiers
Agenda
CHAT!
LINKS

European NewsReal

MDI's complaint against Indymedia.nl
Courtcase Deutsche Bahn vs. Indymedia.nl
Topics
anti-fascisme / racisme
europa
feminisme
gentechnologie
globalisering
kunst, cultuur en muziek
media
militarisme
natuur, dier en mens
oranje
vrijheid, repressie & mensenrechten
wereldcrisis
wonen/kraken
zonder rubriek
Events
G8
Oaxaca
Schinveld
Schoonmakers-Campagne
Help
Tips for newbies
A short intro into Indymedia NL
The policy of Indymedia NL
How to join?
Donate
Support Indymedia NL with donations!
Lawsuits cost a lot of money, we appreciate every (euro)cent you can spare!

You can also direct your donation to Dutch bank account 94.32.153 on behalf of Stichting Vrienden van Indymedia, Amsterdam (IBAN: NL41 PSTB 0009 4321 53)
Indymedia Network

www.indymedia.org

Projects
print
radio
satellite tv
video

Africa
ambazonia
canarias
estrecho / madiaq
kenya
nigeria
south africa

Canada
hamilton
london, ontario
maritimes
montreal
ontario
ottawa
quebec
thunder bay
vancouver
victoria
windsor
winnipeg

East Asia
burma
jakarta
japan
manila
qc

Europe
alacant
andorra
antwerpen
armenia
athens
austria
barcelona
belarus
belgium
belgrade
bristol
bulgaria
croatia
cyprus
estrecho / madiaq
euskal herria
galiza
germany
grenoble
hungary
ireland
istanbul
italy
la plana
liege
lille
madrid
malta
marseille
nantes
netherlands
nice
norway
oost-vlaanderen
paris/île-de-france
poland
portugal
romania
russia
scotland
sverige
switzerland
thessaloniki
toulouse
ukraine
united kingdom
valencia
west vlaanderen

Latin America
argentina
bolivia
brasil
chiapas
chile
chile sur
colombia
ecuador
mexico
peru
puerto rico
qollasuyu
rosario
santiago
tijuana
uruguay
valparaiso

Oceania
adelaide
aotearoa
brisbane
burma
darwin
jakarta
manila
melbourne
oceania
perth
qc
sydney

South Asia
india
mumbai

United States
arizona
arkansas
atlanta
austin
baltimore
big muddy
binghamton
boston
buffalo
charlottesville
chicago
cleveland
colorado
columbus
danbury, ct
dc
hampton roads, va
hawaii
houston
hudson mohawk
idaho
ithaca
kansas city
la
madison
maine
miami
michigan
milwaukee
minneapolis/st. paul
new hampshire
new jersey
new mexico
new orleans
north carolina
north texas
nyc
oklahoma
omaha
philadelphia
pittsburgh
portland
richmond
rochester
rogue valley
saint louis
san diego
san francisco
san francisco bay area
santa barbara
santa cruz, ca
seattle
tallahassee-red hills
tampa bay
tennessee
united states
urbana-champaign
utah
vermont
western mass
worcester

West Asia
armenia
beirut
israel
palestine

Topics
biotech

Process
discussion
fbi/legal updates
indymedia faq
mailing lists
process & imc docs
tech
volunteer
Credits
This site is produced by volunteers using free software where possible.

The system we use is available from:mir.indymedia.de
an alternative is available from: active.org.au/doc

Thanks to indymedia.de and mir-coders for creating and sharing mir!

Contact:
info @ indymedia.nl
how the companies exploit anti-globalization
dementia - 06.02.2002 13:05

cool hunt anti-commercial money




How the companies are using the Anti-globalization movement


Did you know what the cool hunters are? Did you accidentally notice lately any advertisements with radical themes or the latest fashion that demonstrates symbols of revolution impressed you? When anti-globalization becomes a mass movement it is easily noticed by the brand companies that they don´t want to loose a share from any part of the consumer pie...


Cool Hunt. The chase of modern trends

Let´s for a moment assume that you are a big international company which produces products like outfit, refreshment drinks or even music-mostly aiming to people of young age. In the today market only by distributing a product is not enough- even if it has already succeeded. The promotion of products has reached a point where is considered like a dynamic system where one day one product sells like fresh cakes and the next day fades away like if it had never existed. Therefore, a continuous attachment with the consumers is necessary in a way that it will keep people´s interest high. Here is where the Cool Hunt is involved.
The whole idea started on the early nineties when Corporate Marketing Consultancies
Like Sputnik, L. Report and Bureau of Style begun carrying out Market research on behalf of Brand companies like Absolut, Reebok and Levi´s in a totally novel way. The research included photographing, video shooting and interviewing with persons and acts that were considered to be "Cool" at the moment. The whole plan was to use the results not mostly for developing new products but rather for the same product promotion. " The idea it looks simple in the beginning. Every one could go out in the streets and come in contact with young persons and come up to general conclusions about their trends. Although, how do you know they are the "right" ones? Have you been inside their closet? Have you traced their daily path? Did you hang out with them?
In an interview of Malcolm Gladwell-stuff writer in the New Yorker and also writer of the Tipping point-with heroin a young Cool hunter- recently made to a movie- says: You must be really an expert to interpret the trends of the youth today. It´s not enough just observing, you must fully understanding how a trend is made...to be cool is valuable for the marketing because they are able to understand that that the message transferred out there is largely enhanced if the receiver is the kind of person which will put the standards of what is cool....Cool hunting is to detect, understand and finally use."
A small example of cool hunting in practice is the following: Did you notice lately any ads-mainly in university campuses-of the Energy drink brand, Red Bull where young people are needed to work as "Student Brand Manager"? ".. Are you ready for action? Party-studies-Travelling, now you can have it all! You only have to be university student, very open and social person, know when, where n´ what is happening.. Red Bull awaits you for unique action! This is a typical example how a big international brand carries out a cool hunt in local level, using as medium the very same young persons and paying almost nothing-comparing to the profit gained.

Hunting the cool character of the Anti-commercial

But, ok. Some institutes that make Market research and sell the data to big companies, so they can sell their products in a better way. No big deal, except of the sad conclusion of the intention abusing the very same way of life of the modern urban youth. Movements like the one of Anti-globalization-with a clear anti-commercial character- hardly could be related and be effected by market research and other tricky brand crap... Apparently, perhaps it´s true. Nevertheless the world of Brands does not care about ideology-even if this ideology stands against them. Whatever is considered "cool" today and owes a mass character can be used, so products can be sold. And the cool hunt is directly involved to it.
The Dutch institute Signs of the Time like the previous ones, carries out market research and afterwards sells the data gathered, to clients-companies interested in the form of "Data packets". The customer points out most times the theme and market analyzed previously. The head manager is a Sociology Lecturer, Carl Rhode, and most of the employees are nothing but post-graduate students. The institute in the period of summer 2001 carried out a Cool Hunt campaign all over Europe, called "The Cool Summer Hunt" hunting..."the most interesting persons, places, products and attitudes....
The important about it is that one of the subjects of research was the Anti-globalization movement...
From the web page of the institute we read:
"The new anti-commercialism. Electrohippies and hacktivists all over the world unite.
What is the wider picture of new rebels in Europe?
How to adapt to the new mood?
Faking that you are also concerned is not enough.
Generation SEARCH is far too smart and clued-up.
Young people protest against the
branded universe they have
to live in. Though, at the same time,
they love many of the branded
products it offers. We are definitely
not going back to the anti-capitalist Sixties!
Nevertheless, anti-commercialism is on
the rise and takes unexpected turns"

This presentation is made as a first taste for the clients of the institute that would be interested to buy the research data. As it was mentioned before, cool hunting is not only info accumulation of the modern trends but something that intents to get into the true spirit of the "subject" analyzed. In the same web page it is made clear:
Cool hunting is different from trendwatching.
Trendwatchers discover and describe trends.
If they are good they also analyse the trends and put them in a comprehensible social cultural frame of reference.
Cool hunters do the same. They also go with the flow of trends.
But they participate far more deeply into it.
They really blend in.
They detect, investigate, describe and analyse
Interpreting the above to the conditions of the Anti-globalization movement he have: Young people-cool hunters which begin from entering into the "mood" of the movement and reach to (pseudo-) participate in activities-like demonstrations and speeches-with the purpose not of course to spy and record faces and practices of ideology but to isolate the "cool" characteristics of these persons. What kind clothes, what kind of hairstyle what kind of music, what kind of attitude, what kind of life style in general...All this pretty tied up in a data packet ready for sale to the prospective clients-companies...
Very interesting was also the presentation of the "Cool Summer Hunt" results in a lecture given inside the Research center of the multinational company Unilever. The company is a client of the institute and owes products like Ck perfume, washing machine detergents, Ola-Algida ice creams, calve mayonnaise etc. During the lecture between the several subjects presented was the important role of utilizing celebrities in the promotion, the importance of sex in the advertisements etc. When the analysis concerning the Anti-globalization, was presented an umber of slides were shown with pictures from demonstrations and web pages dealing with similar themes. Emphasis was given to the so-called ad busting-the alteration of ads transforming them to anti-commercial message- and to the kind of music more popular between the fans of the movement. Also attention was given to its philology with references to books like the one of Naomi Klein, No logo. Oxymoron is that the same book deals hot material for the activity of multinational trends in Third World countries...

Anti-Commercial promotion? Already on your screens...

If the institute above is still analyzing the recent results, about the movement already in other parts the practical application of anti-commercially promoting products has begun.
In an advertisement of the outfit brand GAP, shown mostly from in the U.S. the scenario was that: Scenes that look like the street fights in Seattle-fidelity low, like shooting with handy camera. Music back round from sampled Kid Rock song. Plans are cut, troubles happening, you can hardly see people with colorful clothes and hair, plans from fires, shops smashed, panic, and then: "Hate us because we are beautiful...GAP"
Similar ads have also appeared in European TV in promotion of products like milk (!). and other kinds (Radio spots etc).

So, fake ant-commercial. And the reaction?

All the above are already outrageous. In one hand we have buy-sell of "products" which are nothing but research of the human behavior, deals between Institutes-secret agents and companies-multinational empires seeking out not for land but for profit. On the other the disgusting attempt of gaining even from the "radical part". The question now that could really set aside all the above is. Could this kind of abuse really influence and cheat, deceive in reality?
A kind of answer "No, we can not be cheated by this kind of tricks" maybe is not enough. We should not forget that the exploitation is not on the field of making anti-commercial products but on the anti-commercial promotion of every product suitable.
It would be a big lie to say that the consumption does not involve every each one of us. Maybe we should ask our selves when was the last time we spent money for something that could express our "radical" feelings. Even if it was music, clothes or publication. From the Che t-shirt to Rage against the machine, from Doc martens to the big book mal, from the alternative video clips to the rasta hair paints. Sounds a litle out of reality? I hope so.

The Hunter and the pray

In the end of the Malcolm Gladwell interview it is mentioned between others: "..The end of the cool hunt is the kill. The procedure of discovering the cool kills cool. The one that previously had adapted it, watching it know being adapted by everybody else, abandons it and almost runs to the opposite direction..." In this statement it could be confronted. The anti-globalization movement is another prey of the trend exploitation? It became massive so easily as it can be exploited and be abandoned afterwards like an impermanent fashion? If it´s so, then pretty soon will decorate the brand´s room of trophies. But if not if it really stands outside this game-where it is seen by the profiteering perspective- then maybe the next turn will be a surprise, a hunt trap for the hunter its self with the prey prepared to attack. And maybe is also capable of mangle.

Links:

- The site of the signs-of-the-time institute
 http://www.signs-of-the-time.nl/

-Presentation of the article:
 http://www.geocities.com/deladementia/


- E-Mail: deladementia@yahoo.com
 
supplements
Ideologie$ 4 $ale 
AO1 - 06.02.2002 19:40

While anti-globalization is an ideological movement to you and me, it matters only as a revenue generating vehicle to corporations and their advertising lackeys.

For the "crowds" - followers, whose attitudes are shaped by mass media, the message is that they can achieve kewlness [sic] by spending their discretionary income on whatever is hot this very minute.... There´ll be a new flash in the pan tomorrow, and the whole story repeats itself ad nauseum.

So, should we be concerned by this co-optation of ideology? I think not, since what is stolen is not the message itself but only its outward image. Rather, I believe that the cool-hunters might unwittingly strenghten the anti-globalization movement: by advertising its traits to a larger audience than the movement could ever dream to reach by itself more people will be prompted to investigate whatever lies behind the coolness.

I wonder whether any former hippies, mods, punks, gays, gen-x, etc. disagree, these were all "alternative movements" whose imagery somehow made its way into mainstream society.

Army of One


supplements
> indymedia.nl > search > archive > help > join > publish news > open newswire > disclaimer > chat
DISCLAIMER: Indymedia NL uses the 'open posting' principle to promote freedom of speech. The news (text, images, audio and video) posted in the open newswire of Indymedia NL remains the property of the author who posted it. The views in these postings do not necesseraly reflect the views of the editorial team of Indymedia NL. Furthermore, it is not always possible to guarantee the accuracy of the postings.