the buzz log
Web Responds to Oatmeal Recall
Is nothing sacred? Now even breakfast foods could be suspect.
There's a recall of products with instant dried milk that could be contaminated with salmonella. So you know the drill. The list of products is likely to grow as it's discovered where all that instant dried milk ended up.
After the FDA found salmonella at their plant, the Plainview Milk Products Cooperative of Minnesota started to voluntarily recall products made in the past two years. The product list is already growing.
The recall originally centered on a single tainted product, but has since expanded to the Malt-O-Meal "Maple & Brown Sugar Instant Oatmeal." The brand is sold nationally under other names. Meijer hot chocolate mix and some Kroger popcorn toppings have also been added to the recall list. According to USA Today, no illnesses have been linked to this latest outbreak.
News of the forbidden foods caused online lookups for "oatmeal recall," "fda recalls," and "food recalls" all to move up in one-day searches.
For a complete list of recalled products, check the FDA website.
Obama's Perfect Pitch
There is a Barack Obama protest in the works, and it's not on Capitol Hill.
Tinseltown has long been seen or accused of being the liberal glitterati, but the Hollywood Reporter says that TV network suits haven't been happy with how chatty the president has been, especially on primetime.
Sure, arguably that last press conference was not the White House's idea, and No. 44 just had to show up to the 100th day party that the media had been planning for so long. But come on—three in three months? Even Bill Clinton, who can really talk your ear off, kept it down to two in four years.
Obama's primetime penchant has supposedly cost ABC, CBS, NBC and Fox about $30 million in ad revenue. Fox decided enough was enough this last outing, and stuck to airing "Lie to Me," and won Wednesday night ratings...as it usually does.
Sure, the president has worked up lots of buzz and ratings for recent appearances on "The Tonight Show" and "60 Minutes." But we're talking a KFC ad that you can never get back again. (Well, until the next day.) And don't bring up civic responsibilities about educating a well-informed republic, and whether an episode of "Two and a Half Men" has more lasting meaning than the knowledge that swine flu should really be called H1N1. That is what the Internet is for.
But really, rather than entertaining ideas of a revolt that they're probably too scared to execute just yet, network execs should extend a hand to Obama and get him to mention a few of his favorite items, and then charge advertisers for it. Consider this:
- Ford Escape hybrid sales are rocking because team Obama drives them.
- The president has shattered records in license plates.
- His autobiographies paid off the family student loans—and his mention of one book title fueled global sales. Hello, bookseller ads.
- That elusive youth audience? They trick out in his gear.
- For a brief moment, he even saved newspapers.
And then if the execs could get the First Lady to amble behind the podium during his speech? Here come the clothing retail dollars.
This isn't a new idea. "Saturday Night Live" gave Republican rival John McCain one of his finest comic moments as a QVC pitchman. Come on, networks, extend a hand to the president. The only fist you'll need to make is over all those dollars that'll fall into your hands.
Filed under: TV, Business, Communication, Barack Obama
Newspapers, e-Readers and Billionaire Doomsayers...Oh My
Billionaire investor Sam Zell said he "made a mistake" buying the Tribune Co. and that the "future of the newspaper industry is at risk today." Sumner Redstone, a broadcast billionaire whose father sold papers in Boston, said that while he would never die, newspapers would. Warren Buffett, who aired his doubts about the newspaper industry back in 1992, confirmed lately that his holding company wouldn't invest in the foolscap biz "at any price."
As if the litter of dead or wounded newspapers weren't enough, the stinging dismissal from the billionaire boys' club is wounding indeed. The only thing missing is Donald Trump claiming his hair would outlast newspapers and be a source of renewable energy to boot.
Of course, they're not attacking the message so much as the anachronistic medium: Plenty of eyeballs still read the news, but there hasn't been a good way to figure out how to keep the news going without starving journalists. There have been no shortage of answers (or failed solutions). Now, a bigger, buffer Kindle DX from Amazon ($489 retail, summer release) has spurred hopeful speculation that this will be the really cool device to encourage people to read (and pay) for information.
That school of thought is sort of equivalent to the iPod-as-savior model...although the music industry's not doing that well. Blogs like ReadWriteWeb and Crunch Gear have shot down the Kindle-as-newspaper-platform model almost as fast as traditional media can float the idea. And indeed, the New York Times threw out the proposal of Amazon as "electronic life preserver to old-media companies," only to trample it the very next day. Of course, the NYT company almost closed down a major newspaper itself, which just encourages not-so-idle billionaire chatter.
The Kindle, still without color or video, might have to find a savior itself. Wired reports not one but two threats: Plastic Logic's lightweight, letter-sized touchscreen sheet due out in 2010 and, even worse, rumors of Apple building a tablet-sized iPhone. So far, infamous technophobes Redstone and Buffett haven't spoken on that topic yet. But they probably know—they read newspapers every day.
Filed under: Tech, Apple Computer, Business, Books, Media, Newspapers, iPhone
A Cosmetic Solution to an Ugly Recession
In a recession, people turn to comfort foods and longer skirts…but not make-up? Like journalists and electronic retail employees, the Avon Lady at first looks to become another endangered species in budget-conscious times.
The cosmetics company that relies on the face-to-unmade-face approach posted news that its quarterly profits have dropped by more than a third. That downer pales in comparison to Estee Lauder's Monday report of a 70% decline in quarterly profits.
On the, er, face of it, that sounds like bad news. But, like in so many desperate situations, standards are lower in a bad economy. For one thing, Estee Lauder actually beat analyst expectations, and its announcement actually helped shares rise on all cosmetic companies.
For its part, Avon long understod the need for a make-over, and has been retooling its products to be more affordable. Even better, the company wants more ladies to go door to door, giving the ranks of the unemployed a sporting chance to make the world a prettier place. Or at least tone down those shiny spots.
Guilty Pleasures for Free or Cheap...Hold the Guilt
Today, a couple national chains offer more deals, with some altruistic twists. April 21 noon to 8 p.m. is the annual free cone day at Ben & Jerry's, purveyor of cheeky concoctions like Chubby Hubby, Jamaican Me Crazy and Karamel Sutra. (Naturally, we're intrigued by the Coffee, Coffee, BuzzBuzzBuzz.) Some locations will be doubling up with a good purpose, such as a blood drive, selling $1 waffle cones for a kids' club, or partnering with an advocacy center to bring attention to Child Awareness Month.
If dairy's not your treat, two quarters will score you an iced coffee at Dunkin' Donuts. That extra buzz will also help Homes For Our Troops, which gets a nickel for every cup sold.
Given the Search surge for both joints, expect long lines from people primed for their treats. Now if only fitness centers joined in and offered treadmill runs free up to 300 calories burned, it could really be a feel-good day.
top movers
| Rank | Subject | 1-Day Move |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Nidal Malik Hasan | Breakout! |
| 2 | Fort Hood Shooting | Breakout! |
| 3 | Tyrannosaurus Rex | Breakout! |
| 4 | Fort Hood | 43518% |
| 5 | Tropical Storm Ida | 4377% |
| 6 | Willie Aames | 3325% |
| 7 | Shannon Dedrick | 3299% |
| 8 | Gretchen Rossi | 2702% |
| 9 | Epic Mickey | 2583% |
| 10 | Lee Harvey Oswald | 1907% |
top leaders
| Rank | Subject | Move | Score |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Danica Patrick | +194 | 207 |
| 2 | Fort Hood | +185 | 185 |
| 3 | Angelina Jolie | +114 | 164 |
| 4 | Rihanna | +39 | 157 |
| 5 | New York Yankees | +54 | 154 |
| 6 | Alicia Keys | +139 | 153 |
| 7 | +1 | 153 | |
| 8 | NFL | +6 | 138 |
what's the buzz?
A subject's buzz score is the percentage of Yahoo! users searching for that subject on a given day, multiplied by a constant to make the number easier to read. Weekly leaders are the subjects with the greatest average buzz score for a given week.
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