In 1985, James Vance and Raymond Belknap killed themselves after drinking beer, smoking pot and listening to Judas Priest. In 1990, their parents sued the band for the alleged inclusion of a subliminal message exhorting their deceased sons to commit suicide. Long story short, my mom didn’t want me listening to the apparently undeniable call of suicidal power metal, offering instead to buy me a Petra tape.

It’s difficult to be enthused about Petra when you are much more enthused about Judas Priest, but the point is, hysteria + moms = forced exposure to Christian hard rock. Or kids losing their Twitter accounts.

According to a report published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences Online Early Edition (what an ungainly thing to put on your resume!), Twitter and other social networking sites are bad because they have the potential to desensitize people in general and children in particular to other peoples’ suffering. Apparently, the “rapid-fire” headline-refresh destroys a person’s capacity for empathy. Of course, I think this is baloney, of the same brand as the idea that Judas Priest destroys a person’s ability to keep from killing himself. Admittedly, there’s a minute possibility if you really, really hate Judas Priest, but you get what I mean.

I’m not really a fan of Twitter. I think it’s useful if you’re taken hostage by militants, and it should be useful if you are waiting to see overrated bands at SxSW (assuming you can connect it to your phone, which I couldn’t do), but otherwise, it’s just another annoying toy for tweens. From what I’ve seen, what Twitter diminishes is an 11-year old’s capacity to sort out what’s interesting in life and what’s merely self-interesting. If anything, I think Twitter helps a young brain assimilate information more quickly, scanning for what’s relevant and what’s hysterical garbage. Frankly, I don’t think kids need to read a lot of what’s in the news, because a lot of what’s in the news is sensational, biased or fluff. Don’t believe me? Check this out–it’s the most popular stories read by people who also read the one about the Dominos employees who topped a sandwich with extra farts:

People Read Hysterical Stuff

I think we should be more concerned with an national obsession with Schadenfreude than information overload.

Not just any UFO, mind you, but the one, according to Goodchild, appearing today on behalf of the Galactic Federation of Light. Not familiar with the GFOL? Well, keep reading.

Until a couple of weeks ago, Blossom Goodchild was just another psychic in contact with a garden-variety Native American spirit. Nothing that isn’t on every block of Santa Fe or Sedona. She had a nice, if somewhat overwhelming, website designed to put you in touch with her books and her in touch with your Paypal account. Again, no different than thousands of other metaphysical hucksters. But then she made a prediction that today, October 14th, the aforementioned UFO would be visible for three days above Alabama.

Obviously, the Galactic Federation of Light needs a better trip planner.

Now of course, I keep an open mind about these sort of things, and a mass-sighting of a flying saucer probably wouldn’t make the News any more dire or alarmed than it already is. So that’s kind of boring, but what interests me about this all this (ostensible) malarkey is the way Goodchild’s prediction has been disseminated. Apparently, she made this proclamation on August 1, 2008. Within weeks, one YouTube video featuring the transcript of her prophecy scrolled against a crappily rendered outer space scene turned into many, each with tens of thousands of views. I caught the wave around September 23rd (a few days after the first video was posted and was surprised to find that no Wikipedia entry existed, not even one copy/pasted from her own site. I thought this was pretty amateur; if you’re going to hawk your books with viral videos you didn’t even have to make, you might as well take charge of the press within your control. On October 1, a Wikipedia entry for her finally appeared, but it was no more than a “stub” mentioning that she used to be an actress and that she gained “notoriety” for her space alien bet.

“Notoriety” is not necessarily a good thing, but a Wikipedia nod is still a Wikipedia nod. Not surprisingly, that initial entry has since been expanded. It now presents a relatively objective treatise on how her prediction provides an opportunity to empirically evaluate the veracity of “channeling.”

If she were smart, she would have written her own article. Or maybe she’s more than smart–maybe she’s crafty. After all, what’s more believable, a hoax that is incessantly promoted by the perpetrator or a hoax that’s perpetuated by other people?

This is a little bit like what came up during the panel on Online Influentials and Social Media Sarah Holoubek moderated during our client summit a week and half ago. Brands obviously need to do their best to corral what users are saying, but they can’t be disingenous or artificial. By letting in some skeptics or disgruntled customers, you confirm your sincerity in the hearts (and wallets) or your loyalists. I suspect Blossom Goodchild is keenly aware of this. That UFO is probably a flight of fancy, but it’s also captured the imagination of hundreds of thousands of believers and skeptics alike. No matter what, she’s probably already seen some book sales, and tomorrow she’ll likely see some more, even if the purported celestial tourists fail to show up. By letting the masses speak for her, she doesn’t even have to be right to make some money. Now, obviously, if she is right, she’s going to be set for life from creating a quality product (read: verifiable message), but by not meddling with user input, she remains, at least until the day is over, a trusted messenger. Whether her message is real doesn’t matter right now, only that she hasn’t interfered with the user’s part in the conversation. Nowadays, that’s an increasingly imminent component of brand connection.

What I didn’t realize is the rules that apply to our industry do not apply to the rest of the world. From the second I walked into the TPC Four Seasons Resort in Irving, Texas, I was bombarded by vendors and other advertisers handing me pamphlets, asking me to sign up for a credit card or drawing, or beckoning me over to endless booths of people grabbing your arm to come check out their latest product (99% of which had nothing to do with golf). Here I am, going to check out a golf tournament with some friends and getting physically spammed. It’s bad enough that I have to wade through a virtual sewer of unwanted erection-pill spam to get to the email I want to read, but I can’t even cruise a golf tournament without being piled high with flyers and trinkets for crap I will never sign up for in a million years.

After I walked about 200 yards, I was finally able to see the first hole. But by this time, I had a handful of paper spam and needed to offload it. Thankfully, there was a Junk folder nearby (the nearest trashcan). Not surprisingly, the Junk Folder was very full—not with beer cups or plates, but with a hundred copies of all the garbage in my hands.

I’m thinking there should be some process to just move all physical spam directly to the Junk Folder. Can we get some legislation on this? Is there someone in Congress I can contact? Or is it up to us, like with networks, to filter this spam or set up spam blockers? I am thinking of bringing a few football linemen with me next time.

I know that as marketers, we try advertising without being obnoxious. And at golf tournaments there is plenty of advertising to go around with sponsors, banners, the golfers. Am I alone on this? Is there really a need for these spammers to ruin what would be a nice event with “legitimate” advertising?

See, I don’t have cable, and while my TV has rabbit ears, for whatever reason, it can’t nab an ABC signal that doesn’t make my TV look haunted. So I watch Lost on ABC.com.

You might think that watching TV on a laptop’s monitor kind of sucks, and if you’re used to the expansive grandeur of a 52” plasma screen, then yeah, TV on a laptop monitor is probably disappointing. But my TV still has a tube, and it’s small, so I don’t care. Plus, I don’t have to sit through so many commercials.

Ah yes. TV commercials. You know, the things you sit through the Super Bowl for? Well, for the most part, I hate them. Okay, so the recent Pontiac one is pretty awesome, but that’s only because it incorporates Spy Hunter, the arcade classic that taught me how to drive. I understand that if not for TV commercials and their precious, network-exec-salary-paying dollars, we wouldn’t have shows such as Lost¹. So I guess I tolerate them, but only barely. After all, I don’t need a Cialis or McDonald’s ad to mark the appearance of a major plot point. I can figure those out on my own. Moreover, I don’t need Cialis or McDonald’s. In fact, rather than making a connection with me, they are instead building a brand association with narrative interference. Or, I guess, trips to the kitchen or the bathroom. This is probably not an original thought, but when I hear the phrase “I’m lovin’ it,” I am reminded not of glistening, sculpted McMeat, but of the Triskits in my kitchen or the Charmin in my bathroom. That and the fact that it will be another four minutes and thirty seconds before I find out why Sayid is playing golf and flat-ironing his hair. And that really sucks.

But thank the maker² for streaming video. When you watch Lost, or The Office, or I guess, Buck Rogers³ online, you only have to tolerate a single brand pestering you a handful of times, for a measily 30 seconds. This is waaaaay better than breaking up the show into 8-minute blocks surrounding five intrusive minutes of various products I will refuse to buy out of spite. So I’m okay with Honda sponsoring an online episode of Lost. It doesn’t necessarily make me want to go out and buy the new Accord, but I appreciate that their interference is minimal and strangely polite. If this is a sustainable model for televised content, then it’s okay by me. It certainly works well online.

¹Nor would we have shows such as Two and Half Men or According to Jim, which is less of an argument against TV ad dollars as it is an argument against TV.

²If you got this reference, I’m sorry for both of us. Also , would you be able to run a game of D&D on Friday night?

³If you recently read about Hulu.com in Entertainment Weekly, probably.