Uri Sells Out. Again!

Herald Founder to be Judge for Coca Cola Virtual Thirst Contest

Herald founder, cyberlebrity and international playah Urizenus Sklar has been tapped to be one of the judges in the Coca Cola "Virtual Thirst" contest. In this in depth interview, Herald stringer Mike "Boat Guy" Allers asks the hard hitting questions and probes the nature of the contest and the trials and tribulations of being a virtual contest judge.

Comments

[Nacon]

Wow... nice to see a retard in real life... ..driving O_o.

[Lewis nerd]

Broken link, thought I'd mention it.

Lewis

[urizenus]

thanks Lewis. fixed it.

[Cocoanut Koala]

Hands on the wheel! Eyes on the road!

coco

[Omega Groshomme]

LOL hey uri,ill run you with my 03 Cobra...muahaha

[urizenus]

ur on Omega. My low profile tires go back on this week!

[csven]

Once upon a time, when I spoke out against trademark violations, the implication was that I was defending *the Man* by being a so-called "boy scout" ( http://www.secondlifeherald.com/slh/2006/03/is_ll_stealing_.html ). Only that wasn't what I was doing at all.

Now here I am speaking out against what I believe is Coca-Cola's heavy-handed effort to unfairly "leverage" consumer ideas, and there, sitting in a little circle with his new mega-corporate friends, is Uri helping them rub... sticks together.

[Inigo Chamerberlin]

'Hands on the wheel! Eyes on the road!'

Funny Coco, didn't notice you in the back seat - No! Wait! That's you wearing the ever popular 'rucksack AV' lurking behinf Uri, sorry, didn't recognise you...

[Inigo Chamerberlin]

'Hands on the wheel! Eyes on the road!'

Funny Coco, didn't notice you in the back seat - No! Wait! That's you wearing the ever popular 'rucksack AV' lurking behind Uri, sorry, didn't recognise you...

[Inigo Chamerberlin]

Er? I'm sure I didn't order two - oh well, never mind

[Cocoanut Koala]

hehe

coco

[urizenus]

csven, it was walker that called you a boyscout, so take that up with him. But in general, yes, good question.

I will say this about *this* contest. When they were working on the contest I specifically provided them links to your post on the Edelman contest, and I told several members of the PR team to contact you for advice about constructing rules for the contest. I (and others in the project) also suggested a substantial financial remuneration for the winner. Not much more I can do about it.

While it is my understanding that they considered these matters, I don't know why they did what they did regarding the prize and the intellectual property aspect of it, and in any case I am requested to forward all questions of that nature to Crayon. So if you are interested, ask them. We'd all like to know how this stuff works.

[csven]

Walker used your name?

"...and I really don't like the way csven is being such a boyscout about this."

http://www.secondlifeherald.com/slh/2006/03/is_ll_stealing_.html#comment-14882247

My bust.

-

As for the issue, it's not so much the prize (though I consider it rather lame); it's that they OWN every entrant's idea whether or not it wins.

As for crayon, they're all too aware of my opinion as we had some back-and-forth on both my blog ( http://blog.rebang.com/?p=1250 and http://blog.rebang.com/?p=1251 ) and on Greg Verdino's blog ( http://gregverdino.typepad.com/greg_verdinos_blog/2007/04/the_coke_side_o.html ).

There are better ways. But until corporations *share* the risk instead of putting it ALL on the participants, those ways could take much, much longer to surface.

[urizenus]

oh yeah, what do yah know. So what's wrong with boyscouts anyway? I was one. It's the *Eagle* Scouts that I don't like.

[csven]

"So what's wrong with boyscouts anyway?"

Why don't you tell us? You're the one who implied there was something wrong by my behaving "like" one (when, in fact, I was acting out selfishly and hardly like what I believe a Boy Scout stands for).

[Mass confusion]

Why are some of these articles unauthored ?

[CC]

The judges will not designate a resident of Canada as a winner unless that entrant has also correctly answered a math skill test question. .

haha what's this all about?? It is in the rules...

[Ordinal Malaprop]

I know this may harm my chances of getting SL-related contracts, but the Coke thing really is a classic example of this sort of deal. "Submit ideas, which we own by default, for a nominal prize - oh, we decide if you get the prize or not." I wouldn't be quite so cynical if I hadn't seen people I know entering these competitions and having their ideas ripped off.

On the other hand, if someone offered me the opportunity to go somewhere and sit on a panel talking crap for money, I imagine I would take it.

[Prokofy Neva]

I have a great idea, I hope Uri will pick me. Hell, Uri, if you're going to sell out and become a judge for Coke, at least sell out all the way and then pick Herald reporters to win, mkay?

I love that faux-rugged oh-so-artfully-spontaneous YouTube. It has just the right angle of jitteriness and wackyness to pass as an "amateur" YouTube, but I'll bet the Coke Crayonista whateverista people had to spend hours to get *just that right jaunty angle* of Uri's sunglasses. BTW, what brand?

[Ordinal Malaprop]

He spent a lot of time training to Level 12 Jauntiness; don't denigrate that achievement.

[urizenus]

Armani of course.

But yeah it is interesting how those marketing guys can make something look like a spontaneous amateur production, but then you notice the logic of the little narative structure and the way things are framed using the rule of 3rds and all and you realize that some big time effort went into the production of that. I'll bet Crayon and Coke dropped a good 10K to get that 5 minutes of material.

Either that, or I bought a handicam on the way out of town and gave it to camera grrrl alex plakias and told her to start shooting.

The world may never know.

[Prokofy Neva]

Yes, Uri, I noticed the triadic repetition of the narrative, but I figured that was your training in morphology at work, not Crayonistas.

[Gideon Television]

As csven helpfully provided links to all my responses to his previous comments regarding the prize and the intellectual property issues, I won't bother to rehash it here. He has some great points to make, and as always in these things, the ideal situation and the working compromise are not always the same thing. But we're trying to incorporate all feedback into making the program better where we can.

And if it makes anyone feel a little better about the controlled flexing of uber-marketing muscle, the first anyone at crayon knew about this video was when I saw it posted here this morning. Go figure :)

GTV aka Steve @ Crayon

[Bridget]

lol he fat

[Omega Groshomme]

Going to need more then tires to beat this snake,muahaha

[Omega Groshomme]

I just realised after posting...that sounds dirty

[Toby McAllister]

*yawn*

Uri Sells Out. Again! >>>>>>>>>>> And why would any of us care?

Fame whores.

[Tenshi Vielle]

I lol'd when the pepsi bottle came up.

<3 Uri xoxo

[Brace]

I Looove it when Uri sells out

*moans*

again again!!

Bring it bay-bah!

[urizenus]

Brace, I'll sell out to u for free!

[Threecrows Sloane]

Found this entirely interesting - at first - until I think I realized this was ending up just another sugar-water commercial funneling gig for the corporation. Essence of the drink's experience through the eyes of SL - sounds great to the non-taste senses - I just wonder what eventually ended up NOT being just like an everyday pre-movie Coke short we see at theaters only generated by some truly expert SL-filmographers? Was hoping for more, maybe I missed the essence somewhere. Or maybe, just maybe, Coke new there was really nothing to "get" from the beginning...hmmm.

[um]

it's the essence of the thing that drives the experience, not the thing itself!
Whoa. DUDE.
I can see you taking notes from ad execs as they patiently dictate over the phone.
laziest intellectual evar!

[bizarro_uri@secondcast.us]

" the issue is exactly what do we have here when we have general motors in here? I mean, one way to view it is that what we’ve got is this giant, immersive advertisement. So it’s no longer the case that advertisers just want our eyeballs, like looking at a page in a magazine, or looking at the TV screen, but they want our digital souls in a certain sense. They want us to be completely immersed in their product and so forth. I mean no one is raising these issues as far as I can tell."