Today, Woody Harrelson’s PR agent decided to “kick things up a notch.” Instead of a typical press event for Woody’s new film “Rampart,” this press agent decided to show his level of “internet prowess” and offer Woody Harrelson up for interviews on Reddit, one of the most “real” Internet sites out there. (By “real,” I mean that it’s pretty much full of people who have their bullshit filters on a constant “ten” and can pick out when something is hype in about two seconds. So, of course, they did. You can read the post, and the resulting crap that Woody Harrelson got here. It ain’t pretty. While it’s fun to try new things, you have to KNOW YOUR AUDIENCE! When [...]

While I’m sitting in my room at the W London, looking out the windows and also zoning out to CNN, it occurs to me – Why don’t hotels simply install flat windows that also have TVs in them – They use illumination-blocking technology that came out ten years ago and is hella cheap now to darken the window a bit the moment the TV is turned on. They save on precious room space, and it looks super-cool. Allows for much, much bigger screens, and when people want to go to sleep, they just shut off the tv, and the curtains come down and darken the room. Am I the only weirdo who thinks this way? What “weird” things can you [...]

On today’s lesson of “What did we learn?” we examine one Ashton Kutcher – Twitter’s biggest cheerleader, short of Lady Gaga. A Twitter hero from the start, his eight-million followers boasts a mighty big audience. As I’ve said many times, for many, social media is simply a better way to screw up to a much larger audience in a much shorter amount of time. Ashton proved that last week, when he defended Penn State’s fired coach without knowing all the facts of why he was fired. Kutcher immediately took a ton of grief for his defense, and backpedaled, realizing what he did, and admitting that he screwed up. He did the complete and total right thing. He screwed up, he [...]

As of October 25th, 2011 (Anyone tell me why October 25th is special? Specifically, October 25th, 1985?) shankman.com has a brand new look! Cleaner, faster, and much more relevant to what I do for a living. I’m excited about it, and I hope you are, as well! I’d like to give mega-props to Pete Czech, founder of the New Possibilities Group, for the incredible job he and his team have done on this rebuild. If you ever find yourself in need of some amazing technical work, you can’t do any better Welcome and enjoy! -Peter Shankman

This isn’t another Steve Jobs tribute post. The man was great, and the world is showing that. This is, rather, a reflection on why, in my opinion, Mac people are so rabid about their products. It’s a reason Steve Jobs knew all so well, and worked to achieve every day. It’s also a spectacular lesson for small and mld-size businesses out there, something we can all strive to achieve. Simply put, if you look at Macintosh users as customers, (which they are) then the product Apple creates is the customer service within the equation. Yes, there’s customer service at the Apple stores, or online at apple.com, but that’s (usually) a one-time thing. For the majority of us, customer service truly [...]