Three Cool 2007 Happenings!

Today is the very last day of 2007.

All the newspapers, magazines, radio and television stations have reported the highlights of the year.

Most of it political, the rest of it Hollywood. Global Warming and Al Gore straddle both topics.

Not that our Blog tries to compete with the media mass, but here are three things that took place in 2007 that I think were pretty hot…

The iPhone.

I bought one shortly after they premiered this past June. In just six short months, I am just as co-dependent with it as I am the MacBook Pro I am punching keys on right now.

This past weekend, I woke up in the middle of the night and could not find my iPhone. I had a panic attack and finally found it downstairs on the coffee table. After that I couldn’t go back to sleep.

I often wonder if I am typical of most Apple users.

We bought a mobile PC for an account guy here at our company that then was let go a week later after we hired him. I tried to use the PC, but just couldn’t deal with all the things that PCs do that Macs were designed to avoid.

(It’s now for sale… $1,000 and it is yours. Hardly used and loaded with the newest version of Windows)

In business, we terms it Brand Loyalty…maybe I’ll be more honest in 2008 and call it Brand Co-dependency.

Whatever we call it, the effects of the iPhone and other “wannabe” devices will drive more change in 2008 than iPods have done in the last five years.

Pre-Fab Housing

In 2007, Cottage Living Magazine partnered with the New Orleans Preservation Resource Center to build a modular “shotgun” style home that was showcased as the 2007 Cottage Living Idea House.

Note the word “modular.”

It’s bye-bye Levitt & Sons and get ready to say hello to the likes of Empryrean International, WeberHaus, weeHouses, EcoContempo, Clever Homes, Hive Modular and kitHaus in 2008.

The homes span the spectrum of style from classic bungalow to traditional to cabin to contemporary. But they are all constructed under a roof in modular sections that are shipped on site and assembled in less than 30 days.

They are not only better built and more cost-affordable, but they can be personally customized and are less intrusive to the landscape and environment.

Prefab-housing.net is a link search site to places like Inhabit and FabPreFab that showcase current listings, developers and floor plans.

Go check the sites out.

The “state” of the real estate market and the new workforce surge of Millennium generation college candidates (one-out-of-every 3 new hires in 2007) set the stage for a new delivery of housing.

Not only is “sub-division” out of the limelight… in 2008, watch as it posts on the list of the politically incorrect terms that are banned from the airways!


YouTube

I now watch YouTube every night before I go to bed.

It is just as much a part of my broadcast viewership as Fox News, TruTV, HGTV and The History Channel.

Friends that I had dinner with last night asked if I had gone to see a movie they saw over the weekend.

I laughed and said “no”…YouTube videos have magnified my ADHD with the 10-minute maximum length of anything I can now sit in front of and digest.

YouTube is also broadcast viewership that is produced by the people. The number of videos launched on YouTube is staggering.

The writers’ strike has a lot to do with just how in the world they will be able to track what is airing when and where in the future once it hits the YouTube and .com airways.

Its also one where the 60,000+ new videos that post every day on YouTube makes many writers question just how long they might be needed!

2007 was a benchmark year for YouTube – it was no longer this website way out there. It was the hosting site for presidential debates.


2008!

2008 promises to be like getting onto the newest wild ride at Disneyland.

The pace of change is accelerating beyond anything we have ever seen in history.

It’s what we thrive on here at BrandVenture.

Come… Let’s journey!