by Dave Zornow

New York, June 11 — Cell phones are more ubiquitous than water. About 8 in 10 people around the world have clean water but almost 9 out of 10 use a mobile phone. Lucy Hood, Executive Director of the USC Marshall School of Business says cell phone usage also trumps global access to electricity (74%) and landlines (18%), too. Hood told attendees at the Advertising Research Foundation AMS 7.0 Conference that the biggest future growth in mobile use is outside of the US and Europe — using a list of services which most domestic users might find unusual.

ABC Television wants to see you smile. Really.

In his keynote address to the Advertising Research Foundation AMS 7.0 Conference in NYC, SVP Research Charles Kennedy talked about how ABC Television is using “big data,” mobile and new technology to conduct research. Kennedy says that many research studies are like a man looking for his car keys by a street light: it’s the easiest place to look. “I would argue that the best insights are out there in the dark,” he said.

by Dave Zornow

Nielsen, who has relied diaries to capture TV viewing data since the 1950’s, is poised to pick plastic over paper for local audience measurement business. Last month the ratings company announced a worldwide initiative to replace over a dozen measurement devices it uses internationally with new “GTAM” units. The “Global TV Audience Measurement” devices will use audio watermarks to identify content on multiple platforms.

by Mollie Vandor

Hi. My name is Mollie Vandor, and I’m a stalker.

No, I haven’t boiled any bunny rabbits lately. My particular brand of stalking has nothing to do with my romantic life, although it is all about passion — my passion for my career, and for the industry that I work in.

by Dave Zornow

Ad sales people and researchers are always looking for compelling stories on how advertising is effective — and something a smart marketer can’t do without. Here’s a story which proves that point to retailers — using their own words and emotional outrage.

The Village of Haverstraw, NY passed a local ordinance banning cigarette Point-Of-Sale Advertising beginning in October 2012. And the retailers and their trade groups went ballistic. Retailers and their trade groups cried foul in Big Implications for a Little Village’s Ban, a convenience store trade publication article about new regulations passed this Spring to ban tobacco advertising in convenience stores in the Lower Hudson Valley Hamlet Northwest of New York City.

by Larry Elkin

There was something refreshing in the political scene Wednesday when congressional sponsors ran away, as fast as they could, from two ill-considered bills that sought to stamp out Internet piracy by more or less stamping out the Internet.

It was fun to watch politicians on both sides of the aisle scurry together in search of cover.

by Larry Elkin

The young people who started the Occupy Wall Street protest a few weeks ago are about to learn some important lessons about life in the grown-up world.

by Dave Zornow

On a day when the world mourns the loss of Steve Jobs and the tech industry is iWriting about the iMac-iPod-iPhone-iPad, it’s valuable to remember that the original Man-In-Black didn’t always have the Midas touch. Which makes his successes that much more remarkable.

by Dave Zornow

It will come as no surprise to regular readers of Mediapost that Joe Mandese is no fan of Nielsen. Mandese, the Editor-in-Chief at MediaPost, has frequently skewered the ratings company for things they have done and much of the time, Nielsen critics applaud his efforts. But researchers say Mandese crossed a line with last week’s story, “Nielsen Discloses Major TV Ratings Glitch, Could Impact Millions In TV Ad Buys” because there was no major glitch — with the possible exception of how MediaPost reported the story.

by Peter M. Gordon

One of my favorite series this summer is Current TV’s “50 Documentaries to See Before You Die.” Hosted by Morgan Spurlock (Director/writer/star of “Supersize Me”), the series counts down the top documentaries of the last 25 years. Documentarians like Michael Moore and Penelope Spheeris, as well as an expert panel of film industry pros and critics, discuss the impact of the films and tell the stories of how they were made.