Greetings Mouthketeers:

Last night I received an e-blast from President Obama who was nominating his choice for Supreme Court:  Federal Appeals Judge, Sonia Sotomayor.  Jeez, did I just see a typo in that email?  If the President’s official e-press releases can house a grammatical error or two, where does that leave the standard for all of our everyday emails?  Who can keep up with all this e-correspondence anyway?  That’s why I nominate “email” as the worst waste of time and worst communicative tool of this generation. 

When did the powers that be (those powers being Blackberry, iPhone, etc.), decide typing emails was going to be a substitute for talking to each other?  Did I just hear someone saying they were just “chatting” with someone on a dating site?  Uh, hello.  You are typing buddy, not chatting.  You use your mouth to chat and your fingers to type.  Email has systematically stripped all of our personalities out of communication—at least when we send them during business hours. There’s no passion in an email, and if there is, the experts say it’s a misuse of the tool.

Who has time to write an email as if it was written by the likes of Ann Patchett or the late Michael Crichton, especially when you have three minutes to bang out the content before a business meeting? 

Did you ever regret sending out an email because of “the tone?”  Hmmm.

Should the White House Chief of Internet Marketing be fired for sending out the President’s email with a typo? I know book agents who have a major meltdown if there’s a typo in a client’s book, so why shouldn’t a press release sent out by the chief executive not be taken as seriously?  After all, once an email is published, it’s published.   

There has to be an easier way to do all of this.  Why don’t we take it upon ourselves and change the dynamic?  Let’s create a new job where people are hired as professional transcribers—those who take our dictation and create emails for us!  That way, our day is freed up to do other things, the company you hire will guarantee a grammar read before the email is sent to the recipient and all of the out-of-work actors will have a new survival job to be hired for.  After all, in the 70s we had telephone operators at Answering Services (who took our messages), and in the 80s we had Wang Word Processing Operators (who took our dictation).  God only knows what happened in the 90s; however in the 00s we should all just shut down our keyboards and let someone else handle the emailing, while we get back to work—and I bet you weren’t hired to stare at a computer and piddle about all day.  

When was the last time you made a pitch on the phone or sent out a letter to someone via the USPS?   I love getting a card in the mail, don’t you? 

Peace.

The Mouthinator. 

The Mouthinator Politics, Pop Culture

Greetings Mouthketeers:

As Passover and Easter are quickly approaching, I can’t help but think of all the sadness that has plagued the Holy Land.  Fighting, killing, bombing, terrorism.  We’d need more than a blog to argue what the fighting is all about; but what I know we all can agree on is that countries want to capture or hold onto their turf.  Land.  Is it all about land rights?  So, if the crux of the disagreement is indeed about the map, wouldn’t it be smarter if the Israelis hired a real estate broker rather than vote for a prime minister to protect their investment?   If so, why not hire Barbara Corcoran, the nationally recognized real estate maven who, according to Answers.com, started her empire in 1973 with a $1,000 loan and sold it in 2001 for a reported $71 Million.   (You’ve gotta check out the Corcoran website.)

My point here is if Barbara Corcoran could market the Middle East the way she marketed Miami and New York City (which probably has more Jewish residents than the state of Israel anyway), it might be a win/win for all.  Imagine purchasing a portion of the Dead Sea and watch it come alive on Barbara’s Israeli website—complete with a slideshow and text highlighting the salts that are precious to its water?  And the music behind the scenes!  Better than a Bar Mitzvah.  If countries were “marketed” rather than “fought” for, the sales might not even go to the highest bidder.  We all know that the Israelis love “fixer-uppers,” (those countrymen could take a basement and morph it into a catering hall), and since they are so creative with working with virtually nothing, they’ll keep the land and the sea.  Most importantly, no one will be in a killing war . . . they’ll be in a bidding war for the property!

Anyone interested in voting for Barbara Corcoranstein? 

What do you think?   I’d love to hear your comments!

Peace.

The Mouthinator.  

The Mouthinator Politics

OK.  So I’m writing a daily blog called “The Mouthinator,” a further branding tool for my PR firm, Mouth Public Relations (www.MouthPublicRelations.com).  Being somewhat of a media whore (pronounced, “WHO-URR”), I figured there’s gotta be something pertinent I can share with the world—even if I hear it via a third person.   For my first blog entry, I wanna share with you what I think is the absolute most exciting stimulus package I’ve heard to date.   My friend, John, a publisher who owns Cider Mill Press (www.cidermillpress.com), says to forget bailing out Wall Street.  Stimulate OUR street!  Give EVERY U.S. CITIZEN (from the age of 21 to 101), 1 Million dollars to help jump start the economy!  That’s right. Every eligible peep in the country would get 1 Million bucks . . . The government would pay less than what they’ve shelled out already, and the economy would be stimulated in less than 24 hours after YOU receive your check. Think about it.  The most important person in this country is YOU.   If YOU received all that green, wouldn’t YOU pay off some bills, save some in a legitimate bank, book a vacation to Florida, eat a fancy meal at Olive Garden, buy fancy-schmancy clothes at Bloomingdales, enroll in a Spanish course at the community college, buy a Cadillac . . . and the list goes on . . . Of course there would have to be some stips to getting the cash, (i.e., you won’t be able to quit your job as a sanitation engineer for the first 18 months after receipt of funds), but if the Prez wants to stimulate his package quickly, we should all run–not walk–to our phones, computers and twitter accounts and tweet the White House!   “President Obama:  Show US the money.  Just do it.”

What do you think?   Oh, and please sign up to be a Mouthketeer (a person who subscribes to “The Mouthinator” blog), located to the right of this entry.  

Peace.

“The Mouthinator”

The Mouthinator Politics