Archive for the ‘Social Marketing’ Category

The Inevitable Grift of Slinging ‘Conservative’ Wine and Beer at a Country Driven Mad by Social Media – VinePair

This October, VinePair is celebrating our second annual American Beer Month. From beer style basics to unexpected trends (pickle beer, anyone?), to historical deep dives and new developments in package design, expect an exploration of all thats happening in breweries and taprooms across the United States all month long.

Debates rage on about the wisdom of his foreign policy, labor relations, and general economic vision for America, but its settled fact that Ronald Reagan was fond of wine. The administration of President Ronald Reagan saw wine service in the White House reach a level of interest unmatched since the time of Thomas Jefferson, wrote author (and former Reagan staffer) Frederick J. Ryan in his 2020 book Wine in the White House: A History. It was at Reagan State Dinners, for example, that both California Zinfandel and Merlot wines were first served at the White House.

Considering his outstanding oenophilia, you have to wonder what the late 40th president would think of the new wine brand hes posthumously shilling for these days. In August 2021, Reagans visage and voice lit up the right-wing corners of digital media in a video ad for We The People Wines, a new-ish company founded by a Republican operative dedicated to Conservative [sic] values. The spot unfolds over nearly two minutes, marrying audio snippets from the Great Communicators 1989 farewell address to unrelated visuals of GOP bogeymen (pro-choice activists, Black Lives Matter protests, etc.) and shibboleths like football players, the troops, and the late Pat Tillman, who was both a football player and a troop. The video ends with a closeup on two bottles of We The People wine in front of a flickering fire.

Don't miss a drop!

Watching the spot, you may find yourself wondering what any of this has to do with selling wine. The answer is nothing, but also maybe everything. As it turns out, theres big money to be made selling conservative versions of everyday beverages. Last year, Black Rifle Coffee Company, maybe the most prominent conservative food and beverage brand, pulled down $163 million in revenue, and has spawned a dozen imitators in the process. We The People Wines, along with Armed Forces Brewing Company an unrelated contract brewer that launched this summer with a viral video featuring former Navy SEAL and current Fox News fixture Rob ONeill represent early efforts to duplicate that success in the beverage alcohol business.

Will it work? These firms are embracing a classic niche strategy, one marketing professor told VinePair, but beer and wine are not as easy as coffee. Then again, $163 million is a helluva reason to give it a shot.

Before we get into the long-term viability of Barry Goldwater-approved booze, lets quickly get up to speed on what the shit is going on here, generally speaking. These days, theres money to be made marketing brands with political posturing to potential customers on both the right and left wings of the American body politic. An Axios/Harris 100 poll from March 2021 found that firms with stated conservative values, like Chick-fil-A and Hobby Lobby, and firms with more overtly progressive stances (think Patagonia, REI) were both enjoying better reputations among American consumers. Americans are leaning into companies that have strong political positions, in the wake of one of the countrys most divisive election years, wrote Axioss Sara Fischer and Danielle Alberti.

But while mainstream companies across the political spectrum have begun to broadcast their corporate beliefs more lately, conservative firms on the fringes have decades of history hawking goods to right-wing Americans. And the goods are often well, not so good. In a 2012 story for The Baffler, historian and chronicler extraordinaire of modern conservatism Rick Perlstein traced the beginning of this style of direct, partisan commerce to the early 60s, a young Republican operative, and a list of 12,500 GOP donor addresses shadily copied by hand from congressional files. Subscriber lists to ideological organs are pure gold to the third-party interests who rent them as catchments for potential customers, explained Perlstein.

What started as direct-mail campaigns raising money for dubious causes (with a nice vig going to the direct-mailer who controlled the list, of course) metastasized into something entirely more commercial once the internet came along. Email marketing added a whole new dimension to snake oil sales. And today, surgical precision of social media marketing, combined with record-breaking rates of political polarization and tribalism, and the rise of direct-to-consumer e-commerce, have pushed all this in colorful new directions. The time is ripe for conservative brands to find, pitch, and profit off aggrieved conservatives seeking alternatives to the products they perceive as liberal.

Conservative clothes? Try Nine Line Apparel or Grunt Style. Home goods? MyPillow has your pillow. And if dietary supplements are your game, Alex Jones is the name. The terminally online InfoWars conspiracy theorist has made millions of dollars shilling stuff like anti-coronavirus toothpaste and testosterone pills to help users push back in the fight against the globalist agenda. These brands vary in quality and griftiness (you can guess where Jones potions land on that axis) but they share a tried-and-true message: Dont buy stuff from companies that are (or at least, seem) liberal, buy our stuff instead. Take Black Rifle Coffee, for example. I want people who voted for Trump to know that there is another option for you, said the companys CEO, Evan Hafer, in 2017. Starbucks chief exec Howard Schultz doesnt want your business. I do.

An even more direct way of saying the same thing: This is a huge entrepreneurial opportunity. You dont have to give money to people that hate you; you can give money to people who share your values. Thats how Fox & Friends Weekend co-host Will Cain teed up We The People Wines founder, Ryan Coyne, in an August 2021 interview about the company. (It watches more like sponsored content than a lot of actual sponsored content.)

Absolutely right, absolutely right, Coyne responded. On the program, the Republican marketing operative claimed that We The People was selling tens of thousands of bottles every day thanks to the Reagan-inflected ad, which he said had racked up over 7 million views in just a few days. Those sales figures are impossible to verify independently, and VinePair was unable to reach Coyne for comment. (A representative for Coyne, James Davis, responded to our inquiry about We The People Wines and agreed in a phone conversation to coordinate an interview before press time, then stopped responding.) But if Coyne counts units sold like he does views, the sales numbers he gave Fox & Friends may be padded: A VinePair review of the brands social media accounts shows a view count closer to 2 million across all platforms.

Black Rifle didnt come up on Fox & Friends, but in another interview Coyne namechecked the coffee firm unprompted. There were no brands saying what weve been saying, he said in an early September interview with former New York Yankees strength coach/current grindset YouTuber Dana Cavalea. Theres a couple that people reference that we know well. Black Rifle Coffee is a good example. They are very pro-military, but I think most people identify them as similarly situated, [based on] what they support and believe in, as we are.

But what if youre a conservative who doesnt like wine? Or perhaps youre simply holding out for a booze brand that exalts American service members more explicitly than We The People Wines, or the bevy of veteran-owned, military-themed breweries and liquor brands already on the market? Never fear! Armed Forces Brewing Company is here.

We started in Annapolis, Md., initially as Seawolf Brewery, which was pretty much a tribute to Navy service, Alan Beal, AFBCs chief executive, tells VinePair. (The official launch coincided with the 2017 Military Bowl, naturally.) After being inundated with interest from drinkers who wanted beers fting other branches of the U.S. military, Beal explains, We decided to develop some other concepts, other brands. It kind of morphed into Armed Forces Brewing Company. The firm now has four beer lines: Seawolf, Soldier, Airman, and Jarhead (invading soon), all of which are contract-brewed at New Realm Brewing Co.s Virginia Beach plant. Beal, who did not serve in any branch of the military (though he comes from a military family), describes AFBC as a sort of Joint Base Command Center for the consumer-facing brands.

In that analogy, the CEO would be the ranking officer. But after watching AFBCs promotional video released around Independence Day and filmed in the please-go-viral style that Dollar Shave Club pioneered in 2012 viewers could be forgiven for thinking the companys commandant was feature player Rob ONeill, the former Navy SEAL who is widely credited with firing the shots that killed Osama Bin Laden. (He wrote a book about it.) The former SEAL Team 6 operator is AFBCs director of military relations and national brand ambassador, and holds a position on its board of directors.

The video, a pitch to would-be investors to buy shares in AFBC via its ongoing equity crowdfunding raise, is shot through with lowest-common-denominator gags. ONeill pours a can of piss water into a toilet; ONeill shoves a slackster coffee house misanthrope; ONeill calls in a drone strike on a building labeled pretentious foreign brewery. Women or is it the same woman? in chesty approximations of actual military uniforms often appear in the frame, but never speak. The spot concludes with an anti-mask joke.

Its not as baldly partisan as We The Peoples brand positioning and video, which at first glance could be mistaken for a campaign attack ad. An appetite for war, after all, is one of the few things most Republican and Democrat politicians still have in common. But while AFBCs video lacks Reagan cameos, its jingoistic visions of American patriotism and military identity suggest a decidedly conservative worldview. As does ONeills participation. Though the AFBC brand ambassador claims affiliation with neither party, hes a regular guest on conservative cable outlets like Fox News and Newsmax, rails about illegals, leftists, and stolen elections on Twitter, and praises right-wing influencers like Dinesh DSouza and Candace Owens.

Nevertheless, Beal denies that his company has a political bent. Robs his own man, he says of his companys brand ambassador. He points out that ONeill has even dinged President Trump a couple times out there in the Twitterverse. Im 57 years old, I remember when Democrats and Republicans could go to a taproom or a bar, have a beer together and talk politics, and not want to kill each other, Beal says. Itd be great to get back to those days.

The U.S., by most accounts, is not headed back to those days any time soon. That may be bad news for the country, but its good news for a company looking to turn partisan fervor into consumer spending especially in a competitive market like retail beverage alcohol, where brand-building is vital to sustained success. These firms are embracing a classic niche strategy, says Tim Calkins, clinical professor of marketing and associate marketing chair at Northwestern Universitys Kellogg School of Management. These are big, crowded markets, and one of the classic ways to enter a very cluttered market is to find a way to really resonate with a small group of people. Thats what these firms are very clearly doing.

Calkins says that conservative start-ups in familiar product categories stand to benefit from a few compounding market factors: low barriers to entry that require little product innovation; powerful, cheap targeted social media marketing that can find like-minded customers like never before (no more hand-copied donor addresses!); and established competition that is loathe to dip its toe into politics of any persuasion.

Politically charged products are a segment that other [firms] are not likely to go, says Calkins. Its not likely that A-B InBev is going to launch a beer that directly competes [with Armed Forces Brewing Company], because the area is polarizing. That is the challenge, but also perhaps the best part of the idea. AFBCs approach is niche in more ways than one: Not only is it going after pro-military beer drinkers with its marketing, but its distribution plan is built around the thousands of on-base military exchanges across the country. Were a great fit for those stores, says Beal. They do about $359 million in retail package sales a year. Thats a big niche market. Theyre in 10 so far, plus Total Wines, and were recently approved for Wegmans.

Of course, table stakes still apply. As Calkins points out, beverage alcohol products are not as easy as coffee to market due to regulatory hurdles and, in beers case, freshness concerns, too. But upstream of logistics is basic drinkability: A firm that doesnt produce a competitive product wont be able to defend even a well-fortified partisan niche forever. On this front, AFBC may have work to do; its Seawolf Special Hops IPA was not well received by a reviewer at military publication Task and Purpose. No part of it is enjoyable, even if youre the sort of masochist who loves having their taste buds scorched by more hops than a rabbit farm, concluded writer Matt Sampson.

(Weve moved on from that, responds Beal, when prompted. Of course I read the article. I guess he didnt like our beer, and thats absolutely fine.)

By contrast to AFBCs base-based model, We The People Wines leans on direct-to-consumer e-commerce sales to get its ~$30 bottles of Cabernet Sauvignon and Chardonnay to thirsty conservatives in 17 states. But according to both Calkins and fellow marketer Nathalie Spielmann, Ph.D., the companies are similarly savvy in the way they engender ownership and belonging through their products and messaging. Its a marketing tactic that encourages psychological ownership based on an idealized national identity, Spielmann, an associate professor of marketing at Frances NEOMA Business School and a diploma candidate in the prestigious WSET program, tells VinePair.

What these brands are trying to say is, Im going to put out this product, [whether] its coffee or beer or wine, that clearly speaks to one half of the population or one political ideology, and Im going to promote this idealized national identity to those people and give them a sense of psychological ownership, which will then trickle down to more loyalty towards my brand because my brand is representing what people actually have as values. Its why Coyne talks about customers joining our community, and We The People bottles are emblazoned with the slogan every sip is another vote.

AFBC takes the ownership pitch even further, offering people the opportunity to literally buy into its professed values by purchasing shares in the firm. Shares start at $200; the highest tier, operator, requires an investment of $50,000 or more. According to a review of the offering materials by Ben Ostrow, a former private-equity investment analyst, Beal and his team are valuing the company at $38.6 million and thats before any capital raised this round. (Ostrow performed a similar analysis on BrewDog USAs offering. Both companies use the same federal regulation, Regulation A, to conduct crowdfunding equity raises exempted from the Securities and Exchange Commissions registration requirements.) Its an eye-popping valuation for a brewing company thatll produce just ~2,000 barrels this year, and doesnt even own a physical plant. But for investors with like-minded politics, the appeal of being a part of something can be a powerful draw. When you invite people to be investors, all of a sudden they are part of the brand, they are part of the movement, says Calkins. Its interesting: You see political campaigns do exactly the same thing. Political campaigns are constantly asking people to be part of an advisory group, or to fill out the survey, or to provide their perspective. Its the same basic strategy of trying to make people feel really connected.

At this point you may be asking yourself: Are conservatives truly alienated by beverage alcohol brands to the point that they need Republican Chardonnay and rally-round-the-flag IPA?

To Spielmann, this question misses the forest for the trees. The political polarization gripping the U.S. isnt going away, and the fact that conservative beverage alcohol firms dont have Black Rifles Starbucksian foil is hardly a non-starter. Why wouldnt you capitalize on a market trend? she asks. The emergence of booze brands like We The People and AFBC (and all the other conservative commerce that preceded them) are, from a marketing standpoint at least, an inevitable outcome of the struggling American experiment. Are these brands revolutionizing [the marketing approach from] what was in the past the war effort, or the Cold War, these types of discussions? No, theyre just repackaging it for a target market that is much more attuned to that message, says Spielmann. Theres nothing new under the sun, selling products that reinforce customers sense of belonging and ownership least of all.

At the end of We The Peoples original ad, Reagan intones: Once you begin a great movement, theres no telling where it will end. Its a fitting sentiment. Reagan was responsible for mainstreaming the conservative political project, but theres simply no way he could have guessed that his dogmatic zeal for electioneering abroad and the upward redistribution of wealth at home would one day give rise to a right-wing wine company made in his image. But here we are anyway. The Gipper is gone, Trump is still here, and bipartisanship seems more like a punchline than ever. In this era, it seems inevitable that Black Rifle-fication of the booze business will continue. We know why and how; the only question left is, What took so long?

This story is a part of VP Pro, our free content platform and newsletter for the drinks industry, covering wine, beer, and liquor and beyond. Sign up for VP Pro now!

Continue reading here:
The Inevitable Grift of Slinging 'Conservative' Wine and Beer at a Country Driven Mad by Social Media - VinePair

3 Reasons to Buy Pinterest, And 1 Reason To Sell – Motley Fool

Pinterest (NYSE:PINS) lost more than a quarter of its value this year as its slowing user growth spooked the bulls. Should investors consider that sell-off a buying opportunity, or should they stay away? Let's weigh three reasons to buy Pinterest against one reason to sell in order to decide.

The market turned against Pinterest after it released its Q2 2021 report in late July, which revealed a sequential drop in monthly active users (MAUs). Its MAUs rose 9% year over year to 454 million, but declined from 478 million in the first quarter and 459 million in the fourth quarter of 2020.

However, Pinterest's average revenue per user (ARPU) still rose 89% year over year and 27% sequentially to $1.32 during the second quarter. Its ARPU rose as its MAUs declined primarily because it lost desktop users, who were more difficult to monetize than its higher-growth mobile users.

Image source: Pinterest

If Pinterest's ARPU continues to climb, it could offset its slower growth in MAUs and boost its total revenue. That's why analysts still expect its revenue to rise 55% this year and 31% next year.

Pinterest generated a GAAP net income of $47.7 million in the first six months of 2021, compared to a net loss of $241.9 million a year earlier. It also generated a positive adjusted EBITDA of $262 million, compared to an adjusted EBITDA loss of $87.2 million a year ago.

Those rising profits indicate Pinterest's growth is sustainable. It will likely spend less money on marketing efforts as its platform expands, and secure more favorable cloud hosting rates as its scale improves.

Wall Street expects Pinterest's non-GAAP earnings to jump 152% this year and increase another 31% next year. Those the kind of impressive growth rates that a stock trading at 47 times forward earnings needs to show.

Pinterest carved out a niche with its virtual pinboards, which let people share photos and videos of ideas, interests, and hobbies. Its visual format made it a natural fit for ads and shoppable pins. That's why big retailers like IKEA uploaded their entire catalogs to Pinterest, and why Shopify (NYSE:SHOP) partnered with Pinterest last year to enable its online merchants to use shoppable pins.

Those partnerships grant Pinterest an early-mover's advantage in the nascent "social shopping" market, which blurs the lines between social networks and e-commerce platforms. They also widen its moat against Facebook (NASDAQ:FB) and its image-oriented platform Instagram.

Facebook tried to challenge Pinterest with Hobbi, a similar platform for curating ideas, last year. However, the company quietly killed off Hobbi a few months later after it failed to gain any traction against Pinterest. Facebook's failure indicates Pinterest's niche market is defensible -- and it could continue to grow as more people seek out fresh ideas on its pinboards.

Pinterest's growth accelerated through the pandemic as more people stayed at home, but decelerated as people started going back to their normal lives. The bulls will claim Pinterest's growth, like the growth of many e-commerce companies during the pandemic, was merely pulled forward -- and that its year-over-year comparisons will gradually normalize.

The bears will claim Pinterest is a passing fad that temporarily benefited from stay-at-home boredom, and that interest in the platform will wane after the pandemic ends. Back in July, Pinterest warned investors that its MAU growth would likely remain sluggish during the third quarter.

That warning has weighed down the stock ever since, and it probably won't rally again until its MAU growth stabilizes for several straight quarters. Therefore, it might be premature to buy Pinterest -- and more prudent to avoid it -- until that actually happens.

I personally own some shares of Pinterest, and I won't sell my stake just because the platform's MAUs declined as COVID-19 restrictions were relaxed.

I still believe Pintetest's strengths outweigh its weaknesses, and that investors who don't already own the stock can consider starting a small position at these lower prices. However, investors should subsequently keep an eye on its growth over the next few quarters before adding or selling more shares.

This article represents the opinion of the writer, who may disagree with the official recommendation position of a Motley Fool premium advisory service. Were motley! Questioning an investing thesis -- even one of our own -- helps us all think critically about investing and make decisions that help us become smarter, happier, and richer.

See original here:
3 Reasons to Buy Pinterest, And 1 Reason To Sell - Motley Fool

Megan Reyes wants you to demand diverse voices in sportson a T-shirt – The Daily Dot

Megan Reyes has been working in sports media since her first internship in 2009, with a diverse range of entities including the University of Oregon, Golden State Warriors, the Athletic, and most recently, sports podcasting network Blue Wire Podcasts before setting out as a freelance sports branding and social marketing consultant. But while the range of places shes worked has been diverse, her co-workers havent always been.

I didnt see anyone that looked like me, let alone many women in the field, said Reyes, who identifies as Filipino, cis-het, and uses she/her pronouns, of the sports landscape. Then just as Ive grown in my career and gone to different places, seeing the ins and outs of different organizations and cultures and talking to other friends and seeing how things operate where they may work, I just realized theres a major lack of diversity.

That led Reyes, in February, to design and market a T-shirt making a simple declaration for more diverse voices in sports. The shirt lists identity markers she feels are underrepresented in the sports world, including women, Black, Latinx, Indigenous, Asian, and LGBTQ+. She also partnered with a trio of advocacy organizationsAthlete Ally, the Black Womens Player Collective, and Move Unitedthat could benefit from proceeds raised via shirt sales.

Though Reyes had plenty of anecdotal evidence about white male dominance in the sports world to draw from in making the shirts, theres also data backing what shes seeing.

ESPN reported recently on the 2021 Sports Media Racial and Gender Report Card: Associated Press Sports Editors (APSE) Racial and Gender Report Card, noting that it evaluates the racial and gender hiring practices of more than 100 newspapers and websites across all circulation sizes.

The article noted, APSE earned a racial grade of a B-plus, an improvement from the B in 2018, while its gender grade remained an F. The overall grade of a C was an improvement from the D-plus in the 2018 study. It found, for instance, that 79.2% of the sports editors were white and 83.3% were men, while the percentage of women reporters rose from 11.5% in 2018 to 14.4% in 2021, and the percentage of BIPOC reporters increased from 17.9% in 2018 to 22.9% in 2021.

The entity responsible for that study, the Institute for Diversity and Ethics in Sport (TIDES) at the University of Central Florida, also did a study of FBS universities in 2018, looking at those schools hiring practices for leadership positions. According to the USA Today article on the study, TIDES gave the schools a D overall, combining a C grade for racial hiring and an F in gender hiring.

Since launching the campaign, Reyes has engaged at least one professional sports franchise, the Los Angeles Chargers of the NFL, which according to her was looking to engage its Spanish-speaking audience and hire Latino professionals who could help the team connect with that part of its audience.

Shes also attracted the attention of athletes who have repped the shirt on their social media platforms, including WNBA star AJa Wilson and NBA veteran Enes Kanter, and is coordinating with the New York-based NWSL team, NY/NJ Gotham FC, on a special version of the shirt using their color scheme.

The shirts also found advocates in the sports media world, including those who have built social media and traditional media platforms allowing them to amplify the message Reyes has committed to shirt form.

Christian Polanco created the Cooligans podcast in 2015, taking a comedic perspective on myriad soccer topics, along with fellow Latino comedian Alexis Guerreros, and theyve extended its reach to TV via the Fubo Sports Network. Polanco attributes its growth to both the hard work theyve done promoting the podcast and what he sees as the comparative open-mindedness of soccer fans. Even though, as he explains, some out there consider them the wrong kind of Latinos to cover the sport.

The fact that we get to do the show that we do is, to me, like this miracle, Polanco explains. Alexis is of Cuban heritage, Im of Dominican heritagetwo particular countries that are not big soccer countries. So the fact that two guys like us who are just fans of the game, and also get to do a television show about it, is nuts. If we had just pitched the show and hadnt been doing a podcast for five years beforehand, nobody would have bought into it.

Joy Taylor, who has her own Fox Sports Radio show and is a co-host for The Herd with Colin Cowherd, was drawn to the shirt and its message, learning of it just by virtue of following Reyes on Twitter.

I think its important to use your platform to encourage diversity, no matter where you are in the business, and also to encourage diversity not just on camera, but also behind the scenes and at the varying levels of decision making that lives within the media business, Taylor said, Behind the scenes, executives, PR, whatever the division may be, its important to have diversity at all those levels as well, because that influences what you see on-air as much as the talent thats hired.

Taylor, who is Black, started her sports media career in 2007, has found that wearing the shirt has led to important conversations shes been able to have around diversity in sports.

It often sparks the conversation of The best person should be hired for the job, which is the usual rebuttal to the idea of diversity in any space But, of course, if you come from a minority space, you will very much understand that its not that straightforward. People often scientifically hire people that look like them, that are the same gender as them, sometimes the same age as them, and feel comfortable with people of their backgrounds.

Its not as simple as The best person should get the opportunity because its sometimes impossible to even get in the room, she explained. And thats the conversation that is usually the response from when that shirt is posted. And I think thats an important conversation to explain to people.

Your workspace should reflect the world, and what the world looks like and sounds like and talks like, and the world is an extremely diverse place, she added. So if you look around the space that youre in, and youre surrounded by all of the same kinds of people, all the same gender, all the same identifying group, then not only are you missing the opportunity for different perspectives, and ideas and growth, but youre also not speaking to whole massive groups of people around the world. And thats why diversity is so important.

Reyes feels that social media can be an incredibly powerful tool for those looking to break into sports media to put themselves out there, seeing Twitter in particular as a way for creatives to put their work out where it can be seen.

Twitter is more of a recruiting tool than you realize, she asserted. Now that Ive been on the other side, when Ive been in hiring positions, Ill look to see, if were looking for someone that fits XYZ, let me scroll on the timeline, let me see if anyone comes to mind, let me check out peoples work.

She also saw first-hand, in the process, how much momentum something started on social media can generate should it resonate with people. My initial thought was let me do this for International Womens Day [on March 8], maybe Ill do it for the month of March for Womens History Month and then Ill close up orders.

She even thought about shutting down orders in April, but noted, Multiple people in my circle told me, You cant close it. You cant shut it down now.

Then, reflecting on the opportunities to connect with people and raise awareness over the issue, added, And Im glad I didnt.

Presented byRhodens Road Trip,a part of the Undefeated on ESPN+ Black History Always Collection

Award-winning columnist William C. Bill Rhoden is the product of a grand HBCU tradition. Rhodens collegiate journey began at Morgan State University, where he was a member of the 1968 team that beat Grambling in Yankee Stadium in the Whitney Young Classic. One of the most respected journalists of his generation spanning nearly four decades he has witnessed the changing face of HBCUs from their rise to their desire to thrive. Fifty years after that memorable moment at Yankee Stadium, Rhoden, along with the help of the Rhoden Fellows, a team of aspiring HBCU journalists, explore the rich history and culture of HBCU football.

Excerpt from:
Megan Reyes wants you to demand diverse voices in sportson a T-shirt - The Daily Dot

What brands need to know about the Twitch hack – AdAge.com

This story was updated to reflect that Twitch has confirmed the breach.

Streaming platform Twitch was hacked, revealing the sites source code, as well as creator payouts.

The 125GB leak was posted in a 4chan message board on Wednesday, stating that the leak was intended to foster more disruption and competition in the online video streaming space."Video Games Chronicle first reported on the leak earlier today.

Ad Age has reached out to Twitch for comment. Twitch confirmed the breach on Twitter.

The leaked Twitch data reportedly includes:

The leak comes almost a month after Twitch streamers went dark on Sept. 1 in #ADayOffTwitch, a movement meant to bring attention to the increased harassment and hate raids the platform has been dealing with. Hate raids are when a streamer's chat becomes flooded with racist, sexist, transphobic and other abusive messages. These raids have increased in recent months due to bots that can post hundreds of hate messages at once.

#ADayOffTwitch stemmed from the #TwitchDoBetter movement. In response to what they thought was Twitchs slow response to the abuse, streamer RekitRaven created the #TwitchDoBetter hashtag to urge Twitch, which is owned by Amazon, to address the harassment.

"Twitch is an essential platform in the modern marketing mix for paid, owned and earned content. so from that point of view anything that disrupts or threatens the operation of the platform is a concern for marketers," said Rob Davis, head of digital innovation at Ogilvy. "From what we understand, the risks from this hack are primarily to Twitch the business itself and not brand partners. If the details we are hearing are true, the code breaches and exposure of the unreleased 'Vapo'product are the most concerning, but again that is a problem for Twitch and not brands."

Added Davis:"If we have (re)learned anything this week, it's that major social networks and content platforms are not immune from either internal error or malicious disruption."

View original post here:
What brands need to know about the Twitch hack - AdAge.com

RIT researchers part of $15 million NSF grant aimed at reducing food waste – EurekAlert

In the United States, nearly 40 percent of all food produced is never eaten, resulting in lost resources, economic costs to business and households, decreased food security, and negative climate impacts.

With the United States moving toward an ambitious goal ofhalving food waste by 2030,a new $15 million grant from the National Science Foundation (NSF) will be used to establish the first national academic research network on wasted food in the United States.

Under the grant, researchers from American University will lead 13 other institutions in a five-year project aiming to deepen understanding of how the causes of wasted food are interconnected and how they intersect with other regional systems beyond food. Researchers will take a systems approach to improving data on wasted food, with the goal of designing and strengthening sustainable solutions to reducing food waste.

Callie Babbitt, a professor of sustainability in RITs Golisano Institute for Sustainability (GIS), will serve as a co-principal investigator for the project,titled Multiscale RECIPES for Sustainable Food Systems,which officially kicked off Oct. 1. RECIPES is short for Resilient, Equitable and Circular Innovations with Partnership and Education Synergies.

Ourresearchwill re-envision wasted food asavaluable resourceas it relates tothecircular economy, Babbitt said. RIT will collaboratewith business and industry partners toexplore andcreate solutions that maximize the healthy, nutritious food used to feed people, minimize costly inefficiencies, and recycle unavoidable wastes into bio-based products and clean energy that powers the regional economy.

Additional researchers for RITs $1.8 million part of the project include Christy Tyler, Thomas Trabold, Kaitlin Stack Whitney, Nathan Eddingsaas, and Todd Pagano.

Rochester-area partners include the New York State Pollution Prevention Institute, Wegmans Food Markets, Biomass Controls, CH4 Biogas, R.L. Jeffres & Sons, Monroe County Department of Environmental Services, Natural Upcycling, and OWARECO, LLC. The project collaborators will provide data and information on regional food system challenges and work with the network to create solutions that reduce and recycle food waste and contribute to economic growth.

According to Babbitt, RITs focus will build on current NSF food waste research and an NSF-funded workshop the university held in 2019. Researchers will study new technologies for recovering the energy, water, and nutrients contained in food waste in a circular economy framework, she added.

We are studying their overall performance, economics, and ecological footprint, Babbitt noted. One issue, for example, involves food waste mixed with packaging, which is a contaminant during recovery. Some technologies can co-process both. But that might lead to micro-plastic releases to local ecosystems, which builds on Christy Tylers work on plastics in the environment.

The five-year project will engage communities in California, and the Great Lakes, Mid-Atlantic, and Southeast regions. In addition to RIT, research partners include the Maryland Institute College of Art, World Wildlife Fund, University of Illinois-Urbana Champaign, University of Albany, Louisiana State University, Pennington Biomedical Research Center, Illinois Institute of Technology, Duke University, and University of California-Davis.

The NSF project includes work in the following areas and will engage communities andfrontline workers in food industries, as well as nonprofit, government, and private-sector stakeholders:

The project was awarded under NSFs Sustainable Regional Systems Research Networks program. NSF research networks create knowledge and solutions that enhance sustainability, equity and resilience of regional systems in the United States. To learn more, go to the Multiscale RECIPES for Sustainable Food Systems website and follow @WastedFoodNtwk on Twitter.

For more information, contact Rich Kiley at 585-475-5697, Rich.Kiley@rit.edu, or on Twitter: @rakiley.

Disclaimer: AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert system.

Read more:
RIT researchers part of $15 million NSF grant aimed at reducing food waste - EurekAlert