That's Armageddon

Among the top five headlines on My Yahoo page:

• New Orleans in chaos, Bush calls disaster historic
  
• Hundreds killed in stampede near Baghdad mosque
  
• U.S. deaths in Iraq in August most since January
  

Or in other words:

Prescription

More cartoons drawn on the back of business cards.

The night b-school got hard

When people ask me what I'm learning in business school, I can usually tell them. The above has something to do with Competitive Advantage from Operations. Beyond that, I'll have to get back to you. And until that day comes, I will never be allowed to be in charge of anything.

Once you go wet

Kandoo, the new tool in the war against smelly kids, is in stores now. I wonder at what point in the marketing brainstorm process did Procter & Gamble say, "You know, how about using an ass-wiping frog as our logo?"

Are frogs renown for their pristine rectums? Did the focus groups really respond to a self-wiping frog rather than, say, a camel? And "Kandoo" - do kids need to be empowered for this?

I am a recent convert to wet wipes myself and have come to insist on them wherever possible. Yet I find them in few households. Do they have a stigma because they're used foremost on babies and old folks?

Instead of making wipes more appealing to kids, maybe Procter & Gamble should work on a witty, urbane wiping mascot that speaks to our generation. They could call them "Buttlers" to bring in the frat boy demographic or "Asstastics" to appeal to urbanites.

Pippi Hotstockings

The original Girl Gone Wild

What I've been watching/reading/hearing this week:

• Flickr.com has a new Most Interesting feature, updated daily, based on what gets the most hits, comments, links, etc. Some really incredible photography, like this, this, and this, that makes me wish I knew what to do with my life camera.
• Guess-the-Google (via Bob Jingle) - A montage from Google Image Search appears and you guess the search term. Harder than you might think.
• Ben Folds rocked Brooklyn to its hipster core last night. The fact that guys like him can sell out concerts without radio or MTV airplay redeems my faith in humanity. And as a marketing guy by day, it shows the power of the Internet to let artists bypass the mass media filters and connect directly with their fans. Without being on his email list, I would never know that he had new albums or was performing in the area.
• My friend Ian spent at least part of Wednesday eating two donuts. At said concert Thursday night, he gets two girls' phone numbers. We could all learn a lot from Ian.