These days more and more companies and brands are turning to social media to promote themselves, but some of these companies stand out from the crowd. Voltier Digital has put together an infographic that lists 5 Companies That Are Rocking Social Media.
Join us on July 31 for our Social Curation Summit in New York, where you'll learn new strategies to connect and engage with your audience using visual communities such as Pinterest, BO.LT, and Tumblr. Speakers include Scott Belsky (Behance), Shane Rahmani (Thrillist), and Elias Roman (Songza Media). Register by June 7 and save. 
You can be forgiven if you weren’t aware of Mongolian hip-hop until you just read this sentence; I wasn’t until happening upon a Kickstarter project intending to capture the rising genre through a feature-length documentary. It probably shouldn’t be surprising to see how fully-formed and unique Mongolia’s hip-hop scene is considering the music/culture’s proliferation throughout the world but, for most of us, I’d hazard that it is pretty well unknown. Luckily Mongolian Bling, the aforementioned doc, should change this in the near future by capturing the nation’s take on the well-loved genre on film.
The project, spearheaded by director/editor/cameraman Benj Binks, has been developing over the past five years, time spent travelling Mongolia’s expansive countryside and bustling cities. In Mongolian Bling Binks and crew explore the various ways in which centuries of national culture and the overwhelming influence of Western culture are colliding in a country’s modern popular music. From the streets of Ulaanbaatar to its surrounding Ger Districts and beyond, Binks has worked hard to trace the evolution of a music and what the country’s biggest stars think about the ever-evolving artistic traditions of their homeland.
Ultimately, Mongolian Bling hopes to express a little bit of what it “means to be Mongolian for the youth of the country in 2011″ by combining looks into the country’s rich cultural and historical traditions with its contemporary embrace of an internationally prevalent musical movement. It’s an interesting stance to take and one that will likely shed some light on the modern dilemma of so many countries where the domination of Western and national culture intermingle to create new, hybrid forms of identity.
Mongolian Bling‘s makers needs interested parties to toss a few sheckles their way in order to get the project finished in the style it deserves. Although already nearly completed (a TV-ready, one hour version of the doc has already been picked up for future broadcast by ABC) Binks and co. want to do their subjects justice by cutting a full-length film suitable for entry to film festivals and popular distribution. To do this they need money for further editing, sound mixing, soundtrack creation, color correction, securing rights for original music and archival footage, DVD/screen reproduction, international publicity and more.
You’ll be handsomely rewarded for makin’ it rain on the film’s producers and spreading the joy of Mongolian hip-hop around the world. Contributors are set to receive specially designed t-shirts, posters (featuring a blend of traditional and graffiti inspired Mongolian art styles), listing in the film’s special thanks, copies of Mongolian Bling, CD soundtracks and, for the extremely generous, the ability to join filmmaker Benji Binks on a two-week Mongolian Bling Tour across (where else) Mongolia.
Want to know more about Mongolian Bling or Mongolian hip-hop in general? Head over to the project’s website, Facebook page or (of course) its Kickstarter home to get hip to the genre’s history, look and sound. Mongolian Bling will be funded on Tuesday, November 29th at 1.24pm EST if it reaches its $50,000 pledging goal on time.
And the Oscar for best stickers created for the 83rd Annual Academy Awards goes to … GetGlue! The entertainment-based social network teamed up with the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences for Sunday night’s telecast on ABC (8 p.m. ET/5 p.m. PT), and GetGlue users who check in can receive special Oscars stickers.
GetGlue is also tied in with ABC’s Oscars Red Carpet Live, which airs one hour before the awards ceremony, and with the network’s Jimmy Kimmel Live post-Oscars show.
iPad users can check themselves into Seattle Grace Mercy West Hospital with the new Grey’s Anatomy Sync app from Disney/ABC Television Group and Nielsen.
The app is based on standout ABC series Grey’s Anatomy and powered by Nielsen’s Media-Sync Platform, as was a similar app released in September for fellow ABC series My Generation, which lasted just two episodes.
Beginning with this Thursday’s episode, users will be able to access exclusive companion content including polls, trivia, behind-the-scenes insights, production details, character bios, video, and photo galleries, as well as having the ability to “check-in” to virtual environments within episodes, such as riding an elevator with Dr. McDreamy. Experiences can be shared with friends and other fans via Facebook.
Interactivity with ads from presenting sponsor Lexus is also included, via trivia and links directly to the automaker’s Web site.
I’m a little ashamed to admit that Cougar Town is one of my guilty pleasures, so I was totally psyched when I read that ABC had launched a companion web series, Andy’s Dreams. The six-part webisode series features “the unbelievably satisfying dreams of Andy Torres”, the husband of Jules’ (Courtney Cox) neighbor and best friend Ellie (Christa Miller).
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The Alphabet Network has a new digital chief, as Disney/ABC Television Group announced the addition of former Comcast Interactive Media senior vice president, online media Karin Gilford as senior VP, digital media, ABC Television Network.
Gilford will be tasked with overseeing ABC’s digital-media, mobile, and interactive-television initiatives.
At CIM, she was responsible for the growth and management of portal site Comcast.net and entertainment destination Fancast. Prior to Comcast, she spent eight years at Yahoo!.
The next time Disney/ABC Television Group goes through the trouble (and expense) of developing an interactive iPad app based on an ABC show, it might want to select a series that lasts more than two episodes.
ABC canceled My Generation Friday, after episode No. 2 drew just 3.82 million viewers, compared with 5.17 million for the premiere, Multichannel News reported.
The series — which followed the personal stories of nine friends through the camera of a documentary film crew — was shelved despite ABC’s My Generation Sync iPad App, which the network developed with Nielsen based on the ratings company’s Media-Sync Platform.
Depending on how much money was invested in ABC’s My Generation Sync iPad App, there might indeed be some talkin’ ’bout My Generation at a few meetings this week.
WebNewser received the weekly television-related Web-site reports from Hitwise for the first time in three weeks, but the results for the week ending Sept. 18 came with a surprise: Late-night talk shows were added as a category, joining cable news, which debuted for the week ending July 3, as well as mainstays broadcast networks, broadcast shows, cable (adults only) shows, and broadcast and cable combined.
NBC’s The Tonight Show with Jay Leno was No. 1 in the late-night category, followed by TBS’ Lopez Tonight, and CBS’ Late Show with David Letterman.
MSNBC’s Zeitgeist topped the cable-news rankings, with Fox News Channel’s The O’Reilly Factor coming in second, and third place going to MSNBC’s The Rachel Maddow Show.
On the broadcast charts, CBS and NBC were the top two broadcast-network Web sites, respectively, and the top three show sites were CBS’ Big Brother and Survivor, followed by Fox’s America’s Most Wanted. Fast risers were four offerings from The CW — One Tree Hill (to No. 7 from No. 22), Gossip Girl (10 from 26), 90210 (17 from 36), and The Supernatural — and Fox’s House (12 from 24).
Comedy Central’s South Park maintained its grip on the top spot for adults-only cable-network show sites, followed by MTV’s Jersey Shore and Comedy’s The Daily Show with Jon Stewart. Fast risers were Bravo’s The Real Housewives of DC (18 from 30), Food Network’s Great Food Truck Race (19 from 45), and VH1′s VSPOT Top 20 Countdown (25 from 36).
When combining broadcast and cable shows, Nickelodeon’s SpongeBob SquarePants occupied its usual No. 1 perch, with Big Brother coming in second and South Park third. Fast risers were Survivor (6 from 33), Fox’s American Idol (22 from 51), and One Tree Hill (25 from 96).
Nielsen is best-known for its TV ratings, but the information and measurement company showed its versatility by teaming up with Disney/ABC Television Group on ABC’s My Generation Sync iPad App, which adds synchronized interactive content and social-media functionality to the experience of watching My Generation on ABC. The primetime drama series debuts Sept. 23.
ABC’s My Generation Sync iPad App is built on Nielsen’s Media-Sync Platform, which allows mobile apps to automatically detect and synchronize with TV programming using audio watermarks, letting users unlock synchronized content and features, as well as interact via social networks.
My Generation follows the personal stories of nine friends through the camera of a documentary film crew, and it stars Michael Stahl David, Jaime King, Kelli Garner, Keir O’Donnell, Mehcad Brooks, Julian Morris, Daniella Alonso, Anne Son, Sebastian Sozzi, and Elizabeth Keener.
