"Only in show business could a guy with a C-minus average be considered an intellectual." Mort Sahl

"A critic is a man who knows the way but can't drive the car." Kenneth Tynan

"A bridge in America just shouldn't fall down." Sen Amy Klobuchar

Today's image by Hugh MacLeod.

We have liftoff: eBay Media Marketplace has enabled a six-figure order for Oxygen. It's a Q3 scatter deal for Intel including spots and a movie sponsorship. The agency is Universal McCann. This is the first order completed using the eBay platform. Kudos to Mary Jeanne Cavanagh, Oxygen's head of ad sales for getting the order without making a single phone call, buyer and seller communicated using the platform's messaging system. Second tier net, yes, but a smart move by the same guys who were smart enough to involve the brilliant Dale Pon in their branding. They deserve credit for doing something different in sales.

The E.A.R. Awards site opens with video. Where's the audio dudes? The copywriter vid is pretty cool but it's not too late to call Chuck Blore about creating an engaging audio opener.

Dahl makes the difference, again: As mentioned here earlier, Steve Dahl, the legendary Chicago radio star, delivered another great book and continues to carry an entire radio station. Now the stats. 65% of the station's 25-54 men and almost 66% of the 25-54 adults are Dahl listeners. Steve's recycling metrics are excellent, of course, in the sixty percent range (compare with morning drive that posted less than thirty percent). Truly remarkable; Steve is producing an audience from scratch everyday. His ratings production serves as a strong practical example of real-world appointment listening behavior. Congrats Steve! Closed circuit to Drew: the station production values need to be much stronger, fresher, the "man in the can" sound is played out.

Photo: Fall From Grace by Thomas Hawk. Another amazing shot. Bravo & Thank you!

"Luck, chance, and catastrophe affect business as they do all human endeavors. But luck never built a business. Prosperity and growth come only to the business that systematically finds and exploits its potential." Peter Drucker

Drucker went on to suggest three questions that will bring out the hidden potential of a business:

• What are the restraints and limitations that make the business vulnerable?
• What are the imbalances of the business?
• What are we afraid of, what do we see as a threat to this business - and how can we use it as an opportunity?

Writing this past weekend on development issues. Came across some excellent points made by the great David Oglivy. His "five characteristics which suggest...a person has the potential for rapid promotion:

1. He is ambitious.
2. He works harder than his peers - and enjoys it.
3. He has a brilliant brain - inventive and unorthodox.
4. He has an engaging personality.
5. He demonstrates respect for the creative function.

If you fail to recognize, promote and reward young people of exceptional promise, they will leave you; the loss of an exceptional man can be as damaging as the loss of an account."

Too much for too little: Now comes word the eBay cable net exchange was to charge 2% per transaction. Also hearing the platform feature set did not allow for any value added. Some cable folks are saying the exchange was just too expensive at 2%.

Best music in the history of TV: Little Steven says it doesn't get better than the music on The Sopranos. Read the Reuters/Billboard story via WaPo here.

100 million - the number of iPods Apple says it has sold. According to Nick Wingfield writing is this morning's Wall Street Journal Apple grabbed a 73.7% share of the MP3 market (US retail) in February. SanDisk was second with a 9.0% share; Microsoft picked up 2.3% of the February retail market. (data: NPD Group). Read A New Wireless Player Hopes to Challenge iPod via WSJ here (sub req).

Wired: Eric Schmidt interviewed by Fred Vogelstein via Wired here.

"How should we think about Google today?

Think of it first as an advertising system. Then as an end-user system - Google Apps. A third way to think of Google is as a giant supercomputer. And a fourth way is to think of it as a social phenomenon involving the company, the people, the brand, the mission, the values - all that kind of stuff."

"Google’s revenue and employee head count have tripled in the last two years. How do you keep from becoming too bureaucratic or too chaotic?

It’s a constant problem. We analyze this every day, and our conclusion is that the best model is still small teams running as fast as they can and tolerating a certain lack of cohesion. Attempting to provide too much order dries out the creativity. What’s needed in a properly functioning corporation is a balance between creativity and order.

But we’ve reined in certain things. For example, we don’t tolerate the kind of “Hey, I want to have my own database and have a good time” behavior that was effective for us in the past."

Bravo Eric! Well done Fred.

Congrats & cheers: Roger Ogden, Gannett Broadcasting CEO, named B&C's Broadcaster of the Year. “Good ideas can come from any level of the organization, from any source. We can’t sit back and hope and expect that’s going to happen naturally or automatically. So we’ve developed a culture in which we encourage people to participate.” Read B&C item here. Ellen Weiss named VP of News for NPR. Well deserved!

Google Maps - create your own personalized, annotated maps - very cool.

"You cannot bore people into buying your product." David Ogilvy

The always amazing Paul Gallis checked in to say everything is looking good for next month's big reunion. Chicago Music Row will happen Tuesday, May 8 at Yolk, 1120 S. Michigan Avenue. 3pm until the last story is told. Open to all who work or have worked in or around the Chicago music scene. Radio, records, retail, A&R, producers, distribution, sales, venues. More info here. Clark Weber and Jim Scully are the event's MCs with Paul. This should be one to remember. See you there!

More than spots & dots: The eBay TV ad sales exchange seems to be in trouble - no inventory. The platform funded by HP, Home Depot and Phillips will not be supported by the cable networks. Louise Story writes Cable TV Networks Boycott eBay Ad Exchange via NYT here. "We don't believe that eBay is going to get this right" says CAB prexy Sean Cunningham. Ouch!

The seven cable networks that tested the exchange over the last month decided it went too far in removing humans from the ad sales process. Cunningham added "The grand-majority is about idea driven packages that have got multiple consumer touch points that activate these brands." So he seems to be saying it's more than spots and dots. More than push print and buy.

If one is able to book almost anything online these days why is it just not possible to book advertising? First, what's being done today is not simply booking, it's online negotiating - it's one kind or another of ad auction. My sense is the hurdle here is all about the bid ask, the process. This is about seller fears. The fear inventory will become a commodity. The fear of a collapse in pricing. The fear of losing pricing power. The fear of those paying full retail migrating to wholesale. Exchanges offering remnant inventory face an even bigger challenge. Why is the buyer not able to buy the good stuff?

What broadcast and cable are having a difficult time letting go of is "the deal." The process. Sellers making deals with their clients with the help of their managers. Some bonus weight here, a bit of value-added there, tweaking the pricing, adjusting the dayparting, add the cool idea and voila! The deal is done. Can't this be done online? Of course but offline haggle is in the seller dna. The selling more art than science with a dash of sport.

The flaw is the liquidator model

"Price becomes an objection when you fail to articulate value" said my dear friend Norm Goldsmith. Media should take a lesson from the successful. Do what The Four Seasons does. Put all of your inventory online. Allow customers to add promotions, signature sponsorships and other "touch points" from a comprehensive menu. If one can design a car or five star holiday online it should certainly be possible to design an ad campaign online. Use your online platform to manage all of your inventory - prime, off prime, promotions, remnant, everything. What's wrong with the exchange idea is the exchange idea. An auction of some inventory has narrow, limited appeal and self limiting potential.

A better start would be an exchange as one moving part of a robust sales platform rather than the entire platform being nothing but auction. Sell full retail, subject to some real-time pricing supply/demand dynamics (think airlines, hotels, et al), and sell off discounted inventory that needs to be moved. Offer incentives to book online. Perhaps you have buyers earn access to the discounted inventories? Require buyers to qualify for access to the exchange portion of the platform. But sell everything. Make it easy for the customer to buy at any price.

YES, this does put your sellers in competition with the platform. The more realistic pov is your sellers are an important part of your sales platform, so is your national rep. The business case for moving forward is clear. If you always do what you've always done, then you'll only get what you've always gotten. To succeed sooner you must learn to fail faster.

There is more than one right answer here. It's not either or it's AND.

P.S. Nothing says you can't have it both ways and then some. Sell online, sell offline to customers who prefer face calls, personal contact, and lots of service or some combination to meet every customer need. High tech with high touch options. No one is going to like that approach but the buyers. Google or Microsoft will probably be the first to make it happen.

All it will take is a broadcaster or a network with nothing to lose.

Congrats & cheers: Joey Vartanian, King of Chicago night life, on his 25th year in the bar trade.