Prescient Media

The Excluded Worker Congress came to Prescient Media for communications consulting, media strategy, and web design and development for the launch of a national campaign in support of the POWER Act.

The bill, introduced to both houses of Congess by Sen. Robert Menendez and Reps. George Miller and Judy Chu, protects the right of immigrant workers to expose labor abuses without fear of retaliation—which will secure job opportunities, wages, and working conditions for U.S.-born workers as well.

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The statewide Wisconsin social justice network WISDOM came to Prescient Media with an urgent request to build a website for its Pray, Sacrifice, and Communicate campaign—an effort to build support among people of faith for public employees’ collective bargaining rights amid an attack by Gov. Scott Walker.

In just days, Prescient built a flexible, functional site that met all their campaign’s online needs, including news and events postings, donation acceptance, and a moderated forum for supporters to post prayers, well wishes, and public commitments of support.

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The Gamaliel Foundation, the community organizing network where President Barack Obama began his work as an organizer, had 25 years of history winning victories for poor people and people of color. Its lack of communications and media capacity, however, left it vulnerable to politically motivated attacks.

Prescient Media first composed and executed a highly successful crisis response operation to deal with the attacks, then led a team of staff and consultants in an identity and web redesign worthy of mentors to the president.

Prescient designed and produced a full compliment of marketing materials, including business cards, stationary, brochures, posters, t-shirts, and the first annual report (PDF) in the organization’s 25-year history.

We also conducted media trainings with hundreds of Gamaliel staff, organizers, and community leaders nationwide; and composed and executed media strategies for a dozen local and national campaigns on immigration, transportation, and education.

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Just in time for New Year’s celebrations in New York City, Prescient Media launched the new online home of Emmett O’Lunney’s Irish Pub, a popular family-run pub and restaurant in the heart of Manhattan’s Times Square Theater District.

If you’re in the city and happen to be in Midtown west, drop in: the place is stunning, head and shoulders above the innumerable other Irish pubs in that part of the city, and Emmett, who’s often on site, is one of the friendliest bar owners in the city.

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Prescient Media performed a comprehensive identity and web redesign for the Transportation Equity Network (TEN), a 41-state network of more than 350 grassroots organizations.

We conceived and implemented a national media strategy that led to front-page coverage in the Washington Post, as well as prominent coverage in the New York Times, the LA Times, USA Today, the Associated Press, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, the NY Daily News, NPR, and dozens of other outlets.

We also directed a comprehensive online outreach campaign for TEN, utilizing Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, Huffington Post, Google AdWords, and the Democracy in Action/Salsa platform.

Prescient Media continues to work with TEN on media strategy, online outreach, and graphic design for web and print.

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Launched in May 2011: the new online home of Dreymiller & Kray, an artisan smoked meats store in Hampshire, IL, with 82 years of tradition behind it.

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Well, even Google nods from time to time.

From Salon.com’s Scott Rosenberg, a fairly hilarious case that’s bound to encourage all the worst in the phony-content-creation world.

Now, most folks with a conscience—and an understanding of how Google crawls the web—maximize their Google search ranking through good, clean code and substantial, regularly updated content.

Then there’s the so-called “content farms,” of which Associated Content is one of the most notorious: online sweatshops that churn out junk text all but unreadable by any actual human being, but loaded with keywords and search terms designed to capture high spots in Google search returns, i.e., to game the system.

Generally, Google’s very good at catching—and punishing—attempts to game the system. But not always.

Rosenberg described his amazement at Googling to read about the recent n-word-loaded primetime self-destruction of Dr. Laura Schlessinger.

Now, it may have been my choice of search term, or it may have been that the event is already more than a week old, but I was amazed to see, at the top of the Google News results, a story from Associated Content. … Gee, maybe Associated Content is getting better, I thought. Maybe it’s producing some decent stuff.

Naturally, he clicked through and read (errors preserved):

The Dr. Laura n-word backlash made her quit her radio show. It seems the Dr. Laura n-word controversy has made her pay the price, as the consequences of herbrought down her long-running program. But even if it ended her show, it may not end her career. Despite being labeled as a racist, and despite allegedly being tired of radio, the embattled doctor still seems set to fight on after she leaves. In fact, the Dr. Laura n-word scandal has made her more defiant than ever, despite quitting.

Rosenberg jumps to a pretty dire conclusion pretty quickly: that Google’s lost its touch for good:

I still feel lucky to be able to use Google a zillion times a day, and no, Bing is not much use as an alternative (Microsoft’s search engine kindly recommends two Associated Content stories in the first three results!). But when Google tells me that this drivel is the most relevant result, I can’t help thinking, the game’s up. The Wagner tubas are tuning up for Googledammerung: It’s the twilight of the bots.

That’s going far too far, for my money. More likely we’re at a temporary high tide of junk content in the endless ebb and flow of junk and control. There’s plenty of us out here hoping so. And none of us work for Associated Content.

For further reading, a great link Rosenberg passes along: “The Google Sewage Factory” by Danny Sullivan of SearchEngineLand.

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Prescient Media loves WordPress. Prescient Media is in Brooklyn. Brooklyn loves Jay-Z. Jay-Z lives in Brooklyn. And now Jay-Z’s on WordPress.

At last all is right with the world.

Well, almost. Having the great Jay-Z, a/k/a Sean Carter, a/k/a Jay, a/k/a J-Hov, a/k/a Hov, a/k/a Hova, a/k/a Jigga, a/k/a Jigga Man, choose WordPress is a great validation for the onetime little-blogging-platform-that-could — now a powerful, flexible content management system that drives a stunning array of websites by an impressive roster of users, including (Technorati says):

* CNN
* Fisherprice
* Wall Street Journal
* Forbes
* National Geographic
* Arena Magazine
* PopWatch Entertainment Weekly
* Nikon
* Pepsi
* Nokia
* Best Buy
* Ford
* Coca-Cola

On the other hand, for a man who makes videos like this –

– his current site is a little…basic.

We’re happy to help any time, J.

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Prescient Media redesigned and developed the website for Emmett O’Lunney’s Irish Pub, a popular family-run pub and restaurant in the heart of Manhattan’s Times Square Theater District.

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Drop in on the freshly-launched website of Baconfest Chicago — and if you can, drop in on the festival itself on Oct. 25!

This isn’t the first Baconfest in the country, but there isn’t a square inch of America where it fits better. A dangerously delicious time guaranteed for all.

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Last week’s Adobe newsletter included a list of bleeding edge Flash websites and asked readers whether any might be early candidates for site of the year.

For my money, the most exciting of the bunch is a sort of interactive music video for a lovely song called “Soy tu aire” by Spanish singer Labuat. Eye-popping, unexpected, and genuinely moving all at once.

Big kudos to Herraiz Soto & Co., the interactive ad agency that created the site.

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