Linkpile

[I’m bringing this back on a Tuesday/Friday basis. Thoughts?]

• • When Good Companies Choose EVIL Names: “Did the founders of these businesses neglect to do a quick Google search before setting their names in legal stone, or did they hope to capitalize on the intimidation factor of naming their companies after sinister fictional corporations?”
  • Green consumers’ dirty little secrets: “New research suggests that those who make “green” purchases are subsequently more likely to behave selfishly, cheat and steal.” Similar: Goodies behaving badly: “Being virtuous is wonderful thing, but feeling virtuous is a shortcut to vice. That seems to be the moral of a fascinating piece of research by two Canadian psychologists, which suggests that the greener people are, the more likely they are to lie and cheat.” Somewhat similar research discussed in Buying In — “the licensing effect.”
  • The Digital Surplus and Its Enemies < Columns | PopMatters: Rob Horning reviews Jaron Lanier’s book.
  • Raiding Eternity: As part of a series called “Memory Forever,” Gizmodo has a rather fascinating piece of writing by Joel Johnson. It deals with our digital legacies, I guess you could say. His approach is unusual, and made me want to read more of his work. Via Listenerd.
  • Product Displacement: Glady Santiago posts a video from an Australian show called Hungry Beast on the topic that she’s been more on top of than anybody. It’s interesting to hear the guy talk about how product displacement (using props that look like a known brand, but aren’t — like UDS instead of UPS; see Santiago’s blog for more) can actually help the real tweaked brand. The idea is that it “engages” the consumer.
  • Will Your College Be Covered in Virtual Graffiti?: “Sophisticated new phones can sense their locations, so people are starting to use them to create a new layer of content mapped to specific places on and around campus. These digital sticky notes can share everything from official tours to student mischief.”
  • Terra Nova: Virtual Goods at GDC: “Virtual goods now a $6b business. … Rumor that US states will begin charging sales tax on virtual item sales within the year.”
  • The revolution was not tweeted – The Irish Times – Sat, Feb 20, 2010: “The Iranian Twitter Revolution meme is thoroughly debunked in Cloud Culture , a new study examining the impact of social media on the way we live our lives. It reports that a third of Iranians have internet access and the number of Twitter users in the country during last June’s unrest amounted to just 0.082 per cent of the population.”

These links compiled via delicious, and repurposed here with plug-in Postalicious. Not enough stuff? Not the stuff you wanted? Try visiting unconsumption.tumblr.com, murketing.tumblr.com, and/or the Consumed Facebook page.