Online Media Nutrition Calculator Helps Parents Track Foods

Fresh from our living lab’s counter-marketing success at Allen Elementary (our pilot program we wrote about here) we thought we’d share some of our interactive nutrition data tools that YOU can easily use to curb childhood obesity in your home or school. This weekend, we showed peninsula PARENTS (and the greater Bay area community) our media-based reality show … [Read more...]

Obama’s MySpace Teaching Moment For Teens

“Is MySpace always mine or can it belong to someone else?” Such was the headline news last week when presidential candidate Barack Obama tried to rein in his messaging by usurping site control from an ardent supporter who had built his site up to 160,000 “friends.” Turns out the fine lines of “friendship” can get a bit testy when folks … [Read more...]

Sittercity: Digital Media Puts Profiles to Work for Parents

With Mother’s Day pummeling kids with media and marketing “must-haves” most moms I know would prefer “the gift of time.” Can social media networks wave the fairy wand and make mom’s dream come true? Maybe so! Check out Sittercity. It’s a database driven hub for pre-qualified profiles of babysitters near YOU. Zap in your zipcode … [Read more...]

Sour Combo: Shrek’s “Apples & Milk” At McDonalds

Ok, gang, let’s reiterate this branding nightmare of mixed messages one more time...Monster movie promos+junk food tie-ins=chubby cherubs. Nothing wrong with Shrek promoting apples and milk (though that combo is sour under ANY circumstances, eww!) BUT: if McDonalds is going to be a poseur for guiding kids toward healthy choices, they need to eliminate the beastie from … [Read more...]

Harris Interactive Research: How Cyberbullying is Shaping Youth Savvy

Thumbs down to cyberbullying! It’s heartening to finally hear some GOOD news to counter-balance the media hype on this harassment. Totally Wired author and über youth guru Anastasia Goodstein flagged the new Harris Interactive research and National Crime Prevention Council report on cyberbullying in this article, adding much needed perspective. Not to belittle … [Read more...]