The mousehouse has some holes in its cheese, and this one really stinks. Disney’s new preteen social networking portal is geared to fill a void for chatty tweens, as TechCrunch reports here.
I’m not alone in finding it unfathomable that Disney didn’t do their due diligence on naming it Disney Xtreme Digital, and branding it Disney DXD.
Aside from “xtreme” being hackneyed phraseology, if preteens search the proper spelling of “extreme” (hey, now there’s a concept!) kids will land on a TRIPLE X porn site, pronto. Ahem, warning, parents, ExtremeDigital is not Disney fare.
Or is it? Seems Comcast already jumbled the circuits on Disney this week by cutting to a hardcore porn site in the middle of a cartoon, as this article reports.
Not their fault, I realize, but hey, that’s like Shaping Youth landing in the middle of a porn site due to cyberterrorism from industry folks not pleased with our message! (yes, that happened, and it was a nightmare for our tech team to clean up; don’t get me started on ‘pingback porn’ blog wars) Even though I’m in the business of branding, I admit I’ve been lax in protecting our Shaping Youth “brand.” No more.
As a tiny nonprofit, we DO NOT have bucks to spare, but I recently bought 56 domains with ANY mention of Shaping Youth and routed them ALL to this site to ensure parents/kids wouldn’t land on a site they thought was ours, and end up with hoochie mamas.
One of our film projects, “Body Blitz: Media, Shaping Youth” could easily have been snapped up and routed to a flesh fest with a name like ‘body blitz and youth’ in the search! Now, don’t you think Disney could be equally thorough with DXD?
Sheesh, Disney: Either change the name of your new DXD launch (hint to Disney: I do name generation for a living, er…I could use the cash due to my legal outlay to protect Shaping Youth, ping me, baby!) or BUY OUT the porn site, because unlike me, you have the bucks to do it!
Fergawdsakes, DO NOT leave “Extreme Digital” wide open in cyberspace for some innocent to Google and land on a T&A jigglefest of bawdy buxom babes!
It just cost me a mint to hire lawyers for an official TM branding search to register and search all our Shaping Youth name and media word marks.
I now have a 340 page phonebook sized document showing Tivo is the closest icon to Shaping Youth, and filed ALL of our media counter-marketing programs, word marks, film names, and Shaping Youth projects OFFICIALLY with the USPTO to protect the brand.
Have I mentioned I despise legal beagle bureaucracy, paperwork, and spending money that I don’t have in the name of “doing the right thing?”
Disney simply needs to plug the hole in their DXD branding and seal it tight for good…if a teeny weeny nonprofit can, they can.
There is absolutely NO excuse for preventable collateral damage. Kids are subjected to pop culture pornification enough already, they don’t need to stumble into it looking for Disney Xtreme Digital!
You can’t tell me the mousehouse doesn’t have a cadre of branding gurus just waiting to pounce on any HINT of a misuse of THEIR brand identity…I’m quite surprised they didn’t batten down the hatches better from the get go, actually.
If they don’t act on this DXD blunder pronto, they could end up DOA in a media snap trap that will kill them. Or worse, one of those horrid sticky glue boards where mice slowly are ripped apart losing an arm and a leg, suffering in agony wishing they’d never ‘gone there.’
Oh, and as for the DXD site itself? Haven’t messed with it enough to test it fully, but so far nothing ‘Xtreme’ about it. Just the usual flashy promos and mega-commercialism blitz.
I’ll send you over to Izzy Neis’ DXD commentary which is undoubtedly more balanced and objective than mine will ever be.
I can only say Disney proves they know how to embed and brand content as ‘previews’ and ‘value-adds’ to lure kids and fill a niche from the get go, so there must be ‘demand’ or they wouldn’t mess with it.
I bow to thee o, mighty marketer…The DXD site is a tedious load that kicks in loudly when it finally opens to babble and blare about sneak peeks, D-concerts and other nonstop promo fests of the Hannah Montana, High School Musical line-up…But overall, it’s free enterprise, and it’s their choice to “bring it on” and fill a niche.
But hey…Do NOT mess with my 9-year old goddaughter, Lara, who’s an avid Disney VMK freak, and believes anything Disney says or does is “okay” and “safe.”
Balderdash. Clearly, I’m not in that camp.
Disney may have filters in place, but this ethical oversight is only one of multiple media messages proving the mousehouse has some holes in its cheese that can be pretty stinky and rotten.
For the sake of all kids, please do the right thing, or be prepared for some “Xtreme” parent reactions.
I will always stand by this statement: Disney eats, breaths, and sleeps Disney. Yes, that’s intense. But at least they stand by their product…
until now?! I just can’t believe they’ve dropped the dirty ball TWICE– in a week! So much for their lock-box way of life.
Amy, as always, you rock! Your write-ups are fantastic. 🙂
This is one of the dumbest posts I’ve ever read. If you think you can control URL addresses you’re dead wrong. It would be totally impossible, a child (or anyone for that matter) is going to hit objectionable sites when they do searches, period. You bought 56 domains to try to do so, and I guarantee you that if someone wants to they can hijack your google searches, but you’re not a big enough target – you’re a tiny nonproffit. To suggest that Disney, as a large target, tries to control all of that is balderdash and reveals a big lack of understanding on how the internet works.
As far as technical merit of the site, you need to drop your service provider if it took you five minutes to enter. I’ve tried that site from a dozen locations at normal bandwidth and it never took more than a minute. After the initial cache it never took more than a few seconds on subsequent visits.
Here’s an idea, why not spend two minutes with your kids to find the sites you want them to see, then block out all the rest. Or better yet, sit with them while they are on the internet and surf together. That way, when objectionable material appears (and it will) you could actually take the time to explain why it is objectionable and to get rid of it. Internet-proof them the same way you would street-proof them. Don’t try shoving the blame at a company that does far more than most to protect kids – they are your responsibility, not the company’s.
I’m still dumbfounded – how the heck can you finger disney if a kid types in a search that doesn’t even include ‘disney’ in the search field???
Tim, Your vitriolic prose is misguided, for if you’d read any of our other posts, you’d see we’re on the same page…I don’t believe in blocking/filters as the biggest filter is between the kids’ ears…and the parent needs to put it there, with media literacy, not censorship and blocking. Totally Wired has a great post on this yesterday in fact, titled, “Blocking Sites Widens The Digital Divide” And I COMPLETELY concur. Check it out:
http://totallywired.ypulse.com/archives/2007/10/blocking_sites_widens_the_digi.php
As far as the DISNEY VMK issue, I’ll professionally address this chapter & verse when I have the bandwidth, but right now I’m at the Virtual Worlds Conference and btw, the VP of Disney VMK is one of the speakers…So before you talk about what is and isn’t possible and make accusations about lack of understanding on the internet, I suggest you speak to some of the leaders themselves. I am. It’s all about education. On that we DO agree…
p.s. And if you’re there in San Jose, on site at the convention—page me at the press booth and I’ll come speak with you personally to assuage your concerns. I’m walking around in a Shaping Youth shirt…
Our nonprofit may be tiny, but we ARE informed.