Meet Drake Meeting Brizzly: A Spanking New ATD Feature

Today, All Things Digital debuts a new feature called “Almost Famous” in our Voices section. No, it is not about Kate Hudson and nascent rock stars. Well, you might meet geek rock stars to be. Focused on innovative, interesting or just plain odd start-ups, we thought it was a good way for our readers to get a gander at some up-and-coming ideas and trends. It will be penned by Drake Martinet every Friday.
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QOTD

At the Democratic National Convention, we were like rock stars. At the Republican National Convention, I sat in my hotel room by myself for three days. No one would meet with us. I was begging people to meet with us.

Facebook Marketing Director Randi Zuckerberg

With all due respect, Randi Zuckerberg is totally full of sh*t on this one…Is it possible Ms. Zuckerberg sat alone in her hotel room during the Republican National Convention because she never actually contacted anyone? Or maybe she forgot about the major hurricane barreling toward the Gulf Coast on the eve of the Republican National Convention? Or maybe she didn’t really want to be around a group of conservative Americans in the first place?…Can Ms. Zuckerberg tell us what the Democratic National Convention did with Facebook–aside from pet their enlarged egos and take them to glitzy parties with the Hollywood elite–that Republican National Convention planners didn’t? I guess next time we won’t make the mistake of letting the business of nominating our Presidential candidate get in the way of the folks at Facebook being treated like rock stars. Apologies to Facebook. Our bad.

Matt Burns, director of communications for the 2008 Republican National Convention

New Guitar Hero Rosensweig and Activision CEO Kotick Speak!

As reported Sunday night by BoomTown, former Yahoo exec and Quadrangle Group partner Dan Rosensweig will become CEO and president of the Guitar Hero division of gaming giant Activision Blizzard. I chatted with both Rosensweig and Activision president and CEO Bobby Kotick yesterday about the move and where the gaming company is going in the year ahead. “I love music and I love big brands,” said Rosensweig, whose enthusiasm for music, especially for Bruce Springsteen, is well known in the digital industry.
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No Market Seen for Guitar Hero "Bronfman" Edition

It wasn’t very long ago that Warner Music Group boss Edgar Bronfman Jr. was demanding a share of Apple’s iPod revenue and calling for mandatory peer-to-peer filtering and taxes on recordable media and MP3 players. So to hear him calling for higher royalties from video games like Guitar Hero and Rock Star isn’t all that surprising.

No Market Seen for Guitar Hero “Bronfman” Edition

It wasn’t very long ago that Warner Music Group boss Edgar Bronfman Jr. was demanding a share of Apple’s iPod revenue and calling for mandatory peer-to-peer filtering and taxes on recordable media and MP3 players. So to hear him calling for higher royalties from video games like Guitar Hero and Rock Star isn’t all that surprising.