Firefighters rescue a family from a car dangling over a bridge after a fiery crash on Highway 101, California, US.

How can a business of any size stand out and profit anywhere in the world? It’s all about currency - Brand Social Currency that is. Vivaldi Partners, an international brand consultancy, just put out its Social Currency 100, which ranks the social branding efforts of companies across the Americas, Europe, and Asia. From cars to confections, luxury goods to toys, the firm compiled a list of campaigns that made their mark on the web, social networks, mobile or location-based platforms, microsites, or even in print, over the past three years.

The “All About Me” factor helps revitalize brand.

Last month, Australia went crazy over newly released cans of Coke. A local ad agency had dreamed up an entirely new way of revitalizing the 125-year-old brand, reversing its steadily declining sales and tapping into the diminishing youth market.

During the first stage of the campaign, 150 different Coca-Cola cans were released, each with a different name. Using the most popular names in Australia–Jack, William, Isabella, and Chloe–as well as the usual Johns, Steves, Marys, and Matildas, each name was written boldly on the can in the iconic Coke font. As soon as word got out, a whole lot of people headed straight for the soft drink shelves in grocery stores across the country, everyone searching for their very own branded Coke can.

The second stage involved 18 Westfield shopping centers, where you could go to have your name printed on your cans. The lines were so long, people waited for hours just to have their own name printed on the can.

PART ONE

60 Minutes‘s interview with Walter Isaacson, the authorized biographer of Apple founder and former CEO Steve Jobs, aired on CBS News. The above and below segments appeared two-and-a-half weeks after Jobs’s passing, and less than 24 hours before Isaacson’s biography hits bookshelves. It’s out Monday 24th, 2011 and we’ve ordered six copies from Amazon.

You may order your copy HERE.

PART TWO

Business is good for pawn shops these days and not just the ones featured on reality television. In today’s unforgiving credit climate, there are fewer and fewer ways for firms to raise ready cash.

In lieu of a more fluid credit situation, small-business owners are turning to pawn shops to borrow against grandmother’s wedding ring or granddad’s Fender Stratocaster to raise funds for their businesses. But rather than head to seedy corner stores, some are going online.

Denver’s Pawngo aims to provide an online pawn shop experience to consumers and small-business people who need some short-term cash but may never have considered pawning as an option.

“That customer would never think of going to a pawn shop to borrow a couple thousand dollars to solve a problem. But we thought we could deliver a user experience that was discreet, fast, secure and very transparent,” says Pawngo CEO Todd Hills.

The company says it has done about $2.8 million in loans since its site launched in June. It is a licensed pawnbroker and fully compliant with state-mandated pawnbroker statutes, says Hills

Apple Inc co-founder and former CEO Steve Jobs, one of the greatest American CEOs of his generation, died on today at the age of 56, after a years-long and highly public battle with cancer and other health issues.

Jobs’ death was announced by Apple in a statement.

The Silicon Valley icon who gave the world the iPod and the iPhone resigned as CEO of the world’s largest technology corporation in August, handing the reins to current chief executive Tim Cook.

Jobs, who fought a rare form of pancreatic cancer, was deemed the heart and soul of a company that rivals Exxon Mobil as the most valuable in America.

“Steve’s brilliance, passion and energy were the source of countless innovations that enrich and improve all of our lives. The world is immeasurably better because of Steve,” Apple said in a statement announcing Jobs’ passing.

“His greatest love was for his wife, Laurene, and his family. Our hearts go out to them and to all who were touched by his extraordinary gifts.”

RIP: A true pioneer and hero – Steve Jobs.

(via Yahoo)

I want NEVER gets. Last night, Jason Castillo went to bed a normal man, with a normal Twitter account and a few dozen followers.

This morning, Jason woke up to an inbox full of messages, thousands of new followers, and wants to sell his account for thousands of dollars. Well good luck on that one!

As previously mentioned Netflix made another fundamental mistake in launching their new spin-off brand, Qwikster: they didn’t make sure they had the name locked down on all of the big social networks before making the announcement. As Jason’s luck had it, he had long owned the @Qwikster handle. He’s willing to part with it — he just wants to make sure he’ll “be making bank” first.

After over a month of silence, Jason’s @Qwikster account sprang back to life just a few hours ago and, likely to Netflix’s horror, has been more active today than it ever was before.

Jason seems to have rallied the, erm, expert counsel of his friend Gabriel (@SoccerIsLifegc7) who says they’re “not talkin til the offers get in 6 figures”. Again good luck on that one! You guys are in a dream world (see below)

Someone should probably tell Jason that selling Twitter handles is strictly against Twitter’s Terms Of Service, and attempts to do so can quickly result in being dropped. Then Qwikster gets their name, free of charge. Social media is a mess anyway. Social Media = Second Life BS.

Netflix CEO Reed Hastings announced a further split between the company’s DVD and streaming offerings with an apology.

In an email to subscribers and a video, Hastings said the decade-old DVD-by-mail service would change its name to Qwikster and be operated as a separate business from the company’s movie-streaming business, which will retain the Netflix name.

But the announcement began with an apology to customers who felt abused by changes — including price increases — Netflix (Nasdaq: NFLX) already has made.

“It is clear from the feedback over the past two months that many members felt we lacked respect and humility in the way we announced the separation of DVD and streaming and the price changes,” Hastings wrote.

With the change, Qwikster will add an option for customers to rent video games in Wii, PS3 and Xbox 360 formats. Customers who subscribe to both Qwikster and Netflix will be billed separately for those services.

Netflix‘s decision to raise prices by as much as 60 percent is turning into a bit of nightmare.

The customer backlash against the higher rates will end September with 600,000 fewer U.S. customers than it had in June.

It will mark just the second time in 12 years that Netflix has lost subscribers from one quarter to the next. The last downturn occurred during 2007 when Netflix lost a mere 55,000 from March through June.

Netflix has turned into Wall Street’s equivalent of a box-office flop. Its shares plunged $39.46, or about 19 percent, to close at $169.25, leaving Netflix’s stock price more than 40 percent below where it stood before the company unveiled the higher prices. The cost to shareholders so far: more than $6 billion in paper losses.

Netflix suffered a bigger setback earlier this month when Starz Entertainment ended talks to renew the licensing rights to a key part of Netflix’s video library for streaming over the Internet.

Wedbush Securities analyst Michael Pachter thinks the company’s shares could fall as low as $110. “It’s like they have taken the beef away from the buffet.”

Chill Report gets the move – Netflix just don’t want to be in the DVD mailing business anymore, although that was the actual reason Netflix became so successful and why Blockbuster disappeared. Now we’re all living in a new world with companies pushing content to online, which cuts out warehouse costs and packaging costs for DVDs and cuts out all the mailing costs. So the loss of customers is probably not as bad as it sounds.

Netflix management believes the convenience of Internet video is the main reason that it has added 17 million U.S. subscribers during the past three years, establishing the company as a major player in the entertainment industry.

Netflix still expects to bring in $10 million to $25 million more from its customers than during the July-September period than it did April-June.

Until Sept. 1, Netflix offered plans that bundled DVD rentals and unlimited video streaming for as little as $10 per month. Those options are now sold separately, resulting in a cost of at least $16 per month for people who want streaming and DVDs. Having both choices is appealing because Netflix’s streaming library primarily consists of old TV shows and movies, leaving DVDs as the main way to see recently released films.

Many of the people no longer renting DVDs from Netflix will get their discs elsewhere. That will most likely be great business for Redbox, which rents DVDs for $1 per night through 33,330 kiosks in supermarkets and other retailers. Shares of Redbox owner Coinstar surged $3.33, or more than 7 percent, to close at $48.55 today. Dish Network’s shares edged up 11 cents to $25.82.

Internet retailer Amazon.com Inc. launched a free streaming service for subscribers to its two-day shipping service earlier this year. Greenfield and other analysts believe Google Inc., already the owner of YouTube, is eager to expand its Internet video offerings to include more movies. One way Google could achieve that would be to buy Hulu.com, which has been put up by for sale by the television network owners that supply its video content. All interesting stuff!

Razoo is an App that helps you Fundraise Without Ever Touching Money

Most of us have decided to help out a charity or organization by raising money at some point in time. Maybe you’re doing a marathon to support cancer research, or a garage sale for disaster relief. Your friends are happy to support you, but you have to deal with checks and crumpled bills and a lot of inconvenience just to give back. A new app from nonprofit fundraising site Razoo can streamline the entire process and might just be today’s answer.

Razoo is a company that makes it easier for smaller organizations to raise money efficiently. More than 180,000 people have donated nearly $50 million through Razoo, to more than 7,000 nonprofits. And now Razoo’s tools are available to individuals as well as organizations.

The key part of the app is that you never touch any money. It gets funneled right past you directly to the organization; Razoo takes a 2.9% transaction fee on each donation. Don’t get any ideas, though: Razoo will only cut a check to a verified 501(c)(3). If it’s not in their database, you can’t fundraise for it.

Watch billionaire Richard Branson charm journalists and celebrities as he publicizes new routes for Virgin America.

As you may or may not know, apart from stepping down as CEO of Apple – Steve Jobs is currently a very ill man. There are even photos on other websites showing just how ill he looks. We came across some great stories from other business people who have worked with Steve and we would rather show that, so here we go…

Vic Gundotra, Google’s VP of Engineering
One Sunday morning, January 6th, 2008 I was attending religious services when my cell phone vibrated. As discreetly as possible, I checked the phone and noticed that my phone said “Caller ID unknown”. I choose to ignore…The message left was from Steve Jobs. “Vic, can you call me at home? I have something urgent to discuss” it said.

“So Vic, we have an urgent issue, one that I need addressed right away. I’ve already assigned someone from my team to help you, and I hope you can fix this tomorrow” said Steve. “I’ve been looking at the Google logo on the iPhone and I’m not happy with the icon. The second O in Google doesn’t have the right yellow gradient. It’s just wrong and I’m going to have Greg fix it tomorrow. Is that okay with you?”

Of course this was okay with me. A few minutes later on that Sunday I received an email from Steve with the subject “Icon Ambulance”. The email directed me to work with Greg Christie to fix the icon.

Since I was 11 years old and fell in love with an Apple II, I have dozens of stories to tell about Apple products…In the end, when I think about leadership, passion and attention to detail, I think back to the call I received from Steve Jobs on a Sunday morning in January. It was a lesson I’ll never forget. CEOs should care about details. Even shades of yellow. On a Sunday.

Mark Parker, president and CEO of Nike
We had worked together on a Nike-Apple collaboration called Nike+. So we took what Apple knows and Nike knows, and brought new technology to the market. Anyway, long story short, he said, “Congratulations. It’s great [that you've been named CEO]. You’re going to do a great job.” I said, “Well, do you have any advice?”

He said, “No, no, you’re great.” Then there was a pause. “Well, I do have some advice,” he said. “Nike makes some of the best products in the world–products that you lust after, absolutely beautiful stunning products. But you also make a lot of crap.”

He said, “Just get rid of the crappy stuff, and focus on the good stuff.” And then I expected a little pause and a laugh. But there was a pause, and no laugh at the end.

Allen Paltrow, student at Princeton University, via Tumblr
Growing up I was a huge apple fan-boy (fine, still am.) The first NY apple store in Soho opening was probably the coolest thing that happened to me between the ages 6 and 12. For a while I would spend almost every weekend there. Every year for halloween I was a mac, and I made a habit of shaving the Apple logo into my head to celebrate every OS launch. My neighbor Brooke mentioned that Steve Jobs, busy as he is, always reads email sent to his public address. I think I was around 12, and I sent a very enthusiastic and grammatically incorrect message including a picture of my shaved head. Apparently he forwarded it to the head of Public Relations, Katie, and I got invited to the opening of the 5th Avenue Cube. I can never thank them enough. This was probably the high point of my childhood.

Jonathan Berger, Apple intern, via Blogspot:
Steve got to about his 4th question from the audience [at an Apple Town Hall in 2000] and by this point almost every single intern had their hand up. He gestured in my direction but I could tell he was actually looking at an intern in the row right in front of me. I got a bit aggressive and barged ahead with my question anyway before the other intern could begin. Steve smiled a bit in apology to the intern I had just trampled over but let me continue. I was nervous. “Steve, many years ago you left Apple to start Next. But recently you returned to Apple. Why did you come back to Apple?”

[Jobs answered:] “When I was trying to decide whether to come back to Apple or not I struggled. I talked to a lot of people and got a lot of opinions. And then there I was, late one night, struggling with this and I called up a friend of mine at 2am. I said, ‘Should I come back, should I not?’ and the friend replied, ‘Steve, look. I don’t give a fuck about Apple. Just make up your mind,’ and hung up. And it was in that moment that I realized I truly cared about Apple.”

David Sheff, freelance journalist, via Playboy magazine’s 1987 interview:
The Interview was all but complete when I met [Steve] Jobs at a celebrity-filled birthday party for a youngster in New York City. As the evening progressed, I wandered around to discover that Jobs had gone off with the nine-year-old birthday boy to give him the gift he’d brought from California: a Macintosh computer. As I watched, he showed the boy how to sketch with the machine’s graphics program. Two other party guests wandered into the room and looked over Jobs’s shoulder. ‘Hmmm,’ said the first, Andy Warhol. ‘What is this? Look at this, Keith. This is incredible!’ The second guest, Keith Haring, the graffiti artist whose work now commands huge prices, went over. Warhol and Haring asked to take a turn at the Mac, and as I walked away, Warhol had just sat down to manipulate the mouse. ‘My God!’ he was saying, ‘I drew a circle!’ “But more revealing was the scene after the party. Well after the other guests had gone, Jobs stayed to tutor the boy on the fine points of using the Mac. Later, I asked him why he had seemed happier with the boy than with the two famous artists. His answer seemed unrehearsed to me: ‘Older people sit down and ask, “What is it?” but the boy asks, “What can I do with it?”

via @fastcompany