Weekend Digest: The Starting A Fashion Trend Edition

For our weekend business and political readers:

CROWDFUNDING HELPS PAY FOR OLYMPIC DREAM
The Sochi, Russia Winter Olympic Games will be in full swing this weekend where American athletes will be vying for those precious spots on the podium and medals they have been training for most of their lives. As CNBC points out, it’s not just grit and determination that gets an American to the Games, it also takes money.

Like every other American athlete — and unlike millions of athletes in other countries — the careers of Olympic athletes are not financially supported by the government. True, the U.S. Olympic Committee (USOC) does dole out millions to each individual sports federation, but there are 39 of those, and many more needs than funds can fulfill.

So athletes are learning that along with grit, determination, amazing skill and a little luck, succeeding in their chosen sport now also means marketing, sales, PR and a little good old-fashioned schmoozing.

Yes, lots of money comes from corporate sponsors, but it’s not near enough, so athletes in non-glamour sports like ice hockey resort to “crowdfunding.”

How does it work? Go to this link to find out.

NEW BOSS AT YOUTUBE
Her name is Susan Wojcicki and she is Google’s senior vice president of advertising and commerce and “one of its earliest employees,” reports Forbes. This past week, Google confirmed she will take over YouTube as the senior vice president in charge.

According to insiders, Wojcicki – who has often taken on difficult or complex initiatives such as Google’s book scanning project – was interested in a new challenge.

The move for Google’s highest-ranking woman is a lateral one, though from a position responsible for most of Google’s revenues to one heading a smaller but more high-profile unit. In 2006, Wojcicki championed the $1.65 billion acquisition of YouTube. The deal was seen at the time and for years after as an expensive mistake, but some outsiders value the unit at $20 billion or more today.

What new moves will she have in mind for YouTube? Forbes says it could end up looking a lot like TV channels that fit YouTubes’ special brand of “less scripted, more free-form nature of the most popular videos.”

This year, Google will open a new YouTube production facility in New York aimed at pushing that initiative ahead.

It’s all designed to create more revenue, but what could the new ad campaign be like under Wojcicki?  Forbes has analysis at this link.

WHAT STARTS FASHION TRENDS?
That’s a good question, and one Fast Company digs in to as New York Fashion Week is set to begin.

New York Fashion Week kicks off later this week, and as the world gawks over the couture coming down the catwalks, it’s worth considering how we got here. From whalebone corsets to Spanx, tartan silk dresses to grunge-era flannels, and gold pocket watches to Baby-G watches, fashion trends throughout history have reflected social attitudes towards sex and identity, beauty and class status.

To examine the source of fashion trends over the last 250 years, the museum at the Fashion Institute of Technology in New York has opened a new exhibit called Trend-ology that takes a decade-by-decade look at fashion trends. Everything from the bustle to camouflage.

Go on a fashion parade through time by clicking this link.

HOW DO YOU BREAK “REALLY BAD NEWS”?
It’s something no one really enjoys and when it has to be done, what is the best way? Putting it off certainly is not the right step, but CNNMoney reports that’s often what happens.

No one likes being a harbinger of doom, so breaking bad news often gets put off for too long, or done badly, or both. Here’s how to spit it out.

So for help, go to this link for four steps to delivering really bad news.

‘NOBODY SHOULD TAKE US FOR GRANTED’

“If I’ve learned one thing from knowing and covering Hillary Clinton for 25 years, it’s this: Don’t assume a damn thing.”

That’s from National Journal editorialist, Ron Fournier.

People assumed that she couldn’t overcome skepticism of feminists and Northern transplants (she was both) to champion education reforms in Arkansas. She overcame.

“I think we’ve elected the wrong Clinton,” legislator Lloyd George, leader of the good-old-boy caucus, said after she presented proposed reforms to a legislative committee in 1983.

People assumed that she’d be a quiet partner in Gov. Bill Clinton’s closely fought 1990 re-election bid. Wrong: She eviscerated her husband’s Democratic rival in a state Capitol ambush.

People assumed that she’d leave her husband after he had an affair with a White House intern and lied about it. Wrong.

So…

“Don’t assume that she runs for president.”

The deeper you dive into her inner circle and talk to friends who are not financially and professionally invested in a 2016 campaign, the more likely you’ll find people encouraging her not to run — or at least to avoid getting stampeded.

You can read all of this eyebrow-raising post by going to this link.

THE MOST PAINFUL SPEECH EVER
POLITICO thinks it may have been, and unfortunately it was delivered this past week at the Press Club Foundation annual dinner by Maryland’s U.S. Representative Donna Edwards.

“I survived the Donna Edwards #wpcfdinner speech of 2014,” tweeted Mike Memoli, a reporter for the Los Angeles Times who sat through the fiasco.

Ed Henry, Fox News chief White House correspondent, retweeted him, and added the hashtag: #isitdoneyet?

Why was it so bad?  For one thing, it included the “equivalent of a sexual battle cry to ladies in the room: ‘Come on, help me y’all: I want to give a really special shout out to Nancy Pelosi and all my sisters in the libido caucus — holla!’ she cried out, raising her hands above her head.”

Reaction: blank stares and furrowed brows.

For more reaction, click on this link.

SPEAKER HAS DIM VIEW ON IMMIGRATION BILL
After much effort to overhaul the nation’s immigration laws, which had the support of President Obama, Republican leaders and much of American business and labor, it was seriously imperiled on Thursday when Speaker John Boehner conceded that it was unlikely he could pass a bill.

His pronouncement, amid mounting resistance from conservatives, significantly narrowed the window for success this year and left it to Mr. Obama to win the trust of balking Republicans.

Mr. Boehner’s remarks came a week after he and other House Republican leaders offered a statement of principles intended to win support for the measure.

So what happened?

For more on this developing story, go to this link from The New York Times.

FREE COMMUNITY COLLEGE TUITION?
It could happen in Mississippi, reports WREG News Channel 3 in Memphis.

Mississippi lawmakers want to offer each of the 75,000 of the state’s community college students free tuition.

State Representative Gene Alday says it’s an economic development issue.

“We want a better product. If we have a better product we have a better workforce. If we have a better workforce, we make Mississippi a better state and that should pull more people out of poverty.”

But how much would it cost? For the surprisingly inexpensive answer, click on this link.

THE MONUMENT MEN

“We’re force feeding films that aren’t going to get made unless we make them.”

That’s movie star and director George Clooney’s take and philosophy on the films he and his longtime producer partner Grant Heslov want to make.

But what does that mean exactly?

Working with lean budgets, deferring their own salaries and asking their actors to work for fractions of their going rates, Clooney and Heslov have specialized in the kind of movies that studios have largely abandoned in favor of comic-book franchises and cartoons.

Their new movie is about the U.S. Army’s Monuments, Fine Arts and Archives unit that, in the waning days of World War II, sought to rescue millions of pieces of art looted by the Nazis. Clooney has joined forces with Heslov once again for their latest movie, “The Monuments Men.”

Clooney stars and it’s his fifth film to direct.

It’s possible to read “The Monuments Men” as an allegory for Clooney’s own mission, as he valiantly tries to save the archaic genres and sometimes risky, subversive material that seems increasingly endangered by Hollywood’s corporate agenda.

For the full story, go to this link from The Washington Post.

BREAK ME OFF A PIECE OF THAT KITKAT BAR
Ever get that jingle stuck in your head? In Japan, they really have it stuck in their minds.

It’s not every day that you see a chandelier made out of KitKats, but you will find one in the first-ever KitKat store. Dubbed the KitKat Chocolatory and tucked inside the Seibu department store in Tokyo’s Ikebukuro district, the shop stocks exclusive KitKat flavors – sublime bitter, sakura green tea, and chili to begin with – created in partnership with celebrity chef Yasumasa Takagi of Le Patissier Takagi.

Fast Company reports it was a mob scene when the store had its grand opening on January 17. It sold out of product in one hour and 40 minutes.

“We’re obviously delighted with the initial response,” says KitKat global brand manager Stewart Dryburgh, who says the store is still struggling to keep up with demand, which, of course, is not a bad problem to have.

For more on the Japanese KitKat insanity and a video “crunch,” check out this link.

FORMER WALMART GENERAL COUNSEL RESIGNS LATEST CEO POSITION
It only took Walmart’s former top lawyer, Tom Mars, three months to get enough as CEO of the Steadman Clinic and the Steadman Philippon Research in Vail, Colorado. He resigned on January 15th.

“The partners of the Clinic asked me to reconsider, but I declined,” said Mars, who said he would continue consulting with the clinic.

So why did Mars, also a former Arkansas State Police Director, quit so soon? Go to this link from Bloomberg News to find out.