Happy Leap Day! (Sorry for the pre-roll.)

Ken Levine is an Emmy-award-winning teevee writer with a great blog. In his excellent post about this year’s Oscars, he gives some valuable and entirely logical (when you think about the business of entertainment for 12 seconds, that is) insight into why the writing for awards shows tends to be pretty lousy:

I’ve never written for the Oscars, but from what I know it’s a Kamikaze mission. Unless you’re a writer who has creative say in the direction of the show you’re just a punching bag.

Let’s say you’re writing a bit for two presenters. You have to have the material approved by the producers, the Academy, probably the network, the actors, their manager, agent, and in all likelihood – their hair stylist. And if it’s for two actors, one might like it and the other doesn’t. You change it to suit the one and now the other doesn’t like it. Then they both decide they want to change it. And their hairstylists get into it. Before you know it, what is left is a horrible, grotesque, painfully unfunny bit and you’re still considered the writer. Actors also sometimes bring on their own writers to “work” with you. And by writers, that could mean their Pilate teacher or life coach. You have three Emmys and now you need your material approved by a Yoga instructor.

And after that, the actor can’t read a teleprompter or remember a line and what results is a trainwreck. Congratulations. You’re still the writer-of-record.

Ah, showbiz!

Read the full post here. Then bookmark Ken’s blog.

In one of these 10 jobs. Hey, why not? Beats flippin’ burgers.

Tonight is a big night for movies. It’s a big night for Twitter and Facebook, too. The Wall Street Journal reports.

Meanwhile, if you want to know who’s going to win, check out InTrade: They’re calling for The Artist to win Best Picture, Jean Dujardin to win Best Actor and Viola David to win Best Actress.

You’re welcome. Now you can ignore the Oscars and watch The Walking Dead.

Can branding be reduced to a simple equation? Over on the Amex Open Forum, Denise Lee Yohn suggests that it can. She also suggests “successful brand-building remains as elusive as graceful elephant-riding.” Having spent many years around the circus and circus performers, I can attest to the fact that there is in fact quite a lot of graceful elephant-riding out there. Still, the article is well worth a read, if only to remind us that great brands become great brands through great culture, customer experience and communication.