Signal is on hiatus this week, as we’re all at the 7th annual Conversational Marketing Summit in Manhattan. We hope you’re attending. Here’s what’s in store …

Curtain Raiser: The CM Summit in NYC Next Week

As New York City gears up for its annual Internet Week, the team at FMP has been diligently working away on creating another stellar program for our 7th annual CM Summit, held this coming Monday and Tuesday in SoHo. The CM Summit is like our regional Signal events, but much bigger….

Last year we eliminated panels from our program, the move was met with great success – attendees love our fast-paced approach, which features short, high-value presentations from leaders in digital marketing and technology platforms, interspersed with conversations with CMOs from Fortune 500 brands and entrepreneurs driving change in digital.

Monday kicks off at 2pm with one of New York City’s media elites — Barry Diller of IAC, Expedia & Trip Advisor. Diller is more recently known for backing the controversial streaming video startup Aereo as well as high-flyer Pinterest. After his conversation, we move into a rapid fire succession of presentations including Joe Frydl, recently appointed SVP of Marketing at FMP, who sets the stage for this year’s theme with his talk on The Law of Content on the Web.

That’s a perfect segueway to our next speaker, Linda Descano, President & CEO of Women & Co., a service of Citi that brings together the voices of independent writers on relevant and thoughtful financial content. Linda is also a Managing Director and the Head of Digital Partnerships for North America Marketing at Citi, driving brand health and customer engagement goals.

After a deep focus on content, we move to the world of analytics with Amy Chang, Head of Product for Google Analytics, who will show and tell the Next Generation of Measurement. Amy is followed by Terence Kawaja of LUMA Partners, who gives his State of the State, a detailed look at today’s marketing landscape in line with the conference theme of Marketing from the 30,000-Foot View. Expect to laugh a few times….

Post refreshments, we continue with a series of conversations with Lisa Weinstein, President of Global Digital & Search at Starcom MediaVest Group; Sarah Bernard, Deputy Director of The White House Office of Digital Strategy; and Alfredo Gangotena, Chief Marketing Officer of MasterCard.

Day one’s sponsor spotlight is Luminate. CEO Bob Lisbonne takes us on a visual journey that highlights New Opportunities for Consumers, Publishers & Brands.

Tuesday, May 15th presents a full conference day that begins at 9am sharp with an intellectual and entertaining conversation with one of Silicon Valley’s most well-connected investors, Ron Conway of SV Angels. From there we move forward with a day centered around the industry’s major technology platforms with presentations from Microsoft, Twitter, Nokia, Tapjoy (a youthful yet successful startup that’s creating a marketplace for mobile games), Salesforce.com, and StumbleUpon.

Day two conversations feature:

• Heather Armstrong, mother, blogger and independent publisher of Dooce, one of Forbes’ Top 100 Websites for Women.

• Marc Speichert, Chief Marketing Officer at L’Oreal USA, not only responsible for driving and enhancing innovation for the company’s Consumer, Luxury, and Professional Products, as well as Active Cosmetics, in this role, Marc also runs Corporate Strategic Marketing, Media & Digital, and Consumer Market Intelligence.

• Jim Lanzone, President of CBS Interactive, on a discourse about the current and future state of premium video content and Internet video channels.

• Clara Shih, Founder of enterprise social media software company Hearsay Social and New York Times bestselling author of The Facebook Era: Tapping Online Social Networks to Market, Sell and Innovate. 

• Alison Lewis, who’s official title of SVP of Marketing for North America at The Coca-Cola Company really translates to being the force behind how one of America’s historic companies maintains its brand leadership.

To add a little visionary spice to the mix, I’ll also be interviewing Gil Elbaz, an accomplished entrepreneur and pioneer of natural language technology. As the CEO of Factual, Gil lives in “the data layer,” making data more accessible for machines, developers, and marketers.

Additional companies presenting include The Wyndham Hotel Group, Sharethrough, and Upworthy. These sessions help highlight how existing content around the web can create real business ROI with just the right amount of attention and curation.

Day two’s sponsor spotlight is Meebo. CEO Seth Sternberg will focus on how to Balance User Experience with Revenue Generation. 

We bring the event full circle with closing conversations by two well-respected figures in New York’s digital marketing community: Randall Rothenberg, President & CEO of the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB), and Susan Sobbott, President of American Express OPEN.

This year the CM Summit has moved venues, and will be hosted at Skylight Soho (pic above), a creative and beautiful loft space custom-built to accommodate both CM Summit audiences, and the IAB conference which follows.

If you have not already done so, buy your tickets today, and we’ll see you at the CM Summit.

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Photo By Anonymous9000

In today’s Signal, John Battelle raises the curtain on next week’s CM Summit and also talks to Larry Lessig, who explains why those who celebrate the “free and open” net are in denial; Bravo celebrates 1M followers on Google+; Facebook’s got a new App Center; and brand videos are making a large impact on consumers.

To the links…

Curtain Raiser: The CM Summit in NYC Next Week (Searchblog) An overview of our crown jewel gathering in NYC next week.

BREAKING NEWS: Twitter Stands Up For One Of Its Users (ALU) Good to see Twitter standing up. Sad that it has to come to this.

Don’t Sleep on Google Plus (Digiday) Cable TV network Bravo recently trumpeted how it crossed 1 million followers on Google Plus. Bravo’s success story is one of a growing number. “The idea that Bravo is going to focus on who they are instead of chasing typical Google Plus audience has worked for Bravo,” says Noah Mallin, group director of social strategy at Digitas. “They are staying true to who they are as a brand, and sometimes that’s more powerful.”

App Discovery By Quality, Not Popularity: Facebook Announces App Center For Web, Mobile, Pre-Paid (TechCrunch) Facebook’s soon-to-launch App Center could usher in an age where your news feed is filled with apps you actually want to use — the ones with the highest customer ratings, engagement, session length, and voluntary sharing — not just those with the biggest marketing budgets. Lots of details inside.

Larry Lessig on Facebook, Apple, and the Future of “Code” (Searchblog) Our own John Battelle talks to Larry Lessig, author, lawyer, professor and, until recently, one of the leading active public intellectuals in the Internet space. Lessig believes that if we don’t realize the Internet is quite possibly the most regulatable technology ever invented, and if we don’t protect ourselves from that fact, we’re in for some serious pain down the road.

Brands are seeing a greater impact with online video, says 33Across (VentureBeat) The folks at 33Across reveal that they’re seeing “unprecedented levels of video viewership and social sharing habits” among consumers. An infographic provides a full rundown of consumer behavior across eight industries.

Publishers Get on Responsive Design Bandwagon (Digiday) How do you reach online audiences when each group requires a different version of the content you provide? Responsive Web design is one way. But for publishers that rely heavily on advertising and sponsorships for their revenues, it can be difficult to work those opportunities into a responsive site successfully.

The Morning Download: The Age of Mobile Is Upon Us (WSJ) People around the world are adopting mobile technology at a rate that’s somewhat astounding. More than 3.4B mobile coupons were redeemed globally in 2011, according to Juniper Research. WSJ editor Michael Hickins talks about why now is the time to start developing a mobile strategy of your own.

What Should We Call Social Media Extremely clever bits to make you smile on a Friday.

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If it suits your information consumption goals, sign up for Signal’s email newsletter or RSS feed on the Signal home page (upper right box).

And don’t forget to secure your spot at next week’s CM Summit, held May 14-15th in New York City. REGISTER today for one of the most exciting and connected digital marketing events of the year. Held in partnership with the IAB at Skylight Soho.

In today’s Signal, we begin with an article written by our own John Battelle, who explains why it’s time to rethink “standard display,” leverage those who are leveraging us, and create some new models along the way (all while employing copious Dr. Seuss references). Also: A number of stories about the control levied by large walled gardens (Apple and Facebook), NBC Sports bets on digital viewing;  and, because we love road shows … When is an IPO presentation not an IPO presentation? When there are lines to get in, naturally.

To the links…

On Thneeds and the “Death of Display” (BattelleMedia) Online display isn’t dead. It just needs to be rethought, re-engineered, and reborn. The hundreds of people working here at FM, at Lijit, and at a burgeoning ecosystem of companies are coming to realize it’s time to wake up from our “standard display” dream and create some new models, ones that honor and reward good content. It’s not the big platforms’ job to create that model – but it will be their job to not stand in the way of it.

NBC Plans Olympic-Size Test of Digital Limits (AdAge) NBC Sports is positioning itself to carry the torch, so to speak, for the promise of digital viewing. Ad Age notes that digital ad sales for the London Olympics have passed $55 million (more than double the digital revenue for Beijing). Plus, NBCS has struck a deal with YouTube and, as part of their agreement, YouTube is building a video player for NBCOlympics.com.

Dropbox Ran Afoul of Apple’s App Store Review Guidelines: So What? (Future of the Internet) Dropbox and others are discovering that iOS developers are entirely dependent on Apple’s whims. But Apple should be careful. If it breaks the Web for too long, the Web will route around it.

Agencies Ditch Blogs for Social Media (Digiday) Agencies tend to maintain blogs to highlight things like awards, hires and news, but some are casting their blogs aside in favor of social media platforms, feeding the misguided notion blogging does little to enhance their brands. Hey, agencies (and everyone else): Put Your Taproot Into the Independent Web!

Zuckerberg Kicks Off Facebook’s IPO Road Show in New York (Reuters) Investors waited in long lines on Monday to hear Mark Zuckerberg talk IPO at the Sheraton Hotel in Manhattan. He took (very few) questions about FB’s slowing revenue growth and its $1 billion Instagram purchase, but he did say that FB moved quickly to strike a deal when it became clear that Instagram was open to being acquired.

Facebook News Reader Apps Decline Amid Tests (TechCrunch) Facebook is in firm control of what apps and content types receive traffic from its news feed. It can dial up and down the presence of anything. In other words, what FB gives, it can take away. Sound familiar? If you were around in 2004, you’d have thought we’d be talking about Google.

Why Publishers Don’t Like Apps (Technology Review) Sure, apps are often pretty, but outsourcing their development is expensive and, most important, they don’t do what readers want and need them to do. This is an critical read, folks. Apple’s approach to the market doesn’t help independent voices.

Mozilla’s Mitchell Baker on Being the Alternative to Microsoft, Google and Apple (Wired) Mozilla chair Mitchell Baker explains why she thinks Mozilla’s new push to create a mobile operating system to rival Apple’s and Google’s matters just as much as Firefox did. The mobile implications of this bear watching, so we’ll be following up on developments.

Twitter ‘will be more valuable than Facebook’ (The Telegraph) Rory Sutherland, the vice-chairman of Ogilvy & Mather, finds Twitter’s 140-character “haiku element” so appealing that he “wouldn’t bet against it being more valuable [than Facebook] in the long term.” Is Twitter ‘intelligent’ enough to prove Sutherland right, or is it, as one commenter noted on the page, just a “useful headline feed”? We’ve got a sense it depends on which way the wind blows in those gardens we’ve been talking about…

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If it suits your information consumption goals, sign up for Signal’s email newsletter or RSS feed on the Signal home page (upper right box).

And don’t forget to secure your spot at the upcoming CM Summit, held May 14-15th in New York City. REGISTER today for one of the most exciting and connected digital marketing events of the year. Held in partnership with the IAB at Skylight Soho.