Heard On The Beat
Gen-Techers: A new Santa Monica marketing company has an unusual plan to cash in on society’s growing fascination with technology. The firm is assembling selected technology-minded consumers into a group called Generation@, then selling advertisers access to them.
Three-month-old Create Wonders plans to recruit members for Generation@ by building an online community on the Web and by staging events where “technology optimists” can get together in person. The first of these events--a ski trip in Big Bear--is scheduled for New Year’s Eve, said Create Wonders founders Brett Holmes and Sven Hackmann.
At first, tech-minded users will be able to connect online at https://www.generation-at.com, a Web site expected to launch this week. If, as Holmes and Hackmann expect, the Internet and television fuse together, Generation@ could evolve into an interactive TV network, they said.
Generation@ group members will also have an opportunity to meet at concerts and sporting events produced by Create Wonders. The company will charge admission to these events and will charge companies that want to market their wares to the Generation@ demographic.
But the odds may be against it. Several previous attempts to create money-making online communities have fizzled, and many users resent ads in cyberspace.
Still, Holmes (a former aide to Gov. Pete Wilson) and Hackmann (a one-time Olympic swimmer) say they will spend a half-million dollars from their own pockets this year to create the Generation@ community and turn it into a well-known consumer brand.
