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227_1 | infomercial spending in the U.S. occurred during the early morning, daytime and evening hours, or in the afternoon. Stations in most countries around the world have instituted similar media structures. The infomercial industry is worth over $200 billion. |
227_2 | The Washington DC-based National Infomercial Marketing Association was formed in late 1990; by 1993 "it had more than 200" members committed to standards "with teeth".
While the term "infomercial" was originally applied only to television advertising, it is now sometimes used to refer to any presentation (often on video) which presents a significant amount of information in an actual, or perceived, attempt to promote a point of view. When used this way, the term may be meant to carry an implication that the party making the communication or political speech is exaggerating truths or hiding important facts.
The New York Times cited a professional in the field as saying that "infomercial companies tend to do well during recessions." |
227_3 | Format
The word "infomercial" is a portmanteau of the words "information" and "commercial". As in any other form of advertisement, the content is a commercial message designed to represent the viewpoints and to serve the interest of the sponsor. Infomercials are often made to closely resemble standard television programs. Some imitate talk shows and try to downplay the fact that the program is actually a commercial message. A few are developed around storylines and have been called "storymercials". However, most do not have specific television formats but craft different elements to tell what their creators hope is a compelling story about the product offered.
The term infomercial, by 2007, had come to refer to the format, even when used in a live presentation. |
227_4 | Infomercials are designed to solicit quantifiable immediate direct response (a form of direct response marketing not to be confused with direct marketing); they generally feature between two and four internal commercials of 30 to 120 seconds which invite the viewer to call or take other direct action. Many viewers respond with a delayed response, by purchases made at retail outlets. These retail purchases are often the largest response. Using "not sold in stores" is a choice by advertisers that dislike sharing profit with retailers, or who lack the immense resources needed to get into retail channels. In the latter case, direct sales enables later retail distribution. Standalone shorter commercials, 30 to 120 seconds in length with a call to action, are erroneously called infomercials; when used as an independently produced commercial, they are generally known as DRTV spots or short-form DRTV. Infomercial sponsors often also use shorter spots during regular programming. |
227_5 | Products using infomercial marketing
The products frequently marketed through infomercials at the national level include cleaning products, appliances, food-preparation devices, dietary supplements, alternative health aids, memory improvement courses, books, compilation albums, videos of numerous genres, real estate investment strategies, beauty supplies, baldness remedies, sexual-enhancement supplements, weight-loss programs and products, personal fitness devices, home exercise machines and adult chat lines.
Uses for infomercials in the early 1990s included offering free trials of personal care products such as enhanced plaque removers; an 800-number was used to collect basic marketing information. |
227_6 | Major brands (such as Apple, Microsoft and Thermos-Grill2Go) have used infomercials for their ability to communicate more complicated and in-depth product stories. This practice started in the early 1990s and has increased since. Such advertisers generally eschew the less reputable trappings of the traditional infomercial business in order to create communication they believe creates a better image of their products, brands and customers. Apple's use of the infomercial medium was immediately discontinued with Steve Jobs' 1997 return to the helm of the company.
Automobile dealerships, attorneys and jewelers are among the types of businesses that air infomercials on a local level.
History |
227_7 | Early infomercials
During the early days of television, many television shows were specifically created by sponsors with the main goal of selling their product, the entertainment angle being a hook to hold audience attention (this is how soap operas got their name; such shows were sponsored by soap manufacturers). A good example of this is the early children's show The Magic Clown on NBC, which was created essentially as an advertisement for Bonomo's Turkish Taffy. The first infomercial for a commercial product (a Vitamix blender) was recorded in 1949; its first broadcast was in 1950.
Eventually, limits imposed by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) on the amount of advertising that could appear during an hour of television did away with these programs, forcing sponsors into the background; however, a few infomercials, mainly those for greatest hits record sets and Shop Smith power tools, did exist during the period when commercial time was restricted. |
227_8 | During the 1970s, XETVa Mexican TV station based in Tijuana but serving the San Diego marketran a one-hour English-language program on Sundays showcasing San Diego-area homes for sale. As a non-USA station, the FCC's maximum number of commercial minutes per hour did not apply to XETV. It was also during the 1970s that the hard sell "But wait! There's more!" Ginsu ads were being aired on American late-night TV.
1981
The Federal Communications Commission lifted the prohibition on program-length advertisements on radio in 1981.
After 1984
Infomercials proliferated in the United States after 1984 when the Federal Communications Commission eliminated regulations that were established in the 1950s and 1960s to govern the commercial content of television.
Kevin Harrington, nicknamed the "infomercial godfather", had his first infomercial air in 1985. By 1994, an estimated 90% of all stations had or were airing infomercials. |
227_9 | Product or person as pitchman
One relatively early question was whether or not infomercials should feature celebrities. Although "how much will it cost" was part of the equation, so was a "highly demonstrable item with obvious features and benefits." Even when experts are used for their endorsement value, a "name" adds value in making an introduction.
Infomercials particularly exploded in the mid-1990s with motivational and personal development products, and "get-rich-quick scheme"s based on the premise that one could quickly become wealthy by either selling anything through classified ads or through real estate flipping. These were hawked by personalities such as Don Lapre and Carleton H. Sheets, among others. |
227_10 | When and where
When they first appeared, infomercials were most often scheduled in the United States and Canada during late-night/early morning hours. As stations have found value in airing them at other times, a large portion of infomercial spending occurs in the early morning, daytime, early prime and even prime time periods. There are also all-infomercial networks (such as cable channels Corner Store TV, Access Television Network and GRTV) that yield revenue for cable and satellite providers who carry them or fill local programming voids. |
227_11 | Some cable carriage contracts were adjusted in 2006. CNBC, which airs only two hours of infomercials nightly during the business week, sometimes airs nearly 30 hours of infomercials on weekends; from the September–October 2008 financial crisis to early 2017, CNBC had inserted a "paid programming" bug at the top right corner of the screen during all airings of infomercials. In contrast, sister network CNBC World airs international programming rather than any paid programming.
When a conventional prime-time two-minute advertising pod has no ads, the networks will run a two-minute mini-infomercial at a much lower rate, charging "as little as 5 percent of what a general advertiser would" pay.</ref>
Commercials becoming full programs
The New York Times suggested that "the commercial became the show as infomercials ruled the night." |
227_12 | A comparison of television listings from 2007 with 1987 verifies that many North American broadcasters began to air infomercials in lieu of syndicated television series reruns and movies, which were formerly staples during the more common hours infomercials are broadcast (such as the overnight hours). Infomercials were previously a near-permanent staple of Ion Television's daytime and overnight schedules, but the channel now only carries infomercials in the traditional 3:00-8:00 a.m ET/PT timeslot emulated by most cable networks. Multichannel providers such as DirecTV had objected to carrying Ion feeds consisting largely of paid programming. This is despite both DirecTV and Dish carrying several infomercial-only and leased access networks which have been criticized by their subscribers. |
227_13 | United Kingdom
As with other advertising, content is supervised by the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) and regulated by Ofcom. Advertising rules are written and maintained by the Committees of Advertising Practice (CAP), working closely with the ASA and Ofcom. |
227_14 | In the UK, "admags" (advertisement magazines) were originally a feature of the regional commercial ITV stations from launch in 1955. While very popular, admags were banned in 1963. The word "teleshopping" was coined in 1979 by Michael Aldrich, who invented real-time transaction processing from a domestic television and subsequently installed many systems throughout the UK in the 1980s. This would now be referred to as online shopping. In the 1989, the Satellite Shop was launched as the first UK shopping channel. Shortly afterwards, infomercials began on satellite television, and they became known as teleshopping. Until 2009, the UK permitted neither paid infomercials nor teleshopping on broadcast television. However, in 2009, Ofcom allowed up to three hours of infomercials per day on any channel. |
227_15 | Airtime for political messages, known as Party Political Broadcasts, is allocated free of charge to political parties according to a formula approved by Parliament, and is available only on broadcast television and radio channels. The Communications Act 2003 prohibits political advertising. Television advertising of pharmacy-only and prescription drugs is also prohibited. |
227_16 | Televangelists
Some U.S. televangelists such as Robert Tilton and Peter Popoff buy television time from infomercial brokers representing television stations around the U.S., and even some widely distributed cable networks that are not averse to carrying religious programming. A block of such programming appears weekdays on BET under the umbrella title BET Inspiration (which fully replaced the direct-response variety of infomercials on the channel in 1997). The vast majority of religious programming in the United States is distributed through paid infomercial time; the fees that televangelists pay for coverage on most religious stations are a major revenue stream for those stations, in addition to programming the networks produce themselves. |
227_17 | TiVo
TiVo formerly used paid programming time weekly on the Discovery Channel on early Thursday mornings and Ion Television on early Wednesday mornings to record interactive and video content to be presented to subscribers in a form of linear datacasting without the need to interfere with a subscriber's internet bandwidth (or lack thereof if they solely used the machine's dialup connection for updating). The program was listed as Teleworld Paid Program, named for TiVo's corporate name at its founding. Teleworld Paid Program was quietly discontinued at the start of the 2016–17 television season as the company's install base had mostly transitioned to broadband and newer TiVo devices no longer included a dialup option. |
227_18 | The 2007–2010 financial crisis
During the financial crisis that lasted from 2007 to 2010, many struggling individual television stations began to devote more of their programming schedules to infomercials, thereby reducing syndication contracts for regular programming. Some stations found that the revenue from infomercial-time sales were higher than those possible through traditional television advertising and syndication sales options. However, the reduced ratings from airing infomercials can have a chain reaction and harm ratings for other programming on the station.
A feature-length documentary that chronicles the history of the infomercial is Pitch People. |
227_19 | In 2008, Tribune Media Services and Gemstar-TV Guide/Rovi began to relax the guidelines for listing infomercials within their electronic program guide listings. Previously all infomercials were listed under the title "Paid Programming" (except for exceptions listed below), but now infomercial producers are allowed to submit a title and limited descriptive synopsis (though phone numbers or website addresses remain disallowed) to the listings providers.
Fox's Saturday morning programming
In January 2009, Fox became the first major broadcast network to carry a regularly scheduled block of paid programming when it discontinued its Saturday morning children's programming after disputes with provider 4Kids Entertainment. Fox gave back three early hours to its affiliates, while retaining two hours for infomercials under the title Weekend Marketplace. |
227_20 | Some local stations utilize Saturday morning slots to air local paid programming that typically sells used cars or real estate, and in other ways rejected infomercials, which were disdained by viewers and Fox affiliates alike: revenue was not shared with affiliates, and no local time for commercials between programs was offered. Some stations used Saturday morning for Educational/Informational (E/I) programming, with infomercials relegated to before or after the block. Some refused Weekend Marketplace outright.
In September 2014, Weekend Marketplace was replaced in some markets by the E/I-focused Xploration Nation. |
227_21 | Criticism and legal issues
In the United States, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) requires that any infomercial 15 minutes or longer must disclose to viewers that it is a paid advertisement. An infomercial is required to be "clearly and conspicuously" marked as a "paid advertisement for [particular product or service], sponsored by [sponsor]" at the beginning ("following program") and end ("preceding program") of the advertisement and before ordering instructions are displayed. |
227_22 | Customer protection advocates recommend buyer beware: study the product and the claims before making a purchase. Many stations and networks normally run their own disclaimers before, during and/or after infomercials. Some mention the Better Business Bureau or a state/local customer protection agency. A "paid programming" bug in a corner of the screen during infomercials, particularly for financial products, is to avoid an exploitation of an "as seen on" claim of endorsement. Some, particularly smaller networks, only use a limited number of trusted advertisers. |
227_23 | Considerable FTC scrutiny is also given to results claims and testimonials. Rules controlling endorsements are periodically enhanced to increase customer protection and fill loopholes. Industry organizations such as the Electronic Retailing Association, which represents infomercial marketers, often try to minimize the impact of these rule changes. FTC enforcement has focused on testimonials for publishing "non-typical" and "completely fabricated" customer testimonials used within infomercials. In 2006, the first third-party testimonial verification company was launched, and it now independently pre-validates many testimonials.
Since the 1990s, federal and state customer protection agencies have criticized several prominent infomercial pitchmen, including Kevin Trudeau, Donald Barrett and, to a lesser extent, Matthew Lesko, and also Don Lapre, a salesman notorious for his get-rich-quick schemes. Some were successfully sued. |
227_24 | Programs that collect donations or sell via Premium-rate telephone number (900-number) have additional disclosure requirements.
As a putdown
The Los Angeles Times mediated a Newsweek review that used the term infomercial about a 1992 cookbook whose author's first was described as "hit No. 1 on the New York Times best-seller list."
Other possible putdowns include informercial-like and infomercial type stuff.
Parodies
The infomercial format has been widely parodied:
Saturday Night Lives "Bassomatic" skit featuring Dan Aykroyd in the 1970s may have presaged the genre; the target of the parody, Ron Popeil, would become an infomercial fixture in the 1980s and 1990s.
Fast Company published "The Greatest Infomercial Parodies Of All Time" in 2011.
Others have been done too, and these parodies are an ongoing source of amusement and creativity.
Other uses and definitions |
227_25 | Political infomercials
In the United States, the strategy of buying prime-time programming slots on major networks has been utilized by political candidates for both presidential and state office to present infomercial-like programs to sell a candidate's merits to the public. Fringe presidential candidate Lyndon LaRouche regularly bought time on CBS and local stations in the 1980s. In the 1990s, Ross Perot also bought network time in 1992 and 1996 to present his presidential policies to the public. The National Rifle Association has also aired programs via paid programming time to present their views on issues such as gun control and other issues while appealing to the public to join their organization. |
227_26 | Use during the 2008 presidential campaign
Hillary Clinton bought an hour of primetime programming on the Hallmark Channel in 2008 before the Super Tuesday primary elections, and on Texas-based regional sports network FSN Southwest before that state's primary to present a town hall-like program. Fellow presidential candidate Barack Obama's 2008 presidential campaign used infomercials extensively, including running a 24-hour channel on Dish Network.
One week before the 2008 general election, Obama purchased a 30-minute slot at 8 p.m. Eastern and Pacific Time during primetime on seven major networks (NBC, CBS, MSNBC, Fox, BET, TV One and Univision (with Spanish subtitles)) to present a "closing argument" to his campaign. The combination of these networks reportedly drew a peak audience of over 33 million viewers of the half-hour program, making it the single most watched infomercial broadcast in the history of U.S. television. |
227_27 | Aside from blocking viewer choice, reception was not all positive: an NBC reviewer referred to Obama as having a "thin resume". Obama opponent John McCain, commenting on pushing off the opening of the World Series, said "No one will delay the World Series with an infomercial when I’m president." |
227_28 | Children's programming
Although not meeting the definition of an infomercial per se, animated children's programming in the 1980s and early 1990s, which included half-hour animated series for franchises such as Transformers, My Little Pony, Go-Bots and BraveStarr were often described as essentially program-length commercials, as they also sold the tie-in toy lines and food products for the shows within commercials. The Children's Television Act of 1990 would end this practice and setting commercial limits. Currently, any advertisement for a tie-in product within the show is considered a violation of the FCC rules and is considered a "program length commercial" by their standards, putting the station at risk of paying large fines for violations.
Daytime programming |
227_29 | From the 1970s to early 1990s, locally produced morning and daytime programs designed mainly for a stay-at-home female audience featured light talk, followed by presentations of various products and services offerings of local businesses. A guest expert was often included. These were not infomercials: response was in-store, although the expert's phone number might be included. The format enabled presenting details beyond those possible in a traditional 30-second pre-recorded ad. To preclude conflict of interest, the program host was not associated in any way with the station's newsroom.
By the mid-2000s, these transitioned from locally produced programs to infomercials. Some programs had one or more 120-second pods, but these programs were all paid programming. These programs can be considered infomercials, albeit not exactly meeting the letter of the definition. |
227_30 | Broadcasters that adopted the model:
Meredith Corporation, which uses a modified form for their national/local hybrid program Better; the nationally produced program was canceled in May 2015.
Belo, now defunct.
The defunct LIN Media
Journal Broadcast Group stations acquired by the E. W. Scripps Company in April 2015 also feature a format called The Morning Blend on many of their stations, which is much closer to the Daytime format.
Infomercial companies
Traditional infomercial marketers (for example, Guthy-Renker, Beachbody, and Telebrands) source the products, pay to develop the infomercials, pay for the media, and are responsible for all sales of the product. Sometimes, they sell products they source from inventors. Telebrands's process of bringing a product to the air and to market was seen in the 2009 Discovery Channel series PitchMen, which featured Billy Mays and Anthony Sullivan, along with the top executives of Telebrands. |
227_31 | There is also a well-developed network of suppliers to the infomercial industry. These suppliers generally choose to focus on either traditional infomercials (hard sell approaches) or on using infomercials as advertising/sales channels for brand companies (branded approaches). In the traditional business, services are usually supplied by infomercial producers or by media buying companies. In the brand infomercial business, services are often provided by full service agencies who deliver strategy, creative, production, media, and campaign services.
Use around the world |
227_32 | The infomercial industry was started in the United States and that has led to the specific definitions of infomercials as direct response television commercials of specific lengths (30, 60 or 120 seconds; five minutes; minutes or 58 minutes and 30 seconds). Infomercials have spread to other countries from the U.S. However, the term "infomercial" needs to be defined more universally to discuss use in all countries. In general, worldwide use of the term refers to a television commercial (paid programming) that offers product for direct sale to persons via response through the web, by phone, or by mail. |
227_33 | There are few structures that apply everywhere in the international infomercial business. The regulatory environment in each country as well as that country's television traditions have led to variations in format, lengths, and rules for long form commercials and television commercials selling directly to customers. For example, in the early 1990s long form paid programming in Canada was required to consist only of photographs without moving video (this restriction no longer exists).
Many products which started in the United States have been taken into international distribution on television. In addition, each country has local entrepreneurs and marketers using the medium for local businesses. What may be called infomercials are most commonly found in North and South America, Europe, Japan and Southeast Asia. |
227_34 | In many countries, the infrastructure of direct response television distributors, telemarketing companies and product fulfillment companies (shipping, customer service) are more difficult and these missing pieces have limited the spread of the infomercial. Canadian Northern Response, an early non-USA entrant to the field, claims to have distributed "over 3,000 infomercials since 1984."
By 1996, countries with Teleshopping included France, Germany, UK, Japan, and Mexico. |
227_35 | Research on effectiveness
Research has been conducted on the general public's perceptions of infomercials. It was found that "With infomercials, you don't buy eyeballs, you buy responsiveness." Agee and Martin (2001) found that infomercial purchases involved some degree of planning rather than being purely impulse purchases. Aspects of advertising content also influenced whether the purchase decision was impulsive or planned. Martin, Bhimy and Agee (2002) studied the use of advertising content such as the use of testimonials and customer characteristics. Based on a survey of 878 people who had bought products after viewing infomercials, they found that infomercials were more effective if they used expert comments, testimonials, product demonstrations, and other approaches. Customer age and product type also influenced perceived effectiveness. |
227_36 | Time-slot effectiveness
Early research found that selecting the best time of day requires avoiding prime time, when "there's too much competition for viewers' attention."
Profitability
Profits from producing infomercials were described as not being "the real profits" when compared to "owning the product."
See also
Advertorial
Brokered programming
Direct response television
Home shopping
Informative advertising
Product demonstration
Psychological pricing
Sponsored film
Television advertisement
Telethon
References
Further reading
Advertising techniques
Brokered programming
Marketing techniques
Promotion and marketing communications
Television terminology
1980s neologisms
Interstitial television shows |
228_0 | Isaac (Yitzhak) Rülf (February 10, 1831 – September 18, 1902) was a Jewish teacher, journalist and philosopher. He became widely known for his aid work and as a prominent early Zionist.
Rülf was born in Rauischholzhausen, Hesse, Germany. He received a teaching certificate in 1849, became an assistant to the county rabbi and then taught in other small communities. He received his rabbinical certificate in 1854 from the University of Marburg and his Ph.D in 1865 at the University of Rostock. That year he became the rabbi of Memel, East Prussia.
Rülf first found fame for his part in the 'Jankel Widutzky case' in which an English minister attempted to convert Widutzky, a Jewish youth, in Memel. Rülf attacked the missionary in the article Jankel Widutzky, der den Händen der Judenbekehrungs Mission entzogene Knabe (1867), sparking indignation in Germany. Widutzky was thus not converted and entered Rabbinical college.
Rabbi of Memel |
228_1 | Memel, in addition to being an important port on the Baltic, was a frontier town and a crossroads between East and West – it lay at the tip of East Prussia, on the border of Russia's Lithuanian province (the Kovner Gubernie). |
228_2 | The Jewish community in Memel was divided between Western Jews (Prussian/German) and the Eastern Jews (Polish/Russian/Lithuanian), with the different groups having their own institutions and leaders. This mirrored a continent-wide division based largely on the Easterners' fixation on traditional religious education and their perceived ignorance of worldly affairs. Rülf arrived as rabbi of the German Jews but tried to unite the communities. Beginning in the late 1860s with his relief works, Rülf gained an international reputation for his assistance to Russian Jews. Thereafter, he strove to establish himself as expert on Eastern European Jewry and as a spokesman and intercessor on their behalf. He would use the press and public opinion as leverage for this activity, making the most important change in the tactics of intercession during the 19th century. |
228_3 | To supplement his small pay as rabbi, Rülf became an editor of the Memeler Dampfboot, the city's largest liberal newspaper. From 1872 until he left the city, he was editor-in-chief. In 1862 Rülf and Rabbi Yisrael Salanter founded a chevra kadisha together in Memel. In 1879 Rülf created an Armenschule, or school for poor children and in 1886 Rülf directed the funding and building of a synagogue for the German Jews. In 1875 for example, Rülf collected funds among the German Jews to assist the Lithuanian and Russian Jews in building their Beth Midrash. In this way he won over the Eastern Jews who had first dismissed this “Doktor-Rabbiner” of the wealthier German minority. In 1871 he and two collaborators caused a Jewish hospital to be built in Memel. It drew so many patients to the city that in 1896 a new, larger building was put up. It has been restored and still stands today, in use as a hospital, at its scenic hilltop site. |
228_4 | The early 1880s saw a series of efforts to force Jews out of Memel in increasing numbers. Rülf raised a great deal of money for the exiles' travel and living expenses. Many of these people were given enough to reach the United States. In 1885, Rülf used his political contacts in Germany to prevent a final mass expulsion of Jews from Memel.
In 1898, Rülf retired from his position and moved with his family to Bonn, Germany.
International aid work
Rülf travelled east to study the cruel conditions of Jewish life in Russia and Lithuania. In response he wrote My Journey to Kovno (1869) and Three Days in Jewish Russia (1882). During this time he received reports, smuggled over the Lithuanian border, on the Russian pogroms. In Memel these were translated into German and sent to England, where they later appeared in two long articles in the London Times on January 11 and 13, 1882. Russian Jews were even able to escape to Germany through an underground directed by Rülf. |
228_5 | Rülf established and headed the “Permanent Committee for Helping Russian Jews” in the 1880s. He organized a massive relief campaign in Germany for Russian Jews, and tens of thousands came to know him as 'Rabbi Hülf' or 'Dr. Hülf', meaning 'Help'. Rülf saved around 30,000 Jews from starvation during Lithuania's 1867-1868 famine. To this end, he collected an amazing 630,000 Mark in Germany, transferring it to 230 Lithuanian settlements over a year and a half.
Zionism |
228_6 | Rülf was struck by the fact that Russian Jews saw themselves simply as Jews, in contrast with 'Western' Jews who identified with their nation of residence. In 1881, he had a conversion to this view of Jewish identity. Within months, Russian Jew Leon Pinsker published Auto-Emancipation, calling for a Jewish state in response to anti-Semitism. Rülf agreed with the basic idea but little else, compelling him to write Aruchas Bas-Ammi (1883). There he went further than Pinsker, specifying that the Jewish homeland must be in Palestine and its language must be Hebrew, and calling for immediate purchase of land and immigration to Palestine.
Three years later, Rülf's was one of the first portraits to appear in Kneset Israel, a great distinction. Correspondents over these years included Pinsker and Nathan Birnbaum, coiner of the term Zionism. Rülf's letters and other writings are preserved in the Rülf Collection at the Central Zionist Archives in Jerusalem, Israel. |
228_7 | Rülf was hurt when, in 1896, Theodor Herzl was embraced as Zionism's international leader. That was the year in which Herzl published Der Judenstaat ("The Jewish State"). However, Rülf came to Herzl's defense against the anti-Zionist “Protest Rabbis” who impeded the First Zionist Congress, leveraging his considerable reputation and writing Declaration versus Declaration in the June 25, 1897 Die Welt. In 1898, Rülf introduced Herzl at the Second Zionist Congress at Basle, Switzerland.
In Memel, Rülf had been the mentor of David Wolffsohn, who went on to succeed Herzl as the second President of the World Zionist Organization. Wolffsohn came to Memel at age 17 from his Lithuanian hometown, and Rülf taught and greatly influenced him. |
228_8 | Late in life, Rülf attempted to warn European Jews of the dangers they faced from German anti-Semitism. In Topical Study, in the May 18, 1900 Die Welt, he wrote that the end of the century would not mean the end of the murder of millions of Jews. Less than fifty years later, his own children were unable to escape the Holocaust.
Family and legacy
Isaac Rülf died in Bonn, four years after relocating there to continue his work in philosophy. His sons became personal friends of Konrad Adenauer, future first Chancellor of West Germany. The danger to Jews from Nazi power increased while Adenauer was mayor of Cologne, and Adenauer offered refuge to Rülf's son Benno at his family home in Rhöndorf. However, Adenauer was himself forced to flee and take refuge at a monastery. Benno and his wife traveled to the Netherlands but, according to a statement of his daughter Elizabeth, he was deported and killed in Auschwitz. Isaac's son Jacob committed suicide in Bonn before being deported. |
228_9 | A street in Tel Aviv, Israel, is named for Isaac Rülf.
Books
Rülf published a five-volume work of philosophy, System of a New Metaphysics, in which he described his theories of theistic monism.
Meine Reise nach Kowno (1869)
My Journey to Kovno
Der Einheitsgedanke als Fundamentalbegriff (1880)
Drei Tage in Jüdisch-Russland (1882)
Three Days in Jewish Russia
Aruchas Bas-Ammi (1883)
Wissenschaft des Weltgedankens and Wissenschaft der Gedankenwelt, System einer Neuen Metaphysik (2 vols., 1888)
(the first volumes of System of a New Metaphysics)
Wissenschaft der Krafteinheit (1893)
Das Erbrecht als Erbübel (1893)
Legacy Law as a Basic Evil
Wissenschaft der Geisteseinheit (1898)
Wissenschaft der Gotteseinheit (1903)
(final volume of philosophy, published posthumously)
External links
Pictures of Rülf published during his lifetime
Meine Reise nach Kowno (1869)
Das Erbrecht als Erbübel (1893)
References
Bibliography |
228_10 | 1831 births
1902 deaths
People from Marburg-Biedenkopf
19th-century German rabbis
German Zionists
Jewish philosophers
People from East Prussia
People from Klaipėda |
229_0 | The Oregon Graduate Center was a unique, private, postgraduate-only research university in Washington County, Oregon, on the west side of Portland, from 1963 to 2001. The center was renamed the Oregon Graduate Institute in 1989. The Institute merged with the Oregon Health Sciences University in 2001, and became the OGI School of Science and Engineering within the (renamed) Oregon Health & Science University. The School was discontinued in 2008 and its campus in 2014. Demolition of the campus buildings began February 2017. |
229_1 | Oregon Graduate Center |
229_2 | The Oregon Graduate Center for Study and Research (OGC) was incorporated on 2 April 1963 as a university at the behest of Gov. Mark O. Hatfield, Tektronix co-founder Howard Vollum and the City Club of Portland, with the help of $2M grant from the Tektronix Foundation. Retired physician Samuel L. Diack of the Oregon Medical Research Foundation was named the first chairman of OGC's board of trustees, and Vollum was a board member. Diack is also noted as a founder of the Oregon Museum of Science and Industry. Physicist Donald L. Benedict of the Stanford Research Institute (SRI) was hired as the first president of OGC in 1966. The original campus, a former Martin Marietta building, was located at 9430 SW Barnes Road near the intersection of Oregon Route 217 and U.S. Route 26 in an unincorporated area just north of Beaverton next to Tek's Sunset facility. Hatfield was unsuccessful in his attempt to get $1.5M in seed funding for OGC from the state legislature. Financial support was an |
229_3 | ongoing problem for OGC, as demonstrated by the brief terms of several of its presidents. Funding in the late 1960s was received from Pacific Northwest Bell Telephone Company, and sought from the U.S. Department of Health, Education and Welfare and the National Institutes of Health. Other early backers and board members included Douglas Strain of Electro Scientific Industries (ESI), John Gray of Omark Industries Inc. and Ira Keller of Western Kraft Corporation. |
229_4 | A report by a committee of the Portland City Club asked, "Why does Portland lag so far behind in the great surge of science-based industry?" in 1963. At the time, metropolitan Portland had about 800,000 residents and its employment mainstays were timber and agriculture. The committee's answer to its question was, "Portland is the largest metropolitan area in the West without a full university." Portland State College (PSC), Reed College, Lewis & Clark College, the University of Portland and other halls of academe in northwestern Oregon were primarily undergraduate schools. PSC was also under pressure to become a university and a research institution, which it did in 1969 when it was renamed Portland State University (PSU). The Portland interests were competing with the University of Oregon (U of O) in Eugene and Oregon State University (OSU) in Corvallis for research funding. |
229_5 | Tektronix ("Tek"), the largest private employer in Oregon from the 1960s through the 1980s, was quoted, "...the creation of a graduate center 'an absolute necessity' for its operations because 'we find it extremely difficult to attract competent people to our plant, and we find those who have acquired with us a degree of scientific competence often leave us for the specific reason that they do not find here further help or stimulation to their scientific development. Tektronix stated that it would have to establish research and development facilities elsewhere near universities if a graduate training and research center was not founded in Portland." Tek encouraged employees to pursue advanced degrees and sometimes provided financial support. Tek started an in-house continuing education program in the late 1950s that rivaled the local community colleges in size. |
229_6 | Benedict's vision for OGC was based on the European model of research for a civilian-based economy, rather than a wartime economy as was common in the United States. Benedict liked the Oxford University tutorial system in the United Kingdom and the Technische Hochschule network in West Germany. Benedict had been in charge of SRI's European operations before he was hired by OGC. |
229_7 | The first six faculty—all chemists—and staff were hired in 1966, and the first students were admitted in 1969. Carl Miller, a structural engineer, was the first staff member hired, and laser expert J. Richard Kerr was the second. OGC moved to a newly developed 74-acre site at 20000 NW Walker Road on the Hillsboro-Beaverton boundary in August 1969, which was intended to be its permanent campus, adjacent to the Oregon National Primate Research Center. The new site had been the Donovan family's wheat farm. Both campuses used Portland mailing addresses, although neither is in Portland proper. The initial programs were in chemistry, physics and mathematics, without any departmental divisions. OGC had no undergraduates, dormitories, sororities, fraternities, student-athletes, mascots, Latin motto, homecoming parade or social science departments, ever. The first research project was a study of the propagation of laser beams through the atmosphere by Kerr. |
229_8 | The first master's degree was awarded to Terry D. Lee in organic chemistry in 1971, and the first doctor of philosophy to Paul M. Perry in applied physics in 1973. All programs were accredited by the Northwest Association of Schools and Colleges. In 1979, OGC had 23 faculty and 33 students. By 1988, OGC had 48 faculty members, all untenured, and 150 students. The purpose of OGC was to provide training, research and graduate credentials pertinent to Silicon Forest and other local industries, without the bureaucracy and politics of a conventional university, somewhat similar to Rockefeller University. |
229_9 | Original board of directors
The original board of trustees of OGC was Harry Alpert (U of O), Henry Cabell, Vernon Cheldelin (OSU), Arno H. Denecke, S.L. Diack (chairman), physicist Walter P. Dyke (Linfield College, Field Emission Corp.), Gerald W. Frank (Governor's Advisory Committee), educator James T. Marr, Harold M. Phillips, Donald E. Pickering (OHSU), G. Herbert Smith (Willamette University), Willard B. Spalding (dean of PSC), Richard H. Sullivan (president of Reed College), metallurgist R.H. "Rudy" Thielemann (Martin Marietta Metals Co.), C. H. Vollum and Harry White. |
229_10 | Presidential eras
Donald L. Benedict was originally hired as a consultant to Gov. Hatfield's committee. Benedict favored theoretical or pure research, as opposed to the applied research favored by most of the industrialists and philanthropists on the committee. His major accomplishment was acquiring the new campus on Walker Road from Tektronix Foundation, where the first new building was dedicated on 15 August 1969. Cost overruns resulted in his dismissal by the trustees just 12 days after the dedication. |
229_11 | E. Robert de Luccia, a Pacific Power & Light Co. executive and board member became interim president in 1969, following Benedict's dismissal. De Luccia had been a trustee from 1968 to 1972. OGC had to borrow money to meet the payroll and pay contractors for new buildings. Mergers with Lewis & Clark College and PSU and a takeover by Tek were proposed, and most OGC employees were looking for other jobs. De Luccia left OGC for a job in the Nixon administration in Southeast Asia in June 1971, and the original OGC facility on Barnes Road was sold for $350k that year. De Luccia was named a Life Trustee of OGI in 1990 for his longtime support. |
229_12 | Arthur F. Scott (1898-1982), a provost of OGC and former chemistry professor and president (1942 to 1945) at Reed College, was appointed acting president in 1971–1972. Negotiations with PSU failed to produce a merger, a request for $1.5M in operating funds from the state legislature was denied, and OGC was on the brink of extinction during this time. The chemistry building at Reed is named for Scott. |
229_13 | Western Kraft Corp. founder Ira C. Keller (1899-1978) was appointed president in 1972. His business approach kept OGC afloat, and brought full accreditation in 1973. Applied physics professor Lynwood W. Swanson and partners incorporated FEI Company in 1973, although Swanson remained on the faculty at OGC until 1987. The National Institutes of Health, National Science Foundation and Weyerhauser Co. all made generous grants to OGC during Keller's tenure. Keller retired as president in 1977 and became chairman of the board of trustees upon Diack's retirement. The Keller Fountain Park in downtown Portland was named in honor of Ira Keller for his philanthropy and civic involvement, and Keller Auditorium for his son Richard B. Keller. Western Kraft began as a joint venture between the Willamette Valley Lumber Co. and Santiam Lumber Co. in 1954, and merged with Willamette Industries Inc. in 1973. The younger Keller was a trustee of OGC from 1984 to 1987. |
229_14 | J. Richard "Dick" Kerr, a professor of electrical engineering at PSC and OGC and later the executive vice-president of OGC, was promoted to president in 1977. Kerr, a laser expert, was hired by OGC as a researcher in 1966. He resigned in 1979 amid more financial crises and controversy with the faculty over cutbacks. The Jack Murdock Research Laboratory, housing the physics and electrical engineering programs and funded by a $2M grant by the M.J. Murdock Charitable Trust, opened in 1978 as the third building on the OGC campus. After OGC, Kerr was an executive at Flight Dynamics Inc. and FLIR Systems Inc., and founded Max-Viz Inc. in Portland. |
229_15 | Electrical engineer F. Paul Carlson was hired by OGC as the vice-president for development in 1977 in the midst of a financial crisis, and became acting president in 1979. OGC purchased 100 acres of land adjacent to its 77-acre campus in 1980, and Carlson was elected president of the center. The additional land became the Science Park in 1982, a site for start-up companies intended as an endowment for OGC. Planar Systems, a Tek spin-off, began developing flat-panel displays there in 1984. Ground was broken for the Samuel L. Diack Memorial Library in 1979, and the building was completed in 1980, named in honor of the first chairman. Jacqueline Jackson, coordinator of a gifted education program in Portland Public Schools (Oregon), started the Saturday Academy, a science program for high school students at OGC and other area campuses, in May 1983. Vollum was awarded OGC's first honorary doctor of science degree in 1984. Carlson retired as academic president of OGC, and became |
229_16 | president of the Oregon Graduate School Corporation and chairman of the OGC board of trustees in 1985. The OGC Corp. was formed to be the developer and landlord for Science Park after the withdrawal of Rembold Corp. The Science Park was intended to provide, in the form of an estimated $4M annual rent from tenants, the endowment that OGC sorely needed for its survival. Planar Systems was the first tenant, in August 1983. A campus quarterly magazine, Visions, was begun in the spring of 1985, with historian Norman R. Eder as its managing editor and Georgiana Johnsrud as editor. The circulation of Visions reached a peak of ~15,000. Prolific author Lawrence E. Murr was a professor of MS&E and the vice-president for academic affairs during Carlson's term. Carlson returned briefly in 1986 as acting president of OGC upon Kahne's departure, then resigned as chairman of the board and took a job with Honeywell. |
229_17 | Stephen J. Kahne (1937- ), an electrical engineer and dean of engineering at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI), served as president of OGC in 1985–1986. Before RPI, he was a professor at the University of Minnesota and Case Western Reserve University, directed a division of the National Science Foundation, and was president of the IEEE Control Systems Society in 1981. Vollum, upon his death in 1986, bequeathed $14.8M to OGC, which became OGC's first endowment. Kahne worked for the MITRE Corp. and Embry Riddle Aeronautical University after leaving OGC. Lawyer Monford Orloff served as chairman of the board of OGC circa 1986. |
229_18 | James J. Huntzicker was hired by OGC as a professor of atmospheric chemistry in 1974. He served as acting president from 1986 to 1988. The Oregon Institute for Advanced Computing opened in 1988 on the OGC campus, intended to be the SEMATECH of parallel computing. Huntzicker stayed on as a professor at OGC, and joined OHSU in 2001 when OGI merged with OHSU. He became Head of the Department of Management in Science & Technology in 2004, which became the Division of Management in the OHSU School of Medicine. As head of the Division of Management he co-led the development of the OHSU-PSU MBA in Healthcare Management in the School of Medicine. He is a former chairman of the board of directors for Saturday Academy. |
229_19 | Dwight A. Sangrey, a professor of civil engineering at Cornell University and Carnegie Mellon University and dean of engineering at RPI, was hired by OGC as president in 1988, "with a mandate to increase significantly the size of OGC's faculty and student body." OGC was renamed OGI in 1989. Sangrey was awarded the State-of-the-Art Civil Engineering Award by ASCE in 1990 for a paper on the reliability of offshore foundations such as oil rigs. FEI Company moved into Science Park circa 1990, but relocated to its present headquarters in Hillsboro in 1992. The 65,000-ft2 Cooley Science Center, the first new laboratory building on campus since 1983, was completed in 1993. Sangrey left in 1994, and was hired as an administrator by Pacific University in 2009. |
229_20 | Paul E. Bragdon, a lawyer and president of Reed College 1971–1988, was succeeded Sangrey in 1994, and took on the task of rescuing OGI from a $2M deficit. Bragdon had been a member of the OGI board of trustees. He retired in 1998, but served as an interim president of Lewis & Clark College in 2004–2005. He was awarded an honorary D.Sc. by OHSU in 2004. OGI reported 448 employees in 1994. A master's degree in management in Science and Technology, in conjunction with Willamette University's Atkinson Graduate School of Management, was launched in late 1994 in a ceremony attended by U.S. Senator Mark Hatfield.
Paul Clayton, a professor of materials science and engineering and the campus provost, served briefly as an interim president in 1998 after Bragdon's departure. Clayton's research included tribology and wear, in addition to his administrative duties. |
229_21 | The last president, Edward W. Thompson came to OGI in 1998 from HRL Laboratories, where he led a team of 40 researchers developing technology for defense contracting, telecommunications and space. Thompson became the dean of the OGI School of Science and Engineering and a vice-president of OHSU after the merger in 2001. |
229_22 | Oregon Graduate Institute |
229_23 | The name of OGC was changed on 1 November 1989 to the Oregon Graduate Institute of Science & Technology (OGI), on Dwight Sangrey's watch. Sangrey foresaw an education-business complex for OGI similar to Research Triangle Park in North Carolina. By 1995, OGI had grown to 153 full-time and adjunct faculty members and 1100 students in full-time, part-time and continuing education enrollment, in six departments. Edward H. Cooley (1922-2000), founder and retired chairman of Precision Castparts Corporation, was the chairman of the board of trustees. The board also included executives from ESCO Corporation, Planar Systems Inc., Tektronix, Intel Corp. and ESI Inc. The board adopted a mission statement: "Oregon Graduate Institute of Science & Technology, the only private graduate school of science and engineering in the Pacific Northwest, educates leaders and creates knowledge through research." The annual budget was $14M, consisting of 9% from tuition, 8% from annual giving, 8% from |
229_24 | endowments, 68% from government and industrial research grants, and 6% from other sources. |
229_25 | The original faculty members, most of whom were recruited by Benedict, were honored at the 1990 commencement. They were: Harlan U. Anderson, Robert L. Autrey, Douglas F. Barofsky, Edward J. Baum, Warren E. Budden-baum, G. Doyle Daves Jr., Roger Eiss, the late Richard A. Elliott, Stephen Fisk, George A. Gray, James K. Hurst, J. Richard Kerr, George G. Lendaris, Thomas M. Loehr, Hans Oesterreicher, George P. O'Leary, David K. Roe, Erwin Rudy and Gerald J. Throop. The graduating class of 34 students consisted of 24 master's degrees and ten doctorates. |
229_26 | OGI's most popular degree in 2001 was management in science and technology. At the doctorate level, the most popular degree was in computer science and engineering. The least popular degrees were in biochemistry/ molecular biology and MS&E. Non-degree programs offered by OGI included Saturday Academy, an Applied Mathematics Certificate, the Solid State Devices Consortium, and short courses under the Center for Professional Development umbrella. OGC was a partner in the Oregon Center for Advanced Technology Education, created by Gov. Victor Atiyeh in 1985 in conjunction with PSU, OSU and U of O. OGI quickly became very competitive with other Oregon universities in research and graduate degrees in STEM fields. In 1995, OGI conferred 77 master's degrees and 26 doctorates, compared to 218 and 26 for the U of O, OSU and PSU combined. |
229_27 | Merger with OHSU |
229_28 | OGI considered mergers with OSU and PSU in the late 1990s, but the 90-mile distance of OSU in Corvallis and the large-public-university nature of both OSU and PSU were deterrents. The OGI board squelched a proposed merger with OSU in 2000. OGI merged with the Oregon Health Sciences University (OHSU) in July 2001, with OGI becoming the OGI School of Science and Engineering, one of four Schools within OHSU. OGI president Ed Thompson became the dean of the school. The enlarged OHSU was slightly renamed the Oregon Health & Science University. Although OHSU is the state medical school, it had become a public corporation in 1995; this was closer to OGI's business model than either OSU or PSU. The MS&E department moved to downtown Portland and became part of PSU's mechanical engineering department in 2001. Fragments of other departments also moved to PSU. The OHSU-OGI merger was funded in part by a $4M grant from the M.J. Murdock Charitable Trust, an organization started by Vollum's |
229_29 | partner at Tektronix, Jack Murdock. The award was earmarked to help launch a new biomedical engineering program at OGI SS&E. |
229_30 | Presidents
Donald L. Benedict, physicist, 1966-1969
E. Robert de Luccia, 1969-1971
Arthur F. Scott, chemist, 1971-1972
Ira C. Keller, engineer, 1972-1977
J. Richard Kerr, electrical engineer, 1977-1979
F. Paul Carlson, electrical engineer, 1979-1985
Stephen J. Kahne, electrical engineer, 1985-1986
James J. Huntzicker, chemist, 1986-1988
Dwight A. Sangrey, civil engineer, 1988-1994
Paul E. Bragdon, lawyer, 1994-1998
Paul Clayton, metallurgical engineer, 1998
Edward W. Thompson, 1998-2001 |
229_31 | Legacy of OGI
OHSU sold the 40-acre OGI School of Science and Engineering campus at 20000 NW Walker Road in Hillsboro in 2007 for $44.4M, but also signed a 7-year lease for the property. The campus had 15 buildings totaling 286,000 ft2. The OGI School of Science and Engineering was renamed the Department of Science & Engineering within the School of Medicine at OHSU in 2008. OHSU vacated the OGI property in 2014, and it was sold again in 2015 for $15.1M. The OGI degree programs in biochemistry, molecular biology, computer science and engineering, electrical engineering, and environmental science and engineering were moved to OHSU's Marquam Hill complex. The rest went to PSU or were discontinued. Science Park was renamed AmberGlen Business Center. The Samuel L. Diack Memorial Library closed in June 2013.
Companies that have roots at OGI include Cascade Microtech Inc. in 1983, Integra Telecom Inc. in 1984, and electron-ion microscope maker FEI Company. |
229_32 | First M.Sc. graduate Terry Lee earned a Ph.D. in chemistry at the U of O in 1977, and returned to OGC as a post-doctoral fellow in mass spectrometry. He was hired by the Beckmann Research Institute in California in 1982, and was working for the City of Hope National Medical Center in protein research in 1988. First Ph.D. graduate Paul Perry became a computer services manager at Western Geophysical Exploration Production in Texas. |
229_33 | Scholarly books by OGC/OGI faculty and alumni
D.G. Atteridge, Advanced Nanoscale Coatings with Plasma Spray, PN, 2000.
A.P. Black, S. Ducasse, O. Nierstrasz, D. Pollet, Squeak By Example, Square Bracket Associates, 2009, .
J.A. Cooper & Dorothy Malek, eds., Proceedings of the 1981 International Conference on Residential Solid Fuels: Environmental Impacts and Solutions, Oregon Graduate Center, 1982.
J.M. Cregg, ed., Pichia Protocols (Methods in Molecular Biology), Second Edition, Humana Press, 2007, .
J.R. Kerr, DIY Advanced Model Railroad Signaling Electronics: Sensors, Interactivity, Track Control, CreateSpace, 2015, .
M.A.K. Khalil, ed., Atmospheric Methane: Its Role in the Global Environment, Springer, 2000, .
L.E. Murr, Interfacial Phenomena in Metals and Alloys, Addison-Wesley, 1975, .
L.E. Murr, What Every Engineer Should Know about Material and Component Failure, Failure Analysis and Litigation, Marcel Dekker, 1986, . |
229_34 | L.E. Murr, Electron and Ion Microscopy and Microanalysis: Principles and Applications, Second Edition, CRC Press, 1991, .
L.E. Murr, Handbook of Materials Structures, Properties, Processing and Performance, 2015 Edition, Springer, 2014, .
J.H. Orloff, L.W. Swanson & M.W. Utlaut, High Resolution Focused Ion Beams: FIB and its Applications: The Physics of Liquid Metal Ion Sources and Ion Optics and Their Application to Focused Ion Beam Technology, 2003 Edition, Kluwer Academic/Plenum Publishers, 2003, .
J.H. Orloff, ed., Handbook of Charged Particle Optics, Second Edition, CRC Press, 2009, .
J.F. Pankow, Aquatic Chemistry Concepts, Second Edition, CRC Press, 2016, . |
229_35 | References
External links
Facebook page for OGI alumni with campus photos and a 1980s video featuring an aging Howard Vollum
Paul Bragdon at Reed College
Ed Cooley at Reed College
Jim Huntzicker at OHSU
OHSU Digital Commons, a repository for all the theses and dissertations from OGC/OGI
Saturday Academy
Arthur Scott at Reed College
List of United States patents granted to OGC/OGI faculty and students
Oregon Graduate Institute people
Universities and colleges accredited by the Northwest Commission on Colleges and Universities
Engineering universities and colleges in Oregon
Portland State University
Oregon Health & Science University
Tektronix
1963 establishments in Oregon
Schools in Hillsboro, Oregon
Educational institutions established in 1963 |
230_0 | Trouble Man: Heavy Is the Head is the eighth studio album by American hip hop recording artist T.I. It was released on December 18, 2012, by Grand Hustle Records and Atlantic Records. The production was provided by some of T.I.'s longtime collaborators; including DJ Toomp, Jazze Pha, Pharrell Williams and Lil' C. These high-profile record producers such as T-Minus, Cardiak, No I.D., Rico Love, Planet VI, Tommy Brown and Chuck Diesel, also contributed to the album. The album features guest appearances from P!nk, Lil Wayne, André 3000, R. Kelly, Akon, Meek Mill, CeeLo Green, ASAP Rocky, Trae tha Truth, Victoria Monet and Grand Hustle's own D.O.P.E. |
230_1 | The album's first single, "Go Get It" (released on July 17, 2012), becoming a moderate hit, peaking at number 77 on the US Billboard Hot 100. The second single, "Ball" featuring Lil Wayne, was released on October 16, 2012. The single peaked at number 50 on the US Billboard Hot 100, logging 20 weeks on the chart. In April 2013, the single was certified gold by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA). The album debuted at number 2 on the US Billboard 200, selling 179,000 copies in its first week of release; also debuting at number one on both the Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums and the Top Rap Albums charts, respectively.
Upon its release, Trouble Man: Heavy Is the Head received "generally favorable reviews" from most music critics, where most music critics saw it as an improvement from his previous album No Mercy (2010). As of September 28, 2013, the album has sold 502,000 copies in the United States. |
230_2 | Background
In August 2011, after being released from prison, T.I. began making up for lost time by appearing on remixes for everyone from Jay-Z and Kanye West ("Niggas in Paris") to Kesha ("Sleazy"); as well as recording 86 tracks for Trouble Man. In an interview with Rolling Stone, T.I. previously stated he was debating between two titles for the album, Kill the King and Trouble Man. T.I. later revealed to Billboard the title of the album to be the latter. The title was partly inspired by Marvin Gaye’s 1972 song of the same name. |
230_3 | When T.I. was asked about titling his album the same name as that of a Marvin Gaye song he said: "I felt like at that moment in time, Marvin Gaye's life embodied what the word 'Trouble Man' and what the song meant in all senses of the word. And today... I feel like the past six, seven years of my life, and the adversity...in my life that I have endured and overcame, that is synonymous and it embodies what the word 'Trouble Man' means today. Marvin Gaye did it for them back then, and I'm doing it for us right now," added T.I.. "Nothing but love and respect, and nothing but salutations and respect to Marvin Gaye and his whole family." |
230_4 | When T.I. spoke on the feel of the album he stated: "It has a more balanced blend of that vintage 'U Don't Know Me,' 'Top Back,' Trap Muzik sound with some of the more mainstream radio records that you heard from Paper Trail. It's more of a cohesive blend." In an interview with Rap-Up, T.I. revealed his thoughts on the album and claimed: "I think it’s a lot more urban than Paper Trail, and less apologetic than No Mercy. I think it’s more diversified than T.I. vs. T.I.P. though. It’s got a lotta heart, it’s got a lotta edge. It’s a creative album. It’s probably harder than most of the shit that’s coming out right now. |
230_5 | On October 23, 2012, T.I. held an NYC listening session, during which he described the inspiration for the album: "I've learned that one thing about my life that is certain is trouble...Be that as it may, I shall embrace that fact and not evade it. We all have faults. Before I let you stand on your high horse and point a finger back down at me, I'm going to give you a big, stiff 'Fuck you.'" On Power 105's The Breakfast Club, T.I. hinted that Trouble Man could be his last album, explaining that he wanted to quit rapping, believing that it is not how it once was: |
230_6 | In December 2012, during his interview with Rap-Up, T.I. stated he recorded over 120 songs and had to narrow it down to 16 that would make Trouble Man: Heavy Is the Head. T.I. claimed that he's going to take unused material from Heavy is the Head and arrange it into a new album titled Trouble Man: He Who Wears the Crown: "Well, I had so much music man. I recorded like 120-something songs for this project, and I imagined that, you know, if just giving the amount of music that we had left over that we weren't able to put on this project, that we’d do a sequel. So, you know, the sequel to this album will be He Who Wears the Crown. That’s the primary reason for the subtitle. That's the purpose of the sequel, so we’ll have a platform to display and release these songs." |
230_7 | Recording and production |
230_8 | On October 19, 2012, in an interview, West Coast rapper Kendrick Lamar revealed that he recorded a song with T.I. for the album. The song reportedly also features B.o.B and samples Gotye's hit single "Somebody That I Used to Know". The song's mass appeal attracted T.I. to the sample: "The record's just jamming. When I heard the twist they put on it, man, it was kind of a no-brainer." T.I. also chose the record for its crossover ability, which he has always been successful with in the past: "It sounds like hip-hop with an international twist to it, and I'm known for taking those types of records and bridging that gap between what we do and what they do," he explained, dropping in a couple of examples. "From M.I.A.'s 'Paper Planes' to 'Swagga Like Us,' we took [Crystal Waters'] 'Gypsy Woman' for 'Why You Wanna.'" Over the drum-heavy sample, Lamar and Bobby Ray join T.I. in sharing some nostalgic stories, which he says reminds him of some of a few renowned MCs and their classic projects: |
230_9 | "[We're] taking turns on our story about a female that we knew years, years, years ago before we were who we are today. It kinda puts me in the mind of the 'Da Art Of Storytellin' [and The Art of Storytelling] from Outkast and Slick Rick. It puts me in the mind of that." The song, which failed to make the album's final track listing probably due to sample clearances, is titled "Memories Back Then". On December 17, 2012, T.I. stopped by Sway Calloway's Sway In The Morning radio show to promote the album, while there he premiered "Memories Back Then". |
230_10 | In December 2012, in an interview with Rap-Up, T.I. shared details about his collaboration with singer-songwriter Pink on the T-Minus-produced "Guns and Roses," which he describes as a "bittersweet romantic story." "We found that we had a few things in common," says T.I. of the pop-rocker. "We clicked. She real people, she from the streets. I’m a real cat, I’m from the streets. We found ourselves in rooms where we were like, ‘You know what? These people fake as hell in here. Let’s get out of here.’" In a listening session at NYC's Germano Studios, where T.I. played ten songs from the album for industry tastemakers and label executives, he stated he had big hopes for the song. |
230_11 | T.I. was also able to work with fellow Atlanta rapper, Outkast's André 3000 for the first time after years of trying to collaborate: "We've been trying to put this particular collaboration together since the King album. Every album since King I've called Andre and been like 'Hey, I'm working on an album, let's get together.' And he'd say 'Okay, let's see what we got that makes sense.' And we've met a handful of times. This is the first time that it ... came together. I'm extremely proud, honored, and privileged." And while T.I. admits that André 3000 out shined on "Sorry," he's not mad: "He did get down on me on my record, I can’t front," laughs Tip. "But to me I’m honored and it’s a pleasure that he would even choose my record to do that on." The song was co-produced by former Grand Hustle intern Sir Clef alongside Jazze Pha, the latter of whom has helmed tracks for T.I. such as "Chooz You" and "Let's Get Away". |
230_12 | T.I. also worked with his former Grand Hustle signee, Philadelphia-based rapper Meek Mill on the album. Before Rick Ross signed him to Maybach Music Group and he cut off his braids, T.I. took the Philadelphia rapper under his wing and showed him the ropes: "He was around to observe a lot and he took it and he used it to his advantage, which is extremely commendable." They ended up recording "G Season". "‘G Season’ is basically just two cats who are cut from a different cloth, separating themselves from the suckers," T.I. told Rap-Up TV. This collaboration would come together after they met each other at the club. T.I. said in an interview that Jay-Z was originally supposed to be featured on "G Season". |
230_13 | On "Can You Learn," which was originally going to be the title-track, T.I. and R. Kelly talk to the ladies from a different perspective: "This record sounds to me like what you would expect to hear if Tupac collaborated with Nate Dogg," said T.I. of the DJ Montay-produced track, which was inspired by his own leading lady, Tameka "Tiny" Cottle. "I really feel the connection between the music and the listener, especially if the listener is a lady or a gentleman who has had a lady who stuck by him through all of the ups and downs, the peaks and valleys that life has to offer. She’s proven herself to be a rider." |
230_14 | The production on the album was also handled by T.I.'s longtime friend and frequent collaborator DJ Toomp. Toomp produced two tracks, "Trap Back Jumpin" and the aggressive "Who Want Some," which T.I. affectionately referred to as the "What You Know" of this project. High-profile record producer No I.D. also worked with T.I. on the album, producing their first collaboration, "Wildside" featuring Harlem rapper ASAP Rocky. |
230_15 | Release and promotion
In preparation for the album's release, T.I. released a promotional mixtape, titled Fuck da City Up, on January 1, 2012. During a sit-down with XXL, T.I. revealed a few collaborations for the album, including a song with André 3000 and announced R. Kelly to be featured on the title track. After initially announcing that the album would be released on September 4, 2012, T.I. announced on August 3, that it would be pushed back to a later date in 2012. He also stated that the reason for the delay was because he was still deciding between 86 different songs for the final album. On October 23, 2012, T.I. previewed twelve tracks from the album at its listening party in New York City, and also revealed their titles. The tracks previewed feature artists such as Kendrick Lamar, Cee Lo Green, André 3000, B.o.B, R. Kelly and ASAP Rocky. |
230_16 | Singles
The album's intended first single, titled "Love This Life" (which was produced by production team 1500 or Nothin'), was released on April 3, 2012. The song is thematically reminiscent of T.I.'s 2008 hit single "Whatever You Like". Markman compared T.I.'s delivery to that on "Whatever You Like", calling it "much darker." Trent Fitzgerald of PopCrush called it "a great rap ballad that could make the toughest neighborhood thug want to buy candy and flowers for his girlfriend." The song peaked at number 81 on the US Billboard Hot 100 and number 39 on the Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs charts. The album's intended second single, titled "Like That" (which was produced by Grand Hustle in-house producers Lil' C and Mars of 1500 or Nothin'), was released on May 22, 2012. Both of these songs failed to make the standard track list. |
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