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The Brand Called Obama / Given the passions of this year's presidential campaign, we weren't surprised by the intensity of responses to our April cover story. There were Obama fans ("I can't help but be inspired") and flamers ("The man blurs the line between socialism and communism"). There were even those who interpreted our piece as an endorsement rather than an analysis of what Obama's rise means for business. (On that score, we plead not guilty.) We disagree with one reader who lamented that diversity will destroy America. But many commenters made insightful points about marketing, the brand of Bush, the lessons of Apple, and more.

A Remix Culture
Henry Jenkins argued in his keynote at SXSW Interactive recently that accusing Obama of plagiarism (as the Clinton camp did when it brought forward that Obama had borrowed words from past speeches of Massachusetts governor Deval Patrick) misses the point: It's a remix culture, stupid! The Obama brand is all software and only a little hardware, and it comes with an open SDK (software developer kit) -- a dynamic, modular platform that both individual campaigners and institutional networks can plug into.

Tim Leberecht
San Francisco, California

I agree that Barack Obama is a brand that represents my generation. We know the difference between leaders and bosses, and we are taking social change into our own hands.

Clark Patrick
St. Paul, Minnesota

Obama may be a brand. He has a nice shiny label (passionate speeches and a smile) that definitely draws attention. But he is not even close to being presidential material. As a brand, he is comparable to the Zune, the MP3 player that Microsoft made to compete with the iPod. Zune has the correct heritage but in no way is it close to being an iPod.

John Weller
Sarasota, Florida

Ellen Mcgirt's piece on Barack Obama shed a nice light on the brand of the man likely to be the next president, but I thought the story was remiss in glossing over the brand-development strategy employed by the current president. For many Americans in 2000, an outsider from Austin, with an iconic one-letter logo and a hollow promise to be a "uniter, not a divider" and a "compassionate conservative," was also "as good as it gets." In many parts of Texas, the "W" stickers on the back of pickups and SUVs still pervade -- a regular reminder that a brand developed eight years ago still has some punch within its niche.

Jacob Lipp
Houston, Texas

The benchmark of a great brand is one that makes a promise and delivers with staying power. Think Apple, Microsoft, the Beatles, Elvis. In this vein, I would have to disagree with Keith Reinhard, chairman emeritus of DDB Worldwide. He states that Brand Obama has the three components of what you want out of a brand -- new, different, and attractive. What Reinhard is talking about is the trimmings without the substance. The endgame for a brand is not what us media geniuses create. It is what the customer decides to keep around.