From direct marketing tool to digital niche product: a Reader’s Digest Sweepstakes case study

This report explores how Reader’s Digest Canada’s digital strategies are used within an existing brand framework to adapt to a diverse and changing media landscape. Using a case study of a direct marketing effort, the RD Sweepstakes (Sweeps), the effects of digitization on the development of new business opportunities are explored. With direct marketing practices following a digital trajectory (in response to audience migration to online platforms), the Sweeps has gradually carved out a niche of its own. This report reaffirms the marketing function of the Sweeps as well as argues that the Sweeps is a vertical capable of generating its own direct revenue. By citing market research and beta testing in the United States and Canada, two monetization models for a stand-alone Sweeps product are considered. Conclusions are drawn that demonstrate the viability of a Sweeps mobile application while taking heed of legal implications, market context, and overall brand equity

Quartet Mountain Lamprophyres and crustal xenoliths: new insights into the Mesoproterozoic metamorphic history of northwestern Laurentia

The Quartet Mountain Lamprophyres are Early Cambrian ultramafic dykes that crosscut Proterozoic sedimentary strata in the Wernecke Mountains, east-central Yukon. They were derived from low-degree partial melting of a light REE-enriched garnetiferous upper mantle and have near-chondritic Nd530 values of -1.5 to 1.9. The lamprophyres co ntain xenoliths derived from the crust and upper mantle. SHRIMP U-Pb isotopic analysis of zircon from five xenoliths identified ages of metamorphism, at 1.60 Ga, 1.27 Ga and 1.15 Ga. The 1.60 and 1.27 Ga events were likely caused by nearby, documented events of metasomatism and magmatism. The 1.15 Ga metamorphism correlates with scattered igneous and metamorphic ages from the northern and central North American Cordillera, the Grenville orogen and the Sibao orogen of South China. The 1.15 Ga event in northwestern Cordillera is thought to reflect crustal heating in an extensional regime generated by the oblique convergence of the Yangtze Craton with western Laurentia

Rifting of Western Laurentia at 1.38 Ga: The Hart River Sills of Yukon, Canada

The Hart River sills are a set of mafic to intermediate intrusions that occur in northern Yukon, Canada. The largest sills are over 500 m thick and over 200 km long. New U-Pb dates of 1382.15 ± 0.39 Ma and 1382.14 ± 0.36 Ma were obtained via chemical abrasion thermal ionization mass spectrometry on zircon. Whole rock initial neodymium isotopic compositions of the Hart River sills are juvenile and have εNdi from +1.5 to +4.0. The primary mineralogy of the Hart River sills is predominated by clinopyroxene and plagioclase. Geochemical modeling indicates that the Hart River sills lie on a common liquid line of descent defined by a fractionating assemblage of plagioclase, clinopyroxene and minor olivine. The Hart River sills have rare earth element and high field strength abundances similar to normal mid-ocean ridge basalts (N-MORB) but are enriched in large ion lithophile elements. The Sm/Yb and Dy/Zr ratios indicate \u3e8% partial melting of spinel-bearing mantle. During the emplacement of the Hart River sills, western Laurentia was juxtaposed with Australia and eastern Antarctica within the supercontinent Columbia. The degree of partial melting, similarity to N-MORB, and juvenile isotopic signature are consistent with an episode of rifting at 1.38 Ga. Coeval magmatism and intracontinental rift basins farther south on Laurentia provide additional evidence for rifting of supercontinent Columbia at 1.38 Ga

A juvenile Paleozoic ocean floor origin for eastern Stikinia, Canadian Cordillera

International audienceThe Cordillera of Canada and Alaska is a type example of an accretionary orogen, but the origin of some terranes remains contentious (e.g., Stikinia of British Columbia and Yukon, Canada). Presented herein are igneous and detrital zircon U/Pb-Hf and trace-element data, as well as the first radiolarian ages from the Asitka Group, the basement to eastern Stikinia. The data are used to evaluate the role of juvenile and ancient crust in the evolution of Stikinia and the tectonic environment of magmatism. Two rhyolites are dated by U-Pb zircon at 288.64 ± 0.21 Ma and 293.89 ± 0.31 Ma, with εHf(t) = +10. Red chert contains radiolarians that are correlated with P. scalprata m. rhombothoracata + Ruzhencevispongus uralicus assemblages (Artinskian–Kungurian). Detrital zircon U/Pb-Hf from a rare Asitka Group sandstone have a mode at ca. 320 Ma and εHf(t) +10 to +16; the detrital zircon suite includes five Paleoproterozoic zircons (~5% of the population). Detrital zircons from a stratigraphically overlying Hazelton Group (Telkwa Formation) volcanic sandstone indicate deposition at ca. 196 Ma with zircon εHf(t) that are on a crustal evolution line anchored from the Asitka Group. Zircon trace-element data indicate that the Carboniferous detrital zircons formed in an ocean arc environment. The Proterozoic detrital zircons were derived from a peripheral landmass, but there is no zircon εHf(t) evidence that such a landmass played any role in the magmatic evolution of eastern Stikinia. The data support that eastern Stikinia formed on Paleozoic ocean floor during the Carboniferous to early Permian. Consistent with previous fossil modeling, zircon statistical comparisons demonstrate that Stikinia and Wrangellia were related terranes during the Carboniferous to Permian, and they evolved separately from Yukon-Tanana terrane and cratonic North America

Challenging the traceability of natural gold by combining geochemical methods: French Guiana example

International audienceConsidering the high economic importance and worldwide distribution of gold, the ability to identify its provenance is critical and challenging to ensuring a responsible supply chain from deposit to consumer, especially within conflict-affected areas. Here we present an innovative approach to trace the provenance of natural gold from French Guiana through a combination of geochemical and statistical methods. This approach is divided in three steps and allows the identification of illicit gold, the certification of the declared gold origin coming from legal operators and, in some cases, the identification of unknown gold. French Guiana was chosen as a demonstration case of our approach because it is a well-known conflict-affected area where illegal mining is widespread. In the first step, we showed that the use of illegal Hg amalgamation can be easily revealed by looking the gold grain morphology with an optical microscope or by detecting the Hg with laser-induced breakdown spectroscopy that allow direct detection on the field. In the second and principal step, we demonstrated that a declared provenance of gold can be certify with a high degree of confidence by measuring the Ag content of a gold grain population and by checking it against a database with the Kolmogorov-Smirnov statistic. In the final step that allows the identification of the origin of unknown gold, we used (i) the content of minor elements (Cu and Hg), (ii) the identification of mineral inclusions and their relative proportions within samples and (iii) the trace element composition of natural gold grains determined by LA-ICP-MS and coupled with a permutational multivariate analysis of variance and a similarity percentage analysis. This method allows the identification of the provenance of 69% of the gold samples; the provenance of other gold populations (31%) cannot be identified because of their geological similarity with other groups. The traceability of natural gold can be guaranteeing with our innovative approach, in particular by certifying declared gold population provenance. Further challenges to be addressed will be the implementation of such approach in others conflict-affected regions to support the global supply chain of gold

Cryogenian magmatism along the north-western margin of Laurentia: Plume or rift?

© 2017 Elsevier B.V. Here we present a new U-Pb baddeleyite ID-TIMS age of 713.7±0.9Ma on the shoshonitic Tatonduk Suite near the Yukon-Alaska border in the Proterozoic Tatonduk inlier, which occur as mafic and intermediate dykes and a sequence of basaltic to andesitic volcanic flows immediately beneath iron formation-bearing Sturtian glacial deposits correlated with the early Cryogenian Rapitan Group.Considering the age overlap with what is inferred to represent the Franklin Large Igneous Province (LIP) of northern Canada, the Tatonduk Suite might logically be considered a far-flung component of the Franklin Large Igneous Province. However, the Tatonduk Suite was emplaced in an actively extending environment >1200km from the plume head on Melville Island and does not obviously align with the Franklin dyke trend. Furthermore, major, trace and isotopic data on the Tatonduk Suite reveal a composition that is unique from the Franklin LIP and most likely reflects melting of potassic and trace element enriched sub-continental lithospheric mantle at pressures of less than 10kb. These volcanics and dykes highlight the complexity in defining what constitutes a LIP. The Tatonduk Suite either represent a non-plume end-member composition of the Franklin LIP, or more likely, rift volcanics associated with extension along the actively extending margin of northwestern Laurentia. Although the plume and rifting may be geodynamically linked, this interpretation suggests that this new age for the Tatonduk Suite does not constrain the timing of Franklin magmatism.The Tatonduk Suite was emplaced during the Sturtian Snowball Earth event and contributes to the growing body of geochronological data that indicates the onset of glaciation at ca. 717Ma. Furthermore, this age provides direct evidence for the syn-glacial origin of Sturtian iron formation in the Tatonduk inlier and further links iron formation to widespread mafic magmatism at this time