I've gotten emails from several of you throughout the summer asking, "What happened to the culture updates?" Well we haven't gone anywhere, sort of. I did stop sending our updates during the summer because of my heavy travel schedule with Awake to Life events. But we're back in full swing and here with the first update.

Each year there are countless award shows where the red carpet is rolled out so in order to inflate the egos of stars just a little more by the critics who love them. The significant difference in this week's award show was the critics were teens. Each year in America teen's spend $150 billion of disposible income on entertainment and related products which is why the Teen Choice Awards is so significant. These awards are a kind of visual yearly register receipt of everything most important in the teen culture. As a parent, when you look at these "choices" you can get a view into the values of your own teen, especially if you use their "choices" to engage them in conversation.

At first glance, it's obvious the Teen Choice Awards are a different kind of award show. Yes, the room is full of thousands of screaming teens and the energy level is amped up several notches. But in this show the stars aren't taking themselves too seriously. This same playfulness is sadly absent at other shows like the VMAs, Grammys, or Emmys. The scope of "choices" is much broader than any other award show covering everything from movies, TV, personalities, sports, and video games. It's a goldmine for parents to understand teens interests. The show is also a study in teen marketing full of product commercials, shameless promotion by stars of their own projects, and endless references to the shows "sponsors" all designed to tell teens how they should continue to spend their money.

Big Winners Bring in Big Bucks

Each year after the Teen Choice Awards retailers see a spike in sales from projects associated with the winners. For instance, the big movie this year was Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest with seven awards including Orlando Bloom for Choice Male Hottie. You'll see teens this week decide, for reasons they can't explain, to go see it again and teen mags with Bloom's mug shot on the cover will fly off the shelf.

It was not by accident that Kevin Federline, husband of Britney Spears, had his world premeire performance at the award show. It's the once a year gathering of the largest number of people that he hopes to convince to buy his disc.

In another not too veiled moment while presenting an award, rap star Ludacris paused, looked at the camera, and said unscripted, "Everyone be sure to check out the new Ludacris disc coming out September 15th!" The audience laughed, but more telling will be how many teens will obey him on September 15th. Look for his disc to hit #1 and bring in millions.

Once again teens have spoken and so will their wallets.

As a parent you can use the list of Choice Winners to spur conversation between you and your teen or tween about their own choices. Ask them why they like certain artists. Ask them what they know about the stars. For younger teens, ask if they understand the lyrics of what they listen to. Your teens are spending their time and money on these people and now you can get a good look at who they are.

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