A lot going on in the office this week; multiple on-going projects, post production editing, the big move to our new office and sprinkle in some sub-90 degree heat for good measure.
On the occasions we do step out of our air conditioned office and into the summer heat, we like to check out the construction of the gigantic billboard on Park Ave. Usually, billboards aren’t really blog worthy topics, but we really appreciate the hand painted ones, which are a dying breed (as everyone has gone to vinyl).
The short documentary Up There from the Ritual Project does a great job telling the story of the men and women risking their lives above city streets to keep one of New York’s oldest traditions alive, hand painted advertisements.
If you had the chance, what would you paint? Do you think billboards can be art?
It’s starting in Amsterdam. Touted as being a city with respectable and creative ad agencies, ‘Dam is leading the pack with doing away with the traditional 30 second TV spot.
Over the past decade there has been an evolving transition from TV commercials to internet video ads. With the internet medium, there are no limitations with time, content, etc. There have also been some examples of TV commercials that break the :30 rule. Recently, in the midst of the World Cup hooplah, Adidas has aired a 2-minute commercial spoofing a scene from Star Wars, including Snoop Dogg as Luke Skywalker, and David Beckham narrowly escaping murder.
Some brands have used a lengthy broadcast to their advantage, by airing episodic commercials throughout. In between TV shows, there was a love story to follow. One of the more successful examples of this was back in the 90′s in England, in a campaign for Taster’s Choice coffee. Two British actors starred in a love story centered around their passion for the coffee, and was a fairly successful and memorable campaign in the UK.
The death of TV commercials would likely mean the death of TV as a whole.
Bottom line: the traditional 30 second TV spot is on its way out. With the internet, there are many more opportunities, and options, as far as interactivity goes, etc. The obvious drawback to this is that people will only be viewing/engaging with the content if they so choose. The good thing about TV (at least, before TiVo and DVR) was that if you were watching a TV show, the commercials were there. However, with the rise of DVR and Hulu and whatever other commercial-escaping capabilities, the TV commercial is becoming less effective and irreverent.
Do you think the traditional 30 second TV ad is on it’s way out?
Is the internet the venue of the future?
How might mobile technology not only come in to play, but change the game?
Nearly two weeks ago, Mini released a video on Facebook and YouTube calling out Porsche in a heads-up, David vs. Goliath race.
Mini Cooper S VS. Porsche 911 Carrera S – a difference of 200HP and $65K.
Jim McDowell, Mini North American chief (and former Porsche exec) lays out the guideline.
Mini, who is no stranger to clever advertising, created an extensive campaign around this throwdown, through Facebook e-petitions, a full page color ad in the New York Times and even rented a plane and flew a banner reading, “Dear Porsche, Bring it! Love, MINI,” over Porsche’s North American headquarters.
Days passed as Mini and automotive enthusiasts alike waited for a response. Blogs buzzed, online car communities roared, tweets echoed and Facebook e-petitions and e-signatures exploded – the conversation was thick and the automotive community held their breath as they waited for a response. People were tuned in. Will Porsche send out their best and play into Mini’s PR antics? What’s there to gain if Porsche does accept?
Finally, Porsche responds to the children at Mini.
While your challenge seems like a fun and lighthearted campaign, we’ll stick to racing the way we have over the decades. We welcome you at Sebring, Le Mans, Daytona or any other sanctioned race where there is more at stake than T-shirts and valet parking spaces.
-North America Porsche president, Detlev Von Platen
Owned.
Along with the letter, Porsche also linked them to this video.
This campaign initiated a ton of conversation, but has lost momentum since Porsche’s letter.
Hyundai, however, stepped in and joined the PR blitz with its own video challenge as they explained, “our driver’s a bit busy this week preparing to set the World Record at Pikes Peak… but July is looking good.” Mini’s response? None yet.
Yesterday, as the clock continued to count down on Mini’s Facebook page, it was still unclear where the campaign was going, or even if the event was still being held. 1 hour, then 20 minutes, then 3, then 00:00:00.
Nothing.
It was only till this morning did we discover the results.
Can you guess? Porsche came out to play, and Mini lost, big time.
Though a 2 second difference in laptime isn’t the greatest of margins, the embarrassing loss of losing a race Mini created, hyped and marketed was a great blow to Mini’s image. This campaign had tons of energy in the beginning, then completely flopped. Nice try Mini, maybe you can salvage your reputation with Hyundai’s challenge.
For those who fall anywhere between the range of addicted, to avid user, to occasional dabbler to social media news semi-follower, you’ve probably noticed that since the start of the World Cup on Friday, Twitter has had some serious issues staying afloat. World Cup fever appears to be too much for Twitter to handle. Trending topics are momentarily down, too, even when Twitter is up and running.
The ‘Fail Whale’ has become an all too common occurrence over the past five days, and with the World Cup lasting another three and a half weeks, can Twitter find a way to upgrade their capacity to be able to control the flood of tweets coming their way?
The World Cup buzz has effectively silenced Twitter.
Sports headlines at the beginning of the tournament read that the coach of the Netherlands team banned his squad from using Twitter during the duration of the World Cup, due to an incident. One of his players, Eljero Elia, was caught on streaming video apparently saying racially insensitive remarks towards Moroccans [though he later claimed it was directed towards a friend, an inside joke between the two]. As punishment, the Netherlands national team joins the English and Spanish teams on the list of teams not actively Tweeting.
I, for one, can’t help but see the coaches’ point. Just because the rest of the world has decided over the last few years to completely disregard any notion of a private life, why should their locker room be exposed to the world?
While this is merely a microcosm of the big questions regarding social media, the non-existence of private life, and the pros and cons of news immediacy through all things internet:
How do you think social media and World Cup will play out?
With its new Tea and Elixir line packaging, SoBe teamed up with Firstborn to create an online application that allows you to test out tattoos on an uploaded photo of yourself. The application can be found on SoBe’s website.
You can re-size, reshape, and play with other details of the tattoo on the picture you uploaded; a fun digital game. This was a cool interpretation of the idea of recreating a product’s packaging, or “reskinning,” as SoBe refers to it. The application allows you to download, email, or share the final image with your friends. By sharing these images on the web, the participants help market the product, by spreading the world on social networks such as Twitter and Facebook.
Here’s what people are saying about the new ReSkin application:
And, Andrew finally got the butterfly tattoo he always wanted…
With the HTC EVO, iPhone 4 and Droid Incredible just dropping on the market, it’s difficult to decide which smartphone to get. How about bringing it old school and dusting off that 2-way pager and training a messenger pigeon.
Mashable’s may have chosen the iPhone against the other heavyweight smartphones, but which would you choose?
From Bloomberg’s leaked e-mail address to the continually gushing BP oil rupture, this week has offered quiet the variety of headlines. Did I mention the World Cup started today? If you’ve been busy all week, no worries, here are some things you missed.
CF presents you, Feed the Beast | Week in Review.
Chamber of commerce says taxpayers should help pay for BP Spill Cleanup; GOP Leader agrees, then recants
AT&T security breach exposes 114,000 iPad 3g customer e-mails, including many top CEOs
Steve Jobs reveals the new iPhone4 at annual WWDC conference
I know I don’t need to inform any of you that tomorrow starts the World Cup. The only place that will be filled with more excitement, more anticipation, and more football-fever than South Africa over the next month will be the CF office!
We here at CreativeFeed started a pool, randomly picking World Cup countries out of a hat (actually it was a Piglet mug… a pink Piglet mug).
Here you can see what teams are aligned with which CFers. Remember, the top two teams from each group advance to the Round of 16, then it’s regular bracket-style from then on.
click to enlarge
Matchups to watch:
Keep your eye on Group C as Robin battles against herself!
Group D revisits the much-anticipated and storied rivalry of Raquel versus Raquel!
Group G features not just one, but two storylines in the Battle of the Interns, as well as Kate VS. Kate 2.0!
Everyone keep a watchful eye out for Argentina in Group B to advance far – if they win, we all win!
Over the next 30 days, you’ll all have the chance to enjoy the most beautiful game in the world. Whether you’re getting caught up in patriotic pride, or cheering on your favorite CFer’s team … the World Cup truly is a special thing. So take advantage of it.
Summer Search is an organization that CreativeFeed loves. The mission of the program is to find resilient low-income high school students and help them realize their full leadership potential by providing mentoring, summer education experiences, and a life-long support network.
Freddie Joyner, a Summer Search alum, joined us last summer for an internship. Involved in research projects in the tech and wine fields, he was a key asset to the CreativeFeed team. We are proud to announce that Freddie just graduated from Cornell University with a degree in Applied Economics & Management!
Today’s gloomy weather definitely called for a pick-me-up, so we created our own environment. Try this out for yourself and comment if it made you smile.
1. Pour a glass of your favorite Bordeaux
2. Then open the following 3 tabs in your browser
3. On the First tab
4. On the Second tab 5. Finally, click here and expand video
Recently, a PR campaign has been in progress by a certain TV network pushing for Conan to get an Emmy for his work earlier this year back before he was booted off television.
And, no, it’s not NBC.
Conan on TBS - Coming in November
TBS, who signed a contract back on April 12 to pick up Conan for a late-night talk show, is fervently pushing for Emmy voters to remember the work that Conan did earlier this year when he was still on NBC. After his extremely public departure from NBC, Conan hit the road to fill the summer months, embarking on “The Legally Prohibited from Being Funny on Television Tour,” – named after, well, fairly obvious reasons.
An Emmy nod would surely put his face all over the broadcast, which just so happens to be on NBC, and in a timely manner (the Emmys are on August 29th, Conan’s TBS show is slated to being sometime in November).
Though TBS has had Lopez Tonight with George Lopez for about a year now, the addition of Conan O’Brien will put them in a serious position in the debate for late-night network kings.
You can check out what is surely to be the first of many ads in Variety Magazine.
Logos have come to play an important role in today’s society: they communicate a brand identity to the consumer, simply through a specific design. A good logo is clear and memorable, and should be able to clearly convey whatever message the company wants to send. These designers have integrated a drawing that reflects the company’s product or service.
Most company logos have become famous simply through their brand popularity, such as Coca-Cola and Adidas, but these logos seem to stand out for a different reason: their clever designs. Each one is simple, using no more than two solid colors, yet inventive in its hidden imagery. In the world of marketing a brand name, these types of imaginative logos could go a long way in promoting a brand. If the viewer stops and thinks that a design is interesting to them, they often take the moment to remember the brand name. Interesting, inventive logos are a great way of drawing the consumer in, and getting a company’s name out there. On a less serious note, it’s fun to find the hidden images!
As of May 2010, Google handled 71% of all search queries in the United States, with Yahoo! dragging behind at 15%.
Despite Googles dominant position in online search engines, the company still continues to innovate, making it increasingly difficult for rivals to compete.
However, Yahoo! has not given up.
In a recent press release, Yahoo! has announced a series of changes to further integrate Facebook in numerous Yahoo! properties, such as their homepage and Yahoo! Mail and Pulse. Their goal is to make Yahoo! not only your online source for news, articles, e-mail and search functions, but also your portal for social networks.
“Starting with Facebook, we are bringing all of these elements together to give people one simple, trusted place to share information and connect. We think this offers great benefit to people across the web, and it’s key to helping Yahoo! extend our reach and increase engagement,” said Cody Simms, senior director of Social Platforms and Yahoo! Developer Network (YDN) at Yahoo!.
We know it’s hard to get excited about another site integrating social networks, but there is potential that can benefit everyone; clever social network aggregation.
Here is what’s planned:
Centralized Dashboard. With Yahoo! Pulse, users can control external social networks in one dashboard
Create and Share. Folks who create and share content on Yahoo! sites like Yahoo! News, Yahoo! Sports, Flickr, omg! etc can seamlessly share information via Facebook
View FB Friend’s Updates. Now you can see a live stream of your friend’s Facebook status on Yahoo without leaving the site
Will this partnership prevail and who has the right social media strategy, Google or Yahoo?
We have no right answer. Yahoo!’s strategy is focused around integration of already popular social networks, while Google focuses more on creating/acquiring its own social networks (ie. Buzz, YouTube, Picassa). Yahoo also creates original content, while Google aggregates. They’re two different companies, but we do believe their both on course with implementing the right strategies.
This statement sums up the second day of the All Things Digital conference, as most of the devices exclusively demoed at D8 themed around a tablet computing interface.
Walt asked Qualcomm CEO Paul Jacobs why his company
left the phone market. His answer: “We sucked at it.”
Can the Kno Tablet Finally Replace the Textbook?
Dell’s entry into the Apple-dominated market:
The Android-based Streak Tablet
Microsoft’s new gesture-based controller for the Xbox.
What are your thoughts? Any device particularly stand out? There is definitely a demand for a modern textbook tablet, but will the Kno Tablet be the answer?
The buzz on the first day of the D8 conference was all about Steve Jobs and the stir around Flash, the iPad, Google and more. Find the video highlights here.
The 2nd day of D8 featured a wider range of tech and media figures, from DreamWorks CEO Jeffrey Katzenberg and Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg to NPR CEO Vivian Schiller and movie director James Cameron.
As our founder, Arthur Ceria, furiously tweeted from the #D8 conference, we were busy following all the interesting Q&A sessions and tech releases back at the NYC CreativeFeed office.
Here are some of the highlights we thought you should see. The tech releases deserved its own blog posts, so you can find that here.
Since 2003, the All Things Digital conference has been breaking news, highlighting innovation, and showcasing conversations with the most influential figures in media and technology.
This year marks the eighth anniversary of the conference, hence the D8 name.
Last night, Steve Jobs kicked off the event with a Q&A session with Walt Mossberg and Kara Swisher, Wall Street Journal’s digital duo.
Here are some highlights from the event, including Jobs’ thoughts on the missing 4GS phone, Adobe Flash, Google and the origin of the iPad.
The FIFA organization has gone one step further to make the world’s most celebrated sport and athletic event even more special; by ordering a custom Louis Vuitton case to carry the holy grail of all athletic accolades, the FIFA World Cup Trophy. And sorry, LV has no intention of making this case available to the public.
Though LV isn’t a sponsor of the event, this product placement should coincide nicely with Louis Vuitton: Journeys – their interactive campaign featuring football legends Zidane, Pele and Maradona, “three of the best football players in history and the moment the world’s been waiting for”, a heads up Foosball match through the visual direction of renowned photographer, Annie Leibovitz. Check the site out, there is also interactive interviews and even virtual signed autographs via Facebook.
Jesse Rosten’s video, iPad+Velcro=♥ , shows two of mankind’s brilliant creations coming together – exploring what is possible with an iPad, and a little Velcro.
We loved the video not only for its creativity and execution, but showing the potential of crowdsourcing creativity. Through social networks, we continually find creative talent, proving that a great idea can come from anyone and anywhere.
