Durex Wants Hump Day Dick

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Durex just can't help itself. First, it brings us pithy penis peculiarities with The Pants Whisperer, complete with hot doctor and dickorations. Now it's pitching a tent on hump day claiming it Durex Hump Day to celebrate the many pleasures associated with condoms and what they're used for. The Hump Dat site says it all, "Canadians are horny. And the weekend's too long to wait. We've got needs! So together we'll take a boring day in the middle of the week and make it sing with the sounds of beds creaking and moans of delight." Indeed.

This witty wit brought to you by MacLaren McCann and MacLaren McCann Direct and Interactive.

by Steve Hall    Nov-29-06    
Topic: Online, Racy



Microsoft Fumbles for Cachet Among Yuppies, Hipsters

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We need a term for yuppie hipsters. Yipsters? Hipstuppies? Yupsters? Be-suited Self-Entitled Echo Boomers?

Whoever they are, Microsoft is groping desperately for their attention in this virally-intended video for Office 2007. It does a good job of demonstrating '07's various functions for the "technical types" of the world but doesn't change the fact that they're still the stodgy awkward behemoths just left of savvy. - Contributed by Angela Natividad

by Angela Natividad    Nov-29-06    
Topic: Bad, Online, Viral



Ballbra Purveys Yet Another Ball-Bearing Poultice

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Yeah. It's a ballbra. Kind of like this thing but without the I-love-America motif, although it does have its own weird shit going on if you take a look at the testicular cancer self-test section, which may in fact be helpful after having some Japanese nut-crunching Doritos. - Contributed by Angela Natividad

by Angela Natividad    Nov-29-06    
Topic: Packaging, Strange



Rolling Rock Wants You to Hate It's Beer Ape

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In the "so horrifically bad it just might actually be good but not really" category is a recent campaign from Rolling Rock that consists of online, billboards and TV spots which urge people who hated a recent "beer ape" commercial - which never actually ran except for placement on YouTube - to email Rolling Rock's VP of marketing to complain. We saw the billboards but hadn't yet seen the video on YouTube which Adverlicious tipped us to. While the commercial itself is over-the-top stupid, 1,024,265 have viewed it and 791 people have commented on it. Like it or not, that's fairly decent play for any YouTube placement. The question, as always, is, will this foolery actually sell any beer?

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by Steve Hall    Nov-29-06    
Topic: Commercials, Online, Outdoor, Strange, Television, Video



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Flatulina Breaks Wind to Christmas Classics

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Another gem for your novelty holiday CD collection. Riding the wave of a supposed lifelong struggle with uncontrollable flatulence, Flatulina puts on a Horatio Algier-style gameface and decides to lace Christmas classics with the distinct sound of farts.

There are plenty of people who make a living off the philosophy of cheap and easy. Bathroom humour epitomizes cheap and easy because somebody somewhere is always willing to laugh at a fart joke, so we have to give props to a chick willing to turn this into her contribution to the world at large. Yet another indication there's a divine calling out there for everybody. - Contributed by Angela Natividad

by Angela Natividad    Nov-29-06    
Topic: Strange



Second Life Makes its First Virtual Millionaire

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A real estate tycoon no less, and a hot one if you're into avatars. Anshe Chung spent her precious time developing islands and creating private communities restricted to certain types of architecture, francophones, the gay community or even "furries," a diaspora of fuzzy avatars.

Now Chung's Linden money is convertable to $1 million US dollars. Makes you wonder why you wasted all the time on the Sims, doesn't it? - Contributed by Angela Natividad

by Angela Natividad    Nov-29-06    
Topic: Online



Manix Condoms Cause End of World

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Not that you've ever had the premonition this guy did before buying condoms but this particular premonition, in the form of a 90 second ad for Manix condoms, clearly illustrates the "dangers" successful usage of condoms can cause. In Bulworth, Warren Beatty said, "If we all fucked each other, we'd eventually end up the same color." If Warren were in this Manix ad, he might say, "If we all fucked each other with condoms, we might end the world as we know it."

by Steve Hall    Nov-29-06    
Topic: Commercials, Good, Racy, Strange



Shovels Invade Kansas City For Outreach International

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While the explanatory video sucks and is five minutes longer than its 6:05 length presents, we like this Kansas City shovel installation St. Louis-based Rogers Townsend did for its pro-bono client Outreach International. Under cover of darkness, a team planted hundreds of steel and wooden shovels in and around one of the city's parks to call attention to the organization's work it's done around the world. It was, seemingly, a fitting analogy for Outreach International and by several accounts, garnered a good deal of notice and media coverage. We're sure the local Home Depot and Loews were quite happy to sell out all their shovel stock for the cause.

by Steve Hall    Nov-29-06    
Topic: Good, Guerilla



Art Directors Club Delivers Armageddon

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The Art Directors Club, in heir promotional piece for the organization's 86th Annual Call for Entries, has acknowledged the state of our world and the tumultuous and precarious position in which today's ad industry finds itself. Created by TBWA\Chiat\Day New York (why do they have to use that forward slash instead of the other one everyone else uses making the typing od thier name a pain in the ass?) the poster portrays hurricanes, tsunamis, energy shortages, bird flu, pedophilia, rogue nations with nukes, political and religious tensions, big box retailers, and numerous other worrisome plagues that afflict the world and out industry.

In the creation of the poster, the agency got all voodoo-like and researched the history of Armageddon, medieval times and other apocalyptic events for inspiration. It shows. We like. In a most blunt and concise fashion, it truly sums up the insanity of our current commercial culture.

by Steve Hall    Nov-29-06    
Topic: Good, Industry Events, Poster



Dwarfs, Pigs, Dancing Indian Sell Awesome Canned Ham Phone

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If the general public ever thought those of us in the advertising business were just a bunch of wanna-be-cool hipsters who drink too much Starbucks, play too much foosball and have strange tastes in music, these two new commercials created by Mother NY and directed by The Perlorian Brothers would confirm that line of thinking. In this spot for the Virgin Mobile Slice, a phone packaged to look like a can of sliced ham, nothing is normal. Nothing at all. And, perhaps, that's a very good thing.

by Steve Hall    Nov-29-06    
Topic: Campaigns, Commercials, Good, Strange



Scientists Brand Bugs, Brave New Frontier for Advertisers

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Nothing is safe from becoming adspace, not even bugs, though to be fair we could consider it a return to our roots since we branded animals way before we started branding other stuff. Scientists have just placed a small logo onto a genetically engineered butterfly.

Isn't that exciting? We're embarking slowly over the threshold of Vuitton-stamped lepidoptera. If that doesn't turn you on just ever so slightly, we will call you a liar and challenge you to a duel. - Contributed by Angela Natividad

by Angela Natividad    Nov-29-06    
Topic: Strange



Copywriters Offer Portfolio Building Advice

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Mediabistro has a three part series on how copywriters can build a great portfolio. Apart from witticisms like this in part III, "The sad truth is that having a great book means that sooner or later you will need to collaborate with another human being. This will probably involve talking, possibly being in the same room together, often listening to ideas and disturbing personal issues not entirely your own and maybe even liking some of them," we had a hard time getting past part II which had that strangely sexy photo of Jennifer Solow in her "Famous Author" tank top, bikini bottoms and leather jacket. Yes, yes, we know. We are easily distracted but at least we took the time to find this advice for you. Read it here, here and here.

by Steve Hall    Nov-29-06    
Topic: Agencies, Good, Opinion



Canadians Want Guys to be Nice to Girls

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The Government of Ontario cares about manners and thinks guys should be nice to girls. That's the gist of the messaging in this commercial which points to a site called Equality Rules. In the commercial, almost directly opposite from a scene in last night's Friday Night Lights in which one of the characters working the register at the local fast food restaurant tries to pick up a girl by telling her what she really wants when she places her order, a mean spirited guy, for no apparent reason, berates a girl who's just trying to order a burger.

The Equality Rules site is filled with cheesy cartoon advice vignettes that seem almost purposefully to mirror high-minded finger-wagging you'd get from your grandmother after she caught you getting drunk with your friend on his Dad's boat. SInce all other angle seem to be taken on convincing people to be nice, maybe this one will actually work. The commercial was created by Toronto's Bensimon Byrne and produced by UNTITLED (yes, that's the name of the company).

by Steve Hall    Nov-29-06    
Topic: Commercials, Good, Online, Strange, Video



More On Japanese Nut-Crushing Doritos

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Adverb keeps us up-to-date on their provocative exploration of Doritos Japan Nut-Crushing Package Design by elaborating on the campaign and interpreting the text. And oh, it was more nut-crushingly delightful than we ourselves could have conceived.

The line of black corn, chili-taco flavoured chips belong to a promotion called "Tights-kun Doritos" or "Buddy-boy in tights Doritos." The aforementioned is a prolific animated porn character and aficionados are collecting variations on the packaging.

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by Angela Natividad    Nov-29-06    
Topic: Good, Packaging



Telecom Arnet Donates Hairplugs for New Broadband Customers

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Argentina's Telecom Arnet got into the holiday spirit and went into charity this month. Juan Manuel Fraga, a decade or two past his sexual prime and balding all the while, serves as the poster child for Todos Por un Pelo. For every new customer who signed up for broadband in November, Fraga got a hair implant courtesy of Arnet and a Canadian clinic run by Dr. Tomas Ballve.

We're not even sure how to approach this but the shit was funny. We would totally have jumped at the chance to sign up for broadband in Argentina if we could watch those hairplugs get pulled out one by one. Maybe that can be a follow-up campaign.

Check out how Juan looks now. - Contributed by Angela Natividad

by Angela Natividad    Nov-29-06    
Topic: Cable, Good, Strange



Alcohol Makes For 'Unhappy Hour'

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We find it really difficult to bash any effort that aims to reduce teen binge drinking so we're not going to. But there's no need to in this case. We're going to applaud this effort by Grey San Francisco for the Youth Leadership Institute called Unhappy Hour that succinctly addresses the subject with a concise definition of binge drinking, informative facts about alcohol content and its effect, information on how parents, students, educators and researchers can help and, finally, two spots that feature conversations between friends that would never happen if alcohol weren't in play.

by Steve Hall    Nov-29-06    
Topic: Commercials, Good, Online



Media Mixes, Future Integrates, Wii Wins

- Tonight from 6P - 9P at Flute in New York City, interactive advertising publication adotas will host its monthly media mixer where you can hobnob with others like yourselves.

- The next Future Marketing Summit will be held March 5, 2007 at the ADC Gallery in New York. Founded by Strawberry Frog, the summit will focus on integration and how it relates to the design, entertainment, technology and delivery aspects of marketing.

- The Silly Girl takes a look at the recent PS3 and Wii launches, provides and analysis and tells us why Wii came out on top.

by Steve Hall    Nov-29-06    
Topic: Campaigns, Industry Events, Opinion