Every once is a while it's healthy to have one's spelling ability tested. It's sort of like going back to high school minus all that clique-ish, cafeteria-style segregation or Mean Girls-inspired hatred. Helping us leave the high school years where they should be, Odwalla and game show champ Ken Jennings have partnered to create Be Soy Smart, a spelling bee site that tests ones spelling metal. We particularly like the tiny disclaimer at the bottom of the site which reads, "We're not saying Soy Smart will make you smarter, but it's a smart choice for vegetarian soy protein and Omega-3 DHA, an important brain component."
You've seen them They're all over. Those unfortunate people that have to hold signs for furniture stores that are having close out sales or car dealers which are promoting their next scam. It's all very boring. Now, sign companies are changing that by training sign holders to become sign spinners. A sign spinners does just what the name implies, spin the sign. Sort of like a baton twirler, sign spinners stand on street corner and, one assumes, attract more attention than regular sign holder due to their acrobatic spinning of the signs. One problem....and it's a very, very big one. With all those signs spinning, how's a passing motorist supposed to read about what's being advertised?
Of course, like anything which is supposedly new, sign spinning is certainly not. It's been around for 20 years and is said to have been invented by Eventz Extraordinaire. We suppose if sign spinnings been around for 20 years, our wonderment as to whether the signs work or not is moot.
For a while, we thought we were looking at an update of Honda UK's kooky Hate video but no. It was a new campaign for Havaianas footwear with three spots that look like a kaleidoscopic, heroin-induced, feed your head-style trip through Alice's Wonderland but turn out to be nothing more than the dreams of feet. We like. After all, just how many ways are there left to sell shoes? The ads were distributed by Jun Group and can be seen here, here and here.
- Today, Joost announced that Turner Broadcasting will begin to distribute content on Joost from its well-known brands and properties, including Adult Swim and CNN.
- Here's a little bit of consumer-created hate directed towards Cingular whose phone's apparently can ruin speakers if placed too close to them. The video promotes Feeling Cingular, a site that is less than complimentary to the carrier.
- Fallon isn't happy. Citi has just moved most of its global creative account to Publicis Worldwide.
- The 11th annual Webby Awards has unveiled winners in 14 new categories.
Any man who's balding will not want to watch this commercial for hair loss drug Propecia because it will make you feel like a loser who can't get the girl. Oh but wait. All this negativity is meant to celebrate the positivity of Propecia's miraculous ability to give you hair and, thus, get the hot girl at the pool. Created by Keta-Keta, it's filled with the company's classic convergence of sex meets quirk. It's the first of three videos to be released over the next few weeks
It's common knowledge most TV commercial for radio stations suck. They're always filled with washed up D-list celebs or they fall precipitously into car dealership territory so it is with great displeasure we find Bostonians (yes, those people that hate all marketing) complaining about a refreshingly weird television commercial for Boston's "play everything" Mike 93.7. The ad shows a bunch of office workers grooving to the station's eclectic playlist while stripping off their clothes in a manner that could be described as anything but offensively salacious.
more »
Teen media and marketing blog Ypulse has partnered with conference producer Modern Media to produce 2007 Mashup, a two day event held at San Francisco's Nikko Hotel July 16-17 which will explore today's "totally wired generation."
Explaining the focus of the conference, Ypulse Founder Anastasia Goodstein writes, "This event was born out of almost three years of blogging and building a diverse community of media and marketing professionals who all have something in common: an empathy for youth and a passion for reaching them in an authentic way -- whether that's through a marketing campaign, editorial content, a website or other technology product or face to face. If I've learned anything over the past couple of years blogging about this audience, it's that, yes, they are 'totally wired.' It's not that they write code or can take apart a computer (although some can), it's that this generation has grown up with the internet and cell phones and has integrated technology into their lives as naturally as the air they breath -- they're hyper connected, multi-tasking and incredibly marketing savvy."
more »
Lonelygirl15 isn't the only girl selling out...uh...getting paid to do what she already does. Uber social connector ShareThis hooked up with Digital Influence Group to partner with YouTuber Abbegirl "to create a series of videos on how you share represents who you are." Her first video, Fashionista, has been viewed 37,000 times since its launch April 14 and points people to HowYouShare which explains how ShareThis works.
Purists might disdain this "soiling" of so-called "sacred" ground on which consumer-generated media walks but, like anything, if content is well done, sponsored or not, people will enjoy it. We enjoyed this.
Brentter points us to Coke's latest spot Endless Summer, courtesy of Singleton Ogilvy & Mather and Monkey Labs, Sydney. It reminds us of W+K's Happiness Factory and is a far cry from the benign but boring polar bears of early Coke ads.
We find it cute and wonderful but can't help wondering why the Coke droplets are cannibalizing one another. Don't they know it will eventually be them in those bottles they're so gaily clinking? Or is their leap into Coke bottles representative of an endless summer's cyclical nature?
Is this some kind of metaphor about the frothy continuity of life? Has someone at Ogilvy been reading The Stranger?
To celebrate its new service from SFO, JetBlue leaps on the social networking bandwagon and pairs up with Going.com to get its schmooze on with young, upwardly-mobile scenesters, kind of like some other people we know.
Going.com, formerly HeyLetsGo.com, is another one of those "fresh takes" on that same photo-whoring friends-hoarding thing. To make Going.com's demo feel super-awesome, and hopefully to bring foot traffic through JetBlue's doors, the companies are hosting a three-city concert featuring The Teddy Bears and Albert Hammond, Jr. of The Strokes.
Winners of some contest will be shuttled through San Francisco, New York and Boston for all the indie fun and games.
We'd totally join but can't seem to find our horn-rimmed glasses anywhere. They're probably still in the bathtub from the last time we tried cutting for attention. Oh Albert H, if only you knew we were alive.
|
|
