In a move that might actually make rich media acceptable, CMP Media's TechWeb Network, yesterday, announced the launch of a new ad unit - the Dogear Peelback. The Dogear Peelback is an animated graphic that resembles a folded over page corner, or dogear. The ad unit, which sits quietly in the corner of the page until activated by mouseover, can be customized to include the client's logo or other creative. When a user 'mouses' over the dogear, the entire page peels back to reveal the advertiser's landing page behind the TechWeb Network news page. The effect gives advertisers a about half of the page real estate. View the demo here.
Once opened, the unit has the obligatory "Close" button on the outer most flap of the unit. Clicking "Close" or simply mousing off that area of the page, closed the unit. Making the unit more dynamic might call for the addition of an "Open" button which would continue to peel back that page until it opens entirely to the advertisers page. Currently, it seems, clicking on the uncovered page is the only method of navigating to the advertiser's page. Minor picks aside, the ad unit makes great use of rich media while maintaining sensibility to flashy, rich media crazy overload like those ads that crawl across the page while you fight to fund their "close" button. So far, it seems, this unit has great promise.
In a move likely to be sold as beneficial to commuters but, in reality, made to increase transit revenue, the Metropolitan Atlanta Rapid Transit Authority will pipe programming and advertising into each of its 230 rail cars. The cars will be outfitted with 15 inch flat screen monitors offering local news from ABC affiliate WSB and an FM transmitter providing top 40, jazz and R&B.
The system, provided by The Rail Network, is the first of its kind and is destined to cause both praise and consternation. The Rail Network CEO David Lane says Atlanta stands to take in $20 million in advertising revenue over the next decade and is in talks with all other major metro transit systems to spread the system across the country.
Lane expects Washington, D.C. and Vancouver, Canada to sign on soon.
42 BELOW Vodka took an appropriate approach to street marketing during the recent East Coast snow storm. From the 42nd parallel in New Zealand, to 42nd street in New York, 42 BELOW was out in the blizzard of Manhattan clearing snow from their favorite bars. Ten inches of fresh powder did not deter the 42 BELOW snow patrol team Monday night as they cleared a path from the curb to the door of Butter, Table 50, Hiro, Quo, 203 Spring, Caviar and Banana's, Snitch and Bungalow 8.
Writing on ClickZ, Pamela Parker explains a campaign Frito-Lat launched to promote its new Doritos Black Pepper Jack flavor. The campaign began with teaser billboards containing the message "inNw" which then expanded to TV, text messaging and a website peppered with hip-speak unveiling the tagline, "If not now when?"
The campaign was targeted to 16-24 year olds and was created by BBDO, Tribal DDB Dallas and Hip Cricket.
When visiting the doctor's office, the waiting room is often filled with oddball characters which creates the need to play internal guessing games as to their ailment. This fellow, with a bulked up right arm, is mocked for engaging in a certain repetitive activity usually reserved for private spaces. As it turns out, he's simply a slot machine junky and it's an ad for Vegas Red Casino.
Here's a very weird Japanese commercial for a very weird Japanese chocolate product. If we knew Japanese French, maybe it would be more fun but watching these two girls hold each other's heads and place sticks of candy in their mouths is oddly transfixing. See some other weird ones here. The more you watch them, the more you'll like them.
Designer Ze Frank provides frustrated designers with a collection of substitute emoticons to use in response to emails from clueless account managers who think they know what they are talking about in terms of creative. If you've been berated one time too many by creative wannabes for work you think is great, check out Ze's instructional video on how to incorporate his emoticon "Punctuation Substitutions" into your next response to that puff bag loser.
If this takes off (or if it already has and we're the clueless loser), agency emails are destined to become a lot more interesting.
Highlighting 100 important moments of the web, Yahoo, today, is celebrating its tenth anniversary with a Netrospective.
The site includes a review of interesting events occurring along the ten year lifespan of Yahoo.
From Mahir, the first, though odd, web celebrity to the birth of Netscape and Google to the dancing baby to the hey days of Napster, the Yahoo Netrospective is a fascinating trip down memory lane. Well done, Yahoo.
A bill before Connecticut lawmakers would require theaters to advertise two start times - one for the time the actual movie start and another for the time the ads and previews begin. State Rep. Andrew Fleischmann claims consumers are being manipulated and that his bill has received the most attention of any bill he's proposed.
We wonder what's worse though. Sitting through ads and previews or enduring the noise and confusion of movie goers entering the theater just as the actual movie begins to roll. Not an easy choice. The only real answer to this, and all other ad clutter issue is for the American Association for Advertising Agencies, the Association of National Advertisers and perhaps others to get together and draft industry guidelines which would limit advertising placement in all media relative to the content in which the advertising appears. Not likely to happen though.
In early February, it was announced Regal CineMedia Corporation , the media subsidiary of the Regal Entertainment Group and MasterCard would launch a co-branded card, Regal Entertainment Group Platinum MasterCard card, and pre-movie ad campaign. Launching this Friday, March 4, the campaign includes three cinema spots created by LA-based Johnson & Murphy.
The terms of the marketing agreement with MasterCard include a variety of on-screen and in-lobby promotional opportunities for Regal Entertainment Group's 560 theatres nationwide, reaching nearly 6,300 screens in 40 states.
Creatively, the three ads track the interaction between a guy doing movie character impersonations and a retail store check out girl who, first, wigs at the guy's propensity to take on Brando and the like, then warms to him and begins spouting characterizations of her own such as, "Dude, Where's My Card." Get it?
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