Called "the online equivalent of an Oscar" by the New York Times, The Webby Awards has launched their call for entries for its 11th go 'round. Fifteen new categories have been added as well as additional judges. If you want yet another trophy to put in your office, get all the details here.
Following all the hubbub over online ratings, log files, metrics firms, discrepancies and other good online measurement mania, comScore CEO Magid Abraham drafted a letter in respons to the hubbub which we'll reprint here:
An Open Letter to the Industry
A recent article in Media Week and Ad Week discusses a recurring theme in the online industry, asserting that panel-based audience metrics are inaccurate because they do not match Web server logs. Since Web logs record a site's every visit, visitor and page request, it makes intuitive sense that those metrics might be viewed as the gold standard. When third party estimates do not match Web logs, it is easy to view this as a reflection of weaknesses in panel-based measurement.
However, as always, the devil is in the details. When you scrutinize the details, the answer to the question about why Web log and panel-based data don't always match up is ... "it depends." In fact, the reasons for discrepancies depend on a number of factors: the panel data could be wrong, the Web log data could be wrong - or more often - they are both right given the exact definition of what they measure. But, those definitions could be vastly different.
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In case you're an African woman whose missing her clitoris or had it brutally removed because of some freakish backwater African belief, equally odd Rael, founder of the Raelian Movement, has launched Clitoraid, a cause that hopes to use medical advances to restore sexual pleasure to these abused women.Yes, it's freakishly weird but it's freakishly true also.
As a follow up to the car-eating gorillas, BBDO has released its second commercial promoting the four door Jeep Wrangler. This ad, following the whole "new species" theme - we can just hear the creative concepting session on this one (new car...hey, I got it...new species!) - , features birds (hawks? eagles?) dive bombing the Jeep only to find out it's a bit tougher that a mouse.
In a piece entitled, "I am Woman. Hear me Blubber," Copyranter is having fun with the Jane Magazine campaign - currently running on Adrants among other sites - and offers up to potential copy to add to the campaign. From "She's a Genius. She's an Idiot" to "She's Zen. She's A Ten" to "She's a Virgin. She's a Slut" there's plenty of suggestion to keep this campiagn going for years. Check out more copy here.
Greenpeace has created a website that looks very similar to the Apple website expect for the fact this Greenpeace website wishes Macs were greener, The site claims Apple products contain hazardous substances other companies have abandoned. The site explains the hazards of toxic waste and its effect on recycling in a section called iTox + iWaste. There's also t-shirts and a tool to mess with a Steve Jobs speech. Nice work, actually.
UPDATE: It seems Greenpeace didn't have all its facts straight.
Add to the ever growing list of contextual fuckery this Pure Gum Spirits Turpentine ad which appeared directly next to a CNN story about a teen who drank turpentine to terminate her pregnancy. The kicker is the ads tagline, "Nature's Solvent." Yup, turpentine sure does make it easier to dissolve that fetus and make it really easy to slide right out into that trash can. Aside from the intellectually-challenged human idiocy that surrounds the use of these freakish remedies, the placement of this ad has to be the most freakish contextual placement fuck up to date. Can we possibly put an end to our own industry idiocy that causes these idiotic mistakes?
Eschewing the usual high fa luting style most European brands adopt when marketing their fashions, European denim company Lee Cooper, with help from Gyro Worldwide, is launching its brand in the U.S. with a decidedly more playful, working class approach. Oh yes, the sex and hotness are still there but not in that GQ-like style. Take a look at the print ads here.
- Ariel wonders where once famed bloggers like Robert Scoble and Dave Winer are today and wonders if bloggers are only as good as their last post.
- Like Tara Reid's boob size, the once fun bag sized YouTube is now undergoing a fun bag reduction with the addition of yet another CxO.
- The marketers for a book that craps on Christians are crapping their marketing all over conservative Christians to fuel controversy.
- AdFreak's got a hilarious spoof pharmaceutical ad that claims Tequila will cure all ills. Of course, just like a real pharmaceutical ad, there's all sorts of disclaimers.
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As Gawker posits after viewing this Harry Rosen ad featuring Malcolm Gladwell, apparently Canada has a very different perception of what celebrity is not to mention hairstyle. But it's all OK because it's for charity: the Toronto General Hospital Multi-Organ Transplant Program. Maybe there's a hair transplant joke here somewhere but we can't seem to find it.