LG "Life's Good" Contest Approaches Deadline, Entries Could Use Some Sparkle

The deadline for the LG "Life's good when..." video contest is fast approaching. In fact, it's Saturday at midnight. If you think you can beat a dancing baby and a Lego man that can't read packaging instructions, you have a pretty good chance of winning $18K in electronics.

The clock's ticking. Ready, set, record.

Submit 11th-hour oeuvres here.

That Hot Chic...And Chicago Real Estate Are Surprisingly Doable

Ah yes. Equating the affordability of some swanky Chicago address called Burnham Pointe to the likelihood you'll be able to have sex with the pair of legs in this ad is, well, probably unlikely to attract female buyers. Well, at least those that don't enjoy being objectified. Lesbians and bisexuals on the other hand...

Oh, and guys. Yes. Let's not forget guys. Given the possibility of connecting with this surprisingly doable piece of real estate (yes, the ad is equating women to a piece of real estate), we expect a pretty good response to this ad

Wonderbra Makes You Come in the Air

So yes, we're in catch up mode but we can't let this excellent Wonderbra commercial which spoofs the Cadbury Gorilla commercial in which a gorilla patiently waits for the drum section of the Phil Collins In the Air Tonight song to begin.

Wonderbra has replaced the gorilla with a model wearing a bra who, like the gorilla, patiently awaits the drum section. Once the section begins, the Wonderbra-clad model begins playing which, of course, causes a significant amount of breast bounce to occur. The camera zooming in and out on her breasts accompanied with the lyrics "well I've been waiting for this moment all my life, oh Lord, I can feel it coming in the air tonight" isn't lost on us one bit. Nice job.

ad:tech's Over, Playing Catch Up

OK, OK, are you sick of it? What? How dare you? The show rocks, dudes! Don't be hating on it. OK, OK, so yea, four days of ad:tech and all of the puffery and pontification from the endless list of companies that continuously claim to the be the first, best and only at what they do when just two booths down, another company is shoveling the same sales sales spiel as if the other company doesn't exist. There really should be an odds game where we could place bets on which of the hundred companies that claim to do the same thing will still be around when the next ad:tech happens.

Since the Adrants "to be published" inbox is is about to explode from press release insanity, we're going to recap some of the news that occurred over the past few days so you can get up to speed since Adrants is the only advertising publication you read and you couldn't possibly have heard this news from any other source, right? OK, we can only hope. So here it is:

- Bill Green launched PayPerDiss, an not so subtle slam on Pay Per Post which recently change its name because it's sick of taking shit from everyone about its business model. Oh, come on, You know it's true. Remember Gator changing its name to Claria?

- Someone thinks a recent Canadian car ad that centers around a man raised by lions is a bit too similar to an older Honey comb cereal ad that centers around a boy raised by bees.

- The California Department of Public Health launched a video contest called Be a Reel Hero which asks people to submit videos with the winner's becoming part of the organization's ongoing anti-smoking campaign. Has the entire ad industry decided to take a nap and hand the keys over to amateurs?

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Get Down with the Homies with the ad:tech NY Ad-Jive Dictionary

You can't call yourself a new media advertiser if you're not hip to the jive, and ad:tech is a great place to brush up on this crucial skill-set.

But it can be tough to keep up. With that, I give you the 2007 edition of the Official ad:tech New York Ad-Jive Dictionary. Use this knowledge well, and you're sure to be the life of the break room.

Better still, you'll confirm your CEO's conviction that burning $5K to send you to an ad conference was a very intelligent idea.

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Route CGA: Put the Prize Money Down!

"The folks who are truly amateurs are creating some remarkably relevant work..." - Moderator Neil Perry, XLNTads.com, in The Golden Rule of CGA - Know Thy Ad Creator, ad:tech.

For those who ain't hip to the jive, Perry describes CGA thus: Creative produced by the general public.

For me, the star of this panel was probably Kevin Nalty - better known as Nalts of YouTube fame.

A marketing director at a pharma firm by day, Nalts has taken to producing YouTube videos (oops - I mean CGA) by night. By now, he's produced over 500. Some have graced the top of YouTube's annals of fame; others have crashed and burned. At some point you ought to check out his half-entertainment, half-video-strategy-oriented site, Will video for food.

I first saw Nalts in a collaboration video with fellow YouTuber HappySlip, where he sneaks into her house and steals her stapler.

"It went on eBay for, like, $800!" he divulged to me later.

Such is the power of CGA love.

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Here's a Roundabout Idea: Shoot the Set Designers Putting the Spot Together

Psyop, the production company behind Coke's Happiness Factory spot, is back with more ad magic in a TV effort for GPS device Navigon, entitled More Real.

Watching something get put together in fast-forward is a pretty cliched technique. But "More Real" is worth watching since it's:

a) showcasing the art of set design
b) quick and to the point
c) about a really cool new toy for your car

Chicago-based agency TwoXFour created the ad.

Orange Enlists Poke, Which Launches Never-Ending Web Paaaagge...

UK mobile telecom Orange hired Poke to come up with a never-ending take on the microsite.

The Good Things Should Never End site includes "100s of wind-up phone chargers [...] as giveaways," hidden in its nooks and crannies, says Poke's Iain Tait, putting method to the madness of spending your workday descending this flash-based world of wonder.

Kudos for the Easter Eggs. They're so under-used.

SENZ Viral Brings Umbrella on 180 MPH Skydive

If you've ever been stuck in Manhattan with the wind blowing and the rain pouring down, you know your umbrella usually breaks around the 12th minute: at the muddy street corner, while a line of taken cabs power down the street.

Broken and defeated by life, you walk a quarter mile for the rain-soaked subway ride.

To both empathize with you and save you, SENZ Umbrella uploaded a would-be viral video showing its umbrellas are tough.

And we mean tough.

Saying "sucks" to bad luck, an open umbrella is thrown out of a plane with a skydiver, only to remain intact when they both hit the ground. The spot is the elemental soul-sister to Will It Blend? -- a series of spots about a really hardy blender.

(Thanks core77 for bringing it to our attention.)

How Many Ads Can Talk You into Eating Chocolate Plastic?

In the press room at ad:tech I met a guy called Frank Nein of OrionsWave, who observed the ad and marketing sectors are falling into turmoil -- spinning uncontrollably into hell, sifting through the din in search of equilibrium in a world gone self-publish and multi-platform.

And I can't stop thinking about Chris Franklin of Big Sky Editorial, who laughed at the idea of a viral ad. "All ads are viral!" he'd said. The point he made was that in order for an ad to succeed, it should be watchable again and again.

How many of our frenetic new manifestos are ideas that have always been there, or at least should have been?

With that, and as a kind of tribute to the future, I give you the Tootsie Roll ad. I couldn't count on my fingers and toes how often in childhood I saw this spot.

What's awesome about it is, most everyone I've met who's roughly my age still knows all the words to the song. We enjoyed watching it then; a lot of us still do.

And in our lifetimes, we ate a hell of a lot of Tootsie Rolls.