Joining the growing number of advertising focused weblogs is VNU big boy AdWeek. The staff of Adweek including Ann Mack, Simon Butler, Tim Nudd, Alison Fahey, Jack Feur and others began posting to AdFreak yesterday and plan to use it to expand coverage of what is already offered in AdWeek. Current posts range from coverage of Mucinex’s disgusting logo, the WTA’s ad campaign with Serena Williams and Maria Sharapova and how hurricanes help Pop-Tart sales.
The tone of AdFreak is decidedly unlike the straight reporting found in AdWeek. It’s as if the chains of the editorial desk have been removed from the writers. It will interesting to watch it’s growth unfold and to see how content is divvied up between AdWeek and AdFreak. Afterall, there’s a subscription model to protect over at AdWeek and decisions will have to be made as to what to offer for free versus paid. The more intriguing question though for AdWeek is whether AdFreak eliminates the need for AdWeek. Already, two days content of AdFreak is of more interest than years of AdWeek’s editorial which consists mainly of agency review announcements, campaign launches, mergers and personnel changes.
