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Click Here to Try Drugs

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This work for the Oslo Department of Health which asks people to "click here to try drugs" is amazing. When you do click, you are taken through representative experiences of using marijuana, cocaine and heroine. It's all very trippy, complete with random confusing pop ups and a mouse that simply won't respond to your commands.

Very nice work which, to use fave buzz word of the day, engages quite nicely.

by Steve Hall    Oct-28-08    
Topic: Cause, Online



RTCRM Wrings Sweat Out of Agency Creatives

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Creatives hitting the vending machines at RTCRM might be accosted with a smorgasbord of aluminum signs, each with a military-style message demanding, in some short shouty way, that they beat their own bodies into a pulp and do a great deal of sweating.

This is part of RTCRM's six-week "extreme exercise" boot camp. Creatives meet at 7am, twice a week, to groan and sweat with fellow languid-limbed chums.

Must be interesting for morale. You never quite look at someone the same way once you've seen where their sweat glands are most active. And an approach like this is infinitely kinder than firing people for smoking.

more »

by Angela Natividad    Oct-28-08    
Topic: Agencies, Campaigns, Good, Promotions



Pepsi Unveils Packaging to 'Digital and Social Media Influencers'

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Today, Pepsi, with strategic help from Edelman, reached out to 25 "digital and social media influencers" with three separately-shipped packages. The first contained five cans representing logo design from 1898 to 1950. The second contained five cans representing logo design from 1962 to 1998. The third contained (yes, you guessed it) the newly launched can design - six of them full of actual Pepsi.

Accompanying the final shipment was a DVD highlights of the company's 110 year history including the debut of the new logo and packaging across all product lines. You can watch the video here.

more »

by Steve Hall    Oct-27-08    
Topic: Brands, Packaging, Social



Guy Orders Water, Gets Luxe Sea Goddess

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America's going through a period of bottled water Puritanism. That is, it's officially out-of-vogue to hawk your (wastefully!) bottled H2O, unless you've got a green angle tied to it ... or you happen to be Evian.

But Mattoni doesn't just flaunt its water wares; it's downright decadent. See its refreshingly playful spot, where a despondent patron orders Mattoni water -- and gets a surprisingly lush response.

The English-speaking version is more brash and saucy, but I dig how the splashy dame steps right onto the table and caps the ad with her theatrically husky (read: dubbed-porn-ish) "Will that be with bubbles ... or without?"

Brava, Mattoni. By Black Mountain Studios VFX/Stuttgart and Velvet Mediendesign.

by Angela Natividad    Oct-27-08    
Topic: Brands, Commercials, Good, Television



Twitter. Still Free. Still Seeking Business Model. Still Getting Slammed

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As only Simon Dumenco can, Twitter gets yet another lashing from an unbeliever. While Dumenco may be a non-believer, not one to drink the cult's Kool-Aid, he a makes a few good points. Twitter was launched in 2006 and still has yet to institute a business model steering the company towards anything more than its current status as plaything for social media-obsessed digerati.

more »

by Steve Hall    Oct-27-08    
Topic: Online, Opinion, Social



Imagine if Your Cat Were a Person...

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...and not just any person, but a middle-aged, jobless man with a receding hairline and a turtleneck. One of those kinds who likes talking about his feelings, and who goes into ecstasies when you scratch his neck.

Would that make you more likely to feed him meat-enriched cat food?

Betting that it will, TBWA/Toronto and Partners Film/Toronto bring back Hubert, the meat-craving Whiskas "cat."

Heh. Funny. Know what else is funny? Toe fetishes, petulant manchildren that wear diapers in secret, and executives that pay dominatrixes $250/hr. to suspend mousetraps from their nipples.

by Angela Natividad    Oct-27-08    
Topic: Brands, Campaigns, Commercials, Strange, Television



Barclay Slideless Card Slides America Towards Speedo Nightmare

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When you leave the office at the end of the day, you commute home on a water slide, right? Wait, what? You don't? What's wrong with you!?!? Idiot. Everyone commutes to and from work on a slide these days. Just watch this Barclay commercial hyping its slideless (pun?) card. Wait, what? It's just one guy? OK, so he's the idiot.

And what's this spot telling us anyway? It's great the card is slideless but are we to believe we have to get inside a water slide to use it? Wait, what? This is advertising? It's meant to be metaphorical? Well thank God. The thought of hundreds of disgustingly obese Americans slipping into Speedos to commute to and from work is enough to make one barf all over Madison Avenue.

Did Donny Deutsch create this?

by Steve Hall    Oct-27-08    
Topic: Commercials, Creative Commentary, Strange



Because Nothing's Cuter than a Second-Hand Costume, Right?

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This painfully cute Goodwill Halloween ad is like a benign form of brainwashing: you've got a repetitive jingle, high-pitched voices and adorable versions of monsters -- including Jason, oddly enough.

It's never warmed my heart more to watch a drop of blood slide slowly down a vampire's chin. Seriously -- I think my pupils dilated.

For Goodwill Los Angeles. The spot'll run until October 31.

by Angela Natividad    Oct-27-08    
Topic: Brands, Commercials, Promotions, Strange



Football is for Girls, Sexism Alive and Well in Czech Republic

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Football is for girls. That's right. It's for girls who are more concerned with how they look on the field then how they play. Hmm. Thank God there are still parts of the world in which sexism and political incorrectness reign supreme. If it weren't for the Czech Republic, we wouldn't have rugby.

Cause groups, send your complaints to Mather Communications.

by Steve Hall    Oct-27-08    
Topic: Strange, Video



OMG! The Blue Are Extinct! Mick Jagger to the Rescue!

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As if it were in danger of becoming extinct...oh wait, it is, the National Blue Foundation is out with a couple of videos that attempt to illustrate a world in which blues does not exist. OK, the videos are fun but, seriously, does anyone listen to the blues anymore? OK, OK...apologies to the two of you that still do but really, Was Mick Jagger the best they could come up with?

Ames Scullin O'Haire created.

by Steve Hall    Oct-27-08    
Topic: Celebrity, Online, Video



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