- George Parker is sick of Facebook, it's plethora of stupid applications and the insanity of a "24 year old billionaire wanker" gets rich using people's information without asking their permission.
- Legendary ad man George Lois makes an appearance on this week's Studio 360, Public Radio International's syndicated weekly show about creativity.
- TNS Media Intelligence forecasts media spend to increase 4.2 percent in 2008 with growth slower in the first half than the second. The Olympics and political spending will contribute significantly to that figure. The biggest increase (14.4 percent) will be seen in internet display advertising.
- AdWeek has named Goodby U.S. agency of the year and Wieden + Kennedy global agency of the year.
On the streets of East London, plastic heads are rolling. Blame the Decapitator, who is mutating ads for his/her own statement-making ends.
That image at left? It once was a cavity-sweet spot for High School Musical 2. And we can't even talk about what happened to that little bee from Bee Movie.
Headless bloody variants of smiling ad protagonists are applied to public posters with wheat paste, wethinks. Wired compares the work to that of New York's Splasher, who was eventually suspected of working under contract for American Apparel.
There's something romantic about street appropriations of ad messages. But marketer-on-marketer violence? That's just bitchy.
While desperately holding out hope there's actually be something other than agency holiday cards to write about as the week draws to a close, we found two interesting pieces about the back lash of social networking. The first story comes from CoolzOr who announces he now officially hates social networks. What caused him to arrive at this state of mind. A growing social network-focused search engine called Spock.
Spock is one of those social applications that spreads virally and that is supposed to be a search engine of sorts for the billions of bits and bytes of information generated from social networks. It's supposed to make it easy to find information about people you now on the internet. Trouble is, some people think it pries too deeply into the information people place on their social network profiles. Some also feel it generates an insane amount of email notifications and it makes it nearly impossible to stop the notifications and the collection of information.
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While it took us about ten tries, "I slept with my friend's wife" finally got Harley Davidson's Subservient Chicken-style Biker Clause to award us a place on the Naughty list. It's slow, not very smart but it's Harley so I guess we have to like it.
There also a Holiday Album recored by Hype client BWN that brings a biker rock, eighties hair band style of music to the MySpace page audio player. Yes, this whole thing's hosted on a MySpace page. And here we thought marketer's use of MySpace had gone the way of Second Life.
But don't listen to us. Despite what we may say about MySpace, it's still the big boy in the social networking neighborhood so it must be doing something right and marketers who see value in that must be at least sort of smart.
- This is just weird. A little Trans Siberian Orchestra. A little Santa Claus playing guitar. And a beard that won't stay on.
- The NBA has announced it will broadcast replays of memorable games on Joost.
- Working Tailgate Technologies, Paramount Vantage has launched a banner campaign for The Kite Runner which allows people to go through the entire ticket purchase process inside the banner. Check out one of the banners here.
- Rubicon Project CEO Frank Addante explains why Silicon Valley isn't the only place where dot com business occurs and why LA is carries just as much weight.
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On Shake Well Before Use, Social Media Insights Consultant Ariel Waldman has written a detailed analysis and review of a campaign hair care company Garnier has launched which involves blog briber PayPerPost (now hiding behind the walls of social media company IZEA) and what is purported to be a new TV show called The Harry Situation. On the show's website, clips highlight the sexual innuendo and double entendre-laden theme of the show. It also covers what's being sold as dispute between the show's creators and Garnier who pulled their sponsorship because of the show's racy content.
Of course, the controversy isn't real. Either is the show. It's all part of an elaborate ad campaign complete with what appear to be paid blog posts and a YouTube video featuring Garnier SVP of Sales Steve Lutz who explains why the company pulled their sponsorship.
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If you're interested in Twitter, what it's all about and how it's effecting the way people interact online, a video called Phantom Limb explores the phenomenon and how it benefits people's lives.
It's definitely one Web 2.0 (damn, I hate using that buzz word) thing that seems to have stuck.
Even though Facebook has backed off its Beacon advertising system which many people called invasive, a recent Computer Associates study finds Facebook still snoops into user's affiliate site activity. Computer Associates PestPatrol Research Engineer, writing on the company's blog said, "Facebook is collecting information about user actions on affiliate sites regardless of whether or not the user chose to opt out, and regardless of whether or not the user is logged into Facebook at that time."
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Did anyone really think they'd get away with plastering people's images alongside ads as mini-endorsements? 50,000 people didn't and signed a petition forcing the company to change is Beacon system so people have control over whether or not they participate in it.
Why, in the first place, they thought everyone would willingly become a buzz agent is mystifying. Is there a social network out there that can can the right mix of human interaction and capitalistic commerce?
New take on the speed-dating thing. We give you speed introductions, courtesy of WooMe.
Hoping to drag the power of the first impression outside the domain of quick-fix courting, WooMe users join little clusters of users segmented by interest, sex and age -- not necessarily for romantic reasons. (There are "ladies' night" and sports fan groups, for example.)
When the music starts, you've got about a minute to video chat each group member, one at a time. After that, you decide which users you dug and click "I'm Woo'd." If you're woo'd by somebody who's been woo'd by you, the pair of you drop a dollar for contact info.
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