Visit ihavethebug.com to take a quiz and find out whether you've got the "travel bug." The exercise -- short, playful and mildly entertaining -- serves two purposes: to flatter you and drive you to the Travel Channel. (If so inclined, note requisite Facebook tie-in at bottom left. What, don't you want all your friends to know you've got "excellent gumption, chutzpah"?)
Internet stuff put together by Razorfish. The Travel Bug TV spot, orchestrated by Moroch, is done in a faux-serious Big Pharma tone. You've got sufferers, playfully agonized; you've got gratuitous shots of people running on beaches. The Travel Channel's the cure, but like all drugs, you're warned it may only aggravate the symptoms.
Ad's expectedly corny, even a little dated in its humour; but the site quiz ties the gimmick back to Travel Channel shows well enough. At the very least, it sparked discussion: last night me and a friend were all, "What exactly is a sexy beach?" Verdict's still out.
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Shots Mag draws our attention to Wieden + Kennedy's "The Light" for Nike. It's one of those soul-of-the-run spots: all about the breath, the pace, the solitude of the sport and the community it simultaneously sparks.
You get the sense that runners inhabit a part of space/time that the rest of Suburbia's completely unaware of.
More intense and less playful than 72andSunny's "Men vs. Women." Classic Nike though.
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Timberland's "Delirium" compares buying nature-friendly shoes to a scenario in which a dire-straits castaway is rescued by nature herself. It's stirring material, particularly if you found a certain film, involving Tom Hanks and a volleyball, emotionally resonant.
Maybe a little heavy for a shoe label, but hey: if we can take a sentimental education from Coke, no harm in getting emo-schooled by Timbo.
By Leagas Delaney.
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- An account supervisor at Lowe in Zurich has asked us to yank a recent post featuring a vampire whose fangs are made of OB tampons. It's unapproved client work. (That means it's not running anywhere and, he says, it never will.) I guess this means God does exist.
- Quite possibly the most amazing brownies ever.
- Wisconsin rebrands. We're still not going.
- Coke Zero's The Morning After (always a promising title).
- George Parker says sorry for using one of his favourite pet names on Susan Bratton, but manages to get some pokes in about an interview she did with Julie Roehm. You remember her, right? No? Probably best.
- Obama's face for Turkish bank.
VCCP put together this no-frills but amiable spot for Jordans Country Crisp, a UK-based cereal label that differentiates itself by spotlighting its own mom-and-popness.
We like how the story of the cereal plays out on the box, and how the wee farmer on the tractor calls out as he scrolls by. So granola. Tagline: "You can taste we care."
Jordans hasn't released a major ad campaign in four years; this also marks its first animated piece. Voiceover by Bill Oddie, whom VCCP said was chosen because of his "association with nature and conservation." Don't know about all that, but he's definitely got a good bedtime story manner. We feel warmy.
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The battle of the sexes gets all literal on yo' ass in "Men vs Women" by 72andSunny. Propelled forth by the challenge of racking up the most kilometres for their gender, Nike-decked runners take to the streets in the playful spirit of competition. (We totally eat this stuff up. Remember those Mia Hamm vs. Michael Jordan Gatorade ads?)
Neat thing is, this isn't just an ad. If you're rooting for any particular team, and provided your knees are in fine shape, join in the fun at NikePlus.com. (Digital material by AKQA.)
Note how everybody seems to own a Macbook Pro. o_O Nike and Apple have collaborated before on a Nike + iPod clothing line, so it should come as no surprise they're still bedtime buddies. Song's cool, too: Run (I'm a Natural Disaster) by Gnarls Barkley.
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Skittles continues its mile-high "WTF?" spree with "Transplant," which illustrates a new pack of cross-breed candies with a guy who recovers from an operation -- only to find he's been crossed with a dude named Jose.
There's this weird moment where a pack of Skittles gets tossed hither and yon, then they eat them while facing each other and delicately licking -- kissing, really -- their own fingers.
By TBWA\Chiat\Day\NY. See its last little bit of magic.
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"A Lighter World," where a couple pops open a bottle of Mahou and does a gravity-defying dance, is deliciously infectious.
By Agosto; featuring a cover of Pump the Jam by Canadian band Lost Fingers. (I realize that sounds not-very-savoury, but with a guitar in the background and a tap-dancing featurette the song is surprisingly fresh.)
Tagline: "There's a lighter world" -- riffing off the Premium Light status of this particular Spanish bev.
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So who says this new-fangled social media, web 2.0 stuff doesn't work? Not Diggnation's Kevin Rose and Alex Albrecht who, on January 16th interviewed Jimmy Fallon, will, in return, appear on Late Night with Jimmy Fallon tonight.
Watch them. They're good. But if you miss it and are going to SXSW, you can see them do a live show at the Bigg Digg Shindigg at Stubb's Saturday night beginning at 6:30PM.
Thanksgiving. Christmas. Valentine's Day. *slap* Easter. Please, make it stop! It's like one holiday ends and another begins. So, yea, Easter's on the way and so are the Easter-themed campiagns like this one from Mars Canada for M&M. Created by Proximity Canada, BBDO Toronto and Firstborn, this one has been dubbed "Canada's most Speck-tacular Egg hunt."
With print, TV (see one of the spots here), POP and online, people are urged to collect M&M eggs hidden around the web (a virtual egg hunt!) and in stores with PIN codes to use as entrance to drawing to win a trip to New York, Las Vegas or Orlando.
There's a site, four minisites and banners on MSN.ca, Yahoo.ca, MySpace.ca and others all with PIN codes to hunt for. Have at it.
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