Fans of YouTube may not have to worry about their baby getting sucked up into the Google void and corporatized because now we have PhilTube. Some dude named Phil has created a YouTube look alike and has videos up that poke fun at popular videos such as the Star Wars Kid and LonelyGirl15. Of course, this isn't the next YouTube at all. It's the creation of Phil McIntyre to parody YouTube, poke fun at social media and to promote PGM Artists, his company that represents production companies to agencies and media companies.
If you didn't know who Phil McIntyre or PGM were, you'd have to do a bit of digging to see what PhilTube is all about but as promotions go, we applaud it. There's no fist bumping here - although, perhaps PhilTube should spoof the Agency.com video - and the content is amusing enough. We're told Hart+Larsson is behind he creative on this one.
We opened our email this morning and found a letter from Stephen King entitled "I Know Scary." We thought, yes, that is true. And then we read on:
Dear MoveOn member,
If I know anything, I know scary. And giving this president and this out-of-control Congress two more years to screw up our future is downright terrifying. Thankfully, this national nightmare is one we can end with--literally--a wake up call.
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At the corner of Bloor and Avenue in Toronto, Stella Artois unveiled a gigantic two-ton object called The Trap. At the heart of the monument sits a shining glass of Stella Artois beer. The campaign also features chalk drawings, printwork and a game in which pedestrians try to unravel a virtual maze.
The Trap is in Toronto until Oct 25, after which it'll do rounds of cities like New York and San Paulo. Check out shots of it here. - Contributed by Angela Natividad
Adrants reader James Gardner snapped this camera phone shot of a street promotion that's part of the currently running VdubRocks Volkswagen campaign. The vehicle in the picture was outside a guitar store on Boston's Boylston street and guitars were hooked up to the car just as they are in the ads. Noting the bright orange parking ticket on the windshield, the Boston Police Department didn't take too kindly to the promotion blocking the sidewalk.
Somehow associating bling with Absolut vodka, Swedish agency Greatworks has created a History of Bling-Bling video in which the genesis of bling is attributed to cavemen affixing rocks on their sticks, Egyptian's fixation with gold, Romans converting their chariot's into lowriders, Vikings' use of gold for dental work, the Ming Dynasty's origination of the word bling-bling and the era's vases becoming blinged out cups used in the hip-hop community, the Renaissance periods use of large gold clocks hung around their necks and how 80's yuppies perpetuated the obsession with Absolut, hence the brand's success. It's all to promote Absolut's limited edition Bling-Bling bottle in hopes the brand can kick Grey Goose's ass and get some of its bling back.
First, and we're no hip-hop expert, we've always been told it's bling and not bling-bling. Second, pronouncing oneself as cool instantly makes one uncool. Third, oh forget it, it's all just a big, witty, inside joke. Or at least we hope it is. Besides, Absolut has simply run out of bottle styles for its ads so this is all that's left.
Looks like it's a good month for men and their menstrual issues. Catch Up Lady points us to Men with Cramps, a site about male cramping which has "directly or indirectly influenced all the most important events in our history." Sufferers are invited to participate in a study with the MacInnes and Porritt Institute which houses the illustrious Dr. Fardel. One participant confides that male cramps "Is like a tiny man playing a triangle in my stomach."
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As part of a McDonald's Japan promotion, the burger giant, along with Coke, gave away 10,000 MP3 players to those who purchased specially marked cups of Coke. Unfortunately, the MP3 players were infested with QQPass, a piece of spyware, that, once connected to people's PCs, allowed hackers access to passwords and other personal information. McDonald's issued a public apology and a recall for the infected MP3 players. It's unclear whether the company made any restitution for any data lost by those who were infected.
Continuing its fixation with strippers and their apparent ability to convey Napster's marketing message, the once free-for-all now pay-for-all music service has trotted out yet another stripper to illustrate just how bad the iTunes buck-a-song premise is compared to Napster's all you can eat offering. We suppose the analogy works. After all, no one really wants to own a stripper. They just want to rent one for a little while until they're...well...finished.
Borat, an anti-Semitic journalist personality invented by comedian Sacha Baron Cohen, has riled up Kazakhstan with publicity attempts to generate interest in his upcoming movie. An irate President Nazarbayev, concerned about Westerners taking Borat seriously, assures us all that "contrary to Borat's claims, [Kazakhstan] is not a nation of drunken anti-Semites who treat their women worse than their donkeys." We're not really sure why this kind of thing is a political issue considering Fez has made us laugh over stereotypes for as long as "That 70's Show" has been around, but whatever, every country is different and has the right to decide what kind of news should be a diplomatic priority.
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Michael Shostack was in Chicago today and stopped by the Gap's (Product_ RED) promotion at its store on Ohio and Michigan. He wasn't too impressed with the promotion reporting the throngs of people had but about five seconds to view celebs Oprah Winfrey and Bono from far across the other side of the street behind barricades. In the early Chicago cold weather today wasn't enough, that five second view was blocked by an army of red jacket-wearing Gap employees who lined up in front of the stores entrance, blocking what little view there was of Oprah and Bono as they made their way from their cars to the strore's entrance. Blocked view or not, Michael did snap a pretty good shot of the pair as they made their way inside, commenting Orpah looked very, very tiny. Check out his full coverage of the event here along with additional photos.
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