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Airlines Don't Understand Width More Important Than Length

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Airlines need to stop deluding us into the fact flying, apart from First Class, is anything other than the nightmarish scenario depicted in the first half of this JetBlue commercial from JWT New York. After showing us the horror of the reclining seat, we are transported to the nirvana of JetBlue's extra legroom.

While extra legroom may be great, it does nothing to address the problem of getting stuck next to a fat person for a cross country flight. And the person doesn't even have to be all that fat, if fat at all, to make life miserable for six hours.

As they always tell us in an entirely different arena, it's the width that matters, not the length. The spot was produced by Blacklist and dirested by againstallodds.

by Steve Hall    Apr-27-09    
Topic: Commercials



When High Blood Pressure Is A Good Thing

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Oh how we love us a weird-ass, whacked out Japanese television commercial. This one, which, yes, is old, is for Suntory tea which claims to help those with high blood pressure. Though it's a very good thing the guy in this commercial has high blood pressure. Nothing like putting a positive spin on a health issue.

Sadly, we'll never see commercials like this here in America. Luckily, Japan hasn't yet heard of cause groups whose sole purpose is to remove every last vestige of humor from our lives...and from all out TV commercials.

by Steve Hall    Apr-27-09    
Topic: Commercials, Strange



Samsung Unleashes Spore on Streets of Austria

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Samsung is doing something weird in Austria. And it has to do with its LED TVs and the online game Spore. They've taken to the streets with the Spore creature posing with people and leading them in a little dance.

Enjoy all the street action here.

by Steve Hall    Apr-27-09    
Topic: Guerilla



Road Trip + Twitter = Roadtwip

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Twitter has inspired everything. It's changed the way people communicate. It's become a marketing platform. It's become a direct marketing channel. It's lent credence to the notion "conversations" can actually occur between a brand and a person. And...it's given us Oprah whether we like it or not. So why not a road trip? Or, rather, a Roadtwip.

Oh yes. Much like iPhone's "there's an app for that," there's an app for anything and everything you want to do with Twitter. Why not a road trip app? OK so Roadtwip isn't actually an app, rather a physical road trip during which three people hop in a car and, for two weeks, traverse the country "seeking the emerging future for a new America."

more »

by Steve Hall    Apr-27-09    
Topic: Events, Social



ad:tech SF: Levi's Blueprint for Storytelling

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"When presented with bold new ideas, people reference what they know more than what they can conceive."

Senior Director Michael Perman of Levi's passed us oranges, recounted memories of his dad and deluged us with blue-jean trivia in an ad:tech sesh entitled "The Power of Storytelling."

See snippets of tweet coverage. It's apt that Levi's give us the skinny on storytelling's underrated appeal, given that its capacity to spin tales has beguiled us for years. Anyway, here's some videographic deja vu.

more »

by Angela Natividad    Apr-27-09    
Topic: Creative Commentary, Events, Industry Events, Video



ad:tech SF: Steve Hayden Replaces Industry Fear with a Wee Bit O' Wonder

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Ogilvy Vice Chairman Steve Hayden conducted a keynote titled "Fear, Love and Advertising" at ad:tech SF last week. I livetweeted it; you can see some of the tweetage here.

Hayden kicked off by explaining the premise behind his talk: in this dire economic clime, when everybody's castrating their own creativity, he hopes to encourage the industry to shelf their fears in favour of a little (well-informed) wonder.

He woke the muse by blasting us with iconic ads, like the Apple Newton stuff and "True Colors" from Dove's Real Women campaign.

Then he gave us a long, colourful explanation of a hexagon he calls Hayden's Mandala -- a complex (and yet simple!) cycle of everything a person/brand goes through when facing a major growth trajectory or change. Here's a video snapshot of that:


Then Hayden did something I've never seen a keynoter do before: he passed the floor to people whose products he thinks will change the media environment. I was awestruck, and only more so when I saw what came next.

more »

by Angela Natividad    Apr-27-09    
Topic: Creative Commentary, Events, Industry Events



ad:tech SF: Hashing Out Social Networking's Impact on Photo Storage

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The stuff that comes out after an interview is sometimes just as good as what you get during. After our audiovisual taste of the future of HootSuite (and a power-fail story about ZipCar), founder Ryan Holmes of Invoke Media and publisher Krista Neher of The Marketess riffed on the photo storage merits of Facebook and flickr.

Compelling factoid: while it may be true that flickr hosts over three million photos, the unlikely Facebook totally pwns that figure. As of October 2008 Facebook became the largest online photo storage site -- clocking over 10 billion pics and counting.

Obviously there are big differences between the sites. Krista argues that flickr's too public for comfort, and people are more inclined to curate personal images in a space where they can control who sees what. (Apropos to that, I like how Ryan murmurs, "...stalker" at :22.)

How has social networking changed online photo storage and personal life-whoring in general? What's coming? We contemplate these questions and others while I clutch a digicam with one hand and macaroon-gorge with the other.

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You Can Never Have Enough White Space.

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ANIMAL New York's Bucky Turco and crew decided to take back some of the space taken over by NPA, a wild posting kinda firm. (Pics and full story of the day's whitewashing activites here.) NYC's Department of Building Sign Enforcement has laws against ads on certain spaces, but according to the notice left by the group, NPA and building owners don't seem to be following those laws. Artists then came in and made things all perty. [ Post-jump ]

more »

by Bill Green    Apr-27-09    




Inspiration Being, You Know...

What do you do when you don't have a big budget or a lot of ideas? Homage! I don't mean a great spoof for spoof's safe, but actual commercials for products, like...

- The Cleveland Cavaliers add a twist to the Heinken shoe closet spot. Score! (The extended version, too long.)

- Next, Dear Jane Sample finds a damm good Obama impersonator for Lastman's Bad Boy Furniture in Toronto. (Extra points on the name alone.)

- Freecreditreport.com? Hold up a sec, Uncle Sam fires back with annualcreditreport.com.

by Bill Green    Apr-24-09    
Topic: Commercials, Spoofs, Television



Werther's Party Line.

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"Hey Steve, what's up. Nah, just wanted to give you a heads-up on where I'm at before you guys get back. Trying to finish up a Werther's Caramel House Party thing. No, yeah, the grandfather chocolate people. From like the 80s, yeah. They're doing some kind of house party chocolate women thing this Saturday. No, just like housewives and shit for a girls' night in, but yeah, strippers and hot caramel takes it places too. Huh? About 15,000 people signed up so far.

more »

by Bill Green    Apr-24-09    
Topic: Announcements, Events



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