It was long and hard but our search for the ubiquitous ad:tech Booth Babe finally paid off when we came across this beautiful, blue butterfly handing out "Win An IPod Video" entries for extravagantmedia and explaining what the company does. Stunned by her beauty and the attention she commanded, we have no memory of what the company does but we enjoyed how she released us from our hard day grinding along the exhibit hall floor.
Cheesy word play aside, the butterfly, model Amy Dillard, was sweet, intelligent and very personable. What wasn't so sweet was the extravagantmedia guys leaving her alone in the corner for an hour while they roamed about the exhibit hall floor. See more of the beautiful Amy here.
This morning, the Monday night party scene at ad:tech Chicago looked dim with only an "official" Bluelithium/CIMA-sponsored cocktail hour on the exhibit hall floor from 5:30P to 7P and a continuation of that party at Fulton's on the River, 315 North LaSalle Street from 7P to 10P. This afternoon, the party announcements began to roll in. So, here they are:
DoubleClick is having a party at Avenue M at 695 North Milwaukee from 5:30 - 7P. MySpace is having an invite only cruise party off of Navy Pier which kicks off at 6P and offers hourly cruises. Some company whose name I can't remember is having a party at the W from about 5P to 7P. And, the late night, combo-company party is happening at the Rock Bottom Brewery from 9P to 2A. And I thought it was going to be an easy night.
Apparently, as indicated by this very sparsely attended ad:tech Chicago 2006 session, not many people are intrested in listening to creative types hyping their most recent creative endeavors. Moderating the collection of creatives, Click Here ACD Brian Linder, DesignKitchen CD Sam landers, Arc Worldwide Group CD Tim Irvine and AvenueA Razorish Disciplne lead (whatever that is) Brooke Nanberg, was Program Partners SVP David Hutchinson.
Landers, the most "creative looking" of the bunch, took the audience though the very Flashtastic work he had done for Motorola to promote the brand and, well, I'm not sure what else. The most telling bit of education here was the utterance by Landers, "oh, it's still loading." Linder shared the work his agency did for high end tequila Patron. Unfortunately, the campaign consisted mostly of low brow humor - not exactly the approach to position a high end brand. His agency also created a site, simplyperfect.com, that carried the campiagn's theme of debate but enabling people to take two side of an issue and post it for others to comment upon.
Irvine shared work for Cadillac that attempted to take the "old" out and inject the car with some "badass" as one critic said while describing the new Cadillacs. Irvine created a fairly cool online car racing game that appeared to be engaging. Within the first month of the campaign the site got 170,000 page views, 57,000 visitors and 150,000 downloads. Nanberg, in explaining her work for AT&T's Digital Lifestyle center - a site that illustrates how AT&T integrates with life, suffered the unfortunate side effect of Flashturbation. Pages took forever to load. Pages hung. Pages froze. And the kicker is the site actually has a Troubleshooting link right up top as if it was in the plan that many people would have trouble viewing this site. The one shining nugget she left us with as if it were an earth shattering insight was "creative is non-linear." Um. OK.
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Susan Bratton kicked of the 2006 Chicago ad:tech conference by introducing the new ad:tech chair, Drew Ianni, who will take over for Susan who will remain with ad:tech as Chair Emeritus. Keynote speaker Kay Ferguson, Co-CEO of Burrell Communications Group, a multicultural agency recently honored by Ad Age as the Multicultural Agency of the Year.
Ferguson's major point during her keynote was to inform the audience multicultural audiences are on of the Internet's fastest growing segment. Ferguson cited 77 percent of African Americans have Internet access at home, 64 percent have broadband and the segment spends 5 hours online each day, all figures higher than the general population.
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Here's a commercial that proves people really can do whatever they want when they put their mind to it. It's a PSA for Life Rolls On Foundation, a group that exists as a resource for people who have sustained spinal cord injury, in which wheelchair-bound athlete Darwin Holmes rolls around the edge of a pool, apparently, wishing he was in it skateboarding like he use to. Then he says screw it, drops right in and boards like any able bodied boarder. Sweet, as they say. Or is it sick? Or rad? Or bitchin'? Or...oh forget it.
Apparently, the client, BMW of Bridgeport, CT, loved this billboard so much, they asked the agency, VogtGoldstein to create a series. Perhaps something like, "From up here I can see New York and I wish I lived there instead of here." Or "From up here, I can see BMW of Greewich and it looks like they have a much better selection of cars." Give it your best shot VogtGoldstein.
Young & Rubicam Brands along with directors The Croneweths have created three spots for Land Rover LR3. In one of the spots, Spinning Accolades, the vehicle is shown driving across the El Dorado Dry Lake Bed near Las Vegas traversing its way around large blocks of type praising the vehicle. It just may get the message across more clearly than the usual sleep-inducing baritone announcer.
As ad:tech kicks off its Chicago conference, changes afoot in the organization's corner office. Susan Bratton, who has been the Programming Chair for many years is shifting her responsibilities and will become Chair Emeritus. Drew Ianni will take the Programming Chair position and be responsible for continuing the expansion of ad:tech.
In a press release, Ianni said, "As ad:tech continues to thrive and grow, we must maintain our reputation as a place people come to learn. The content and programming have to remain on point and of the highest quality. Time is increasingly scarce and valuable, so we must make it worthwhile for industry influencers and leaders to take the time off and attend. ad:tech has achieved its role as the gravitational center of this industry by doing just that, and I intend to keep us here."
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