Movies
According to Variety, Apple's move into the movie business appears to be working quite well.
"Studio execs said that iTunes movie sales and rentals -- which the computer company said tops 50,000 daily -- dominate the small but closely watched digital movie biz. Apple is now on track to sell or rent 18.25 million movies a year, or triple the number of last year, before it inked deals with all major studios for new-release rentals and sales."
Phones
Apple placed an order with Samsung for 50 million NAND flash chips. It's basically taken over Samsung's production. The order is so big, Samsung is asking its other customers to wait. A fascinating development when you consider that Samsung also wants to play in the phone wars, but here it is helping a foe with a critical component.
Posted by Ed Cotton
The Whitney Museum engaging in some creative use of media to promote its Bucky Fuller exhibit.
Using a vacant store 50 yards from the museum, they put up a relevant quote.
Makes you think a little and work to connect the dots.
Is the store part of the museum exhibit or is it an ad?
Posted by Ed Cotton
Tom Coates of Yahoo and Matt Jones of Dopplr gave this fascinating presentation about the topic at this years Web 2.0 conference.
The personalization of experiences through this information suggests that no experience should ever be the same.
After years of talk and nothing to show for it, we are truly moving into a one-to-one world.
Posted by Ed Cotton
(1) “Its 28 different postings on YouTube have garnered 10m views. It has been spoofed with a toy gorilla as well as remixed with a 50 Cent and a Bonnie Tyler track. It is simple, bonkers and funny”
Media Guardian-October- 2007
What have we learned?
1.Sales Performance: It worked- Dairy Milk got a 9% bump in sales
2. Some Creatives Get the New World: Creatives liked it and it won big at awards shows including Cannes
3. Some Creatives Don't Get the New World: Creatives didn't like it- it caused some significant debate at awards shows including Cannes
4. There's No Such thing As A Formula: It's hard to repeat success- the second spot, despite it's craziness could not capture in the way Phil and the gorilla did
5. The Planners Worked Hard: Despite the feeling that planners weren't involved in this- they did a ton of work setting the stage for the client to accept a new form of advertising. Things like:
Why being matters more than saying
Being true to yourself, rather than pretending to be something you are not
Being authentic vs. contrived
The idea of brands taking on the role of entertainers.
6. Research Can't Explain Everything: This thing was tested to death- it blew the lid off Millward Brown's ad testing scores, but the company couldn't explain why.
One thing is for certain, it's paved the way for other clients and agencies to take more risks. Not everything is going to work, but they are going to have a lot of fun doing it.
Posted by Ed Cotton
They are keeping up with these 2.0 times by using a wiki to record the thoughts and insights from other planners.
Here's what they are asking.
You can post your thinking here.
Posted by Ed Cotton
People are still thinking about alternative energy as alternative to oil, but what if there isn't one? Higher prices are the likely new reality.
Brands thinking about the future are going to have to realize that consumer's disposable income is going to decrease based on increased expenditures on items that we've previously taken for granted; fuel, energy and food. In addition, the knock on impact of this on costs of goods will be significant.
The prospect of decreasing standards of living looms large, but this appears to be the price we are paying for a reliance on an oil-based economy.
"Almost everyone seems to agree: governments now face a choice between saving the planet and saving the economy. As recession looms, the political pressure to abandon green policies intensifies. A report published yesterday by Ernst & Young suggests that the EU's puny carbon target will raise energy bills by 20% over the next 12 years. Last week the prime minister's advisers admitted to the Guardian that his renewable energy plans were "on the margins" of what people will tolerate.
But these fears are based on a false assumption: that there is a cheap alternative to a green economy. Last week New Scientist reported a survey of oil industry experts, which found that most of them believe global oil supplies will peak by 2010. If they are right, the game is up. A report published by the US department of energy in 2005 argued that unless the world begins a crash programme of replacements 10 or 20 years before oil peaks, a crisis "unlike any yet faced by modern industrial society" is unavoidable.
If the world is sliding into recession, it's partly because governments believed that they could choose between economy and ecology. The price of oil is so high and it hurts so much because there has been no serious effort to reduce our dependency."Posted by Ed Cotton
"At the beginning of last year, Ms Oppenheimer poached Helen Dodd, a retail design expert, from Tesco.
Ms Dodd, who has spent 20 years working out how to attract customers to shops and keep them there, trooped 250 Barclays customers and staff through the Northampton warehouse to test the new layout and technology.
Nothing was sacred, not even the good old British queue with the black tape barriers. The new Manchester branch is experimenting with a ying-yang-shaped queue, broken up by waist-height pillars housing computer games. The branch's space-age information desk is pure Apple store, while, according to Ms Dodd: “We're trialling a lot of different queueing methodologies - people do PhDs on this stuff.”
The childrens' play area is inspired by the Science Museum. There is no glass separating tellers from customers, to stop people from raising their voices, something that Ms Dodd believes makes banking more stressful.
Curves are used to make customers feel “warmer”, while the glass frontage will make women more inclined to enter. “At the moment, they don't feel welcomed into branches,” Ms Dodd said. Concierges, dressed in uniforms by the designer Jeff Banks, will issue customers with tickets telling them how long they must wait and even if they would be served more quickly if they went to another branch.
Getting the right doormat was key - customers like dry feet, so Ms Dodd found a mat that dried wet soles within four steps. The Manchester branch operates to the same timetable as other retailers, with late night and weekend opening."
Posted by Ed Cotton
Here's how Dawn describes herself.
"Dawn Danby explores the intersection of design, sustainability and business. Which is a fancy way of saying that she wants the things we make to benefit both people and the world.
An industrial designer by training, she's a boundary-spanner and synthesist who has acted as a cross-disciplinary designer, strategist, art director, project manager, producer and artist."
Dawn is a sustainability expert and will talk to us about what's next for brands and companies as the start to face the issue head on.
We have very limited space for this event, but if you are interested please email ecotton@bssp.com and hopefully we can squeeze you in.
Posted by Ed Cotton
(2) "INNOVATION IS NOT GOOD IN ITSELF - IN FACT, MORE INNOVATION DOES HARM, THAN DOES GOOD.
My evidence for this statement is contained in a breathless announcement from Mintel, the market research company, that a "Record-Breaking Number of New Products Flood Global CPG Shelves" and that (the numbers are for 2006) "close to 182,000 new products were introduced globally, with key booming areas focusing on mind, body, and general good health".
Well over half of these of these innovations - 105,000, to be precise - were food and drink products. This flood of innovations enable us to profit from such trends as "brainpower foods, age-defying treatments, increases in portion control, and "just for you" customised products”.
Now I may have misunderstood something here, but surely the Mintel numbers mean that more than half the innovations that reach the market all over the world - 300 innovations, every single day of the year - decrease the resource efficiency and hence sustainability of global food systems?
Good, so that's Innovation dealt with. Bring on the next killer word!"
However, shouldn't innovators now consider the social and environmental responsibility of their actions?
If they do, innovations shouldn't be product launches for the sake of it, but new products that improve upon the social and environmental footprints of their predecessors and then innovation would be a good thing?
Posted by Ed Cotton
1. Briefly describe Glue and your role at the agency?
I work at UK digital ad agency glue London (current clients include the likes of Adidas, Toyota, Bacardi, Nokia, 3, Playstation, McCain, COI and Virgin Trains)
My role is Head of Emerging Technology which is a job title shrouded in ambiguity I know, but actually means I focus on identifying how technology can enhance glue’s creative idea, and how technology can be harnessed to take the creative idea out to new audiences. A lot of time is spent digging out links to the best campaigns and technology partners, creating learning's and then trying to educate and inspire the wider agency on how to do cool stuff.
2. How does technology integrate itself into the creative solution?
We strive to integrate technology as seamlessly as possible. We always approach things from the consumers perspective who on the whole couldn't care less about technology. What people want is a great experience that's tailored to the channel they're on. People should stay oblivious to what's going on under the bonnet. The best technology is invisible.
Once we have a creative idea and understand who the audience is, we're then in the position to identify which channels could be relevant - out of which the technologies generally fall. It's massively important to fully understand the opportunities and limitations of each of the channels, and to try and push those boundaries with each project.
3. What new demands are clients placing on interactive communications?
We’ve witnessed a shift from brands buying time with an audience, to a need for brands to create time with an audience – and by that I mean creating experiences or utilities that add value and that people choose to spend time with.
It’s human nature that once we’ve had a great experience we tell our friends about it (and by experience I mean any experience). Our objective is therefore to enable our brands to enter peoples everyday conversations in a positive fashion, and we do this by building rich and engaging experiences or utilities that people want to spend time with.
4. Looking ahead, what technology trends do you think are going to be big in the interactive space?
Everything is so new that the industry as a whole is on a collective learning exercise to understand what channel opportunities are out there, how people are using these channels, how brands can add value to people on these channels, and also how to build for them. (Made easier by the fact that all of these are constantly evolving!)
For me the special campaigns will be those that understand how people use particular channels, and identify when to employ them in combination to produce something special. The Nike piece is a perfect example.
The other big thing for me is dynamic video. The digital industry has historically been restricted on how work is executed by the limitations of Flash. Motion graphics and 3d applications offer a much wider variety of techniques and better production values, so I think we’ll see a lot more agencies moving into this space.
5. What work out there do you wish Glue had been involved with?
There is so much good work out there. The work R/GA do for Nike is amazing. I love Absolut Machines as an example of how to create a real world experience that is controlled virtually. The Japanese have always been good at technology and their creative skills are now catching up fast. The recent Uniqlock piece is a great example of this and is a strong creative idea is deployed over a variety of channels.
6. Where do you find your inspiration?
I have a wide group of friends from all walks of life. I expose myself and absorb as much as I can across all disciplines. I make time to look on the interweb but also make sure I do real world things too.
There’s an interesting insight to be had everywhere. We’re lucky in London because there’s stuff going on around us all the time, the trick is finding the time to go to it.
Posted by Ed Cotton