Right-Half Chow

Billboards killed the video star: T-Mobile

I spent the past weekend in London, and a good part of that weekend travelling around on the undergroun. CBS Outdoor is rightly defending the heavy presence of billboards around the tube, citing research that claims about 9 in 10 people like the ads. I can see why because they're usually of higher standards than what we normally have in the streets around here, or maybe it's just the sheer abundance that ups you chances of meeting anything worthwile.

Anyhow, they seem to have come up with some new technology there as well: rows of small billboardlike screens next to the automatic stairs, fully capable of displaying moving imagery. I was not impressed... instead I was baffled by the silent view of inane people dancing to silent music in a silent subway station in a silent 3 or 5 second ad, whereafter T-Mobile claimed that 'Life's for sharing', all in silence... Give me back my witty words, my funny posters, and even the occasional idiotic Musical hyperbole (I successfully avoided visiting one again)!

Deeply underwhelmed by their latest attempt to tempt me I came to work this morning, only to find a link in my inbox (from the Frankfurt-London colleagues) to the real thing: a gigantic flashmob dancing to, get this, music you can hear, in a subway station (Liverpool street to be precise):

Brilliant!

So don't go screwing it up by trying to reuse it in a different media format which is not suited at all. I doubt that if I would feel any different if I were to see the moving imagery (did I say there's no sound?) again after seeing this film.

How many euros, pounds or dollars must you throw away before you realise that you don't need to do the same bloody thing in every media touchpoint you have. I love the whole flashmob/dance/film thing, and it makes a great tv or online ad if you've got the time, and I love the witty posters you used to have in the subway. But don't go mixing them up... I don't mind that they're two different things, I don't mind if the fonts are not the same, I don't mind if you portray different people on the sub compared to your telly ads. I like brands that get their message across in the most suitable way, and that depends on what you use to talk to me at what time.

For the final time (wishful thinking, I know...): consistency and coherence should be found in a strategic idea around your brand, not in executional similarity.

YouTube picks of the month

You never know, I might come up with something regular like this... but don't get your hopes up.

Anyway, here's some stuff I really liked and/or found intriguing for the past few weeks.

First up is the Virgin Atlantic film which is a good example of how you can use the past as a relevant way to portray themselves today. I had a discussion on the importance of 'brand anniversaries' recently and my general comment was 'don't bother'. In general people only use it as a pretext for a pretty mundane promotional idea or giveaway. But if it adds to your expertise and vision, go right ahead. I really like the way they portray themselves as a beacon of style in an otherwise catastrophic decade, Franky's excluded, obviously...

Second is the trailer for Objectified, a new film by Gary Hustwit, who already turned a typeface into something interesting (and not just for art directors). The role of design in marketing is growing evermore, up to the point where it's sometimes becoming hard to distinguish one from the other. And I've had quite a few interesting discussions with designers and people in r&d during the past few months. In general these start with a direct confrontation between the product and the consumer perspective but I often find it a lot easier to find a common ground here than I would with, for example, a sales director. Which probably says something about the way people do business today...



Finally there's this magnificent film about the importance of advertising awards by Maggot Operations, I'm guessing they have a quite a few David Lynch fans around:

PSFK Good Ideas Salon

Piers Fawkes asked me to mention the next PSFK conference in the UK, and for good reason: the lineup looks fantastic. I'd be on the lookout for Nicolas Roope, the Penguin people, the BBC (the title 'vision development executive' rings a bit hollow but in the case of the BBC that should be worthwile) and especially Cameron Leslie from Fabric.

I won't be going myself because it looks like I'll be here, lucky I've already got some first hand experience of Fabric then... But seriously: go there if you can, it promises to be a lot more inspiring than the usual big name conferences everyone goes to, and there's bound to be an interesting audience as well.

Whopper Sacrifice

For a moment I contemplated turning this into a Burger King only blog, that would make my life easier and lower expectations from recurring visitors. But that seems a bit too lazy though...

Far from making any promise, I am looking for a way to breathe some life into this blog again for 2009, but to start of the year here's Whopper Sacrifice.

As usual they seem to be spot on again: This might be the year people suddenly realise they run out of real friends because they're too busy throwing virtual sheep at people they befriended to up their status in whatever social network you can think of. The phenomenon is installed, now let's try and turn the quality up to 11 (but then it's still the interweb, so 7 might have to do) by trimming the contact pool. They're probably doing Facebook a service with actions like these, so who's next?

I'm still very sorry there is no Burger King nearby, otherwise this would have been quite an easy decision...