Webicratic

Social Parsimony or Google+ Vs. Facebook

2011-07-06T23:20:00.008-04:00

There was no way in hell I was going to miss an opportunity to articulate some of my thoughts surrounding Google+ and how I personally think it completely redefines the entire social ecosystem.

I consider myself one of the lucky few to have gotten early access to the new social network.

It is a rare opportunity to explore its environment and see it evolve before the onslaught of social dalliers start littering it with billions of bytes of content and continuous activity.

For now my stream mainly consists of people like myself who are getting a lay of the land in order to better understand its geography.

Not because we are sociologists but because most of us are in the business to create and communicate content and we are always looking for the best ways to deliver our content and disseminate it to our audiences.

We are the early explorers of new channels and we are typically a kind of litmus test for their eventual popularity because of the way we instinctually scrutinize the effectiveness of these new channels.

What excites me most about Google+ is that it isn't the new kid on the block that has to claw its way past its competition, it doesn't need to raise money, it needs no additional growth to compete and in many cases it already has the manpower to exceed any advances or innovations its competitors can try to come back at it with.

Google+ isn't something new, it is something that has evolved slowly over time.

Nothing truly great simply just appears.

Especially in the cases when greatness instantly explodes on to the scene, it eventually fades away because it doesn't have the wherewithal to withstand the complexity of the interaction that its users will require of it.

Greatness requires time and maturity.

Google+ is the eversion of tons of wildly successful and ubiquitous online tools all being sucked into one single place and energized by the force of social networking.

First Google perfected and contained the beast that is searching the web.

Then Google conquered personal email.

Google went on to reinvent video with YouTube.

Blogger became a writers paradise.

Analytics were made available for free to everyone big and small.

Google brought us the entire Earth and every single street and side road that is contained within it and exactly how best to navigate them.

It houses our images, and now our music, there are archives of books and a huge cache of free productivity tools.

Google also provides us with a cutting edge browser in which to peruse the web.

Oh wait, did I mention that Google is also the most popular mobile operating system and is quickly becoming a major player in the tablet and PC operating systems race as well?

Anyway... you get it, Google is huge!

And with a simple addition, using the sign for addition. Google adds a Social Layer on top of it all and appropriately calls it Google+ (g+).

Like some new variable in an equation, "g" represents an amorphous set of technological offerings that is forever adapting to accommodate its ravenous audiences. Plus (+) is the social layer that represents all of us.

Now you dont have to be a social media expert (although everyone claims to be one) to immediately see the similarities between Google+ and Facebook. The comparisons are obvious. However if you look deeper it will quickly become clear that Google+ has a much better chance of becoming the premier social network over the next few years.

Social media is made up of billions of rabid users. Highly social, competitive and technologically infatuated people who love nothing more than seeing themselves inside of the technology that most fascinates them. Technology that shines the best light on the personas that they maintain online.

A new subset of people who evolve culturally through a constant strive for identifying the "killer" that will eventually replace that which they find to be most advanced with something they are led to believe is even more advanced.

Feeding off of the drama of the eventual fall of the current titan and reveling in the defeat of the once beloved cultural epicenter. Then over valuing its victor with loyalty and adherence to its infrastructure.

We no longer take into account things like business models that have long term sustainability and profitability, instead we reward the victor through our own devotion and support. In praise of the mighty champion we flood its channel with billions of bits of personal information making it a valuable cistern of human content that can then be mined by corporations in order to better profit off of the golden nuggets of our souls that we so publicly reveal openly.

There is a principle called parsimony.

Parsimony is a rule that states that if there are two options and if one option is to be true, well-established social norms and etiquette must be either re-written, ignored, or suspended in order to allow it to be true, but if the other option is to be true no such accommodation need be made, then typically the simpler of the two options is much more likely to be accepted.

Basically people will migrate towards the network that gains them the greatest amount of accessibility and usability options that house our personas and is preferred to the one with the less complex options regardless of what is in actuality a better network. Its just how us crazy humans work.

Social network ecosystems like Twitter, Facebook & Google+ will naturally grow in size to accommodate the complexity of the human data being fed into the network.

But if the complexity of the data diminishes so will the size of the network.

Hence MySpace.

The less dynamic and complex the data the less dynamic and complex the network.

Now this is where Google+ wins.

Google has all of the tried and true tools that are already being used by billions of people worldwide. All Google has to do is simply and methodically converge all of these tools and it will continue to grow its Social Network dominance simply by exposing more and more of its already successful products within Google+.

It has been some time since I have been this excited about a new platform, especially since everything Google has done since its inception is all coming together now and the picture is starting to become more clear.

Mobile, Web, Social, Publishing, Productivity, Entertainment, Advertising, Navigation, Telephony and countless other vital tools for living in this new age all thrive within Google's veins.

I cant wait to see how this all plays out, my bet is that Facebook will not withstand the solid foundation and maturity that Google+ brings and will be relegated to AOL and Yahoo status. Facebook will survive on its fumes and hopefully weather a maturation phase to better define itself and its place in the social ecosystem or it will simply run out of resources as Google will continue to dominate yet another part of the web.

By the way, Twitter will be just fine.

Personal Gain

2011-06-07T19:51:00.001-04:00

The origin and evolution of social networking has had many inroads, message boards were the earliest and most primitive form that roamed this new chaotic landscape of the Internet.

Ideas were being shared and distributed across small networks of early adopters, subjects mainly consisting of the new media itself. As the platform evolved networks like AOL fostered a new level of social sharing in the form of instant messaging and chat rooms dedicated to almost every topic known to man.

Websites were still very primitive and typically communicated in one direction. Early websites were a shallow bucket of information that was closed to comments and conversation.

Without the ubiquity and the transparency of two way communication brands and content creators were reluctant to open up their sites to public conversation.

Blogging was an evolutionary shift that blew the doors open to public sharing as we know it today.

Bloggers tend to be highly opinionated, precisely focused and generally catering to a particular niche of audience that cares to read and comment on a particular subject of interest. Blog commenting forced a certain level of transparency so that the conversations would be fair and controlled.

Social Media grew out of the womb of this kind of public sharing, our social media profiles are now deep enough to verify our identities and allow us to share our thoughts and essentially micro-blog everything that goes on in our lives. This transparency is a form of social currency that give strength to our voices.

Social networks encourage and enable us to record every second of our lives and in many cases it is the recording and sharing of our lives that helps dictate many of the decisions we make throughout the day.

Where to go for lunch may be based on a Foursquare check-in made by a friend, a business deal may have evolved from a simple Twitter exchange, a relationship could hinge on who may have poked you on Facebook today or what your official relationship status is. Political views and status comments now quantify our social positioning and how the world views us as individuals.

But I ask myself, how has this really improved our lives?

How has this contributed to our advancement as human beings?

How do we benefit from being more social than ever before?

I try to weigh the pros and cons of every permutation of sharing across all kinds of topical social networks and I still wonder where the personal benefit is gained.

There are metrics that weigh sentiment and influence, popularity and frequency that have obvious benefits to brands that glean deep insight into the markets they service but where are the personal analytics that give social media users the metrics for success or failure in our own personal lives?

How can we gain deep analytical insight into improving ourselves?

How can we take a step back and click a button and see how we can better our own lives through the analysis of our social media activity?

I'm sure anthropologists and psychoanalysts could have a field day with this. Examining profiles and offering advice and insight into a persons behavior just by reading a log of an individuals social media stream over the course of a few days, weeks or years.

Imagine your therapist asking to see your past years Twitter posts to better understand your issues, imagine if there were analytical tools that gave you the power to read between the lines and help you figure out who you are and where you should be focusing your efforts in life?

This is a gaping void in the world of social media and as more and more people realize that this information can be used for the betterment of their own lives we will see more and more money being poured into services and tools dedicated to this purpose.

What better way to use the information we share every second of the day than to help us become better people?

So I throw out this thought and hope that we collectively realize the potential of the billions of bits of personal information we share with the world every day.

No Stone Unturned

2011-05-24T12:53:00.006-04:00

We have entered an age where our attention is constantly occupied by all kinds of new spaces.

We are no longer limited to television, radio, outdoor signage and other traditional spaces where content, specifically ads, have been intruding upon our lives.

Technology, specifically mobile technology, has taken us even deeper into our attention caves.

Our focus now lives comfortably in deep cavernous spaces, in new and undiscovered places.

Smart phones, eBooks, tablet computers, Netflix, YouTube, Facebook, and Twitter streams. Tagged photos, online radio streams, text messages, Wifi signals, location check-ins and local deals have cannibalized our attention away from the old television commercials, ancient billboards, sagging signage, morbid magazine ads and so on.

It is the age of digital distraction and these distractions are both complex and constantly changing.

To capture audience attention we now have to start communicating in places that are very different than the past. Places that we haven't yet discovered or even fully understand.

Communicating in these new spaces requires new kinds of techniques and a new kind of language, a more stealth and subtle way of storytelling. It requires us to not only tell our stories but to disrupt and inject them directly into real life situations. As virtual as they may seem.

It has been ages since I have used a traditional phone, my cell phone is my main line of communication.

I recently used a land line, upon picking it up I heard a dial tone, a white noise that lets us know that there is a signal and that we can start dialing. It immediately occurred to me that this tone is a completely wasted opportunity. Why didn't the carriers stick a message in there?

A similar thing happened when I was walking down the street, completely immersed in my iPhone, suddenly alert messages started popping up informing me of nearby hot spot locations.

These signals were coming from apartments, businesses, office building and even personal roving hot spots. Except all I was seeing was either a silly name or some jumbled letter & number combination.

Why not communicate through these micro channels that are ubiquitous to all and have our undivided attention?

This led me to sit down and to think about all of the new "places" that exist today, it now excites me to find and try to come up with creative ways to communicate through those tiny spaces.

I am extremely lucky to live in NYC, it is a great opportunity to explore some of the new, less conventional or less obvious, places that people are spending the majority of their time in and to find creative ways to enter into those spaces and communicate a message in the new and unique language that the spaces require.

So next time your out for a stroll take the time to look around and notice all of the amazing opportunities that technology offers us as marketers. Think about new ways to communicate with a population that is now living in these spaces, try and find creative ways to augment and enhance these spaces and try to retrofit your ideas to live in these new and interesting environments.

Like to Be Liked

2011-05-16T13:04:00.006-04:00

From big box brands to the local store around the corner, every marketer seems to be convinced that offering consumers the ability to LIKE a brand or service is a way to measure loyalty and build community.

It has become one of the new holy grails of marketing.

The LIKE button is everywhere.

Like us on Facebook, Follow us on Twitter, Check In to us on Foursquare...

The ravenous desire for a brand LIKE is quickly becoming a driving force behind many ad campaigns today.

It is now prominently displayed on television spots and outdoor ads, clamoring for your LIKE.

This new phenomena leads me to wonder, does a LIKE really mean people actually LIKE what they are LIKING?

Normative social influence says otherwise, there are conclusive studies that say what we do in public is often the opposite of what we really believe in private.

When a user clicks that LIKE button they are seemingly making a public, social proclamation that they endorse whatever that cute little blue thumb is attached to.

We all want to gain acceptance from people within our networks so we may intentionally LIKE or retweet something that we may not really believe in, we do this in order to gain greater social cohesion within our networks and this cohesion seems to make us feel closer than we actually are.

In reality many of us rarely see or interact face to face with the people in our networks, however we have a deep longing to maintain the relationship so that we may feel more secure about the amount of friends or followers we have.

The more friends and followers the more important we seem, at least to ourselves.

As marketers and advertising professionals we must really reconsider and try to better understand how valuable a LIKE or a FOLLOW actually is.

Solomon Asch, a trailblazer in social psychology, would conduct studies using social confederates as influencers to get people to conform with something that was obviously false.

These confederates would knowingly opt for the wrong decision and in doing so would cause the other unsuspecting participants to do the same.

However when the same participants were asked to make the same decision in private, many of them would opt to do the opposite of what they did in public because the pressure for social acceptance wasn't a factor.

Social conformity forces people to copy the behaviors of what individuals perceive as normal for the social network they are in.

In doing so they create for themselves a sense of comfort in knowing that the chances of becoming a social outcast is slim and that by participating in the interests of the network the user actually feels as if they are strengthening the network they so desperately want to be a part of.

Herbert Kelman, a Harvard psychologist, codified three major forms of social influence:

Compliance: a public conformity, while possibly keeping one's own private beliefs.

Identification: conforming to someone who is liked and respected, such as a celebrity or an industry thought leader.

Internalization: the accepting the belief or behavior and conforming both publicly and privately.

There have not been any conclusive statistics regarding the number of LIKES and the effect it has on a brand's bottom line, it is way to early to gather this information.

However I would like to raise the concern for the importance of LIKES or FOLLOWS or RETWEETS as a measurable metric of success.

We need to all step back and dig a bit deeper into the motivations behind social sharing and LIKES and try to figure out how these interactions actually impact a brand.

This will help marketers decide how much money to put behind efforts to gaining more LIKES and allow brands to spend their money more wisely and on more effective ways to gain consumer engagement and loyalty.

A Brick Wall

2011-04-28T12:04:00.003-04:00

Newspapers, magazines, periodicals and most other publications have all felt the impact the web has had on their age old subscription model.

Information, news, facts, gossip, research and studies are readily available for free across the vast information superhighway.

Anyone can find anything at anytime for little to no cost.

But one must ask themselves... who creates all this content we consume on a daily basis?

Quality content is the one thing that cannot be manufactured without the need for highly specialized and creative professionals. The web has made us ravenously hungry for this content and at the same time we so freely consume it we simultaneously have taken for granted the amount of work that goes into its creation.

One of the major challenges for content and online utility creators has been to try and reverse the notion that content and utility is free and to get users to pay a premium for access in a similar way they pay for cable TV. Through subscriptions.

The problem with subscriptions is that it is fundamentally adverse to the way the internet is used. The birth of the web promised everyone free access to all kinds of content. Everything was free but that was only to make the case for the potential and the existence of the web.

We live in very different times now. The web is not only stable but it has become the backbone of our society.

In the past if you wanted to read a specific article in the New York Times you purchased the entire paper even though it was just the one article that may have interested you.

Sharing the article would require you actually physically handing the paper to the person you wanted to share it with.

I know this sounds like a painstaking task...

My grandmother has this great habit of clipping out articles and sending them to me in the mail, with an actual stamp on an envelope.

We see a similar pattern with cable television, if you wanted to watch a particular show on HBO you had to subscribe to the entire channel and even that was bundled into a package of other channels you may never even flip to. Then you would have to record that show on a VHS tape and somehow get that tape to whoever you wanted to share it with.

The horror!

Luckily the internet came around and the mighty web has fragmented everything.

We now gather our news, entertainment, research and other sources from a variety of different places on the web.

We may want a certain column from Wednesday's WSJ or only the Monday recap of Sunday's big games, we may only be interested in the Approval Matrix in New York magazine or simply want to watch a particular segment on a television show we may never watch in its entirety.

Paywalls have been one of the ways that publications have been trying to get people to pay for premium content. But the paywall structure goes against how we use the web.

I understand that Time Magazine wants people to subscribe to its publication, however I am not so sure everyone wants every piece of content in the magazine.

Apple was extremely successful in the way it allowed people to buy a whole album or just a single song. That model completely revamped the music industry and actually helped to almost completely eliminate the illegal pirating of music.

I believe that every piece of content on the web should be available a la carte.

Every article, news snippet, utility, video, image or anything that a content creator should receive compensation for.

If there is an article in the Times I want to read then I should be able to pay an access fee to read just that article or agree to view an ad that will justify the cost of my consumption.

Fragmentation is the key to monetization.

Subscriptions are just too much of a commitment for people who hoard and gather information from a zillion different places.

Everything can be made available in a fragmented format or in a limited access format so we can pay for what we actually want.

I may need to read a chapter of a book that I certainly don't need to own. I may need a certain tool offered in Photoshop for a single use but I certainly don't need to own a full blown copy of the application.

I strongly feel that by fragmenting premium content and utilities their creators will find that getting users to pay for usage will become a much easier sell.

The Social Media Stratification

2011-04-22T12:43:00.004-04:00

The massive adoption of social networks within the lives of billions of people has naturally created a new layer of social classification within today's digitally oriented society.

Access to inexpensive computers and mobile devices has given everyone a personal platform to express practically everything they do, see and hear instantly.

One of the most popular channels of expression come in the form of social networks.

Social networks started off quite simply as a way to share stuff.

They have quickly become refined into hyper focused channels of communication offering a wide array of ways to express and share extremely detailed and targeted information.

Social networks give its users the ability to easily acquire a new type of control over a resource that is quickly becoming more and more valuable.

This resource is a new type of social capital that can be gained, shared and returned.

This new form of capital has stimulated waves of investments and shifts in power within the realms of technology, politics, communications and entertainment.

It has ignited heated debates over the control of and valuations of platforms, services and channels that help facilitate the ability to attain this power.

The debate dujour is the overvaluation of companies that create and innovate these channels.

Networks that are focused more on ubiquity and usability than the ability to generate actual revenue, and to the dismay and confusion of many, receive record breaking valuations.

Most see this as a bubble waiting to burst. I disagree.

There is a new wave of visionaries who are pouring billions of dollars into companies like Twitter, Facebook, FourSquare, Groupon, Instagram, Tumblr and other channels that are able to garner its users the ability to grow social capital.

These people have a vision and a belief that social capital will eventually be or is already as good as gold.

These vast digital plains are being mined for innovative ways to allow billions of users the ability to grow their social wealth.

To help stoke the desire to possess the power to control these social resources by building digital extensions of personalities, knowledge, insight and experience through apps, websites, games, services and devices.

We are essentially mining the human mind and soul and the precious ore that emanates is a new commodity that has a tremendous value.

My experience in both using and building social networks and extensions to social networks has driven me to try and codify some of what is going on.

I have attempted to identify a class system and have patterned it after Max Weber's famous Three Class System of Social Stratification.

This breakdown is based on my own attempt in identifying the highest tiers of the social network ladders.

I break it down as follows:

The Initiator: those who are able to effect wide spread interest in content, trends and discussions particularly in the realm of consumerism and purchasing influence.

The Celebrity: those who have gained celebrity status within their respected fields. Accomplished social climbers who are widely followed more for their antics than their opinions.

The Dynamo: people who use social media to help motivate others. Content is typically altruistic in nature however the widespread following inadvertently gains them strong social power.

This classification system is still very much a work in progress and will be something that I will be expounding on more in the coming weeks.

What I hope to achieve is to gain more insight and understanding into the new social structures that I find crystallizing around me every day.

As an advertising professional it gives me greater insight into how we communicate and share, how information flows and is interpreted based on its origin and the many paths it now takes to reach the masses.

We are now all a channel, a conduit, and it is up to us to decide how it is we want to refine the information through our personal spectrum and how valuable it is when we present it to the world.

Twenty Eleven

2011-01-03T14:04:00.002-05:00

The onset of the new year has always been a trigger for hundreds, even thousands of predictions.

We are all excited and look forward to the potential of the new year and try our best, based on how the previous year ended, to predict what new occurrences will take place in the year to come.

Rather than try to predict what will happen I will make it more personal and list what I hope will happen.

2011 will be the year the web truly goes mobile.

The browser will once again be the main gateway to the mobile web. Apps, as cool as they may seem, will become relegated to games, soundboards and photo manipulation.

The allure of the browser and its instant access to a plethora of information will continue to guide users through the mobile web.

Look out for some major breakthroughs in mobile commerce.

2011 will usher in a new breed of mCommerce sites that will be specifically designed for making purchases on the go. Mobile commerce will allow merchants to use tools like geo-location, social media and hyper-personalization to sell their wares. Interfaces will become much more simplified and check out will take place through a centralized payment method associated and secured by the device.

The Social Web will start to splinter out and become more topical.

We will see a set of new players who will attract some of Facebook's minions who have grown tired of the piles and piles of general information that has grown boring and useless.

We will see players like Quora, Instagram, GroupMe, Hashable and others who will offer up robust alternative social experiences rather than relying on FB's very general town square approach.

Now that Facebook has become a strand in the fabric of our lives we will start to see some of the more darker angles of the social network. Users who will have grown bored of old high school friends will start to create multiple personalities that will allow them to play out the fragments of their personalities as they relate to different aspects of their lives. Could get really interesting.

The deal is the new ad.

Ads will no longer be one sided communications. They will have to hold the promise of a deal, if you want a deal you will have to interact with the brand in some way. Ads will now try and lure audiences with tangible promises that will get them to engage.

YouTube will go on a spending spree buying up (web) video production companies en route to becoming the first "Studio" born from the web. We will see higher production value and more in depth content flanked by babies making funny faces, teenage girls lip syncing and a new massive network with tons of great content surrounded by all of our silly videos. It's a beautiful combination.

Tablets will rule.

HTML5 will do what Flash did but better.

Twitter will become a full fledged human alert service where we turn first for breaking news as well as whimsical thoughts. We the people surrounding the content that is useful to us with our own ramblings and witty repartee.

Privacy dies. We elect to share everything we do online, the new definition for antisocial will be someone who can't or won't share online, those folks miss out on all the fun and eventually start a new society in caves.

The TV becomes a major portal to web content. We will see a huge shift where millions will access specific large screen web content and apps directly from their TV. The big screen gets a curtain call.

Apple will no longer only appeal to the "Crazy Ones".

Inspired by the Apple of earlier years we will see a new slew of obsessive compulsive, design oriented, sexy companies all playing hard to get.

Apple will now be forced to join the ranks of the IBMs and the Microsofts of the world and seen as a Big Brother type company. Google is not far behind.

Form and function will finally be completely integrated. Design heavy websites will become a thing of the past. We will encounter much cleaner and easier to use designs that will eliminate the clutter and allow us to do what we need to do without distraction.

Content becomes truly personalized. More and more web services will be using Facebook and Twitter as sign in methods and our social content and connections will be there to greet us in almost everything we do. Sharing will no longer be the holy grail as we will be conducting our lives on the web in real time for all to see.

Billion dollar valuations. Companies making zero or very little money but that service millions of users will continue to get billion dollar valuations all based on the rabid use of its audience. 2011 will not be the year we finally see pay walls and other monetization methodologies take hold but it will surely set these companies up for big pay days once they do figure out how to make money.

This is just a glimpse of what I hope will transpire in 2011.

Its been a wild ride so far and it only gets more and more interesting each and every day.

Happy New Year!!!

Your Virtual World Can Save You Real Life Bucks

2010-11-09T14:03:00.002-05:00

Pushkart.com is a site that puts a spin on the typical web coupon merchant. They offer a service that links discounts to your online presence. They take a survey of your Facebook, Twitter, and other social media and evaluate your “Social Networth.” The higher your value, the better the discounts. It offers a way for businesses to integrate into the social media culture – when you redeem a coupon; Pushkart passes the savings on to your friends and followers.

Main Street USA

2010-09-22T15:41:00.002-04:00

Just when we all thought the digital revolution was going to annihilate all forms of traditional media, entertainment and commerce.

Just when we started to forsake all forms of normal activity for an alternate world where you Like Followers and Tweet your Places.

Just when just about everything was done behind a computer screen along came a new wave of mobile technologies that threw a wrench into every futurists chances of being the one to accurately predict the ultimate demise of an age.

We humans are wired to anticipate the worst especially when we are smack in the middle of an evolution.

So in a preemptive measure we have all but said our eulogies to the ways of the past and have embraced a new future predicted to live and breath in cyberspace.

A future fraught with information overload, oppressed by privacy concerns, a life encumbered by social networks that were to incarcerate us in front of our computers lest we miss the latest status update from a distant friend we once went to middle school with.

Everything from social interactions, love, family, shopping, entertainment, study, games and journalism cowered at the massive berg that hovered over its dark future.

Commerce, being the blood that flows through the veins of humanity, is one area of our culture that has gotten the most scrutiny and that has been affected most by the web.

Online shopping steadily gained ground on the massive emporiums and charming boutiques that once lined the grand avenues of our cities and the strip malls of our suburbs.

Everything included free shipping and was received almost as fast as you could take it off the shelf and bring it home.

It was all but over for Main Street USA and aside from a generation that wasn't born wired, a new generation turned, almost exclusively, to the web to peruse an endless catalog of anything their hearts desired and the ability to get it at the speed of light.

Just when brick and mortar was licking its wounds and trying to rethink how it was going to survive the next onslaught of the web a funny thing happened almost twice as fast as it took the internet to administer its first deadly blow.

The mobile web was born and with it came a whole new way to enjoy the world around us.

New apps were created, by visionaries who understood that we couldn't forget our beautiful world, started to appear on our phones.

Apps that allowed us to use the world around us as the content we reacted to and our pocket computers is what we use to record and interface with our reactions.

All of sudden we sought out new and interesting real places to go so that that we are able to declare our visit.

We started looking at the world around us so that we may report within 140 character headlines that we saw a guy picking his nose on the F train or that we overhead some ridiculous comment some swarthy eccentric made at the bar while trying to convince a girl to friend him on Facebook.

We are now able to navigate winding streets for the best route possible and book a reservation at the restaurant with the most stars at the same time.

We can now research and book vacation destinations while waiting to be served our discounted meal and then trash the venue because of a lack of a Wifi connection and charging stations at the tables.

We have taken the web to the streets and now Main Street USA has a chance to reinvigorate itself by offering its charming and unique personality to our mobile web experience.

We use our devices like metal detectors, constantly trolling for new places, unique items and great deals.

Hoping to find hidden rarities and unparagoned places that will make help our status updates attract more friends and followers to our personal brands.

Venture outward!

The world is anew through the power of the mobile web.

Written & Sent from my iPhone

Hiatus

2010-09-15T18:58:00.004-04:00

Its been some time since I had a moment to blog, thank goodness I have been super busy.

There is a new post coming very soon but in the meantime check out our Freedom + Partners blog to see some of my latest thoughts.

http://www.freedomandpartners.com/news

Stay tuned!

Ideas.

2010-07-11T01:52:00.002-04:00

Rational thought within the context of one's life is required to maintain the continuity of one's path and it is understandable that we contain certain trains of thought so that we may prove ourselves to be trusted to maintain a unified sense of control over our environments.

However there are times like this, 2am on a Sunday morning, where one needs to put aside those restrictions in order to refocus on some of the fundamental aspects of one's life.

I am not a star athlete nor am I a brilliant mathematician, I am not consumed with scientific proofs nor do I care much about social caste. But one area of thought that best defines where I spend the majority of my time is in the realm of ideas.

So I am going to attempt to try and express a thought that has been churning deep within me for some time now, it may seem a bit extreme, however it needs to be articulated before it dissipates into the abyss of thoughts that were cast aside for fear of the implication of expressing them.

So here goes.

The feel like the perception of a great idea has become grossly misinterpreted.

Ideas today have become the possession of the over organized, of the psudo-creative and an exorbitantly formal realm.

We as thinkers have become stale because we have been taught that our ideas need to be meticulously cataloged and acutely plausible to execute.

We have lost sight of the great idea and the excitement and chaos that comes along with it.

Any great idea requires a certain degree of change and that change should be shrouded in chaos and be overwhelmingly exhausting to even begin to think about putting into practice.

Ideas cannot possibly be so neatly organized, innovation cannot begin to grow and evolve within the confines of our necessity of certainty.

An idea that doesn't require painstaking thought and agonizing exploration cannot possibly be worth anything more than the amount of time it took to appear in our minds.

Our ideas today seem to arrive masked with a facade that they are magically conjured by creative shamans who deceive us by re-wrapping some other shallow idea that managed to pass itself off as brilliant, but meanwhile just serving as an anesthetic so that the masses don't crave anything better.

We are casting off our greatest ability as humans, we refuse to wander within the chaos of the unknown because the lack of certainty scares us to death.

It is the ability to explore that makes us the greatest creature on earth. We have become blunt in our ability to defy convention in order to evolve further into enlightenment.

We do so because we fear we will lose control over the comfort of relative certainty.

Many of today's industries think that they are built on relative certainty, the ability to innovate the obvious has become the short cut we have chosen because it confirms our control over what we believe is truth.

The truth being our hunger for money. Our desire for power and our belief in our abilities to manipulate perception.

Investment in the exploration of the unknown is where our money is best spent.

Conventional wisdom keeps us where we are, breaking that convention is what takes us further than where we started from.

We have become modern day magicians, no better than any aboriginal tribe that believed in what it was safest to believe and continued to live according to that false certainty until it was proven otherwise by some other dominating faction that decided to unmask the pretense of the prevailing civilization.

Great ideas need to be radical, they should be near impossible to execute. A great idea should be introduced by those brave enough to delve into the primeval terrestrial terrain that the idea is mined from.

At the inception of the idea we really only catch a glimpse of change in its rawest form and we must then excavate it and polish it from the confusion that encases its potential.

That potential is what is hidden, it is the potential that we must place our beliefs in and that potential can only be identified by those smart enough to understand that it cannot be immediately organized and broken down into digestible bite sized processed pieces. It needs to be looked at as the raw material for change.

I believe that only truly great men and women undertake such ideas, they are naturally inclined to identify them either in their ethereal form or when stumbled upon by accident by some coward who is unable to identify it as anything other than something that should be filed into a folder that follows an organized convention of orders so that it may refined for mass consumption.

Everything we do has a standardization yet we fail to understand that in order to create better process for change we must shed the current order that requires the change. Only then can the idea become realized and change be instituted.

Time plays an important role in the cultivation of ideas, once an idea is accepted then the change must take its course, it will last as long as it takes for a new idea to be properly introduced.

That time is where we must grow and evolve so that we are ready to accept the new system once it has matured and is ready to be adopted. Otherwise we stunt evolution and remain stuck within our own obsessive need for control.

Ideas are like earthquakes, they should shock the public, they should impact and then inspire, there is no vote, no polls taken to meter its level of awareness and popularity, it is the force of evolution being set into motion and an idea so great that no one man can alter its path.

We fear such ideas.

When introduced we become defensive by using our stringent organizational requirements for introducing even the simplest idea. Any idea that threatens the comfort of our current certainty is automatically defused at its onset by the effort it takes to introduce its tenets for consideration.

Why do fear change?

Why do we fear evolution?

Why do we fear chaos?

Isn't it the same chaos that formed this very earth?

Isn't it the same chaos that emulsifies life and isn't it the same chaos that ultimately prevails once we have exhausted our ability to avoid it?

We must embrace the chaotic process that is involved in cultivating ideas. Rather than worrying about how the idea will impact our comforts or how it will be communicated we should spend the time and energy on the idea itself.

Once the idea has become revealed and its value for change accepted it will then instantly make itself understood on every level that it will impact.

Our job is not to manipulate its transmission but to usher its progression.

Ideas are powerful, change is powerful, nothing worth anything is painless.

We crave new ideas, we have become gorged on what is now and our minds thirst for something new.

Disruption is the only way to replace what has become stagnant. We must embrace change and culture new ideas for our own sake, we must cast aside some of our stringent organization and make room within our processes to let new ideas come to life.

Great thinkers are born with ability to explore the unknown, they are blessed with the courage to stand behind advancement and they are girded with the will to see it through.

Do not disregard your ideas, never let something go unexplored and always make room for chaos so that your ideas may have a chance to be one of the few that may advance mankind into higher realms of creativity and a more unified collective consciousness towards advancement.

An Impassioned Plea

2010-05-17T08:10:00.005-04:00

My blog is typically reserved for the outré geeky, divinely techie, obnoxiously smart advertising insight and digital deliciousness but today a different passion overcame me and I needed to wax about a topic that is very close to my heart.

Basketball.

My love of the game started at a tender age, from sun up to sun down there was only one place I could be found, either warming up on the half courts or running full on the main court. When not playing I was in front of my television screen watching my beloved Knicks playing every game like it was game 7 of the Finals.

I was born in Brooklyn, a basketball town to two huge basketball fans. Both my parents imbued in me the torturous agony of being a Knicks fan. I idolized individual players like Michael Jordan, Larry Bird, Magic and Reggie Miller but was taught to save my utmost affection for our hometown Knicks.

Year after year I watched Patrick Ewing, John Starks, Charles Oakley, Anthony Mason, Doc Rivers, Xavier McDaniel, Greg Anthony, Larry Johnson, Gerald Wilkins, Mark Jackson, Kenny Walker and an assemblage of other players constantly fall short to the superstars of the league.

As if adolescence wasn't tough enough.

I will never forget that summer afternoon watching the Knicks and the Pacers clash it out when suddenly O.J. was absconding in the passenger seat of a white Bronco.

My mother immediately stood up and threw her empty cup onto the living floor in complete outrage and disgust, she was right in the middle of a tirade against Reggie Miller as she was going into detail about how Reggie Miller's family must have been Rhodesian and that Rhodesia was now known as The Republic of Zimbabwe and it was because of his ancestry that Reggie had acquired his lanky frame and lighting speed.

Her outrage wasn't at the murderous villain who was fleeing from capture along a Los Angeles highway, it was that our beloved Knicks had been interrupted right in the middle of a classic battle with one of our arch enemies the Indiana Pacers.

Neighbors came down, people came out of their apartments, the phone started ringing and there was suddenly an uproar, the entire neighborhood was in distress and it had nothing to do with O.J. as a matter of fact no one could care less, it was all because we were missing the game.

No other city in the world focuses its energy on its hometown team more than Knicks fans.

Imagine how abominable their play has been over the past decade, how gruesome the situation has become. We were raped and pillaged by a man who decimated our team both physically and financially and if your a New Yorker, spiritually.

We have become reduced to a side show that can barely beat the Maccabi Tel Aviv team that comes to play annually.

Sure we have the Yankees who are a pristine dynasty. They have brought us some comfort but the real die hard New Yorker knows deep in their hearts that until the Knicks win we cannot rest.

We now have a chance to sign a legitimate cynosure, the real deal, a certified kosher superstar! Someone who would soak up the lights, become the toast of the town and give us fans a reason to cheer again.

The Garden would once again become the Supreme Mecca of basketball and the great people of New York would once again ascend 34th street with pride night after night to catch a glimpse of the hero we so desperately pine for.

That hero is a young man who was destined to play in this city. He payed his dues to his home town, he gave them a taste of what it is like to win but was unable to bring them a title because of a slew of reasons that all boil down to one. This basketball king was meant to claim his crown on the largest basketball stage in the world.

Winning a title in Cleveland would have been like winning the Battle of Brandy Station as opposed to winning a title in NYC, akin to winning the Battle of Gettysburg. What Lebron doesn't understand is that destiny is playing its hand and it isn't ready to show.

How can one man so naturally gifted and so destined for basketball greatness settle for bringing a title to the Rust Belt? A city whose national fame is based on the fact that it was ranked as the best city for business meetings, with nick names like "The Cleve", "Sixth City" and "C-Town". Don't we have a supermarket chain named C-Town?

Lebron, the time is now. There is no other place in the world where you will bask in the glory of the greatness that is NYC. No other city will shower you the praise and the honor you have earned. Consider Cleveland your college years and now step up into the big leagues and "make it here".

Watch as great actors, prolific musicians, comic geniuses, political dignitaries, eccentric artists, renown writers and brash billionaires all dedicate their evenings to watching you crush the competition.

Savor the city that will cater to your every whim. Come into your own in the cultural capital of the world and stake your claim to the throne that awaits you in Midtown.

You will not only amass great wealth and admiration but you will re-inspire a city that has been dormant. You will ignite a basketball renaissance that will reverberate throughout the world and will bring prestige back to the American Basketball.

Winning a title in any other city will always be second rate to the millions of fans who will line the Canyon of Heroes as you glide through to the sweet tunes of a custom written song by Jay Z that will define you as a champion year after year.

Throngs of people who "make it here" will be screaming your name and you will be the toast of the town.

Tell me what other city can offer you that?

Social MEdia

2010-03-26T10:26:00.012-04:00

Social Media has officially eclipsed search as the most popular activity on the web.

It consumes our attention and has become the one of the most central focuses of everything we do.

Personal sharing.

People are rabidly addicted to themselves. We are our own biggest fans and the fact that we can now build and interact with whole communities that we custom build around our own self interests and with people who can add value to our lives gives us a renewed sense of confidence and purpose in the world.

It is what I call REVOLUTION ME. Indulging in one's own self for the sake of growing and bringing value to the community you so desperately want to be an active member in. On the surface social media seems like a very self centered activity but in reality it is an activity that empowers a collective that gives back to those who contribute to it.

"No one can contemplate the present condition of the masses of the people without desiring something like a revolution for the better." Sir Robert Giffen. Essays in Finance, vol. ii. p. 393.

We have long outgrown the simple avatar and short bio and are now represented by a complex series of personal entries.

Hundreds of thousands of moments recorded using a mixture of media such as text (long winded blog posts and spurts of short messages), pictures, videos, hyperlinks and even our whereabouts.

Devices such as computers, smart phones and netbooks, digital cameras, MP3 players, eBooks and gaming devices give us the ability to feed and access these social networks anywhere and anytime we wish.

We now carry with us a sizable network of friends, colleagues, acquaintances, experts and and stragglers who all help us make decisions and are a sounding board for whatever it is that is swirling around our minds.

We are arm ourselves with a village of people who can help us make decisions at any time of day from what to order on a menu to signing a huge business deal. We can take a photo of a shirt and share it with 400 of our closest friends and get instant feedback before we buy it.

Everything we do we now do collectively.

A flurry of new start-ups are now enabling people to shop, conduct business and disseminate information in all kinds of new ways and with much larger and targeted audiences than ever before.

The early promises of the internet are now starting to become realized and it took social media to ignite that revolution.

No great change ever came from the top down (sorry Obama), great change is usually the result of the masses collectively deciding that something must be done.

I am excited and anxious to ride the wave of the next generation of businesses that are cropping up and being fueled with the fire that is social media.

I really didn't intend this blog post to be informative or educational I really just wanted to express my excitement and anticipation for what I think is going to be one of the most exciting times in history.

I will leave you with this wise and prophetic quote from Malcolm Gladwell.

We overlook just how large a role we all play--and by 'we' I mean society--in determining who makes it and who doesn't."
— Malcolm Gladwell

Let's all make more people make it!

Small Talk

2010-02-24T00:03:00.017-05:00

In 1923 the study of small talk was pioneered by a polish anthropologist named Bronisław Kasper Malinowski who postured that a "phatic expression is one whose only function is to perform a social task, as opposed to conveying information."

Malinowski explains that small talk is nothing more than conversation for its own sake, or "…comments on what is perfectly obvious."

Malinowski insisted that all anthropologists have daily contact with their informants if they were to adequately record the "imponderabilia of everyday life" that was so important to understanding the culture.

The "imponderabilia of everyday life", a term that has for decades been a subject that was incredibly difficult to define and even harder to employ in the study of social behavior.

Until now!

I am the furthest thing from a scientist but I feel somewhat confident in saying that based on Malinowski's criteria for adequately recording the "imponderabilia of everyday life" I may actually have some expertise in this particular area of anthropology.

In today's advertising world social media has become a necessary focus and its trends change by the minute. It is a living target that must be communicated with at the speed it is traveling.

We can no longer rely on the trusted billboard, the reliable circular or the memorable television commercial to speak to an audience. We must now communicate and interact directly with our audiences and in many cases even include them in the critical functioning and the overall success of our marketing initiatives.

As marketers we no longer have to spend countless (billable) hours trying to guess what the deep inner thoughts of our audiences are. Working in huge groups and spending millions of client dollars trying to hit our targets while blindfolded and hoping to get as close to the bulls eye as possible.

Today we live in a new world, a digital world with an ocean of "imponderabilia of everyday life" flowing rapidly across our eyes and every current in that ocean brings with it the vision we as marketers need to communicate with our customers.

Before social media took the grand stage we were an industry dominated by advertising shamans and persona like Don Draper whose strength and charm would give license to conjure up campaigns from deep inner wounds, giant egos or some mysterious connection into the consciousnesses of the public. The bravery to express those ideas against mostly unfounded assumptions were often awarded and then were copied again and again because they slightly resonated with the general public.

There were no questions or arguments, no forums for feedback or criticism, the general public trusted the techniques of advertisers because they believed that advertisers knew how to communicate and that if it was on TV then it must be important.

A new age has dawned (its so cool that I can actually say that).

An age where everyone has a voice.

There are 500 million people, all connected, that are expressing and exchanging ideas, praising and complaining, competing and supporting and buying and selling from one another.

Gathering virtually, all day, every day to form new and unique groups and societies, thriving on the social web while living simultaneously and performing necessary tasks in the physical world.

We are communicating constantly and in our own natural environments that shift as we shift. Advertisers must now also shift if they are to remain relevant voices in the"imponderabilia of everyday life."

The only way we can expect to communicate with our audiences today at the pace they are living is in short succinct and informative dialog. What I would like to call Small Talk.

Now you may be questioning my decision to attach such a mundane and even annoying moniker to such a monumental shift in society and are probably thinking it should be called something more along the lines of The Great Conversation.

But if you recall at the beginning of this post I introduced an anthropologist named Malinowski who explained that small talk is nothing more than conversation for its own sake, or "…comments on what is perfectly obvious." What he calls small talk.

Those "comments on what is perfectly obvious" amongst one another are the secret formula we as advertisers have been yearning for all these years. It is our direct line of communication with our audiences and the source for which we should base our marketing strategies.

There was a time when commerce and daily life was driven by conversation.

Consumers lived in well defined communities and completely relied on the trust of the community and the ability to engage in dialog regarding every aspect of that community.

The products these consumers desired to purchase were often used by other people they knew and the reputation of the products would be woven into the daily chatter.

If the goods were defective customers knew exactly who to complain to and if they were in high demand it was immediately recognized by the peddler selling those goods.

The source of these goods were usually supplied by a man with a cart whose ability to make a living was based on a keen talent for listening and responding to the needs of his customers. Being an active voice in the community.

Everything happened in real time, no check out lines or customer service reps, it was advertising and selling in the midst of a bustling life that was vibrant and exciting.

Everything returns in new incarnations.

Today there are virtual communities are all over the place, each one of them with very specific needs.

In an article written by Moses Ma, a partner at Next Generation Ventures, Moses writes "These social networks act to fill a deep psychological need in our society. The reality is that customers are starved for real community. Consumer's brains are wired to operate within the social context of community - programming both crucial and ancient for human survival."

Brands must now rejoin the societies they supply. They must once again become part of the ecosystem and re-establish the meaningful connections of the past through the powerful medium that is the future. In short succinct messages (140 characters perhaps), not huge special effects or sexy flashy models but speaking as the community speaks, in small talk.

Buenos Tardes 2009

2009-12-13T08:28:00.004-05:00

The digital decade is coming to an end.

A decade shrouded in uncertainty.

It began with a fright, the Y2K scare had those who would eventually usher in the digital revolution uncertain if the the time would even come, like a sort of stage fright for what was to be one of mankind's most progressive moments.

When the year 2000 stepped into the spotlight and we all blinked for a second to make sure everything was ok, what happened in that blink was the beginning of a revolution. Something did actually happen, we just didn't instantly realize what it was.

Everything went digital.

Vinyl vanished, analog moved along, information sped at us on the superhighway, music metamorphosed and relationships reignited. By the end of the decade we were all instantly connected via the social web.

Everything we did was digitized. The places we went, the people we met, the things we saw and what we thought at that exact moment was to be shared by everyone everywhere with access to the internet. We were armed with devices that would enable us to share every moment of our lives and exchange them with others like a social currency that would redefine the caste.

The result of the digital revolution was a new hierarchical division of society according to Twitter followers, Facebook friends, or LinkedIn connections.

At its onset it was the decade's abolitionists, its digital ambassadors, who were thought by many to be destroying the physical threads of society. The phone, the television, the printed word and all forms of media were all being harrowed so that the seeds of improvement and efficiency could flourish.

Suddenly we were able to store our media in the heavens and have anything we desired rain down on us at the push of a button, the click of a mouse or a tap on a screen.

The 2000s was a decade where our lives all instantly synced. At the end of the 20th century our grandmothers couldn't program their VCRs and digital displays were blinking endlessly like a beacon calling for help. In the beginning of the 21st century suddenly grandma was able to set up her email and is now forwarding powerpoint slideshows, mom shops online, dad is on Facebook and Twitter, teens are sexting and kids are programming smart phone apps and becoming millionaires.

We do everything online, and as we move into the next decade of the digital revolution that convergence is going to become more intimate, more fluid, easier, faster, more integrated than we would ever imagine it could be. Our new technological world will be more tangible, more tactile, easier to control and at the same time so much more complex than it has ever been.

2000 is about to update its profile to 2010.

Incalculable Probability

2009-12-06T09:58:00.012-05:00

Throngs of digerati who have been chatting online since the days those creepy rooms opened their digital doors in the what seems like ancient halls of AOL, have been priming themselves for this very moment in time.

Message boards, instant messages, blog posts, dating websites, multi-user RPG games, Craigslist, Friendster, even email have been the "boot camp" for the new social media expert. Years of early forms of social media have sharpened the online digital social skills of geeks everywhere.

Bill Gates who became the poster boy for success in the digital age said in the year 2000 "In the years ahead, the Internet will have an even more profound effect on the way we work, live and learn. By enabling instantaneous and seamless communication and commerce around the globe, from almost any device imaginable, this technology will be one of the key cultural and economic forces of the early 21st century."

That was a pretty bold prediction in 2000 and pretty much exactly what is happening now.

Bill went on to say in the same essay "All these advances will soon create a ubiquitous Internet--personal and business information, email, and instant messaging, rich digital media and Web content will be available any time, any place and from any device."

We live in a world where the social bar is becoming less about looks or money, success or intellect, its how many followers you have on Twitter, Facebook friends or how many comments you can generate on a blog post.

In the past month there has been a bit of an apprehensive backlash against those who claim to be social media experts. People who charge money to brands in order to help them navigate the murky waters of social media like a digital tour guide helping to make sense of what is going on in the landscape.

It seems kind of weird for people like myself to imagine that brands are paying for what we do each and every day. Paying for the witty snippets, great timing, passive aggressive pokes and overinflated praise, the hook-ups and the super secretive"DM me" via the @ or the RT, the #FF or the open conversation about the success your having and flaunting every second of your life over a number of social networks that equal to the second or third largest population in the world.

Napoleon Dynamite had a scene that for me immediately summed up how much confidence social media can give someone like Napoleon's brother Kip (prototypical social media expert).

Kip represents the forefather of social media "experts" the guy who was so desperate find ways to assert himself into society, despite his physical and other lacking, that he immediately jumped on to the social web to sway his hidden swagger and land himself the woman of his dreams.

When Napoleon complained that Kip "...stayed home all day and eat all the frickin chips" his response was "Napoleon, don't be jealous that I've been chatting online with babes all day. Besides, we both know that I'm training to be a cage fighter."

Chatting online and becoming a cage fighter, in that simple statement Kip explained to us how invigorating social media can be and how empowering it can be for someone like him to even consider himself for such a unattainable goal as cage fighting.

Social media levels the playing fields. It gives everyone an opportunity to have a voice and to express who they are from within.

Granted, its behind a screen and somewhat anonymous, but its no different than the facades people put on and social games they play in real life but only now its your digital prowess that gets you up that ladder.

So now its the eve of 2010 and a new social landscape is upon us.

Brands want in big time.

Brands want to take hold of the conversations and ensure that their carefully crafted messages translate in the social media world as they once did in the regular world. Brands want to monitor and react based on the ambient awareness that they are paying these social media experts for. In return brands want results, they want the same results they used to demand of traditional campaigns. That is impossible.

I will explain why.

BusinessWeek published an article on December 3rd entitled "Beware Social Media Snake Oil" in this article it warns the public of so called experts who may or may not be what they claim to be.

Steven Baker concludes in his article "Many argue that a fixation on hard numbers could lead companies to ignore the harder-to-quantify dividends of social media, such as trust and commitment."

It is those "harder-to-quantify" things that bring us back to a time where we trusted people to do what they do because only they can do it.

It was a time when a rainmaker sold products or services not based on some book or some scientific business method but on his charm and the intangible understanding of society and the way to navigate influence it.

It was a time when there was a role where someone who intuitively knew where the herds were running not because he or she was part of that herd but because they were helping to direct it through a methodology that was nothing more complex than just something they were born with.

Today's social media experts are no different.

Some will promise the world and scam you out of every dollar you have and others will lead your brand to that social media pie in the sky.

They will shepherd your brand into the awareness of millions, maybe even billions of people in a shorter time and with a fraction of the advertising budget. The right person can create a world wide conversation that could make or break your brand, they can kill it, resurrect it, re-birth it and refine it almost instantaneously.

Social media manipulation is not an art, its not a science nor is it something that can be fabricated or coerced the way traditional advertising did on TV, in magazines and the early web.

It is a digitally amplified version of the world we live in where the fast, the witty, the nimble, the intelligent, the verbose, the passionate and even the somewhat anti-social persona is what draws the most attention.

The future will bring us more tools, more channels and more ways to perfect the persona that we all want to portray online.

New tools and applications, services and ideas that will give the public more power to control the world around them and to shape the social media landscape to their exact specifications. Digital refinement.

The "experts" will be more like anthropologists than programmers. They will be less artistic and more articulate.

They will be those castaways who now control the velvet ropes into the hottest social networks on the web.

It is the Kip's who labored all day knowing that somehow this technology was going to reveal the superman within. They knew that there was a fire hidden beneath those glasses and wiry frames. They knew that there was an "expert" hidden below those thin mustaches and buttoned up collars and they were right.

Social media experts have indeed arrived, some fakes and some true.

When considering a hire have them show you their world, describe their day and talk about their successes. Not every social media campaign is going to produce exacting results, rather it is an ongoing step in the social ups and downs of living and breathing in a social network online. There is no end, death maybe, but an ongoing brand story that everyone may or may not want to be a part of.

Your next "expert" is going to help your brand live that life and communicate and navigate a whole new world.

So when the question arises in your next strategy meeting if social media experts really exist you can rest assured that they do and in many many different forms.

Scary. But Fun!

Very Clean

2009-11-17T21:41:00.006-05:00

The industry has been turned upside down with the announcement of brands now going directly to digital shops for work.

It is a truly historic time that I personally feel very privileged to be part of.

There has been a great debate brewing as to if digital agencies were ready to lead.

Daniel Stein of EVB sent me a link to some work that has made me more of a believer.

A conte so succinct and perfectly executed in every way. A video, simple, charming and completely engaging made by EVB for Orbit.

Digital is not just a website, its not just a microsite or just a banner. Its not just a touch screen display or an interactive kiosk. It is the next generation of advertising, storytelling and entertainment.

This latest piece is mature, charming and absolutely perfect in every way.

Are digital agencies ready to lead?

EVB certainly thinks so.

Social Environmentalism

2009-10-20T13:13:00.004-04:00

It is no secret that I am a Twitter fanatic, I am continually fascinated with every aspect of the technological and societal impacts that Twitter has had on our digital and social landscape.

I came across a new site from GetTRASHED.org and McKinney that is using Twitter to save the planet and cyberspace one tweet at a time.

The site is www.recycledtweets.com

The concept is to recycle your boring Tweets.

The site allows you to recycle all the boring tweets polluting your Twitter feed with Re:cycled Tweets.

Take your friends’ cyber-garbage and turn it into cyber-gold.

And that’s not just clever wordplay: for every tweet you recycle, McKinney will donate a penny to getTrashed.org.

Think about it. You recycle your followers’ boring tweets, get all of your friends to recycle their followers’ boring tweets, and that’s a lot of birdseed for getTRASHED.

To participate simply follow these steps:

@reply to someone who posted a lame tweet.
Copy and paste their lame tweet, and add #recyclethis.
then Click reply.

Recycledtweets.com will recycle it and send them a new, transformed tweet. They’ll learn what an interesting tweet is. You’ll add another penny to the total being donated to getTRASHED.org.

But it’s up to you and the rest of the Twitterverse to take part of this initiative to help better social media content and the planet.

So get busy and take out the recycling—one tweet at a time

Getting Baked with Bogusky and Winsor

2009-10-14T12:14:00.007-04:00

I recently got my copy of the new book Baked In by Alex Bogusky and John Winsor of CP+B fame.

Ad folks writing ad books is nothing new, David Ogilvy's legacy is probably better recognized by the books he has authored than any of the campaigns he had mastered.

What kept me intrigued about this particular tome is that it not only focuses on the tectonic shifts taking place in the ad industry right now, but it is also an honest assessment of where advertising is failing because of these drastic shifts in consumer engagement.

Baked In's focus is trying to teach brands how to make better products and to educate consumers to have higher expectations from these products so that the claims they make match up with what they actually get and in turn these products will simply advertise themselves by living up to their claims.

Who better to tell this tale than two ad execs who are at the top of the advertising game. It is either meant to make their jobs easier or render them completely obsolete.

Social media's meteoric rise has obviously spurned the need for a book like this and I was impressed at how relevant it read based on what we are seeing today.

However the shelf life (no pun intended) of this book may not last more than another few months as things are changing so rapidly.

Baked In initially started to read like a religious manifesto, talking about brands as if they were deities.

My rebellious mind immediately started to think about how these ideas would apply if the advice laid out in the book was being given in relation to starting a cult and it sort of matched up well.

My aversion to brands dictating social culture and dominating the social conversion may have skewed the way I am reading this, however I am trying my best to put that bias aside and accepting what the reality actually is, they do dictate most of our conversations.

With that said, the brilliance behind this book is that it's so passionately written and the experience behind the advice is apparent.

Both authors obviously believe in branding as more of an integral part of a social philosophy rather than just a means of selling stuff to people.

I get a sense that the authors believe that products are more than just things we want or need, that they are more of a promise that will make our lives better in some way.

An avowal that you will be better off if you own this product or use this service. Especially the ones that they help to peddle.

The book is full of repetition, reminding us a lot of what we already know.

I enjoyed the repetition of the "mixing marketing and product design deep within their culture" message because it is as simple as that and when adhered to it really can clarify the way we communicate those messages to the public.

By saying it over and over again, through real world examples, is a powerful yet subtle way to fasten this message into the minds of those who should be reading this book, marketers and consumers.

It is the expectations of the consumers that will ultimately be dictating the output of advertising from this point on.

Social networks and the internet today is far too powerful a voice to let any brand use marketing to get away with trying to correct the issues the product creates.

It's this extreme passion that when strained through the rational mind that turns every word on the pages of this book into well founded and quite practical advice.

But what else could we expect from two of advertising's great spin doctors?

The Pendulum Rest

2009-10-05T00:57:00.004-04:00

When a powerful industry is uprooted from its long standing position, it is subject to a restoring force due to the natural laws of gravity that will accelerate it back toward the equilibrium position.

However what is unique about the situation we find ourselves in here in advertising is that the acceleration back has actually altered the original equilibrium position.

What was once known as traditional advertising (print, radio, TV, outdoor) has been replaced with digital media. As the pendulum is settling back into place it is experiencing an altered equilibrium state that is quite different from where it originally started.

When released, the restoring force will cause it to oscillate about the equilibrium position, swinging back and forth. That dizzying oscillation is what we had been experiencing for about 8-10 years now.

The entire industry had been thrown into a flurry of definitions and a tug of war for the right to claim supremacy over the prevailing creative platform that is what we now know as Digital.

Perseverance and a new form of communication were both the sword and the shield wielded by digital creatives and technical professionals everywhere. Once considered nothing more than a service, we now stand tall looking out toward a new frontier.

An economic meltdown and new forms of social media helped usher in this new golden age of advertising. What was once thought to be an impossible battle soon became a truce, not a bloody victory, but a truce of sides willing to work together in order to thrive in this new environment.

Digital is not a revolution but an evolution.

It is creativity plus time.

Creativity thrives in free spaces. The onset of the web was about trying new things and failing for the sake of experience, like a toddler taking its first steps. It was a vast wide open space where ideas could be nurtured and matured.

But now the web is dominated by social media, news and entertainment and it is in those annals that we find fertile ground for our creative ads and capitalistic allure.

Powerful creative ideas compete powerfully when they are doing what those ideas are supposed to do, which is to provoke our audiences to not only be entertained, but also to think, to react and to interact. That is how advertising has evolved.

Digital is a repartee.

A succession or interchange of clever retorts.

The brands are now the straight man and the consumers are part of the act.

It is our job to set them up to retort not just for the sake of retort but for the sake of engagement and that engagement will eventually lead to loyalty and trust through allowing that conversation to take place.

We have been swung back in time.

Back to an age where the merchants engaged in conversation with their customers.

Like a digital souk where yelling and response both stimulates and excites all the shoppers into a frenzy, a lively center of commerce where the marketplace is the platform for socialization and communication.

Digital has converged advertising and the marketplace back into one area, back into a souk where people gathered to do business and to share ideas, crowded, bustling and exciting, the way it was meant to be.

The time for one complete cycle is a left swing and a right swing, that is called a period.

A new period has begun.

Digital Dumbo - 150Days

2009-08-28T13:16:00.004-04:00

Discover Simple, Private Sharing at Drop.io

Space150 hosted a very entertaining Digital Dumbo last night that gave us a glimpse into the next 150 days of digital. I like digestible chunks... 140 would have been more appropriate considering Twitter was the unanimous winner amongst what everyone thought would be all the rage, but 150 is the brand.

Well done guys! Thanks for the event, free drinks and the Tron trailer!

News Twitter Style

2009-07-08T09:57:00.003-04:00

MSNBC has released an amazing new free iPhone application.

The app itself is nothing new in terms of what it does but the amazing part is how it does it.

The news is served up in Twitter sized chucks. Part of the set up process is to login with your Twitter username and password so that you can easily tweet any headline instantly.

Best Buy is the flagship advertiser on the new app. As part of that partnership, Best Buy is running a new mobile campaign that provides links to its deal of the day as well as the company's Twitter feed.

Twitter has changed the culture of communication and both entertainment and news as well as big brands have quickly adopted this new method of communication to interface with audiences.

The impact Twitter has had in such a short period of time is a refreshing sign that adoption to new and better ways to communicate and implement technology are taking place and that the digital space is continuing its rapid growth.

Understanding how to harness these new platforms will be a challenge but seeing some of the creative ways its being executed is great.

Definitely check out the new MSNBC iPhone app for a glimpse into the future of reporting and disseminating information.

I Heart Twitter

2009-06-27T23:10:00.002-04:00

Erik Natzke is an interactive designer who is constantly trying to blur the lines between design and technology. Erik (@natzke) recently ran a contest on Twitter where a random person who mentioned the hash tag #NatzkeFreePrint would win a free signed print of one of his amazing pieces of artwork.

I WON!!!!

I have watched You Tube, Google, Facebook, and many other web mainstays emerge and submerge and I must say that Twitter is by far the most immediate, exciting and interesting of them all.

The sheer volume of content, feedback, interactivity and potential is endless. The surface of Twitter hasn't been scratched and I am really excited to see what new ways to aggregate live awareness emerge.

I wanted to make another mention of a new website that has blown me away with its innovation to use Facebook as a content aggregation, it is a new site called Prototype-Experience (http://www.prototype-experience.com) it is for a new video game of the same name. Check it out and see what the future holds in store for social network content aggregation.

Anyways, thanks Erik!

What's the Time?

2009-06-14T11:15:00.002-04:00

I realize that the conversation pitting traditional Vs digital has been going on for some time now and that it has probably gotten to the point where the mere mention of the topic induces nausea and anxiety.

If I had a nickel for the amount of times AdAge and AdWeek have featured articles on this topic plus the various blog posts, commentary and panel conversations not to mention a certain bubbly society that prides itself on this very distinction, I would be a very rich man.

However I am going to go against my better judgment and speak about the topic because an amazing analogy came to me that I feel best describes the situation we find ourselves in now.

The Set Up: Definitions taken from Wikipedia.

Traditional advertising is a service business dedicated to creating, planning and handling overall marketing and branding strategies and sales promotions for its clients.

Traditional ad agency clients include businesses and corporations, non-profit organizations and government agencies. Agencies may be hired to produce an advertising campaign.

Vs

Interactive agencies differentiate themselves by offering a mix of web design/development, search engine marketing, internet advertising/marketing, or e-business/e-commerce consulting.

Interactive agencies rose to prominence before the traditional advertising agencies fully embraced the Internet.

The digital agencies offered a wide range of services and grew very rapidly, although some have downsized just as rapidly due to changing market conditions.

Today, the most successful interactive agencies are defined as companies that provide specialized advertising and marketing services for the digital space.

Now that we are clear on the distinctions lets move on to the "Vs" part.

Traditional agencies have been farming out digital work to the smaller digital agencies for 10-12 years now pretty much keeping them afloat in terms of large budgeted projects and the infusion of how to service these larger clients from a creative production standpoint.

The smaller digital agencies have been assiduous in learning how the larger agencies function and have adopted many of the same practices in hope that they will slowly evolve into one of these larger agencies with digital as the core and in time start to compete with the larger agencies that have been keeping them in business all these years.

The larger agencies provide their clients with a multitude of other services that are critical to formulating an entire campaign and require the ability to manage hundreds of people and tasks that a smaller digital agency would be overwhelmed with, making the larger agency the ideal starting point for the brands to formulate its message.

The smaller digital agencies are fast and nimble and can complete similar tasks, but not all, in half the time because they have been bred to work faster and turn around very complex technical and creative work in a very short amount of time.

Now as I thought about the two I wanted to apply them to a real world example that would help me better understand the relationship that the clients had with the two worlds.

Then it hit me. A Watch!

Think about it... what do most people have on their wrists to tell time?

I would say most people who appreciate fine time pieces that are accurate, stylish and expensive are walking around with an analog watch. A watch that has been built in a similar way for ages and a watch that has thousands of moving parts each one of them interacting with the other all to perform one small simple task. Telling the time.

Kind of like a... Traditional Agency.

How many digital models does Rolex make?

Why wouldn't someone who could afford a fine timepiece choose to get a geeked out digital watch?

Its just as accurate if not more accurate, it can be synced up with a satellite or a database, it has the ability to provide many other functions all in the same form factor and can be encased in gold, platinum or any number of metals.

A digital watch can be made to do virtually anything its buyer wants yet everywhere I look I see analog watches on the wrists of those people who I would consider in the same bracket as the decision makers at the big brands.

It seems that people choose the more traditional analog watch that has that reassuring ticking sound, with clear backs that display thousands of gears all moving at once all to serve one purpose and one purpose only, to tell you the time. I guess the psychological advantage is that each and every one of those gears is there to serve you in its own way.

Sure from time to time you have to wind it up or shake it or change its battery, but most people enjoy the small effort that they have to put into this seemingly complex object. In the mind of its owner it is a precise instrument that is worn on ones wrist so that they can better manage their lives.

Not that different than a traditional agency, don't you think?

Thousands of people teeming all at once doing this and that in order to come to the very same conclusion that a smaller digital agency may be able to come up with using a quarter of the people in half the time. The digital agency has all kinds of functions, animation, design, data, social media, it is plugged in to all kinds of data and can instantly expand things into a million new directions, yet clients seem to prefer the reliable gears all turning for the single purpose of servicing them and them alone.

It makes total sense to me when I think about it in these terms.

Why should advertising be any different? Why wouldn't the head of a big brand want the prestige of a Parmigiani over the geeky sleekness of a Rosendahl?

Now lets look at the price differences between the two.

You can get a digital watch from Timex, Rosendahl, Abacus or Garmin that is Bluetooth-enabled with caller ID that will tell you the weather, act as a USB drive and locate the nearest WiFi connection for under $200 dollars. WOW! (see that excited me).

OR

You can get a Lange and Sohne, Alain Silberstein, Audemars Piguet, Blancpain, Breguet, Franck Muller, JLC, Parmigiani, Patek Phillipe, Ulysse Nardin, Vacheron Constantin within the price range of $5,000 - $2,000,000. These watches have hand finished mechanical movements and some additional mechanical complications like moon phases and power reserve indicators to very subtle ones like correctly handling all the obscure conditions of the Gregorian calendar.

Starting to see the comparisons?

Traditional agency Vs. Digital agency...

I admit that I personally do not wear a watch and I usually whip out my iPhone to tell me when my next appointment is.

And if I were to wear a watch I certainly would not feel comfortable sporting something that costs more than my buddies house. Nor would I want to have some geeked out digital watch that is solar powered with 8 selectable radio channels and 38 subcodes per channel and LEDs to indicate the hours and minutes in binary format.

So what is the solution?

Well, thats not for me to decide, but what I wanted to do here was to just present the situation against something that may help make a bit of sense to those who had some struggle with the whole Traditional Vs. Digital quandary and to put it into a little bit of a better perspective.

I will let you the reader decide what the answer is.

The Runaround

2009-06-08T08:22:00.006-04:00

Navigation is one of the very first words that I had encountered when I started designing and developing websites in 1998. It was and still is the very foundation of what sets digital apart from traditional. The navigation is what gives our audiences the wheel in order to make their own decisions and to decide how and when they were going to interact with the brands that we put in front of them.

Web design is not advertising nor is advertising slowly becoming web design but what bridges the gap between the two is how we hand over the wheel when we design and formulate a navigation system to our now rich and complex online campaigns.

When I say navigation I am not just referring to that left hand down or that top centered line of icons or text. I am talking about how we take our audiences through the experiences that we build.

There are clients who will jump on the band wagon and throw millions of dollars towards whatever the hot new trend is right now because they want to take advantage of the immediacy of the crowd and its various waves.

The draw back to that is that a strategy needs to be formulated on the spot and executed flawlessly as to not seem like it is band wagon jumping and to also completely interpret what that wildly fast trend is at that exact moment, not so easy.

Then we have clients who want tried and true, a website or a digital campaign that embodies the very core of digital standards, upright information, clean sleek design and absolutely none of that horse play that goes on all over the web.

The safe route. Playing it safe in a dangerous world can sometimes be quite dangerous.

Then we have clients who are always a step behind, they want the best, they want to experiment and be the absolute cutting edge but due to not being guided properly and tending to fall in love with what has already been done successfully they simply end up missing the mark and looking tired and old once their shiny new digital campaign has launched.

Then there is the trend setter, the brand that has the digital eyes and ears to navigate the yellow brick road without falling prey to the disasters that ensue along the way.

The web is so vast and so precise that it is so easy to get it wrong. You have to stay one step ahead without over jumping that step and maintain a strong and steady grip on this bucking broma bull we have all mounted.

I read Ad-Age and AdWeek each and every day, the NYTimes and the Wall Street Journal and countless blogs (just see my blog roll on iPro, yes I do read all of those) and what I am experiencing is similar to the picture at the top of this post.

That Scarecrow that keeps pointing Dorothy in every direction and at the same time in no direction.

AdWeek will feature some CEO talking about the revolution that is Twitter and then follow up with another CEO bashing the social media trend. Yet another who says traditional isn't dead and then the very next day some famous Creative Director swearing that every single dollar must be put into digital, then another COO claiming that Facebook will raise the dead and yet another saying that Television is about to explode and then another saying that.... STOP!!!!!!

See what I mean?

I'm not saying that any of our prestigious publications are not doing their jobs, they are. But it is up to us to decipher what is and what inst the right direction to go in for our clients.

With so many options today it is extremely important that we try to stay away from just slapping on a trend and calling it a day.

The way of our business is that everything happens fast. The pitch takes place at lightning speed, and that sets up unrealistic expectations because we promised the client the world. The agency then wins the account and starts bidding out production, then the production shops have to all fight for the right to execute those unrealistic expectations against a crazy time line and zero budget - you can imagine the end result.

Lets remember that there are a hundred answers to every problem and each one of them need to be carefully examined before dumping tons of money into a campaign that will prove to do nothing more than scratch that digital itch.

As an industry (digital) we need to help navigate the deep channels that are now dominating our client's attention and guide them carefully as to where their money will be best spent.

The first step is carefully understanding each one of those channels and knowing how to wrap it around the right brand so it accomplishes the goals that the client sets out to meet. This involves having the right people who can hit those moving targets when the time comes and get the brand positioned with the channel that fits them best.

So the next time you read that "this" is dead or "that" is hot or "this" is dying or "that" is emerging. Keep in mind that everything comes and goes and that the web is a giant life cycle that keeps on feeding into itself as it gives birth to new and more interesting ways to navigate its waters.

Don't ignore what has been or what will be and keep in mind what is now and what works best for your brands. That is the beauty of this medium. Unlike print or TV it is never canned or done, it is an evolution that is constantly morphing as we morph within it.

Imagine a digital campaign that lasted forever, slowly evolving and taking on various incarnations but all seamlessly and effortlessly flowing through the same vessel as its changes. No new website, just an evolving digital idea, a story that intensifies and changes over time based on the terrain that it navigates over.

Now that's digital!

Digital Dumbo #5 - Freedom + Partners Rocks The House

2009-06-02T12:55:00.003-04:00

Digital Dumbo - Freedom + Partners Rocks The House from Craig Elimeliah on Vimeo.

Digital Dumbo is quickly becoming one of the hottest must attend events in the digital social scene.

Dumbo is the epicenter of of digital New York and is home to many of the worlds best interactive, motion graphics, creative and technological studios in the world.

We get together on the last Thursday of every month for some well deserved drinks and socialization.

Freedom + Partners hosted the past event last Thursday by preparing a flash based audio and video installation that rocked the house all night with music that was all Brooklyn themed.

Community is one of the foundations of our existence and it is important that we are plugged into the digital community as both a contributing partner and active member of our small digital neighborhood.

Enjoy the video.

50 Billion, I mean Million, Visits!

2009-05-13T10:38:00.008-04:00

Today marks the day that the FWA is celebrating its 50 Millionth visit.

Quite an achievement for what is now a true institution in our community. The FWA has been following and documenting our industry since 2000 and has stayed true to spotlighting the very best each and every day.

To me The FWA is like a thermometer that measures the temperature of our industry in the areas of design, technology, trends and unique executions. How amazing is it that there is a new site every single day? That alone is a testament to the hard work and dedication that we all pour into our work day in and day out.

Domani Studios stepped up and donated time and effort to throw a party for this milestone. Its heart warming that the celebration is about us, the people, the folks who every day take out a slice of time to check out what the bar in interactive excellence is today.

It is really nice to finally see the faces, the eyes and the smiles, the avatars and the logos, the persona of all the people who make up this industry and the folks who will inherit this industry.

I want to say congratulations to a good man, Rob Ford, who has served our community loyally and lovingly to make sure that The FWA exists, I know for a fact that he spends countless hours making sure that little square is there each and every day without fail.

It has been and continues to be a pleasure watching The FWA mature and grow, now video and photo, who knows what will be next.

Thank you Rob for your commitment and dedication in giving us a place to go to every morning and a goal to reach for each day. I cant tell you how many countless meetings I have been in where clients have said "lets win an FWA on this one", it would make you proud Rob.

Keep up the good work!

Digital Path-O-Gen

2009-05-12T11:29:00.001-04:00

Creative Review just posted a great chat with Mr. Lebowitz, of Big Spaceship renown, where the topic is about the “viral category” at the D&AD awards.

When talking about insights as to how people behave and why they pass things along Mr. Lebowitz says “People don’t pass things along because they love brands, they pass things along because they love their friends”.

Just like there are varying schools of philosophy and strains of thought, there is really no right or wrong answer to this particular insight. I am sure with every varying demographic there is a separate rule as to why a particular person may or may not have the need to add to the viral vigor of a particular campaign or item they found on the web.

If we want to have an honest conversation about why people find and then pass things along we need to really examine the motivation behind why they feel the need to share everything they find on the web.

I think that it is really because they ultimately love themselves.

They want to be the one who found this cool video, or upload their face to a dancing elf or to be the one who uploaded their friends picture to the dancing elf.

I don’t know that anyone ever trolls the web for cool things and thinks, “oh I really love my friends so I will send them this”, its more about “I am so freakin' cool for finding this thing, I am going to show everyone!”

There is a sense of claiming an ownership over something you really didn't create just by simply being one of the first to pass it along.

The web is a giant treasure trove, we all look for that unique, rare find that we can claim we found and then spread it to our closest 200-300 followers, oops, I mean friends.

With the emergence of Twitter I think that what was viral before has a much farther reaching but shorter infection period, because people are spreading things at a much faster rate, its no longer about “send to a friend” its now about broadcasting to hundreds and sometimes thousands of people in your personal network. A barrage of links that come at us at a much faster rate and now the viruses must now compete for our attention as to what is the most endearing or funniest or most profound.

I think as technology advances that it becomes more about the mode of transference that will determine what kinds of content has that viral quality.

One very interesting feature that I have found intriguing in Twitterific is NEARBY, where your cellphone determines your positioning and then allows you to “Twit” with those closest to you, not friends, total strangers within your vicinity. The ability to start and contribute to conversations based on proximity. I find the possibilities behind proximity extremely fascinating and it will make the digital virus an even more contagious topic. A new pathogen that gives us an even more precise way to structure and target our campaigns.

Its a great discussion.

Let's Get Back

2009-05-02T22:37:00.003-04:00

I want to say that the BBH Labs blog is one of my new addictions and should be read by everyone in our space, its insightful, relevant and has been saying all of the right things.

There was a recent post entitled "10 Reasons Why There’s Not More Great Work in the Interactive Space"

I loved this post for so many reasons.

Digital has suffered because of the relationships that have been formed in the production process.

Smaller digital shops have been feeding off of the low hanging fruits that the agencies have dangled for so many years and have been able to get away with delivering what you so beautifully referred to as MICROWAVED solutions.

These shops have always lacked real creative minds and have stockpiled on flash developers who produce absolutely wonderful work but add very little to the BIG IDEA.

The problem was that in order to execute something online that was compelling, the Idea Folks fooled themselves into thinking that it was the Flash folks who were the only ones to bring those ideas to life because there were so few really good ones and they were all stockpiled in these digital shops.

As we all know that is no longer the case. Now that social media, WP, HTML, Video and other venues have emerged, Flash is no longer the only sexy kid on the block. Digital shops now need to rethink how they do business and either completely submit to the larger agencies or to offer up real idea based solutions as a supplement to the agency offerings.

We all knew this was coming and that in order to create good work we would need to be strategic and think along the lines that our MAD FATHERS thought and to get back to the foot in the door and the fedora peddler roots that advertising originated from. A used car salesman wakes up every day, knowing he has to put on his A game, get his ass in gear and sell the shit out of his lot, to seduce the moms, college kids, down and outs and up and comers that his product is what they need and will provide them with value and usage.

We have all succumbed to the thinking that we are any better than that guy, we are not, we need to realize this in order to set things straight.

There is a humility to what he does and we need to adopt that same humility when selling our clients products.

The web is a very big place, tons of room for everyone to thrive, lets not pollute it with empty ideas. Interactive is revolutionary, it now gives us the ability to get immediate feedback and then act upon that just as immediately. It lets us interface directly with our audiences in a so much more intimate way than ever before.

I agree that the narrative and story telling is what will breathe life into the web and what it desperately lacks. the code/narrative ratio is way off.

There is just as much importance for a great story teller as there is for a great coder or designer, but show me one interactive shop that employs a great copy writer, I have met very very few.

So lets not let the technology of our new medium cloud our notion that old school disciplines like writing and selling are no longer needed, sometimes youth’s ego is its greatest downfall.

All The Rage

2009-04-05T09:56:00.004-04:00

The timing could not have been better, just as Facebook and MySpace had exhausted its audiences with an overwhelming flood of information, high school reunions, what kind of dog you would be and what you looked like puking at that party last night, along comes a sleek, streamlined and simple social media tool that is taking the world by storm.

Twitter.

Twitter is so much more than people think it is.

When friends ask me what Twitter is they usually preface the question by saying "oh its like your status on Facebook, right?" and my answer is always no!

The best place to start defining Twitter is the dictionary.

1. Twitter - a state of tremulous excitement.

2. Twitter - to talk lightly and rapidly, esp. of trivial matters; chatter.

3. Twit - To taunt, ridicule, or tease, especially for embarrassing mistakes or faults.

Twitter is a true conduit of human chatter and a concise and exacting form of communication that forces each and every person using it to get as creative as they possibly can within 140 characters or less.

Twitter is not just a medium but a concept that is being chatted about in every media circle around the world. People are Twittering about Twitter, writing news stories about Twitter, blogging, Facebooking, IMing and emailing about Twitter.

Erick Shonfeld wrote in a TechCrunch article published on February 15,2009 where he captures the true essence of what Twitter is all about. He writes "What makes Google and other search engines so valuable is that they capture people’s intent—what they are looking for, what they desire, what they want to learn about. But they don’t do a great job at capturing what people are doing or what they are thinking about. For thoughts and events that are happening right now, searching Twitter increasingly brings up better results than searching Google."

Twitter is Chatter. Chatter is water, water flows and needs to be channeled. Twitter does that by allowing people to create their own chatter channels. In doing so the public creates organic content pools that are worth a lot of money to brands that want to know what people are saying.

Twitter somehow managed to trump Facebook's social appeal and demolish Google's search relevancy. I recently tested how good Twitter could be as a search engine. By typing in a search term I got tons of human responses to the term I was looking for.

After missing yesterday's final four games I went to Search.Twitter.com and typed in "Michigan State" I was BLOWN AWAY with the expressions, the links, the references, the history, the excitement, the drama and the relevancy to the NOW!

I got links to local websites in Michigan that gave me an insight and experience that was so much better than the dry ESPN and CNNSI coverage that Google would have led me to. I got fan reaction, I got pictures from the game and I got a slice of time captured at the exact moment that it happened. To be completely honest, it was pretty exhilarating.

The search is alive, as I looked through the various links and reactions I got a message telling me that I should refresh my page because more results have come in.

I was really happy that I was living in the now and indexing the world as it is at this very moment and not at the mercy of the mighty Google index that does what it wants when it wants and no one knows why or how links get to the top of a search.

There is no mystery behind Twitter, its human, its real, its alive and its growing.

Remember in the movie The Dark Knight, when Batman was looking for the Joker, he decided to use a tool that was able to tap into the chatter of everyone in the city and by doing so he emulated the way a bat uses sonar to see, basically creating a picture of exactly what is going on in the world. That is Twitter!!

I am very excited about what is in store for Twitter, I haven't been this excited in a long time and that lingering question about the Google buster and the next Killer App has just been answered, in less than 140 characters.

Twitter.

Indecent Accolade

2009-03-22T15:42:00.018-04:00

Awards are a measurement for the best of any particular field's top work and achievements.

Advertising is an industry that produces so much work over the course of a year that it requires a slew of award shows in order to recognize achievements in the many various categories and channels.

Award shows are the gala balls of the industry and often have pomp, circumstance and drama associated with them. Last year gave us the infamous gripe of Michael Lebowitz who spoke out about credit. This years drama has already started to surface, ill get to that in a second.

Advertising forefather and visionary, David Ogilvy abhorred advertising awards, stating that they had nothing to do with sales or bottom line. He remarked that most awards were trivial, "for best commercial shot on a cloudy day." Ogilvy felt that advertising awards should reflect the effectiveness of the campaign, not it's cleverness or creativity.

In light of a recent spillage of a certain spreadsheet from a major award show's entries, I felt that a dedicated post to awards was in order.

Agencies love awards, its fuel for the fire when going after new clients or brandishing in front of perspective talent that they may be wooing to the agency.

Awards are shiny reminders that the work that comes out of "here" is top notch.

Awards are a great way reward the most creative and successful work, however these days it seems like they have become the ultimate goal.

We are all in the service industry, we service our clients in order to sell more of what they make or to get them more recognition for their brand in the eyes of the public. Our goals and objectives should be the same goals and objectives of our clients, not to fill the space on our own award mantels.

Awards are really nice and when you win, your on top of the world, but the bottom line, especially in today's economy, is to sell sell sell and to make sure creative is communicating the brand story properly.

On March 20th Ad Age broke a story about an accidental list of entries that leaked into the public. It had the names and entries of agencies who submitted work to The One Show. There were 9,795 entries for the awards, at a total cost to the agencies of $3,507,860.

Three and a half million dollars in award entries!

I think that as an industry we need to keep things within perspective and recognize what the ultimate goal is, and that is to service our clients with creativity, dedication and integrity. The work we produce should be focused on the goals of our clients and not the judging panels awarding the bling.

Recessions are a great time to rethink what is truly important and to learn to commit to and appreciate the substance of what we do. It is a time to reflect upon the mistakes we have made and to cut away the fat that we have been carrying.

Perhaps this accidental leakage was no accident at all and a sign of the times and a reminder to all of us that we need to help our clients spend their money more wisely, and to help them re stimulate the economy so that we may get back to filling our bellies with useless things we don't need (joke).

Perhaps the poor unfortunate soul who has most likely been fired for attaching that infamous spreadsheet to the email she sent out is an angel in disguise who has come down to help us fix the error of our ways. Probably not but when viewed as such it makes for a much better story.

I have compiled a list of major ad industry award shows so that you may get a sense of what kind of money is being spent on award shows, imagine what was spent just on the One Show and add that across all of these other major shows:

ACE Awards
ADDY Awards
Advertising Age Awards
Advertising Hall of Achievement
Advertising Hall of Fame
CA Advertising Annual Competition
Clarion Awards
Clio Awards
G.D. Crain Jr. Award
Creative Excellence in Business Advertising
Award
Cresta International Advertising Award
Effie Awards
Ad Age’s Hispanic Creative Advertising Awards
International Advertising Festival at Cannes
International ANDY Awards
International ECHO Awards Competition
Jay Chiat Planning Awards
Mobius Advertising Awards
MPA Kelly Award
New York Festivals
OBIE Awards
One Show Awards
O’Toole Awards
Pro-Comm. Awards Competition
Radio Mercury Awards
Reggie Awards
Webby Awards

Lets all remember in this time of slashed budgets, sparse work, struggling clients and a faltering economy, that what is really important is the substance of what we do and not the bling it gets awarded.

Pearl Jam Ten Game Rocks The FWA!

2009-03-18T08:24:00.003-04:00

In the interactive industry we have many different types of affirmations in the form of awards. Awards are like doggie treats they get us to do things a tiny bit better than we would have originally but just a bit better.

No but seriously, accolades are good, they remind you that your work is good.

As a highly technical, emotionally artistic, generally cranky and highly caffeinated industry that works long hours, gets daily ass kickings and suffers ego crushing blows day in and day out these small things can mean a lot.

So without further ado: Today's FWA Award goes to PEARLJAMTENGAME.COM

Not only is the site super cool and very addictive, oh and it has some of the most memorable tracks of the 90s, but if you go to our website http://www.freedomandpartners.com you will see the new feature for PJ that is pretty darn cool itself.

I wanna say congrats to the band!

WE ROCKED THIS ONE!

Stay tuned... much more to come!

The Times They Are A-Changin'

2009-03-12T12:35:00.010-04:00

Thomas L. Friedman is a NY Times columnist and Pulitzer Prize winning author of Lexus and the Olive Tree and From Beirut to Jerusalem.

Mr Friedman wrote a column in the New York Times on March 11, 2009 titled "This Is Not A Test. This Is Not A Test."

The column so eloquently states in exactly 860 words how badly up shits creek we all are.

His exact words are "Economically, this is the big one. This is August 1914. This is the morning after Pearl Harbor. This is 9/12."

Hows that for not beating around the bush?

On the same day I read Mr. Friedman's words pertaining to the economy as a whole I also read a statement made by the Omnicom Group saying that they are issuing a very stringent sequential liability clause in vendor contracts.

The clause is that vendors will not be paid anything until the agency gets paid by its client. Additionally the Omnicom agencies will not assume liability for a project if the client doesn't pay.

If your part of a production shop or a digital vendor I will give you a second to say "WTF!!!?"

:one second pause:

We all work in an industry where we are obligated to our clients to sell more of whatever it is they are offering.

As ad industry professionals we are supposed to find innovative ways to come up with creative campaigns that will somehow be impervious to the economic crisis we face in this country and to find ways to get our audiences to buy stuff regardless of the fact that they have no money to spend.

The very fact is that no matter what, the public all needs things. Basic items, luxury items, services and everything in between, we are a country built on consumption and no economic downturn is going to change that.

Smaller production shops are the lifelines of these massive agencies. We are the blood, sweat and tears that go into every project.

We are the craftsmen and women who have honed our skills to perfection in the various fields of film, editing, digital, technology and beyond.

We are the assassins who come in on a project by project basis and give everything we got to make sure, in many cases the turd of an idea we are handed is polished and sparkles like a diamond.

We provide the small details, the documentation, the specifics and the education. We set up the infrastructure and handle the executions. We offer up solutions that sometimes don't even exist before we create it on the fly.

How many times has the experience of a production shop given an agency the core idea for a brand because the agency had no clue what kind of technology was needed to execute whatever it is that they are trying to communicate?

This is a collective slap in the face to all of the folks who work hard day in and day out to get these projects done. The producers, the directors, the flash programmers and video editors, the after effects wizards and the 3D modelers, the gaffers, the grips, the designers and the programmers.

This is the first step towards what I predict is going to be a major impasse in the advertising industry. Productions shops will not accept these suicide contracts and eventually will go directly to the brands themselves to provide the services that these brands all need to communicate to their consumers.

Where does that leave the agencies?

Granted this is just Omnicoms policy and I am sure other agencies outside of Omnicom's group will not adopt this policy. However this is not good for the industry to take a stance against those folks who break their necks day in and day out to get projects out the door.

As holding companies agencies need to be the financial brokers between us smaller vendors and the massive client. Agencies get to call the shots because they were the ones holding the cash, but now what?

Brands would benefit more from working directly with the vendors in executing the ideas that the agencies come up with. The transparency would produce some shocking results.

Brands communicating with vendors directly will result in campaigns being richer and better communicated, the lines of communication would open up and the barriers would get torn down so that the soul of the idea doesn't get diluted by all of the needless layers.

Oh! And budgets would be utilized towards the core idea and not for roles that are simply not needed within the project.

In doing this we would usher in a new golden age of advertising that would welcome and utilize all the advances and experiences of the various vendors. The stories that we tell would be more compelling and the creative will explode into the hearts and minds of the public.

Clients should know exactly how and where their money is being spent and they should have realistic expectations for what is going on with their campaigns during a project life cycle. Vendors have always been hidden away and the agencies have tended to throttle the flow of information in a way that only benefit themselves.

Its time for CHANGE!

String of Pearls

2009-03-06T13:33:00.010-05:00

I have produced a lot of websites over the years for some of the worlds biggest brands and properties. But this project has some special meaning for me.

Our latest project over at Freedom + Partners is one that I have to put into my top three projects of all time that I had personal involvement in.

Sony Music partnered with Freedom + Partners on this amazing website for Pearl Jam.

Our intention was to converge two widely popular genres, music and gaming into one kick ass website. To create an engaging experience that would keep users coming back again and again.

We wanted to create an experience that would give Pearl Jam fans the ability to play a branded game that would pay off with some killer Pearl Jam tunes, a sweet visualizer and some unique videos.

I think we hit the mark! (feel free to let me know if you disagree)

When you work on a project for a while you tend to get sick of looking at it but this site keeps getting better every time i come back to it.

The challenge and the pay off are both fun and gratifying.

"Everyone knows the music industry is going through monumental changes,” says Freedom + Partners Founder and CEO, Mark Ferdman. “This project is a testament to Sony Music's willingness to think outside the box set, and their understanding of the creative power of new media to extend a band's vision for the music. It's visionary type of thinking and Pearl Jam gets it, too, of course."

Check out this truly awesome website at http://www.pearljamtengame.com

I want to say thank you and congratulate the entire F+P team for an awesome job!

Love to Hate

2009-03-06T11:38:00.001-05:00

We are culture that loves to hate the people we secretly love.

When real people who get up on stage with a brazenness that entertains us more than actual talent we flock to see what the hell it is that they are saying.

Freedom of speech is platform for our entertainment more than social change or equality amongst mankind. We revel in the exploits of people who have the balls to do the things every single one of us wish we could do ourselves.

A new campaign created by Droga5 Sydney for Virgin Mobile is absolutely genius.

They have lined up every single one of these amazing personalities who have somehow made it to the big stage based on their outlandish personalities and ability to become the scapegoats of our own flaws.

As a culture we all love to hate these people because at some point they have hit a spot within all of us that resonates deeply into our psyche, they have defied the odds and made it to fame and fortune through sheer silliness and utter ridiculousness that keeps show business attainable for anyone who can find the right shtick.

This is why we love these people, in a strange way they represent hope.

If Vanilla Ice or Milli Vanilli (what's with the common Vanilla theme?) can make it, so can anyone.

Well the time has come for these pre-fab'ed, rality tv muppets to fess up and apologize to their adoring fans for being so damn awesome!

My only gripe is that this is an Australian site that should be American.

Check out this great new site http://rightmusicwrongs.org/

No Golden Pot

2009-03-04T07:39:00.003-05:00

I personally find Skittles to be one of the most annoying candy creations ever, sort of like M&Ms on steroids. Ever put a handful into your mouth at once? Not exactly a rainbow sensation. But regardless, my personal preference is not really important here because I am sure there are millions of candy loving folks who adore those chewy treats in their myriad of colors and flavors, I like the sound they make in the bag.

Now take that first paragraph and split it up into 140 word little nuggets, post them on Twitter and... what?

The new Skittles web panel, floating navigation or whatever you want to call their lame excuse for a website is a clinic in a brand who did absolutely no strategic planning whatsoever on this new web site. The concept is idealistic and reckless.

Taking a brand and leaving it out there, in the guttah, for the audiences of Facebook, Twitter and Flickr to handle the creative, copy writing and reviews is suicide. Advertising is about persuasion, the art of seduction, getting people to BUY STUFF!

This method is like leaving your baby in a dumpster. Its like whoring out your sister. It is a complete cop out and frankly defies every rule in advertising.

Did no one think that exposing the Chatter section to Twitter wouldn't spark a rainbow of profanity?

Ever see a news report with some punks walking by in the background, they cant resist acting like idiots which almost always end us with a middle finger or some ridiculous pose that rolls evolution back 1000 years.

A brand needs a gate keeper, someone who is molding and moderating the message that is being put out there, the public cant be trusted to do this and frankly why would they?

So today marks the day Skittles pull down their Twittles (twitter) campaign, draped in curses, profanity, ridicule, recklessness and stupidity, the people have spoken!

Pepsi, Tropicana and now Skittles.

America has way too much brand drama, that's right I said it, brand drama! Now go pontificate on that term for a while.

Two friends and I were talking about all "this" last night and it occurred to me that the Jerry Springer Show we now call advertising has resorted to "Brand Drama" to sell things.

I said to my friend:

"How Peter Arnell handled the whole Pepsi logo leak and then the Tropicana debacle was brilliant not in just it's design but in it's essence, the buzz, the whole thing is foolish but unfortunately we live in a foolish society and Peter did his job, gave the people what they wanted.

Brands are now celebrity, Pepsi is Brittany, love her, hate her but never get enough of her...

We are a celebrity obsessed society and our creative tends to manifest that obsession, imagine, brand drama! The new way to sell.

Brand Drama - you heard it here first!"

The likes of David Ogilvy are now rolling in their graves...

The New Age

2009-03-02T09:30:00.005-05:00

One of the first personalities that stood out in our industry was someone who had broken the code of interactive design and had started introducing us all to a whole new way of looking at how to communicate on the internet. This was a person who had come to NYC from Moscow to explore what was possible and to consistently raise the limits of what the web was capable of communicating to us all.

That person is Freedom + Partners Chief Creative Officer, Vas Sloutchevsky.

I first met Vas when I started working at Firstborn. By the time I had arrived Vas had already cemented his place amongst those who were breaking new ground in interactive design and development. He was a rock star in every sense of the word.

I am once again privileged to be working along side Vas here at Freedom + Partners and he is continuing to break new ground each and every day. It is not often that a person comes along who can continually innovate and inspire with his design prowess and ability to see beyond what is in front of him.

Working side by side with legendary flash developer Shea Gonyo, Vas has once again taken things to another level with our new company website, Freedom + Partners

Seeing the web as a living space, a three dimensional reality that both houses the rules of physics and then breaks those rules to deliver a truly dramatic and awesome experience, Vas has done it again!

Navigate the site using all your senses, 3D doesn't just apply to the eyes but to the ears and to the touch. Information has never been served up this intuitively. Each and every page is a new place to play and explore.

I am pleased to announce the launch of our new website!!

Check it out here: http://www.freedomandpartners.com

Experience what the web is all about.

Time For A New Conversation

2009-02-11T19:09:00.002-05:00

There has always been a certain charm for what I like to call "out of town" agencies that come off very endearing and more human than the traditional Madison Ave agencies that have been walking the earth forever.

McKinney is one of those special agencies that has always impressed me with its metropolitan thinking and southern charm.

Memorable campaigns such as the sensual and sexy LetsHaveText.com and the Oasys Mobile Booty Call. Nike work such as "Beat The BS" and the NASDAQ "Listed" campaigns have all left memorable impressions on me as very forward thinking, creative and breakthrough.

Now that charming southern agency based in Durham, NC has done it again with a new website that has the entire industry buzzing.

Today was the launch of a new website McKinney.com

The site features a design infused with the tag line "Time For A New Conversation". Users are introduced to a breathtaking 3D, text based interface that has the familiarity of a search engine and the robustness of cutting edge technology.

A spacial design that is both simple and endless as information is driven to us in "players" that house nice small chunks of content that is both enjoyable to read and easy to digest.

I would have liked to have seen actual pcitures in their news section rather than repeating gray boxes and I found the bottom navigation a bit underwhelming compared to the way the rest of the site was treated. But overall its a really impressive site.

The search box is very fun to play with and seems to be quite intelligent when answering odd questions, like it almost really knows what it is I am asking it.

The overall animation and responsiveness is fluid and not typical for an agency website.

McKinney.com is bold and refreshing and it makes a huge statement to the clients that it services. By positioning itself with a site like this it is sending a message to the world that it has embraced digital as its own medium and that it is committed to staying on the cutting edge of technology and interactive design

McKinny.com now joins and exclusive pack of agency websites (BBH, Publicis & Hal Riney) that dare to break tradition and face towards the future where digital is waiting to be met.

Well done!

A Moving and Articulate "Manifesto on Interactive Advertising Creativity"

2009-02-10T20:00:00.002-05:00

I simply had to share this with everyone.

It happens to be one of the most profound and articulate manifestos I have ever read about "Interactive" it is a MUST read for anyone who is serious about this business and its future.

"A Bigger Idea":
A Manifesto on Interactive Advertising Creativity

Enjoy! ... and pass it on!

Thank You Randall.

Internal Review

2009-02-09T13:36:00.002-05:00

The nature of a recession typically is to help reset an economy that has gone awry and to help reestablish the momentum and processes that may have caused things to have taken a turn for the worse. This can be due to either rapid growth, corruption, lack of standards, loss of focus or differences within an industry that may strangle its progress.

Our industry, the interactive industry, is no different than any other.

Because of the pace we travel at, interactive professionals, tend to go through the hills and valleys more often than most. There is constant turn over, talent shortages and surges, new technologies to adopt to and trends that change per second.

The results are typically a more refined crop of professionals that are seasoned and nimble enough to take things to the next level and meet the demands of the never ending web.

Ab incunabulis to ad finem (from the cradle to the end) we explore and engage everything we get our hands on and like survivors on an island we are trained to look into every crevice and corner for new ideas and trends in order to survive.

Survival of the fittest in its most primitive form in the most advanced technical age ever.

The onset of most niches within an industry can sometimes be a bit of a free for all. When something new and exciting is unleashed into a ravenous world it can sometimes be over hyped and in many cases over valued.

This is a trapping that can blind many business owners and professionals into thinking that what it is that they are offering is some sort of cure for the woes of the world.

The Internet sets all kinds of unrealistic expectations that on some level do manage to be met on a daily basis, however after meeting each expectation another even greater one is waiting at the gates.

This is no business for a simple mind and someone who needs a calm and peaceful atmosphere. It is the chaotic world of the creative mind that can thrive in such a tumultuous landscape. To remain human while keeping the pace with the every changing trends in design and technology.

Many of the digital shops in our industry have enjoyed a rapid growth based on the novelty of many of the new trends we uncover and expose to clients and the public who are less digitally inclined.

However the pace of the maturation of the industry renders those novelties less impressive within days of their release. What this does is create a very unstable face value for the services we offer our clients.

Loading up on interns and junior talent is a way for smaller shops to keep salaries down and to infuse a youthful energy into the work that is being created, however it also perpetuates the vicious cycle that we tend to get trapped in.

That trap being lack of leadership, maturity and understanding. The elements that will hopefully help stabilize this industry and help form a solid foundation based on real strategy and ideas formulated to last.

With a stable creative and technology core and a leadership group of seasoned veterans who have been doing this from the very beginning, clients can be assured that they are communicating the right messages and that they are getting the most bang for their ad buck.

And not just some fly by night trend that will cause everyone to take three steps back every time we take one almost cool step forward.

We live in uncertain times. Things do not stop progressing and in many cases they accelerate during these times. However, there always seems to be a settling period.

The point in time when over inflated expectations come crashing to the ground and the humble and truly creative come crawling out from the ashes to help clean up the mess.

We seem to be embarking on this period now and while the smaller shops and larger agencies all compete for the same work it will be the real hybrids who come out victorious.

Kind of like Superman who is defeated by the very rock that formed his home planet, us ad folks sometimes become enchanted with our own poison.

We can sometimes becomes so caught up in nonsense and over hype that we fail to see the shaky ground that is under us.

This explains why there seems to be a renaissance of the old guard that helped start this industry coming back to reestablish its foundation. With a mixture of traditional creative know-how and a craftsman approach to introducing new technologies, without flooding the trend radar with over hyped copy-catting and pounding round pegs into square holes.

It is like a virtual Shaolin Temple of Flash masters who first saw this medium as a means to tell more engaging stories, people like Vas Sloutchevsky, Samuel Wan, Marc Stricklin, Chris Andrade, Gabriel Mulzer, Brian Limond, Pete Barr-Watson, Mickey Stretton, Josh Levine, Jessica Spiegel, Hoss Gifford, Manuel Tan, Amit Pitaru, Ross Mawdsley, Erik Natzke, Joshua Davis, Eric Jordan, Yugo Nakamura, Brendan Dawes, Adam Phillips, Billy Bussey, Anthony Eden, Aral Balkan, Moses Gunesch, Keith Peters, Colin Moock and many others who knew very early on that interactive multimedia was so much more than an over hyped and really technical mathematical and physics platform.

No one knew that it could very well be the demise of the traditional ad agency. But those early masters did see it as a new tool that if fully understood and integrated into the ad world, could change the landscape of communications forever.

So now we stand at a new frontier.

Everyone is stepping over the hill and we are collectively trying to figure out how to ascend the mountain that stands before us. Traditional is still holding the reigns but the grip is not as tight. Digital is frothing at the mouth waiting for the opportunity to take those reigns and lead the big brands to the top of that mountain.

We all struggle with various aspects of the business where the digital artisans and the number crunching traditionals all need to see eye to eye and communicate for the sake of the clients.

We need to have a moral and an ethical responsibility to step out from behind the curtain and to work side by side with our clients. This is accomplished by educating them in what we do and listening better to how they want us to help them communicate their messages without getting tangled up in the entrapping of trends and regurgitated ideas.

We need to address the economic crisis and figure out a way for everyone to come out successful and by doing this our young industry will thrive by us establishing a unified and glorious foundation.

Bowl of Cherries

2009-02-02T10:34:00.003-05:00

The highly anticipated and extremely underwhelming Super Blow ads have aired and, at least in my circles, Monday morning is a time to review not the game but the performance of the ads.

The Super Bowl has become the stage where advertisers bring out the big guns and pay top dollar to impact their audiences' perceptions and purchasing habits.

Advertising is obviously the backbone of a capitalist society that thrives on consumption in order to keep the blood pumping through the veins of the public. This is something that we all know in the back of our minds and in accepting this lifestyle we combine our greatest yearly sporting event with an injection of marketing elixir that will ensure that our appetites for domain names and fast food are met throughout the course of the year.

Coke came out the big winner this year with a flurry of animation and visual candy featuring more natural and familiar subjects like grasshoppers, ants, ladybugs and bees trying to steal a sip of its bubbly, caffeinated goodness from a snoozing picnicker.

I felt that it was the most well balanced, socially conscience and refreshingly natural (in all its computer generated glory) spot during this years game.

In a pool of horny horses and horny domain name registrars, 80s cartoon movie revivals, the emergence of Hyundai as the economical choice of wheels and lots of beer and chips, there were two spots that really made me take notice.

The first would be the almost embarrassing pairing of the legendary Bob Dylan with the Black Eyed Peas front man Wil.I.Am. While the spot was well conceived and actually a nice juxtaposition of the "now and then", I felt that some of the comparisons were insulting to the greatness of those who have laid down the foundation for todays posers who eat from the fat that has been accumulated from the greatness of the pioneers of the past. It just didn't sit well with me, however I remember it on Monday morning so it must have been effective.

The second spot that stuck with me was a name I had not expected to see during the game. Pedigree ran a pretty well done spot for something called The Pedigree Adoption Guide, the VO says - "Maybe You Should Get A Dog?" - ...maybe you should get a dog, so you can buy more dog food? It was really the first time I had seen something like this during the big game. A dog food manufacturer telling people to get a dog... I will let that set in for a bit.

Coke remained consistent this year with some very cool spots that I thought resonated really well culturally. Avatar is by far my favorite spot from them this year. It is well written and spot on in terms of the convergence of digital into our culture. Its official folks! When Coke ads feature digital avatars and cute characters living harmoniously with humans, now you know that whatever it is you think is cool, is really cool.

In the second Coke spot named Heist we are witness to some more great computer generated life all pining to get a sip of some carbonated water, lots of sugar, phosphoric acid, fructose, corn syrup, caramel, color, natural flavors, and caffeine.

What else would "nature" want to drink?

In perpetual second place is Pepsi with some pretty lame and violent ads trying to sell men diet soda. Cheetos, SOBE, Gatorade and Frosted Flakes all rounded out the line up of the staples of the American diet.

Cars and tires made their perennial appearance this year with the usual disappointment expected from the diminishing auto industry.

My two favorite breakthrough spots had to be Alec Baldwin for Hulu which made watching TV on the web supremely better than watching TV on TV. The tag line? Hulu: An Evil Plot To Destroy The World, well done NBC!

The second had to be the Cash4Gold spot featuring none other than MC HAMMER and Ed McMahon pawning off all of their worldly possessions for some cash. The spot had that "dirty" effect rendering it cheap and lowly yet was obviously backed by some big bucks. I am not quite sure what to make of this spot, kinda sad that pawning is now big business.

I always try to put the entire line up into some sort of social perspective where I judge our great nation based upon what I see in these Super Bowl commercials.

This year it was obvious that the economy has taken a real hit. Jobs and food seemed to be the stress. What I didn't see was a focus on the new administration, looking towards the future, a chin up and a chest out attitude. I would have liked to have seen more of that kind of messaging to both ride and enhance the momentum of the recent elections and changing of the guard.

I think that the opportunity was lost and hopefully next years batch will be more optimistic and hopeful.

Le futur de la vidéo sur le Web est ici

2009-01-17T18:20:00.005-05:00

Absolute genius! This is one of the very first sites that I have seen a really seamless and harmonious convergence of video and internet come together as one.

Finally a video website being treated as a website and not some awkward production.

Video and the web kind of had this weird junior high school awkwardness that made it endearing but held back how sexy the two can be.

The honeymoon is over and these two mediums have grown as one.

This is one of the few sites I have seen in a while that is truly a foreshadowing towards the future of productions on the web.

It feels right, its comfortable and flows so well.

Hats off to Emakina.

Originally saw this link on TheFWA.com

Check out the site here ---> click!

Completely Loaded

2009-01-13T08:12:00.003-05:00

We live in the age of self promotion and personal branding. Everyone and everything is a brand, the brand you, the brand us, the brand them.

Facebook, MySpace, LinkedIn and Twitter have us scrambling each and every day to come up with a witty twit or a twitty wit or some contrived status update message pertaining to our current condition. We are at a new social impasse.

Our community here in Interactiveland is no different.

We are the specialists, we created this stuff. However now that everyone is a marketing expert, our jobs should be to take advertising off of the socioeconomic plane and blast it off into the astronomic so that we at least have some sort of gap between creative storytelling and selfless promotion.

Each one of us is a concentrated, jam packed, chock full o promotion.

We now live in the Digital Advertising Age. An age where our President is a web celebrity who won the election online. Our brands have all become mini celebrities creeping and crawling all over the internet. Everyday people have become micro-celebrities, choosing to display their lives, thoughts, ideas and neurosis online for all to see.

I am not sure if I was kinda loaded or perhaps just PRETTYLOADED when I first saw this new "curated" site by Big Spaceship.

Its a web site featuring pre-loaders, yep that's right, those annoying little buggers who sit there and remind you that you are either on a really slow connection or the load sequence on the site wasn't programmed properly. A little device conjured up to distract us from the fact that our instant gratification isn't being met as instantly as we like.

Right now it is simply a showcase of SODA members Big Space, Firstborn, Odopod and AgencyNet but I am sure they will let others play too.

I am not sure what I make of this contrived attempt at coolness through recognition of a small nuance that seems to not have gained its proper place in the 15 minute slot we call fame.

The preloader is sort of like the SMPTE color bars on a TV.

Its purpose is to serve as a waiting pattern while something else is happening in the back. Sure they can be cute, adorable, fun, interactive and they serve a very important role, however some things need to remain unsung, a hero in the dark.

Self promotion is a great thing. Trust me I am guilty of it each and every day.

Especially in the age where it is as important as breathing.

But in this case I would rather these four shops created those funny puppet characters that said those funny things and danced around the screen like they did when they were playing ping pong and foosball against one another.

I loathe watching preloaders when I come to a site and the thought of a site dedicated entirely to those nasty little buggers makes me cringe.

Good try Big Curator.

Maybe the next exhibition can be a tribute to the Form Field or a retrospective of the Send Button.

Busted

2009-01-06T15:28:00.002-05:00

It takes a single moment.

A single incident.

A minuscule fraction of time to change a whole industry and turn it on its side.

The buzz has been rampant about the economy and the digital shift, the fact that agencies may or may not survive the transition.

All kinds of discussions about who is taking over the reigns of the ad world and so on and so fourth.

The chatter has finally come to a head and a major agency has been busted for over billing on digital work.

Leo Burnett in Chicago has just been ordered to repay the Army (of all clients) 15.5 million dollars.

Ad Age writes.

"Burnett was treating the work of its own internet unit as if it was performed by a third-party contractor, as well as inflating the costs of subcontractors it worked with, in order to increase its profits."

Tax payer money! In a failing economy and the client is the U.S. Army, can it get any worse?

Finally the veil has been lifted.

I can't even imagine how often this goes on all over the place. Clients are getting reamed for millions of dollars and subcontractors never see a quarter of that money.

For years traditional agencies have been paying digital shops fractions of what their clients expect them to spend on their projects.

Leo Burnett just took a really hard fall and the domino effect may ensue. We all kind of saw this coming but no one was sure when it would hit and how it would start but I think it has started.

It will be very interesting to see what kind of ripple effect this has on the industry and if clients will start to come directly to the digital shops for fairly priced work.

Home of The Brave

2008-12-17T17:28:00.002-05:00

I started this new blog site so that I would be able to speak directly to a very special group of people.

The Interactive Producer is what I consider a new breed of media producer.

A hybrid of many talents.

Today's Interactive Producer is a maniacal cross between between Don Draper, Malcolm Gladwell, David Ogilvy, Sigmund Freud, Douglas Merrill, Adam Sandler and Mel Brooks.

In the film industry the producer is usually an executive of the studio often overseeing the financial, administrative and creative aspects of the production, though not technical aspects.

The role of Producer in the interactive industry is a true convergence of the creative and technical worlds, just like the industry itself is a convergence of so many different medias.

Many people confuse the role of Project Manager with Producer.

I will set the record straight right now, Producers are NOT project managers.

So what is an Interactive Producer?

The producer is the spark, he or she initiates, co-ordinates, supervises and manages schedules, budgets, hiring talent and overseeing deployment and PR. The producer is involved in all phases of the interactive process from idea, to design to development and on to completion of a project.

Being a Interactive Producer requires so much more understanding of so many different things.

The industry as a whole has witnessed the accelerated evolution of its talent. In less than ten years the one dimensional designer who lived in Photoshop now is required to have skills in Flash, 3D applications, some coding and video skills as well.

Legendary creative directors now wake up in a cold sweat just knowing that kids are coming out of school with a mastery of a number of disciplines that they themselves would never be able to catch up to.

The torch is definitely being passed in all realms of our industry.

The role of Interactive Producer has taken on its own evolution. It is being a business development specialist, a project manager, a team leader, clergy, friend, advocate, evangelist and mentor.

The voice of reason within the chaotic tumultuous and emotional process of hyper-creativity.

Someone who can weather the storm of a highly creative, super technical, below budgeted, ridiculously dead-lined, fast paced, ever changing, always evolving, super charged, late night... OK, I need not go on because if you are one of these people you already know what the hell I am talking about.

So on that note I will say welcome and thanks for joining me in this new endeavor, I hope to be a good resource and sounding board for our kind. I promise to keep each post relevant and insightful and I hope to make this blog as meaningful and insightful as I possibly can.

Check it out here <---

Digital Manifesto 2009

2008-12-16T12:20:00.005-05:00

There is a custom that defies tradition, location, culture or religion.

It binds us as intelligent beings.

A custom that is not only a unifying thread but one that seems to be deeply ingrained in each and every one of us.

A custom that is totally instinctual, it permeates our character like the very cells that make up our physical bodies. Like migrant birds we naturally think of change every time our calendars reset.

This custom is a component of our primitive aptitude for survival and has been refined over many generations as our society has become more exacting and complex.

It is an impulse, a predisposed tendency that starts to ferment around the holiday season and it finally reaches its anaerobic conversion by New Years.

No matter what calendar you follow, be it the simplest of lunar positions or the most complex distinct interlocking Mayan calendric systems, you still have a start and an end to every year.

As we all take a huge collective deep breath and start our decline out of what seemed like a very long and tumultuous 2008 and head into the incline of what is a hopeful 2009 we should all tap into this custom and think about how we can all make the new year one of positive change.

The economy has always been a great catalyst for change. From the times of the famines of the bible to the Great Depression, the economy has always been a reliable agent of change regardless of how it swings.

In 2008 we were stung with some harsh realities about our perceived notions of social, political, environmental and economic sustainability and their ability to weather even the most bizarre of adversities.

It was the year that the threshold had finally given in, the world was thrown into economic uncertainty.

Politics and economics were the reality show of the year and history was made while the world watched it unfold, online.

One by one the largest financial institutions fell, the auto industry crashed and the curtain was called on the political stage. The rich were getting bailed out by the poor and the playing field was once again leveled for emerging ideas to take root.

Every single move was documented on the web by literally thousands of websites following every angle of the climate changes that took place in 2008.

In 2008 the combination of the environment, politics and the economy all played a huge role in how the web is now perceived and ultimately was more embraced as the preeminent platform in today's social and business worlds.

History is a rerun and you learn something new every time you watch.

The Great Depression was a time that can offer us some unique insight into the power of brand advertising during times of economic crisis. It represents the plowing of the field where the soil is turned for new seeds to grow.

Our own recent history has proven that during times of economic uncertainty, brands that maintain creativity and innovation in advertising during these hard times actually help to maintain the morale of the nation and come out even stronger on the upswing due to "hangin in there" and sticking with their consumers through good times and bad.

What I find personally fascinating is that the very nature of this kind of dedicated and innovative advertising during the Great Depression actually accelerated the growth of radio broadcasting and print media, today we are seeing a similar effect where the web has now been thrust into the spotlight and is the new field of advertising innovation.

The impact of the economy on our industry is more relevant than ever and we are seeing the absolute accelerated shift of both advertising and entertainment making their primary homes online.

Its difficult for me to look at things in such a negative light when so much good is coming out of these hard times. There is a concept in mysticism where the current good must be destroyed in order for a better new good to emerge.

2009 is going to be the year of that emergence.

So for 2009 my own personal business resolutions are to keep evangelizing our wonderful medium, to help educate and inform our clients as to how to best understand and use the medium to its fullest potential.

To help brands understand the value of a smaller agency that will think digitally and provide more bang for the already tight buck. To continue to help to bring innovative ideas and to push the limits of the web.

To help build better relationships and help to establish our industry as a cohesive unit and a powerful social voice that is more intelligent, responsive and community driven.

To be part of something big and help contribute to that on my own small level.

My main resolution for 2009 is to really embrace and appreciate the times I live in and acknowledge the fact that I am lucky to be a contributor to an industry that is emerging as the global social media platform.

In the words of my favorite writer Henry Miller,

“Life moves on, whether we act as cowards or heroes. Life has no other discipline to impose, if we would but realize it, than to accept life unquestioningly. Everything we shut our eyes to, everything we run away from, everything we deny, denigrate or despise, serves to defeat us in the end. What seems nasty, painful, evil, can become a source of beauty, joy, and strength, if faced with an open mind. Every moment is a golden one for him who has the vision to recognize it as such.”

Happy New Year!

Happy Birthday Noble Warriors

2008-12-16T11:24:00.003-05:00

HAPPY BIRTHDAY BARBARIAN GROUP!

You guys are the leaders of the pack and a true example of success. Our industry is so convoluted in terms of proper definition and roles but you guys embody what this industry is all about.

The perfect hybrid between ad agency and digital shop, creative genius and technological minds, social visionaries and digital dynamos!

TBG is all of that and then some.

TBG has redefined what advertising is all about. You have helped reshape communications for the new digital age and has helped all of us achieve what we all are so passionate about.

A Barbarian is a pejorative term for an uncivilized person, either in a general reference to a member of a nation or ethnos, typically a tribal society as seen by an urban civilization either viewed as inferior, or admired as a noble savage.

In idiomatic or figurative usage, a "barbarian" may also be an individual reference to a brutal, cruel, warlike, insensitive person.

Take all of those attributes and focus them towards the absolute positive and passion for everything digital and what your left with is the ideal "noble savage" for the industry.

What better way to celebrate than to be named Creativity's Digital Company of The Year!

THANKS BARBARIANS!

True Love

2008-12-12T13:20:00.001-05:00

Digital production shops Big Spaceship and Firstborn unveiled some healthy competitive spirit today with a very funny takeover of the Big Spaceship site by Firstborn.

The two shops engaged in some foosball, basketball and ping pong to celebrate the holiday cheer that is permeating the air.

Putting design and development prowess aside they competed in some physical competition that gave Firstborn the bragging rights to the phrase "We Sank The Ship".

The result is a rather hilarious depiction of the top dawgs at Big Spaceship in caricature shooting out some comic lines that I thought was pretty funny.

Its nice to see some inter-industry camaraderie amongst competing shops to liven things up a bit. Healthy competition creates a good feeling all around.

Some Change

2008-12-11T09:49:00.000-05:00

Change is the moniker of our generation. We no longer classify our times with the single letter X or Y.

We have grown past the one dimensional descriptions that limits us to a single marketing demographic.

We are now about change. Change is good. Change is a modification, an adjustment and in some cases even a revolution.

Today, one of the the oldest ad agencies still lingering, a throwback to the days of scotch and cigarettes, JWT (founded in 1864), has made an announcement.

Typically when ad agencies make an announcement its heard "round the world" because ad agencies are designed to be the loudest voice in the room.

Its what they do, they advertise. So when a directorship position is announced, especially one that oversees a world wide operation, its pretty big news.

These announcements are typically saved for creative directors or the traditional roles that have made up ad agencies since that founding year of 1864.

However today marks a notch in the belt of a new age. It signifies the recognition of the tectonic shift that has been taking place in the ad industry over the last few years and it has also signified the rapid change that is taking place everywhere.

The Digital Revolution.

Joe Mandese over at Online Media Daily writes:

"With the pomp and circumstance that it might have announced a new creative director in days of old, one of Madison Avenue's best known full-service ad agencies, WPP Group's JWT, this morning announced that David Eastman has been named its worldwide digital director, responsible for the strategic oversight and management of digital advertising campaigns within the agency, and all its subsidiary companies. "

This paragraph so succinctly states that what "was", now isn't, and what "is", is.

The words World Wide Digital Director reads like music to my ears.

Its a recognition that digital has fully arrived and is here to stay.

That the digital revolution has overcome the traditional resistance and assisted by a faltering economy and the rapid advancement of technology, is becoming the main cog in the advertising and entertainment machine.

Upon anointing this new royal appointment, Sir Martin was quoted, saying:

"I think there is a little bit of a misunderstanding over our digital businesses," Sorrell told analysts, investors and journalists attending UBS' Media Week conference in New York this week. He said that digital marketing services now account for about $2.8 billion of WPP's revenues, or about "23% of group revenues," and said that WPP currently is about "three times the size" of its next closest agency competitor - Publicis - in terms of "digital prowess."

This is going to really change the landscape in terms of who will be left holding the reigns.

Bravo Sir Martin, Bravo!

Sign of the Times

2008-12-08T08:08:00.009-05:00

This new post is a response to a recent New York Times article penned by Virginia Heffernan describing why traditional media (content) must evolve along with new forms of digital expression and technologies.

In her aptly titled piece, Content and Its Discontents, Virginia delves into the subject of how traditional content and the new media landscape are quite different and how it is the old that must now change for the new.

You can read the article here <--

My response is as follows:

The medium in and of itself is a new frontier in both expression and a more complex means of communication. Traditional “storytellers” have been shoving their round pegs into our square holes for ten years now and have completely missed the point of how powerful the new media landscape truly is.

Traditional agencies have been blindfolding their clients into believing that they can translate their brands online and have been grossly misguiding them into a realm entirely unknown by the agency and employing professionals who have been trained to simply copy whatever the latest template is.

This is not entirely the fault of the agencies themselves rather the brutal reality of immediate transition to a new medium that has quickly emerged due to the speed of technology, the veraciousness of the web and a struggling economy looking for more bang for its advertising and entertainment buck.

Over the past ten years, smaller digital agencies (sometimes referred to as vendors) have been carrying the workload in developing these new expressions for a fraction of the cost that the clients are paying their traditional agencies for. These smaller digital shops have been the primary source for the growth of this medium in both design and development and have been the ones to set the bar for standards of excellence.

The online experience is a much more concentrated and intimate one that, if executed properly, will not only completely immerse the end user with the content but deliver to them a message that is so much more powerful than any we have known in the past.

Snippets have replaced pages, animation has surpassed the static image and video accompanying text has become the norm in storytelling. The traditional static and its partner in crime, the analog, ways of story telling and brand building of the past are now lingering like a defunct eon waiting for its evolutionary replacement.

Traditional content simply doesn’t fit the digital mold and its forceful application only makes it even more clumsy and undecipherable.

Both the advertising and entertainment industries need to realize that a new breed of creative professionals who are both equally creative and technologically savvy are needed to properly codify their messages in a way that live harmoniously within the pixelated world we now live in.

The smaller screen calls for more intelligent and visceral executions of the tale being told. Rebroadcasting traditional content online is a futile attempt to monetize on a medium that screams for original content created specifically for its voice.

We need to all take a collective step forward and hand the baton over to those professionals who have been reared online, we are no longer vendors, computer geeks or web designers.

We are artisans who have trained ourselves to tell more compelling stores.

We are craftsmen who have been imbued with the ability to live in a world where multiple forms of media converge and are retold as a single and powerful digital voice that reverberates through to billions of small screens all over the world.

We transcend the demographics and local markets, we think globally, we are both localized and global at the same time. We think in more concentrated one by one pixels that are in tune with physics and precision all driven by exacting and in many cases user generated data that is endless.

We are NOT nephews or babysitters, we are NOT hermits and introverts. We are the new face of both entertainment, advertising, journalism and art.

We are both the voice and the originators of these new ideas, we think in pixels, in technology and in innovation, our ideas expand themselves across an almost infinite network and remain strong enough to ring true in the hearts of people in the most sacred and intimate corners of their existences.

Our audiences choose us, we don’t force ourselves onto our audiences like the finite selection of channels that all seem to be saying the same thing. We are unique in every way and our uniqueness forces us to find more and more ways to remain that way day in and day out.

Everything can be translated into this new language called digital, you just need the right people to do it.

Perennial Analysis

2008-12-03T15:14:00.002-05:00

Took some time to pen a year end roundup on one of my Favourite sites, The FWA.

2008 was a great year and some amazing work was done.

Enjoy this review and get inspired for what looks like a powerful 2009.

Click Here To Read <---

Fowl Play

2008-11-27T10:14:00.004-05:00

Happy Thanksgiving!

This year thanksgiving is riding the momentum of the nation, a new president, a teetering economy, a cultural shift and a world at war.

Us Webicrats sometimes lose site of what is going on "out there" because we are so busy "in here" designing, developing, programming, strategizing, and telling stories.

We sometimes get competitive, harbor anger amongst one another over accounts, clients, projects, work, whatever...

We are very fortunate and should be thankful that aside from the crazy deadlines, budgets, long nights, fickle clients and creative challenges we do what we love and live in relative peace and comfort, we are surrounded by toys, computers, and "kids" like ourselves who get to sell things by having fun.

There are now 125 dead, 327 wounded in attacks in India.

Lets all be thankful for everything we have and do each and every day.

Thanksgiving is a great way to head into the end of the year on a positive note so that the new year begins with a cheerful outlook and brotherly love amongst all human beings.

We should all reflect on everything we are thankful for, and internalize that thankfulness so that we may reflect it upon others around us.

Have a happy and a meaningful Thanksgiving holiday and may this season of change be for the good.

FWA SOTD

2008-11-20T17:18:00.007-05:00

ThoughtPile won today's FWA award!!!

There is also an article published on The FWA to accompany the achievement.

In addition to ThoughtPile we also partnered with Mono to create this absolutely cool product site for the new Embody by Herman Miller.

Check it out here: Embody Micro Site

Both these two sites represent a kind of reconnaissance in interactive design. Designed by Vas Sloutchevsky, both employ 3D and all of the latest technologies yet the design is completely classic, I really enjoy the lack of sizzle and corporate brand bling that usually bloats a good idea.

Congratulations to the entire Mono and Freedom + Partners teams for a job well done.

Elfed Myself

2008-11-18T10:18:00.001-05:00

Send your own ElfYourself eCards

My Hero

2008-11-17T07:49:00.002-05:00

The buzz in the industry this year has been swirling around the concept of story telling.

In an "ad age" where the old guard is passing the torch to the new, where advances in digital media have not only propelled the industry into the future but has also set it on a unchartered path, where the web has become the central storytelling hub for a many industries.

Take a breath, OK, continue...

Michael Eisner was quoted, saying “YouTube is to the Internet what a nickelodeon is to the movies. It’s the preliminary installment of what is to come,”

So what is to come Michael? his response is “Great, creative storytelling.”

- Michael Eisner says to AdAge.

Then in the famous interview heard around the ad world, Lee Clow was quoted on this topic as well:

“Online advertising is still semi-nowhere. It’s very intrusive and annoying and kind of the worst of our business in terms of pop-up and flash, and jump up and down”….”The ability to use the Internet in terms of great brand storytelling is still at its infancy,” he said. “The Internet advertising media, cross my fingers and hope to God, with bandwidth and with some ability, is going to become more artful; it’s going to become more interesting. … But it’s going to take creative people to embrace the possibilities of what you can do on the Internet in terms of advertising and storytelling and make it a little better and smarter.”

Story telling is what is going to save the web from its intrusive and annoying toddler stages. It will be the maturity that the web will eventually grow into and will become a giant field overgrown with thick, lush, dew-laden, story telling in the most creative, technologically advanced, and impressive ways we have ever seen.

Right now we are NOT there yet.

That nagging top header, that annoying left nav and that over bloated center table doesn't seem to want to die just yet. The hyperlink and the rollover are still lingering in our interfaces and we are still tripping over stingy footers.

However! Do not despair!

Today's FWA SOTD award went to Cookie a shop from Poland who in my opinion showed us one way to tell a story online.

The website is called Day To Day Hero and its super!

Check it out here: Day To Day Hero

Lukasz Twardowski and team Cookie did a superb job showing us how fun telling a story online can be.

Definitely check out this site.

Crossed Thoughts

2008-11-11T10:41:00.005-05:00

I monitor the web like a freak.

I have trained myself to hone in on the latest and greatest sites out there so I can be a better evangelist for our industry.

I try to examine every detail of any site worthy of examining so that I can better inform our clients as to what will succeed and what will fail.

Many times I see two sites that launch around the same time, designed and developed by two completely different shops, and they have such stark similarities in both their concept and design, function and genre that I often wonder if information leaked into each one of the agencies as to what the other is doing.

I know I know, its called a trend, but what happened to me today finally enlightened me to how this occurs.

Freedom + Partners recently put out a site for Herman Miller called ThoughtPile. It is a really neat site that is a data visualization of various thoughts that people have about various topics concerning the world and how to make it better.

Firstborn Multimedia recently put out a site for AT&T called Speak In Thumbs. It is a really neat site that is a data visualization of various thoughts that people express using keyboard shortcuts on their Samsung Propel Smart Phone.

Now I know for a fact that none of us speak, yes I did once work at Firstborn, however there has been no sharing of creative, ideas, nothing, yet these two sites are almost identical if you break them down.

So now I finally get to be in the eye of the storm! I get to see how this happens.

Lets examine...

ThoughtPile starts off with a standard text intro that explains the site which is pretty standard, nothing so glaring about that. But then when we go into the site we start to see the similarities.

ThoughtPile has a question of the week at the top left hand corner of the page, a circle in the middle displaying the thoughts and then an orange plus sign on the right hand side that is used to add new thoughts.

Speak In Thumbs has a text instruction on top left hand corner of the page, a circle in the middle displaying the expressions and then an orange plus sign on the right hand side that is used to add new thoughts.

So I ask myself, how? Are trends that powerful that they permeate the industry by filling the heads of creative directors, designers, coders and agency partners?

The answer must be that we all think alike, we must all have a unified intuition that binds us as web professionals.

I can understand how popular trends force designs to look alike and dictate how images and video are treated but to wire frame two totally separate sites to be so similar is mind boggling.

Well, both are great sites by two great teams, excellent executions that speak volumes about both studios.

I am glad that I was finally able to be involved in this anomaly that had been confusing me for so long.

Its interesting to see that there is some sort of greater connection between digital agencies that cause sites to sometimes mimic one another.

Obama.com

2008-11-07T07:09:00.004-05:00

The celebration from this weeks election results are still reverberating throughout the city (I live in NYC) and cities all over the world. People are suddenly alive with chatter, intelligent, emotional, and critical chatter about the new President elect Barack Obama.

Obama means so many different things to so many different people.

Obama is a candidate that truly embodies the nation he is serving. Just look around at the faces, listen to people speak, gauge the atmosphere around yourself and you will see why Obama was the obvious choice for President.

We live in very uncertain times and in many ways Obama is a very uncertain choice for President.

A black man is now President of a very young nation that very early on in its history was a bastion of slavery and racial intolerance, that sometimes still lingers in many parts of the country.

As a nation we elected a man who has little high office experience, often preaches over inflated promises and is a mixture of races that leaves him sitting just outside both black and white lines. A man who is full of potential and who instills the desire in a nation that wants to help him realize that potential.

As a nation we have decided to break loose the grips of conventional wisdom and let a man who is more about the future than a patriot of the past. A man who is looking forward, not back, to an America that realizes its true place amongst nations.

His campaign has cured this nation of its apathy and has re-injected a new interest in how we are perceived amongst other nations. The reality of his very being is proof enough that we are a nation in transition.

Obama is a man who represents the hope in all of us.

He is the culmination of everything we want from a nation that promised us all a dream.

Obama is no super hero. He is all of us, his mixture goes beyond race, his honesty and courage is rooted in the desire for those very attributes in all of us. His determination and his rise to success from the very depths of community service is what draws us to him so closely.

We have become an empty nation and an empty people.

Our spending habits, pop culture and banking and education systems have all deteriorated due to neglect and over consumption. We are losing our houses, our jobs and our security into old age.

The nations to the east and to the south are like hungry wolves waiting for the right moment for us to weaken from the fat that we consume on a daily basis. We are fat from every aspect of our lives. Fat from gas, from money, from food and from consumption.

The past eight years have been spent dealing with the realization that we have lost our luster. Our respect and our prominence has worn off and we are now tangled in a ball of critical issues facing our country. We were left licking our wounds and trying to figure out how to clean messes rather than how to prosper.

Obama may not be the cure but he is a remedy that will lead us to a cure.

His desire for truth and for facing the issues head on through constant communication and embracing the nation wholly.

This is not a political article, and what I am about to write is not entirely political in nature.

What amazed me the most about this campaign was Obama's ability to recognize, understand and embrace the web as a tool for communication. He not only validated the publics desire for change but he also validated the power of the Internet as a means to help bring about that change.

Obama understood the the Internet was his bull horn, it amplified his voice, his persona and his soul to the furthest reaches of the planet.

From Facebook to YouTube from Google to Yahoo, CNN and ESPN. News clips, SNL and MySpace. Widgets, RSS feeds, banners and blogs.

The digital frontier was Obama's campaign trail conquered!

We no longer recognize those purple mountains majesty and from sea to shining sea is a vague term to the youth of today

Emails, websites, Sarah Silverman viral video-sites, iPhone apps and digital downloads.

Obama knew that he would be heard the loudest through the Internet and through technology that is embraced by all.

3 minutes before Obama emerged to give his historic acceptance speech in Chicago, every one of his supporters got a personal email thanking them for everything they have done to support his landslide win.

From the very beginning of this campaign there was a very futuristic feel to how Obama was speaking to the public. It was llike nothing else we have ever witnessed.

The Internet has changed the way we do lots of things in our lives and now it has changed the way elections are won. It is the new stage for politics and the most powerful communication tool known to mankind.

What impressed me was Obama's familiarity for the medium. His campaign trusted and executed flawlessly on every technology, trend, application and information platform. From design to function and beyond.

You think your popular because you have 998 friends on Facebook?

Well Obama has 2,712,479 and counting.

Names and faces of real people, real supporters, real users who feel a connection closer than any connection to any other past President. These are people who can speak up and feel that they are being heard, people with hopes and dreams and a people who wants to know that those hopes are not going unnoticed.

Democrat is now a brand.

I am a Mac = Democrat

I am a PC = Republican

Its amazing how the threads of pop culture and society mimic one another so subtly yet so obviously when put side by side.

We are obviously a nation divided by a checkered past and an unknown future.

What was is now and what is now is almost gone.

The speed of communication has accelerated us as a planet and is now forcing us to go beyond and transcend, to evolve.

Obama is the face of that evolution.

He is global, he is both sides of the coin.

His lack of experience is a strength because there is less for him to undo and more for him to grow into.

His leadership will succeed based on how committed he is to keep that light burning so that we as a people can navigate through these dark times.

His tenacity is what we will need to push through these next eight years. Hopefully he surrounds himself with the right people so he can focus on keeping that smile burning across his face. That smile that smiles for all of us.

His race, his facade, is simply that of a people who have always struggled for progress. His face is the color of adversity and overcoming it.

We all now struggle for progress, we all need redemption from our mistakes and now we all move forward together as one nation to climb out of this hole we have found ourselves buried in.

Obama is the first President in the new age.

The continents of the Earth have gathered as one Pangea once again, as it had started millions of years ago. The Internet has bridged the great oceans and has created dialog, both good and bad amongst the people of the world.

Obama is the first President of the first generation of an evolution.

The Internet Age.

As the community who designs and develops for this great voice to be projected to the entire planet, we should all be proud that the medium we love is what made a difference in the world.

UPDATE:

Today, November 17th, President-elect Obama will record the weekly Democratic address not just on radio but also on video -- a first. The address, typically four minutes long, will be turned into a YouTube video and posted on Obama's transition site, Change.gov, once the radio address is made public on Saturday morning.

The address will be taped at the transition office in Chicago today.

"This is just one of many ways that he will communicate directly with the American people and make the White House and the political process more transparent," spokeswoman Jen Psaki told us last night.

In addition to regularly videotaping the radio address, officials at the transition office say the Obama White House will also conduct online Q&As and video interviews. The goal, officials say, is to put a face on government. In the following weeks, for example, senior members of the transition team, various policy experts and choices for the Cabinet, among others, will record videos for Change.gov.

Sudden Impact

2008-11-03T13:17:00.018-05:00

The web offers the ad industry tons of potential in terms of options to market a brand online.

So much so that it can get confusing or even impossible to nail down which methods will work for which brand.

Brands require experts who monitor those trends on the internet and who understand what is working at any given time in specific areas of the web. Trends change daily based on new technologies and more interactive ways to tell a story.

The experts are the ones creating the new technologies and innovations on the web as a means to stay competitive.

They are the digital agencies.

As ad agencies get more proficient at identifying and in some ways codifying these various techniques we are starting to see more and more interesting websites being launched. But those sites are not necessarily successful.

It is often the case where ideas and the technologies don't play nicely together.

Today these new techniques come and go almost daily and the rule book changes with every new site launched. This is confusing to agencies and by the time they think they get it, they don't.

If you take a look at a cross section of the more successful or popular sites that have been launched recently you will notice that most of them lack one important component, and a trend that is becoming more and more popular today, that is critical for a successful online campaign.

I will get to what that is later in this post.

Imagine you come up with an idea, and you sell it through to your client but in the back of your mind there is nothing that says that the idea will surely work. Its a gamble, like anything in life, you just have no real facts to say that something will be a hit.

You familiarize yourself will all the latest trends and work with the best digital agencies out there to make sure your site will be prefect for launch.

The copy is airtight, assets are beautifully created and the site is the definition of digital harmony.

The ad buys are in place, banners are everywhere, even a TV spot driving traffic to the site.

Your psyched, your client is psyched, everyone involved is feeling great and you've already drafted your awards acceptance speech.

The day has come, the site goes live.

Then...

...nothing.

What I am getting at here is that culturally traditional ad agencies are just simply out of sync with what the public wants, expects and needs from the web.

The web insists that those who are creating media for it stay much more abreast to what its capabilities are and unlike the past new technologies are adopted much quicker on the web than the more static traditional platforms ever had available to them.

Over the last ten years consumers have been re-trained to think faster, react immediately and receive their reward instantly.

Apple's iTunes is a great example of that. Who would have thought that Apple would emerge as the top seller of entertainment media like music and movies and now mobile applications.

We are the instant gratification generation.

We click we get.

So the question that weighs heavily on my mind is, why would an ad agency that specializes in traditional marketing endeavor to strategize a web campaign for their clients when their staff is not geared for this kind of work and why would brands pay them millions to do work they are not specialized to do?

One of this year's biggest stories was the outburst by Big Spaceship owner Michael Lebowitz. He spoke up regarding his shops credit snub at Cannes.

The issue was credit, and the topic was definitely newsworthy, but what also happened was that it helped usher in the emergence of the digital agency.

It was a new voice speaking up and saying HEY WE EXIST!

Brands typically rely on their AOR to strategize a marketing campaign that they expect to be evenly distributed across various media platforms based on where they will get the best consumer response.

Now that the web has become one of the, if not the, most popular places to advertise we are seeing ad agencies starting to struggle with how they are executing more traditional ideas on the web.

There is no doubt that traditional ad agencies are tremendously talented at coming up with stories to tell based on brands and that ideas are in no shortage but taking those ideas and translating them online poses a new challenge to them.

I do not believe that the agencies were able to foresee the speed at which the industry would shift, the veracious impact with which digital would gain prominence as well as the rate of expansion of the web.

Agencies were simply to big and unable to see how quickly the web would become mainstreamed and how the new media marketplace would be completely redefined.

Most of the larger traditional agencies have not adjusted to the shift.

Only a few agencies have changed culturally. The agencies that have sprouted up during the dot com years were lucky enough to have built digital capabilities into their core services. Older agencies are now trying to simply acquire it.

Brands expect their agency to be able to execute across all media and inherently understand the nature of that media and how to integrate with it.

Smaller digital agencies had already bought into the new culture in the mid 90s, they have been doing this for over ten years now and over those ten years have accepted their roles as second fiddle to the larger agencies but at the same time waiting patiently, and learning from the mistakes that agencies made, for their time to come.

Digital agencies live and breathe and experiment with new media and digital storytelling in ways that traditional ad agencies cant. Digital agencies are naturally more curious about the medium because they created that medium and are always trying to improve it.

Digital shops have been learning from the mistakes made at larger agencies, smaller digital shops have identified that in order to grab the reigns they must know how to own and then integrate online media across a larger media marketplace and are doing so quite nicely.

As brands now shift their dollars towards the web the looming question is who should be getting the big bucks?

Digital shops have been doing work with agencies for some time now and like any close relationship each of the participants have rubbed off on one another.

Digital shops had to learn how to communicate with agencies by adopting a lot of the traditional processes that agencies have had in place for a 100 some odd years now and large agencies have had to step up their techno-jargon in order to jive with the hip smaller digital shops.

The result is that digital SHOPS have now become digital AGENCIES.

Growth is critical in any industry and evolution is unavoidable.

Now that media technologists and ad folks have intermingled and digital shops have realized that they too can come up with creative and innovative ways to market a brand, especially online, there seems to be an inherent shift in where brands need to be turning to drive their next campaign.

Any smart brand manager should realize that going directly to a digital agency will not only help save them money, because digital agencies tend to be much smaller and more nimble, but that they will be putting their money behind the people who are not only following the trends but actually creating those trends.

With limited budgets digital agencies can only go so far.

Digital projects suffer because the pie is being eaten by way too many people. By the time the people who are actually doing the project get the brief most of the dollars have been eaten up by the layers of bureaucracy at the AOR.

But if the budgets for digital campaigns were to be put directly in the hands of the digital agencies it would help to create not only more innovative executions but also help to finance the emergence of new technologies on the web and more exciting stories being told.

I mentioned earlier in this post that there is a missing component that traditional ad agencies lack.

That component is real time media tracking that is both accurate in terms of understanding audiences and identifying what user behavior patterns are successful and acting quickly on those findings.

Digital shops not only understand the inner workings of new media, they created this media, and intuitively understand what ideas will work online and which ones will fail.

Imagine a small digital shop who has been working every major traditional agency for ten years, learning from every project. Learning how each one of them communicates, comes up with ideas and tackles problems. Then they go ahead and apply that to their vast digital knowledge and then wrap that up with killer creative. The perfect model for the new agency trained by the old guard.

The digital shops were and continue to witness and learn from every success and mistake made by a cross section of large agencies.

Its like spending ten years in grad school being taught by the best professors.

Now that our country is facing financial introspection and money needs to be spent wisely, brands should reconsider where they distribute their ad dollars.

Digital shops are now more than capable of quarterbacking a campaign.

Ideas born from within the digital culture will have a better chance of surviving the fast pace of the web and in turn will give brands more bang for their buck. They will offer brands solutions that will enable the campaign to shift based on what users want and expect at various points of the campaign life.

One such execution, in my opinion, was launched this year for NBC Universal by digital shop Freedom + Partners. It is a very unique website created for the show The Starter Wife.

The site can be seen here: http://www.tswlife.com

What set this site apart from other sites I have seen this year is that it is loaded with potential for what the new face of the web will look like once more digital shops starting leading campaigns online.

With time and budget limitations, Freedom + Partners was able to execute a site that was a true convergence of media platforms. From book to mini series to weekly episodes to website every part of this property lives on a separate and appropriate media platform making it a truly diverse brand that speaks to a multitude of audiences.

NBC Universal was brave enough to take a chance on a digital agency who understood how to get immediate feedback from its audience. In partnering with Freedom + Partners, NBC Universal saw the potential for giving users new content immediately following an episode of the show and using that information to provide them with a better overall brand experience every time they came back to the site.

The site is now an evolving media platform that will give NBC the ability to see what their audiences want and how they react to what they are already giving them.

There is no exact science for success on the web, however putting your projects in the hands of those who are most intimate with it is one step towards success.

Go Digital!

Moral Decline

2008-10-08T12:30:00.004-04:00

Perhaps my brain is interpreting things based on the fact that tonight is the night of Yom Kippur (Jewish holiday of introspection and repentance) and I am feeling morally accountable for the work I do or what I read in Ad Age this morning is really, really scary.

Nat Ives at Ad Age wrote an article about Google’s CEO Eric Schmidt and his comments about the the internet becoming a “cesspool for false information.”

Schmidt’s solution to the problem was the following:

"Brands are the solution, not the problem," Mr. Schmidt said. "Brands are how you sort out the cesspool."

We all know that Google’s agenda is to sell more ads, but to go as far as saying that the entire web should be a giant virtual Times Square, filled with brand controlled content is a bit disturbing.

Brands control network television, since the early days it was the brands who sponsored the shows that dictated content based on how they wanted it to align itself and its products with its consumers. We all know how wonderful an example television is on our society, its like one long commercial.

But the web?

Our sweet autonomous web, the space we all go to for choices, for voices and for original thought.

Imagine the web controlled by the major brands, that is scary!

Schmidt went on to say that the future of quality editorial is, moreover, hardly certain. "It's a huge question in the world," Mr. Schmidt said, "particularly in the United States."

The CEO of one of the most or actually, the absolute most influential and powerful media companies in the world suggests that quality editorial is “a huge question” and “uncertain” while brands are thriving and alive is a really sad outlook if you ask me.

As we stand on the brink of a collapsing economy, we should be embracing real substantial thought and culture and not brands.

During a time of instability, its the editorial that should be thriving. Ideas, comments, theories and thoughts should be growing in the fertile soil of uncertainty helping to deliver us from the mess we put ourselves into. Over consumption and unrealistic economic outlook. We should not be feeding the addiction but treating it. An even balance of truth and honesty.

Creativity and original thought thirsts for inspiration. It yearns to be nurtured until it is distilled down to it's most simplest form. It's of the few forms of expression that is loudest and most powerful when expressed in it's most basic and uncensored way. It spans the masses and speaks volumes. The web gives us this freedom and by handing it over to brands because Google wants things more relevant is creative suicide.

Schmidt went on to say that branding, on the other hand, may be an essential element that helps people navigate the world, he said. "Brand affinity is clearly hard wired," he said. "It is so fundamental to human existence that it's not going away. It must have a genetic component."

If we follow Schmidt’s direction on how to navigate the world based on brand affinity, we are all doomed for destruction and the complete failure of mankind will be upon us.

Google just got scarier.

Oldy But Goody

2008-10-04T20:30:00.002-04:00

A very wise man named Moshe Chaim Luzzatto (also known by the acronym RAMCHAL) who lived between the years of 1707-1746, penned a book called The Path of the Just. In that book he wrote an elaborate introduction that started off with a very wise piece of advice, he wrote:

"I have written this work not to teach men what they do not know, but to remind them of what they already know and is very evident to them, for you will find in most of my words only things which most people know, and concerning which they entertain no doubts.

But to the extent that they are well known and their truths revealed to all, so is forgetfulness in relation to them extremely prevalent.

It follows, then, that the benefit to be obtained from this work is not derived from a single reading; for it is possible that the reader will find that he has learned little after having read it that he did not know before.

Its benefit is to be derived, rather, through review and persistent study, by which one is reminded of those things which, by nature, he is prone to forget and through which he is caused to take to heart the duty that he tends to overlook."

I had written a blog post last year that I feel is very relevant to post again but introduced with these very wise words from the Ramchal.

A very honest and very smart person asked for some help with cohesiveness of the production team at a pretty big studio.

I was really pleased to see that someone cared enough to seek outside help in making the team better, this person really cares!

Hats off to you buddy!

You know who you are!

Below is my response...

I'm sorry to hear that the team is having cohesiveness issues, that is really a major work flow problem.

I faced this issue at some studios that I had worked in and was able to help solve some of the issues by restructuring and better defining roles and responsibilities that both empowered people and made them very accountable for their specific roles.

Team members need to clearly understand boundaries and where hand off points are and when to come in (many times without being asked) and help out.

There needs to be chemistry amongst the team that is based on trust, ultimate trust is what will allow people to go into a project with the best attitude and wanting to give it their all.

Apathy is our cancer and when you have members of the team who have their minds on other things or simply don't care enough to perform on the highest level then you will see that the quality of the work suffers and that every project becomes a nightmare.

That is one reason why I am so against a revolving door policy where designers and developers come and go, a team needs time to grow.

Members need to know the others through and through, its not all business, its a creative field that requires everyone knowing what is in the head of the other.

Producers need to gauge every team member and then deal with them accordingly, sometimes talk out of both sides of their mouths in order to please everyone and get everyone to perform at their very best. No different than a sporting team.

1. How is your current creative team structured (ECD, CD, Senior AD, etc)?

The Creative Director sets the overall tone of the project's design phase he or she makes sure everything is tight and on brand and can be executed from a technological standpoint> The Art Director dictates the specifics and execution> The Developer works with AD on motion and look and feel> The Producer has final say as to what client will see.

The Producer IS the client and should understand how to look at the project through the eyes of the client and help anticipate any issues that may arise.

I hate sounding biased but the producer has to be able to explain to the creative director what the client expects and the CD has to fit that into the overall vision of what is being produced.

I have produced what would have been award winning sites that have never seen the light of day simply because what was delivered was not what the client wanted and the CD or AD didn't want to budge...

You learn your lessons...

Ultimately the client is in charge and the team needs to understand that. The team is somewhat sheltered from the client so they need to trust that the producer is making decisions based on the best interest of the relationship and that everything pushed back on will benefit the relationship and ultimately lead to more business and at the same time not sacrificing the quality of the work produced.

2. Are your teams assigned to a particular account / client or do they
work on pretty much everything?

Teams are assigned based on availability and yes pretty much work on everything, only places like RGA and AKQA have the ability to have special teams for special projects.

Smaller shops MUST cultivate their talent and must evenly distribute the work. I knew one producer who would only give the best projects to who he liked working with the best, that is not going to benefit the studio, everyone should have a chance to raise their abilities and grow as a professional.

Again it is all about trust. I have always been pleasantly surprised at how amazing a young art director or junior developer will come through it you give them the chance.

3. How do you guys handle work flow, meaning once a big project gets in the pipeline, how does it start and finish? Is it talked about amongst the
group or just given to a random designer / AD?

The project is ideally give to those best suited in terms of skills and expierience, however smaller shops must rely on available resources and don't have the ability to shuffle things around mid project.

Typically 2-3 design directions are submitted, the client chooses, winner stays on as Art Director - it is given to the available resources.

There have been cases where certain people MUST be added to the mix, at that point special decisions must be made. But again, try to trust and get people to expand themselves as professionals.

4. How do you guys share ideas amongst the team as far as where you want
to go or do as a group / company?

Drinking beers, having lunch, talking openly and always listening attentively and allowing everyone to have an equally loud voice.

There needs to be a collective consciousness developed, no one will ever always agree however people may give in at certain times knowing that it is the best solution for that particular direction.

The group must have equal say, if there is someone who is part of the group that time and time again is shunned or one person who dictates all then that person doesn't belong.

Leaders should be established and I do believe that they naturally rise to the top.

Follow those who are passionate, those who really believe.

The company must represent the common collective, not some facade, it will show through eventually.

5. How do you guys share what your working on? Do you have a weeekly /
monthly type meeting to discuss what everyone is involved in?

You must encourage people to get up and walk around, to ask "hey, whatcha working on?"

To involve people in various capacities and to force people to talk about what they are up to and if any issues have arisen and how did they solve it.

People need to speak up, think out loud and present ideas and issues to the group. Its a matter of getting others involved.

I would sometimes bring people over and say, "hey, what do you think of this, i know your not on this project but i need an outside opinion?" just keep the gates open be a catalyst for chatter, IM links and progress it only takes a second.

6. How do your communicate as a group as far as creative ideas / workflow
is concerned?

Assemble the team to talk about upcoming possible projects, look over RFPs, specs, ideas, as a group bring paper, pencils, and blocks and toys to the table, let people think out loud write everything down.

Pose imaginary problems and let the group solve them. If we were to get such and such project, how would we attack it?

Ask questions that get people to think. Groups become very stale if they dont engage in strategic thinking.

If there is a project that is particularly impressive done by another company, get together and ask how WE would have done it. This will not only provide ammunition for the next pitch but also grow the team as a single thinking unit.

7. What do you do for fun as a group?

Do lots of drugs! ... just kidding, DO NOT DO DRUGS!.... same as everyone else, Beers, BBQs, dinner... go to a museum, take cameras and snaps pictures, talk about what you would do with these assets, how you would animate them, design with them, go out and get inspired together.

Movies, shows, etc... try to always get the group to think at the same time, train them and you will see that when the time comes the ideas will flow like one single river.

8. Do you guys meet every week to discuss whats going on in the industry?

Unfortunately no one does this, I try to do this but people tend to not care or be too busy.

I would shoot everyone links all day long LOOK AT THIS LOOK AT THAT!

I was annoying but it works, this is a MUST, there has to be some small sense of competition as well as what others are doing.

It should inspire a person to see what someone else in his field is producing. I will typically send out 25-30 links a day for people to look at, i will force them to comment just so that I know they saw it and "got it".

I think its important to keep the rear view mirror focused all the time or you will get lost. The industry is the body and we are just one organ. Be aware of the body and the role you play.

A company should know who they are.

9. Do you meet weekly for creative / status meetings?

We used to and found it was not productive... as long at it is productive then yes every Monday pep talk, or Thursday night beer and review.

It should be something that is done all week in smaller chunks and then one quick review where everyone is more or less already familiar with what they are looking at.

Many times we would do this and people were like "WOW I didnt even know we were working on that!" and once we even won an award and someone said to me "Wow we did that!" so there should be a general awareness of what is going on at all times.

10. How is it handled when an artist / team does an AMAZING job on a
project and the client LOVES it, do you get a bonus, a day off, etc?

UHHH NO! thats your job!

Bonuses should be for production over a year.

Why should someone be rewarded for something that is expected of them.

I would say bonuses should go to those people who went above and beyond the call of duty as well as those who have performed on a consistently high level all year.

Beside the obligatory Christmas bonus I think that extras are a good way to motivate people but not for every little thing. If a team is in sync then maybe send them all out for beers on the shop or sushi make the reward a team thing as well.

11. If there is anything else you guys think could possibly inspire us a
bit, or perhaps put us in the right direction, please write down.

Love what you do and realize that as a team your creating things together.

Like parents you are partners in creation.

Dont fight the differences, embrace them, love what the person brings to the team and forget the petty bullshit.

Realize that anything less will only hold the project back and the end results will be less than expected.

Want to win together, individual accolades are lonely and somewhat hurtful, a team is a team, no one person is greater than the whole team.

Give everyone, even interns an equal voice, hear it out, if it sucks then thank them and keep moving, if its great make sure you tell them that.

Go into projects excited, producers should build a sense of positive excitement and not anticipate the worst. Many people produce from fear and expect something to go wrong at any minute, those people are the worst leaders, be mindful but be positive, if something does come up it is not the end of the world, try to be flexible and make the adjustment where needed and move on, don't let it break up the team with accusations and finger pointing.

If someone falls then everyone should help them up.

Jealousy is cancer.

Disrespect is a disease.

Not everything will be a GET THE GLASS but the effort put into it should always shine through.

Even bad designs can be redeemed with effort and passion.

The client sees all of this.

Even over the phone the client listens to the tones, to the words used.

When the client feels safe then the shop gets more work, when the clients feel that the team is on the same page and all the gears are moving at the same time then even if the project fails the client knows that every effort was made to make it a success.

Care about shit, just care, give it more than a second or two in thought, really be honest with yourself and others and make sure that you never ever compromise your standards, your ethics and your beliefs.

Oh have TONS OF FUN!! really! not foosball table fun, i mean really have fun! Love what you do and do it hard!

Parish is On The Money!

2008-09-28T11:30:00.003-04:00

Nick Parish's latest article entitled "The Price is Right (Isn't It?)" in this months Creativity is so right on the money.

(excuse the pun)

It never fails.

At the onset of every project that a large agency outsources to a smaller digital agency like ours there is this afterthought called a budget.

We are all well aware of the media buy, the TV spot and print budgets.

When the agency partner tells us that we have exactly 4 weeks to come up with the most amazing kick ass website that fully integrates every aspect of the campaign, and oh by the way, we usually are not brought in from the onset to make sure that there is a bridge between the offline and online creative, and its a budget that is a minuscule fraction of what it is worth in terms of its importance to both the campaign and the work provided.

This always ends up being a sore point in the relationship.

When a relationship is entered into on an unfair foundation it is bound for a rocky road ahead and this is what typically happens 90% of the time when larger ad agencies work with smaller digital shops.

I have heard so many complaints from ad agencies towards digital shops regarding a disconnect between communication, creative suffering, deadlines not met, expectations not delivered and so on.

If the digital agencies were compensated fairly so many of these issues would be solved. We work through the most adverse conditions because our direct line of communication is blurred by the lack of transparency with the source.

The relationships in general would be healthier if there would be more partnerships in the entire creative, the website and the online video production would benefit immensely.

If the digital teams were not thrown the scraps of the larger campaign we may be a bit more enthusiastic about the whole process.

It seems like no one wants to admit that the website is now the anchor of the campaign.

The website serves as the heart and soul of the "new age" of advertising, the television spots and print ads are simply driving traffic to the websites and the spots have budgets that are in the millions and the website, that has its own custom video produced by the smaller shops, is a mere 100k.

How does this seem fair?

The scales are way too unbalanced.

Ad agencies will get millions from a client to do a site that they will pay a small digital agency MAYBE a few hundred thousand for.

Digital agencies have limited resources, time, budgets and accessibility to the client directly all come through day in and day out, by the skin of their teeth, every time producing the great work we see online every day by constantly jumping through hoops and having to swim through way too many layers than necessary.

Oh and by the way did I mention that we have to also educate our agency partners through the entire project so they can sound like they know what they are talking about to their clients.

I have gotten so many emails saying, “can you help me explain this better?” or “Our client wants to know about hosting, is that something we need for this site?” or a week before launch I get “is this site in Flash or HTML, our client wants to know.”

Anyone at a digital shop will recognize these question and know exactly what I am saying.

Us digital shops actually like working with the big agencies and are totally open to working together and collaborating, however once the client gets wind of all the drama involved, and the price being paid, and how much better the work would be if those layers were removed and we were compensated properly, they will simply start coming directly to us digital agencies for service just like they would any other specialty agency.

The larger ad agencies don't have the dedicated expertise or the specialized teams in house to properly execute or even explain the nature of this highly technical and creative work, this is why 85% of it is outsourced to smaller digital shops.

In my experience, every time the client came directly to us the work was infinitely better, the budgets were better and the relationship was amazing!

Its been 10 years now and I think its time that the digital agencies start getting paid fairly!

Nick Parish’s article in this months Creativity is a wonderful voice for the cause and will hopefully open a lot of eyes to the unfairness that has a strangle hold on the relationship between the traditional and the digital agency.

As our economy continues to struggle and budgets are tightened I think we will see a huge shift of dollars to the internet because you simply get more bang for your buck on the web.

The ad agencies will no longer get the type of quality work they want to deliver to their clients if those budgets continue to insult.

Time and money are the only two barriers between decent work and great work. With the right amount of time and the right budget almost anything can be achieved online and in the most exciting and dynamic ways.

Everyone will look like rock stars!

I think that the digital agencies have been hazed enough and it is time to pay us fairly for what we have worked hard for. We are officially "Mad Men" now too.

If traditional agencies want to continue the relationships with the digital shops, they need to create more of a transparency within the entire campaign and allow digital teams to get in from the onset and help budget the time and those dollars correctly.

It will be only a matter of time until someone really smart at a big brand realizes they can go directly to the digital shop and will start the trend towards contacting smaller digital agencies directly and taking the entire bulk of the digital budget out of the hands of the ad agencies who are handling the offline portion of the campaign and putting that money into the hands of the people who are actually doing the work.

Brands... We have good accountants too!

It is advantageous for both the traditional and the digital to work together NOW to find a fair ground so that digital production is paid for fairly and that better work, more creative design and better deadlines can be established.

Right now the marriage is suffering and traditional and digital will want a divorce pretty soon. Divorce is not fun and everyone loses.

All Shook Up

2008-09-26T07:36:00.006-04:00

Interactive development has been steadily evolving since the day the web allowed the public to post their own websites.

People have been intuitively finding new ways to make things happen, shake, blink, move, react, click, rollover and so on.

There are people like Carlos Ulloa, Mathieu Badimon, Andy Zuoko, Tim Knip, John Grden and many others who are doing great work and continue to develop amazing new ways to manipulate animation and add new dimensions to the online world.

However I feel that one area that seems to continue to lag behind is interactive design. Where are the designers who are innovating interactive design?

I keep seeing the same executions flashed up, placed into grids, thrown onto a lit surface, papervisioned and tweened.

There is no real experimentation with how we communicate visually to the public.

Just because you throw a circle in the z axis doesn't change the fact that its still a circle. We need new ways to communicate online. Websites today embody too much influence from print and frankly its a waste of technology to make something so flat simply move around.

Navigations have been explored in a bunch of inventive ways but in the end clients will always go back to the traditional navigational schema because of the fear of their audiences not being able to find something.

In the early days of Flash when people like Vas Sloutchevsky and Yugo were experimenting with design that fully utilized the show/hide, physical and dynamic, motion driven and curious nature of what Flash truly offered us as an animation platform.

Just go take a look at the early portfolio of the first 5 years of Firstborn where there are many executions that Vas Sloutchevsky had taken corporate designs that were outside of the normal flat executions he never designed out of fear of not communicating properly.

Clients trusted him then and they still do now.

He makes sense of his work and thinks out every single detail.

Vas is now doing that again on some new very exciting projects coming out here very soon at Freedom + Partners.

Its exciting to be producing projects that are truly interactive in both their design and their development.

Not just an interactive Colorform board.

Yugo is also one of these rare talents who truly understands this method of design. He constantly produces work that is fully born from the interactive womb.

Flashing up flat jpgs or turning them into 3D is just not exciting anymore.

Similar to the way Apple designs products that are wildly addictive to not just technophiles but the general public, we need to design in a similar fashion for websites that move, inform, entertain and communicate to a wider audience.

It is our job to make our audiences and the web more sophisticated.

Being handed comps by a client and making them move, in my opinion doesn't constitute good work, at this point anyone can accomplish this.

I have worked at shops where we were overloaded with amazing flash developers who were wasting their time and prime years coming up with algorithms and flashing up lame designs and flat creative, that once animated, was really not that much more impressive than it was when it sat in its original flat Photoshop layers.

Some sites are exact rip-offs of others!

Tim Nolan pointed out to me yesterday that this site named Quarantine is an exact rip off of the Big Spaceship HBO Voyeur site they did for BBDO.

He also pointed out a site that was so original and so inventive in its nature where the content and site were perfect compliments to one another. It was for the new Wii game Wario.

See it here.

We need to back track a bit and return to the philosophy of designing interfaces that are designed specifically for the web.

We need to think of exacting and smart solutions that work and not to just "make it move."

People aren't fooled anymore, you cant fake it these days. The web is scrutinized to the umpteenth degree, your not going to get away with letting people think that they are customizing something and then show them a result that is canned or "fake".

The web is now fully enveloped into our culture, our kids are already sophisticated users.

My 9 year old daughter can point out very subtle, but to her, obvious flaws on most websites. Its intuitive, the way our generation looked for "fakes" in movies, people now see in the web.

Retrofitting designs and campaigns has become tiresome and frankly its a cop out.

Lines that move, squiggle, dance in the shapes of animals and squirm when you touch them are just lame gimmicks.

The web expects more from us.

Lets not litter it with sites that have no real substance or foundation.

Every site deserves thought, strategy, enthusiasm and dedication to its perfection in both design and development.

PC Response

2008-09-21T19:42:00.004-04:00

Crispin has ditched their Jerry & Bill campaign to respond to Apple's MAC Vs. PC spots that have been sweeping the web, TV and print.

Who would have thought that the once mighty now feels they must respond to those they once looked down upon.

This shift is happening all over the place.

Even in our small space (interactive) the once mighty seem to be feeling the sting of the creative at heart that has been holding steadfast just waiting to emerge.

Check out the new ads from our friends over at Microsoft

Strange how confident Bill looked shaking his ass, guess the world is tired of his sorry ass.

True 3D

2008-09-18T07:54:00.002-04:00

I highly suggest going out and finding a pair of 3D glasses.

Trust me on this one, this site is unbelievable.

Go check this out now!

These are the kinds of sites that simply impress.

This site is one of the reasons I love the web.

Just think of the possibilities!

AWESOME WORK!!

VectorVision takes vectors in Papervision to a whole new level.

We are using it at Freedom + Partners on a number of projects and it delivers!

Im Right Here

2008-09-11T07:54:00.003-04:00

Social networking has become a phenomena that has suddenly inspired the world to go online.

Grandmothers who couldn't program their VCR 20 years ago are suddenly able to create complex profiles and communicate with friends and family.

Teens have ripped through the likes of Facebook like a veracious storm swollen up over a patch of warm water in a tight gulf just waiting to devour anything in its path.

The business world has embraced social networking as a means of making business relationships a bit more personal and to show a lighter side of who they really are.

I suddenly know that my lawyer is bummed about his deck, my client is heading towards destruction and my coworker is super duper psyched'aroony.

We all are glued to our small screens for second by second updates of the happenings that are occurring in the lives of our closest 200 friends.

Its the new reality show. The new sitcom. However you spin it, its entertainment.

Little tiny golden nuggets raining from cyberspace down on our curious little minds to help quench our curiosity for that which really isn't our business.

I do it, we all do it. Shamelessly updating everyone we care to update about the play by play as we go about our day.

Some are playful messages aimed at inspiring fiends, others are alerts for ones state of mind, some are the insecurity that lays deep within those who never reveal it, some are vicious attacks towards a competitor or enemy and some are loving reminders to friends and family that they are thinking of you.

What about social stalking?

The ability to see who your friends and their friends' friends are now friends with.

Social networks have aggregated new business, reunited friends and family and have leveled the social playing field.

I am no longer not there.

I am right here.

Goodbye Cruel World

2008-09-10T07:19:00.007-04:00

The events that will take place in a remote area of Switzerland during the unknown hours of September 10, 2008 may forever change the world.

Similar to the early morning darkness when the incredible destructive powers of the atom were first unleashed and what had been merely theoretical became reality, today the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) will be switched on, accelerating sub-atomic particles to nearly the speed of light before smashing them together.

The purpose of this experiment is to re-create the very moment 13 billion years ago when scientists believe a tremendous explosion known as the "big bang" created the universe.

But what if, 13 billion years ago, there was no explosion?

What if they are wrong and the big bang was none other than the hand of God or some other mystical occurrence?

Im going to be a little nervous today, sitting in the Embody and working on our latest projects, hoping that within one fell swoop we don't all get decimated.

When those two opposing beams of protons charged with approximately 7 TeVs of energy hit, and they produce the God Particle, producing mass to vector bosons, I seriously hope everything we have worked towards as humanity isn't decimated...

OK ILL ADMIT IT, IM SCARED!!

Why is this allowed to happen?

Is there someone we can all call and say "HEY WAIT!! NO!!!!!! DONT DO IT!!"

Well world, if at some point you cease to exist today, its been great.

I guess the fact that Google's picture today isn't of the Earth exploding.

That could be seen as a positive thing right?

Google would know, wouldn't they?

Walking the Guideline

2008-09-08T00:05:00.025-04:00

Since its inception in May 2000, The FWA has continued to exceed expectations on the Internet by generating a groundswell of excitement for the best that the interactive community has to offer, and continually bring us inspiration per diem.

Rob Ford, the patriarch of the most visited destination in the interactive community, has now compiled a book based on the success of his website.

The title of this new book is none other than “Guidelines for Online Success."

Before I even opened the book I spent a good amount of time examining the design.

Taschen has always been a champion for not just great content but also beautifully designed books for the very community that contributes to them.

“Guidelines” is no different.

From the choice of color to the tabbed chapters and the glossy finish, this book had already impressed me as a true embodiment of what it was created for; to be a showcase for the most successful websites on the Internet.

When I first heard about the book before its release, I was a bit apprehensive about how overwhelming an endeavor it might be to undertake a project of this magnitude.

How could anyone capture the best of the web when the web is constantly out doing itself on a second by second basis?

The very impetus of The FWA is to serve as a testament of the daily evolution of this creative network we all contribute to each and every day.

As I began to examine through each page and peruse the various projects and personalities that made up this festschrift, I was immediately impressed by the selection of projects that captured a slice of time that served as a period in which the industry grew leaps and bounds.

This phase will forever be defined as a foundation of the many incarnations that the web will embody tomorrow and well into the future.

The book opens with a quote from none other than Albert Schweitzer, a man who nourished hope in a mankind that was even more profoundly aware of its position in the Universe.

“Success is not the key to happiness.
Happiness is the key to success.
If you love what you are doing,
you will be successful.”

What an apropos way to start off a book about an industry where happiness is often disguised with the sweat and tears of the toil that make up the sites in this book.

An industry that is still too new to have a defined set of process and rules; its bible being written at this very moment.

This quote is directed towards an industry and a group of professionals who are also profoundly aware of its new position in the universe.

Within the second paragraph of his introduction, Rob so graciously steps aside in order to spotlight the trove of talent he has collected.

By the time the ink dried at the printer, just as many websites have been launched that make the sites in the book look ancient. But perhaps that can also serve as a tribute to the veracious appetite the web has for creativity.

Surely Rob knew as he was compiling the sites showcased that they would all quickly be replaced by newer incarnations. Personally, knowing Rob, I am positive that his intentions were indeed to try and capture a slice of time where the projects would profoundly influence the culture of the web.

"Guidelines for Online Success" opens with an eloquent greeting by none other than industry darling and CEO of Big Spaceship, Michael Lebowitz, who introduces us to interface and design.

As a producer in this industry, this chapter resonated deeply with me as a clear and concise documentation of exactly what is important when formulating a successful interface and approach to design.

The second chapter covers marketing and communications. Martin Hughes and Jordan Stone of WEFAIL knocked me off my feet with their hilarious introduction to this section.

They pulled no punches in truly telling the story of the typical project drama.

Staying true to the WEFAIL style of web development, Hughes and Stone crafted a wonderfully written introduction that embodies the collective consciousness of the industry. Using their brand of humor, they eloquently set the stage for this very important chapter.

Each section following features one heavyweight after another, outlining for us the most valuable advice in the industry; how to achieve true success.

Each page is wonderfully strewn with powerful images of websites that have burned themselves into our minds as models of perfection, which all hold us responsible for outdoing at the onset of any new project.

The last chapter was introduced by none other than Freedom + Partners CEO and former Firstborn co-founder Mark Ferdman.

Mark ends off this book with a journey through the history of commerce from its very inception until its new cutting edge.

Just when you thought you knew it all, Lars Bastholm of AKQA then delivers an Afterword seeded with some of the most valuable advice you will find anywhere.

Lars’s ultimate conclusion is that in order to be successful online one must not only adhere to the tenets laid out by each of the super friends who contributed to this amazing book, but that one must also have a passion and be firmly integrated and active in the online community.

I want to thank Rob for this wonderful volume that will forever stand the test of time. It is a complete contradiction to the ever-changing nature of the web and in that lays its beauty and profound essence by capturing the very foundation of what makes a successful website.

I suggest you all go out NOW and buy this must have book edited by Rob Ford and Julius Wiedemann.

Get it online here.

Hate to say I told you so...

2008-09-05T08:08:00.005-04:00

Well the first spot came out and sorry folks but the "future" paired with Jerry Seinfeld (washed up comedian) and Bill Gates (washed up monopolist) isn't "delicious" and this spot sunk within the very first sight of Jerry eating one of those nauseating mall sticks called Churros.

Did Crispin really think that inserting Bill Gates into the random musings of Jerry's world and make him one of the Seinfeld "friends" will make him more endearing and sell more software?

Bill Gates cannot be softened, the man abused his power and is now trying to cozy up to sell more broken operating systems by hanging out with Jerry?

I'm lost.

I'm sure tons of research went into this, or maybe not, but this campaign is so flawed.

Nothing can save this sinking ship, not even Jerry.

The Original Airwair with Bouncing Souls

2008-08-31T14:20:00.006-04:00

Doc Martins are probably one of the most nostalgic brands that I personally identify with.

I was glad to see that they are undergoing a new website design.

Check it out here.

I just picked up a new pair of Vintage 1460 8 eyes, I opened the box and saw a postcard inside and it seems that DM has adopted the word "Freedm" as its new moniker.

I think we all know how I feel about Freedom.

Freedom + Partners

You can still see the old site here.

Its nice to see a brand stay true to its roots. DMs are one of the few things you can take with you through this crazy world, they are timeless.

So enjoy some FREEDM and get back into a pair of the worlds coolest shoes.

Rerun Richochet

2008-08-31T09:35:00.007-04:00

This has been the year we have seen the big networks all swallow their prides and finally accept the web as a viable means of delivering content to its loyal viewers.

Content on demand, when we can fit it into our busy schedules and content that isn't some user generated crap.

Networks like NBC pretty much giving us whatever it is we want to watch on both its network as well as Fox via the online network called Hulu.com. Not just shows that are running now but also past shows that may have not hit the rerun circuit but that can draw advertising dollars and provide nostalgic injections of some old favorites.

Today I had noticed something really interesting, the old WB network, which in my day was simply Channel 11 and Channel 9 in NYC, which is now called CW Network which runs on two channels, I think, has resurrected its former incarnation of The WB online.

The WB began its life in 1995, broadcasting a paltry 2 hours of cheesy teen entertainment one night a week. The WB's first shows were mostly sitcoms targeted at an ethnically diverse audience. Even though four of the five shows shown in the netlet's first nine months (The Wayans Bros., The Parent 'Hood, Sister, Sister (picked up after being cancelled by ABC), and Unhappily Ever After) were renewed beyond the first year, none of them made a significant impact on anything.

The WB began programming on Sunday nights in the 1995-1996 season, but none of the new shows managed to garner much viewing interest. Still, the network continued to expand in the 1996-1997 season, adding programming on Monday nights.

That season gave the WB modest hits in the family drama 7th Heaven and comedies The Steve Harvey Show and The Jamie Foxx Show. We all know where Jaime Foxx is now.

The WB also added the Kids' WB programming blohttp://www.blogger.com/img/gl.link.gifck in 1995, which mixed Warner Brothers' biggest hit shows (Tiny Toon Adventures, Animaniacs and later Batman: The Animated Series, all of which originated either on Fox Kids or in syndication) with new productions and original shows.

In 2006, CBS and Warner Bros. Entertainment announced plans to can both UPN and The WB and launch a new network, The CW in their place. Over the next nine months, it was to be seen which shows from UPN and The WB would cross over to the new CW, as well as which stations across the country would become future affiliates of the new network.

A slice of time has now been captured online. Our beloved web is now a time machine for those who want to revel in an hour of Friends and then some Buffy The Vampire Slayer.

In an unprecedented and in my opinion a genius strategic play, The WB, an entire network, has been reincarnated online.

Click here for a preview.

The web is the new wild west, a frontier, a place where media can be reinvigorated and where anyone can now start an online network of both original content as well as content that once held the hearts of millions of viewers.

It is the new Rerun Model.

Networks will be salivating over the ability to recreate a slice of time that was wildly popular.

Imagine the old NBC line up featuring the Cosby Show, Family Ties, Cheers, Hill Street Blues and Miami Vice coming back to life online.

The late Brandon Tartikoff would have been proud.

Now shows can be rebroadcast in a multitude of various formats. We can now enjoy the television that has shaped pop culture anytime we want. The strength this garners the web is unfathomable.

The web is now a new fertile landscape where the old is new again and where slices of time can live always.

A true monument to mankind. Buffy will never die!

Travelling Matte

2008-08-27T10:17:00.002-04:00

I am on the set today, shooting for a new site we are working on at Freedom + Partners.
Shooting on green screen is always fun.

Sexy People

2008-08-25T00:19:00.002-04:00

I'm not quite sure what it is about this site but its incredibly inspiring.

Perhaps the beauty of the common man or the true'ness that emanates from every picture.

You just cant capture this unless its real and that is what makes it so damn interesting.

Every picture floods my head with ideas of how to better communicate ideas in different ways, all based on the facial expressions, clothing choices, lighting, couplings and every other odd little nuance that each picture offers.

I am very addicted to and extremely inspired by the pictures on this site

Check it out here: Sexy People

Why is it...?

2008-08-24T14:44:00.008-04:00

Has Crispin lost its mind?

Has Microsoft gone mad?

Is Jerry Seinfeld crazy?

What is going on here?

How much more desperate can Microsoft get?

What means will they employ this time to plug the gaping hole in the side of its sinking ship?

I have worked on quite a few Microsoft projects with McCann SF and TAG so I feel like I can speak on this subject.

McCann SF was one hell of an agency that really worked hard to prolong the inevitable death of Microsoft. There was nothing more McCann could have done to keep the Window from breaking, and it looks like Crispin just threw a hardball right through it.

Windows Vista is a flawed product, computer companies everywhere are moving away from windows and looking for other ways to compete with Apple.

OS X is continuing to win over new users by the day due to the virus strains called iPodinae & iPhonesvirinae that has infected the public.

Point Number 2:

Doesn't any one remember the Mac in every single episode of Seinfeld?

Watch any episode, I dare you, you will find a Mac in the corner of Jerry's apartment nearest to the window on his desk in every single episode.

Jerry was not only a Mac owner but Jerry was an early adopter, he always had the absolutely newest model including the 25th anniversary issue.

How the heck is Crispin going to spin this one?

This was the year we see Gates retiring, its no wonder, the man is not an idiot, with the world clamoring over their precious iPods and iPhones it was no surprise that we have now entered into the "Switch Age" where the once mighty Windows once ruled is now a depleted creatively challenged office thirsty for some sweet titanium casing and that playful dock at the bottom of the screen. No more anti virus software and less crashing.

Apple's market capitalization is at nearly $162 billion. This means Apple is surpassing Intel, valued at $155 billion and IBM at $157 billion. Thus, Apple is rapidly closing in on Google ($200 billion), perhaps Jerry will be the one to help Apple get closer to the "mighty" Microsoft, valued at $290 billion.

I say let Jerry end his career as the hypocrite he will look like while peddling the flawed Windows Vista.

I nominate Larry David as the lovable idiot who should go head to head with Jerry and endorse the Mac. After all its his success that has carried on while Jerry rots in Vegas.

Why do they call it a "building"? It looks like they're finished. Why isn't it a "built"?

Maybe Jerry should use that routine in his new Vista commercials.

One Two Punch!

2008-08-18T19:32:00.003-04:00

The ad business is full of duos, teams of creative assassins who together come up with the one two punch that cannot be matched by any ad hoc group or single individual. A duo can tag in and out and can take on any challenge each drawing strength from one another.

During our days at Firstborn we both looked for and found such people and we killed em one by one.

None of these phonies...

Mario and Luigi
Han Solo and Luke Skywalker
Bert and Ernie
Batman and Robin
Jay and Silent Bob
Pinky and The Brain
Ren and Stimpy
Cheech and Chong
Frodo & Sam
Beavis and Butthead
Jules and Vincent
Wayne and Garth
The Lone Ranger and Tonto
Simon and Garfunkel
Wiley E. Coyote and Road Runner
Mac and Cheese
Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak
Green Hornet and Kato
Shaggy and Scooby
Bill & Ted
Napoleon dynamite and pedro
John Masterson & Steven Sundheim
Knight Rider (KITT & Michael)
Starsky and Hutch
Andy and Barney
Thelma and Louise
Calvin and Hobbes
Chris Farley & David Spade

...have anything on Craig Elimeliah & Tim Nolan

Back for more!

Watch out!

I want to welcome and old friend and a true partner Tim Nolan to the Freedom + Partners team. He has come on as Executive Content Director and is going to tear shit up!

Good to have you back!

A Barbarous Truth

2008-08-06T11:35:00.004-04:00

Rick Webb over at The Barbarian Group is one of my favorite industry personalities. On the heels of the Michael Lebowitz comments that were circulating around the industry regarding his Cannes experience and the lack of credit for the HBO Voyeur project.

Rick's comments are here.

Rick chimed in and added his 2 cents to the story and I had this to say about his response...

"This is one of the best responses that I have read from a legitimate source and someone who I would actually consider a real voice on this subject. You hit every point spot on and drove home the real issues that are at hand. As digital partners we are only a single entity in a much bigger picture. We are obviously biased towards our discipline and I am sure the media buyers would chime in a say "well no one would be at your damn site if we didnt throw out 2 million banners to drive traffic so we should get the credit" and so on...

I believe that as an industry that is going through the growing pains of a new medium and as the new kids on the block we need to become a more cohesive group of creative professionals. An idea is never the child of one single person, its an entity that is comprised of the pasts and presents of a collective of creative individuals who have all breathed some life into the idea. We cant single out any one contributor as the only creator unless it was a one man show that made it all happen.

It really boils down to a very fundamental rule we all learned in pre-school. Playing nicely and sharing. Egos are rampant in this business and those who can set aside their egos for the betterment of the idea are the real winners here. No slab of metal fashioned into a lion is worth the strife that our industry has be thrown into, the unity has been compromised and we have been set back because of some petty ego stroking.

Credit is always a nice thing to get, but at the end of the day the check you get is really the only credit any one company can give another, being paid fairly is above all the farthest anyone needs to go. Once we all get past this and start refocusing on the big picture then maybe we will all make it a point to be more sensitive to our respective roles and spread the love a bit more.

This is not a new subject and has been infecting the creative process since the dawn of time. Who did this? Who discovered that? Did the captain of Columbus's ships throw a shit fit when the King and Queen noted Columbus as the founder of the new world? Probably.

I think we all need to take a good hard look at ourselves and keep in mind that we are at a critical stage in the convergence of a new medium with age old traditional advertising and that right now there is no time to bicker over small issues when much larger ones prevail."

Earnstwhile

2008-08-03T08:37:00.003-04:00

In 1991 one of my heroes came up with this idea to gather together the best musicians of the ALT rock scene and have this great big ol' outdoor concert. At the time us wee kids only heard of concerts like this from our baby boomer parents who hazily passed down stories and sometimes pictures from the historic Woodstock.

We were the perfect market to start this up again, the seed was planted and we all would readily make the same trek as our parents did to some outdoor alternative rock mecca to pray for three days on drugs and rock and roll.

Jane's Addiction, Nine Inch Nails, Siouxsie & the Banshees, Ice-T/Body Count, Living Colour, Butthole Surfers and The Rollins Band.

Back then that line up would have brought peace to the middle east.

Its pretty early on a Sunday morning, I am as always awake with ideas swirling, I'm online making my rounds, round, rounding the corners of the globe and I come across a banner ad for what I thought had ended in 1998.

Lalapalooza is back except this banner ad wasn't to come make some trip to some field to tune out for a few days... rather it was telling me that they didn't actually expect me to make it and that I should be tuning in ONLINE!!!

Do I feel old? NOOOOOOO.

Ok yes.

The web page I ended up on said this...

"Tune-In To Lollapalooza Live On the Web
Can’t make the trip to Chicago for Lollapalooza August 1st-3rd? Never fear, blue room is here. Experience Lollapalooza LIVE via webcast just by turning on your computer. Mark your calendars now! Tune in to watch Wilco, The Raconteurs, Love and Rockets, Bloc Party, G Love and Special Sauce, Flogging Molly, and many, many more!"

Like most smart businessmen in this capitalistically ravenous country, Farrell sold the Lollapalooza brand to Capital Sports & Entertainment. The concert was revived to become a two-day fest only to remain in one location, Chicago's Grant Park. The concert actually relies on the web to stream it to the world.

THE WEB!

Ok maybe I have geeked out completely but this is a profound cultural swing. The web is now a venue for concerts, not just any concerts but big ones, those summer ones that change your life, the ones that evolved from Woodstock to free us of our addiction to pop music and usually ended up with an addiction to something totally new, and bound us together in the darkness and angst of Alternative melodies as we were soon thrust out unto the world to start our lives.

I'm in my very early 30s and I am ranting like a geezer here.

The web has accelerated time. We have built a time machine except it progresses culture, information, music, arts, education and if you don't keep up, your gonna be left behind.

Dont You Forget About Us...

2008-07-28T08:35:00.007-04:00

Today's FWA winner is North Kingdom!

I love these guys, they did Get the Glass! They are legendary when it comes to web development and design. Probably one of my top 3 favorite shops. But today's execution kind of surprised me .

I didn't think the site execution was all that great. The video was kind of so so and I am sure that was done in the States. But the site lacked a certain love and appreciation for the American pop culture iconic movie that The Breakfast Club is, especially one that is so dear to so many people.

The Breakfast Club is an American movie that has, good or bad, literally shaped a generation.

What American teenage guy didn't secretly adore Claire?

What American kid wasn't saying EAT. MY. SHORTS for like two years after this came out?

This is a slice of Americana. I may be sounding like good ol' John Bender when I say this but - THIS BLOWS!

I really think an American shop should have won this gig.

Saatchi did everything right except for one small detail. They hired North kingdom to execute this thing.

If it were anything else like American Milk, oh wait forget that... yikes... ummm

... Horses Running through the English country side then I would say North Kingdom is the BOMB!

But something as American and as wholesome as Milk, yikes scratch that, I mean The Breakfast Club should be done on American soil.

Wow I never thought I would be ranting about this but it just feels weird to see that remake and an foreign name attached to its creation.

I felt the site lacked a certain pride, a certain nostalgic flair, a certain, "like totally!" Or as Claire (Molly Ringwald) would have said "You wouldn't know. You don't know any of us."

North Kingdom, you guys get tons of respect however I am sorry but you did not do justice with this site. Probably not your fault, all the way out in North Yorkshire tucked away in the Humber region of England its hard to have captured the subtle "Bender" nuance.

JCP should have also insisted that an American shop like Big Spaceship or a former JCP vendor Firstborn or OH WAIT!!! I KNOW! maybe a shop with a really patriotic name, something like Freedom!!

Ok I know i went too far with that.

Not saying anyone did anything right or wrong, just wanted to vent that this could have been done better by the nation it so greatly had an impact on.

iPhone Vs. iPhone

2008-07-18T00:11:00.003-04:00

Remember when back in the day (1981 - 1988) the Voltron toy craze, those 5 awesome die cast metal lions that formed this super mega robot that would kill anything it went up against?

There were two kinds you could buy, the $300 dollar die cast metal, weighty, version or the $75 dollar hard shiny, light plastic version.

The metal felt great in your hands, its weight commanded respect, it was almost a weapon.

The plastic often didn't snap in right, was always so flimsy and you never felt like Voltron couldn't even trample your old Smurfs.

Leah got the new white, shiny, plastic white iPhone 3G.

I have the original, heavy, titanium iPhone.

Hear No Evil, See No Evil

2008-07-15T21:51:00.006-04:00

Its rare that a site simply blows my mind, when an execution is so well formulated it just screams SMOOTH!

I yearn for inspiration and when tons of sites launch each day its difficult to find greatness within the haystack called the web. I found one today, a new site for Ikea developed by Forsman & Bodenfors.

This site uses video and sound perfectly synchronized, the design is playful and fresh and this site truly represents creativity and innovation and interactive at its best.

Simple, clean, fresh and inspiring, perfect! Awesome work Forsman & Bodenfors!!

Check this out here

The Writing On The Virtual Wall

2008-07-09T07:57:00.006-04:00

The speed of the internet is blinding.

Our industry accelerates faster by the day.

As soon as 2.0 took off and the commitment to standards, layout, cleanliness and integration with web apps became all the rage, it burned itself out like a supernova.

Well, I always wondered what that day would look like when you wake up and things are suddenly different.

Today is that day.

Red Interactive had put out a site with multi user avatars and chat enabling live social interaction between people online, live, in real time, where you can talk, play, kick, punch, laugh, exchange goods, befriend, and lots of other cyber-things.

It was cute, won tons of awards, really put them on the map.

It was a precursor to what we are about to see everywhere.

Websites driven by people, live people, all assuming various personae, playing games, chatting, interacting, exchanging ideas, virtual products, and anything else creativity can conjure up. Oh did I mention they can all do this at the same time!

I wake up today and I read an article that Google is now entering this ring of live online interactive social sites a new service they call Lively.

Then i go over to the www.thefwa.com and low and behold, the site of the day is none other than a live, multi user interactive avatar chat and game site!!! For Slim Jim!

I was blown away, today is one of those days where you wake up and everything kind of shifted from gear 2.0 to gear 3.0 and will never be the same.

In a way I am happy.

Stay tuned for more in depth coverage of 3.0

Passing Notes in Class

2008-07-06T23:39:00.005-04:00

New platforms for creativity are popping up everywhere, everything is coming alive.

I feel like its the end of a lush spring season where everything is blooming and filling our space with fragrant beauty, bleeding colors everywhere.

The onset of a summer full of growth and ingeniousness, ingenuity and originality.

Look around and you'll find new spaces all the time.

Co-Dependance Day

2008-07-03T17:29:00.005-04:00

July 4th, the official kick off of the summer season, when things heat up and slow down.

The city empties out like a Jr High School fire drill and folks like me who choose to vacation in the desolate metropolis I love, get to have some peace and quiet with Miss NY for the weekend.

I am sitting on a bench on 84th street and central park west. Tons of free Wifi here, strong signals.

Before I made my way to the bench I was walking down the street tapping away at my iPhone emailing co-workers. A jogger, also distracted, and I collide, just a bump, but enough to startle the shit out of one another.

I almost drop my phone and as I'm juggling it from falling, I see a big smile framing a gap between two front teeth and I stand back and take another look and its Morphius from the Matrix, and for a split tiny second I was instantly prepared to swallow the blue pill. A very weird mental crossover occurred that for a single moment took hold of me.

But alas just another celebrity enjoying the peace and quiet of the city, we say our apologies and move on, no Matrix for me, bummer, but for a second, I was fully prepared to go engage in some combat training.

Anyways, its a beautiful day, there are like 50 live wifi signals here, the breeze is gentle, the coffee is iced and I am about to go meet some friends later for Karaoke.

Its a great way to start the summer, tons of awesome work ahead next week and a mini vacation in-between.

Happy 4th of July!

Independence is lonely, celebrate unity and love!

Peace!

There is a Time and Une Saison

2008-07-03T08:01:00.002-04:00

"Television has officially thrown its hat into the virtual ring. It is "la saison de television Internet"."

Check out my latest observation over at The FWA.

My Two Cents

2008-06-30T12:33:00.002-04:00

Credit has been a topic that has been long looming over the interactive industry for sometime now.

The traditional agency and digital agency relationship has blossomed into a full blown collaborative marriage and the lines of vendor client relationship have been blurred to look more like full on creative collaboration.

My gut instincts tell me that the topic hasn't been fully addressed until now because in many cases it is really not that big of an issue when you boil it down to the root of why credit is so important.

At the end of the day its not really a deal breaker between either client or digital vendor.

This is an issue that needs to be evolved more than it needs to be solved. Similar to the way Hollywood shares credit when awards are doled out for best picture. The CG team doesn’t come up for the award, MAYBE they get mentioned in the thank you speech but that is definitely not to be expected and if they aren't mentioned there isn't some big press release as to why or why not. They get their own award for technical achievement in some secondary award show that isn't televised.

Again this debate only exists in the very ego-centric realm of recognition, awards.

At the end of the day its about doing great work and feeling great about the work that we do. Its about creating something positive for our culture and work that advances us as an industry.

Unless the project is simply amazing and the budget is paltry, credit can sometimes be a factor in making the decision as to the worth of taking the project on or not.

Sometimes a PR project comes along and its not about the money but more about what kind of amazing things you can do with the brand and showcase your studio’s skills using the brand as the stage. In that case credit is critical and needs to be negotiated at the onset of the project. I cannot remember a single case where we turned down good money on a project where the client absolutely refused or simply could not give credit where credit was due.

I have personally produced a number of great projects that have won awards but will never have my name or the name of the shop I was with associated with its credit.

Its not entirely a bad thing.

Humility sometimes rears its awkward face in times when its hard to be humble, and maybe its a lesson we must embrace in order to not lose site of the big picture. Great work, regardless of accolades and awards.

There is rarely a case where a digital shop didn’t get public credit but couldn't show the work to a potential client or agency in order to get new work. Even if they aren't allowed to list it on their website portfolio it can still be part of an internal presentation for business development.

At the end of the day the level of credit should be equal to the overall level of involvement with any given project. A digital shop cannot expect to receive full credit for executing an agency’s vision, regardless of how awesome the digital execution is. But if the digital shop DID indeed conceive the idea or alter it enough for full credit to be given, then that is the case in which the agency needs to step up and give credit where it is due.

Most digital agencies and 14 year old kids can build a simple web site, only a select few can build a website exceptionally well. Even fewer can conceptualize, script, shoot, frame 3D, and produce an entire campaign without the ideas and assets (footage, copywriting, etc.) that the traditional agency delivers. So no matter how important the digital shop was in the execution, the efforts put fourth by the traditional agency cannot be ignored no matter how minimal because ultimately it is a vendor client relationship where the traditional agencies are delivering a product that will determine if they keep their clients business or not.

We need to all understand how symbiotic this new dynamic is and be sensitive to every collaborator when it comes to credit so that we all win in the end.

This kind of public strife shines a negative light and doesn’t help the advancement of the shifts that are taking place one bit, resistances are natural and healthy but need to be overcome in mature and fair ways.

We need to all play nice.

Lebowitz and his shop Big Spaceship should have gotten mention from BBDO and had their efforts recognized during the acceptance speech or in some print ads thanking them for all they contributed. BBDO deserves the award for collaborating with Big Spaceship on this website and having the wisdom of knowing that only a top notch digital shop could have pulled the site off as well as they did.

We need to evolve together and share the praise as well as the criticism of our industry and be a more cohesive network of creative professionals.

Big Mouth

2008-06-29T02:21:00.004-04:00

Friends and close industry folks have asked me to comment about the recent statements made by Big Spaceship CEO, Michael Lebowitz at Cannes regarding the HBO Voyeur project his company collaborated on with BBDO.

As someone who works in, and closely monitors, our industry I felt it was an important enough topic to deserve a blog entry.

In my humble opinion this is probably one of the most important and hottest topics of this year.

Let's set the scene:

A steamy, sultry, passionate French summer in Cannes, the worlds most creative minds attending the Oscars of the ad industry, hotels, bars, clubs, halls, streets, teeming with ad agency brass, hungry and rabid for that Golden Royal Feline set in their cross hairs and waiting to poach it up for their shelves back in NYC.

Emotions are on high, the competitive fierceness has been unleashed.

A year wrought with anxiety and fear of the silent industry tectonic shifts between traditional and digital, causing all kinds of eruptions across the creative landscape.

Each side battling for dominance in this lavish world of shiny and technologically polished ideas.

France, the country of love, emotion, heartbreak and despair.

The place of ex patriots who have fled their home lands in order to find themselves through the eyes of a country known for its outspoken rebelliousness and uprise.

Thoughts weigh heavier in this French air, much harder to keep to ones self in the midst of competition.

A judge, Mr. Lebowitz, sitting on high looking down at the piranha snapping at the prize.

Reality kicks in as he watches someone else walk away with his prize, that coveted Lion is being carried away farther from its source, the shop who toiled to earn its merit.

Michael Lebowitz, CEO of well known digital shop Big Spaceship, the creators of the website that took home top honors at Cannes this year. As he sits at the judges table, seething with animosity and disdain for the lack of fairness being displayed right in front of his eyes.

Why not have Lebowitz himself present David Lubars of BBDO the award for the HBO Voyeur website?

Opinion versus Fact

Most industry people will say that BBDO owned the idea and they simply contracted Big Spaceship to "code it up".

Others will say that Big Spaceship took an idea that lived outside of the web and digitized it to work on the most powerful media platform known to man.

This is a topic that is going to become increasingly hotter and hotter as the internet becomes the "official" launch pad for most or all ad campaigns.

Being able to translate an idea from the bowels of a brand into the digital world completely integrated with interactivity, entertainment, illusion and inspiration is no small task. Some would say it is the most detailed and intrinsic role of any campaign today.

Voice of Reason

Lebowitz simply took that first step into the parted ocean and spoke up for what he saw as the truth. He let his emotions run free and what better place to kick up some dirt and peer into "the often uncomfortable relationships between ad agencies and digital specialists" than Cannes, France.

Like a lovers quarrel while on a holiday, Lebowitz took this opportunity to speak his mind and attempted to defend the smaller digital shops against the mighty ad agency that often times takes most or full credit for an idea born again in a digital world. Ideas that could have only been given birth to by the digital shop that was inseminated by the agency to translate their concepts on the web.

Rupal Parekh, a writer for Ad Age covering this story, enumerated this relationship in the following statement,

"Increasingly, agencies are becoming a kind of hub that marshals other resources, from digital experts to production companies, on behalf of clients."

If this is indeed the case then it should be the digital agency that walk away with the honors and the traditional agency simply patting themselves on the back for finding the perfect match to bring their ideas to life.

However, it is true that the traditional agency is the birthplace for the concept. It is the traditional agency that has won and maintained a relationship with the client and ultimately holds in its back pocket the client's trust. And it is the traditional agency that did ultimately make the decision to choose a particular shop to collaborate and execute their idea digitally.

Why should they not get all or most of the credit for orchestrating this difficult process?

I strongly disagree with Rupal Parekh. Agencies do indeed marshal resources in order to translate ideas digitally, however those ideas still remain the property of those agencies and at the end of the day it is the agency that brings the overall idea to the digital shop to execute. Ownership is never transferred.

Now don't get me wrong, I am fully behind the reasons for why Lebowitz said what he said but what I am not behind is what is seemingly being built up as a war between traditional and digital agencies.

BBDO had every right to take credit or share credit for the work, they rightfully won the awards for the concepts that they delivered to Big Spaceship.

However because Big Spaceship so perfectly executed that idea in the digital space and it was that very space that launched this idea into the stratosphere, BBDO should have made mention and even shared the honors with their partner.

It was the lack of recognition that charged Lebowitz with emotion to speak out against his agency partners, it was the blatant disrespect for the ability to take an idea and bring it to life in a totally new and powerful way that was completely dishonored here and that is where the unfairness resides.

Lebowitz is 100% correct in saying that the award shows are just as guilty for not recognizing the digital efforts put into a campaign and to award them based on those merits alone.

We as an industry need to step forward and realize that every aspect of a campaign requires a completely new set of rules in its execution of an idea and even though that idea has originated from a different source, it takes on a whole new life once it is given into the hands of those who re-birth it on the web or any other emerging platform.

No one is to blame, these are simply growing pains.

Lebowitz spoke up and I respect him for his emotional honesty and his passion for our medium.

BBDO did as they have always done as a traditional agency and simply haven't gotten used to the fact that the digital shop plays a much larger role in a campaign.

Cannes needs to get with the times and start sharing the love with everyone who plays a major role in the idea becoming part of pop culture.

Let's not create a stand off and a cold war that will only hurt the "ideas" being collaborated on. We all need one another so lets realize that sensitivities need to be met and that credit should be paid where it is due.

Lebowitz and Lubars need to get on a web cam and hug this out and be a shining example for the positive direction we all must go in.

Digital and Traditional are now tied at the hip. We are at a cross roads and we must decide on a path, it can be laden with thistles and thorns or an illuminated golden path that leads to a new age of ideas and creativity.

Let's choose carefully.

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2008-06-13T13:18:00.001-04:00