I Heart Twitter

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?

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

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

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!

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

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

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

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

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!

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'

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

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

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

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

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

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"

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

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

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

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!