Touching base with top ten cheesiest phrases

I hadn't heard 'team-work makes the dream-work', might try that and see if anyone wets themselves laughing. 1. Blue sky thinking 2. Singing from the same hymn sheet 3. Thinking outside the box 4. Touching base 5. Run it up the flagpole and see who salutes 6. End to end solution 7. We must reach out 8. Evolution NOT revolution 9. All on the same page 10. Team work makes the dream work Read more at IAB

Touch base with the top ten most irritating business phrases

IAB UK : News and comment : 1. Blue sky thinking 2. Singing from the same hymn sheet 3. Thinking outside the box 4. Touching base 5. Run it up the flagpole and see who salutes 6. End to end solution 7. We must reach out 8. Evolution NOT revolution 9. All on the same page 10. Team work makes the dream work

CR Blog » Blog Archive » The Sony Bravia Zoetrope

CR Blog » Blog Archive » The Sony Bravia Zoetrope The new spot follows Fallon’s earlier ‘Colour like no other’ campaign for Sony Bravia, which included the hugely successful Balls, Paint and Play Doh ads. The Bravia-drome spot moves away from colour to focus on motion, and the Bravia’s new Motionflow 200Hz technology which ensures a smoother picture than in conventional TVs. To emphasise this smoothness, Fallon built an enormous zoetrope in Venaria, a town near Turin in northern Italy. The zoetrope has been causing a stir online for the last couple of months, with Sony posting films of it in action on YouTube while the ad was being created. The zoetrope presents a series of still images of the footballer Kaká, which when rotated (at speeds up to 50km per hour) and viewed through small slits on the outside of the zoetrope, give the illusion of being animated.

Orange films gets a poke

I am forever at the apple trailers site checking out the trailers for the latest movies. I havent found a site that was as quick and dirty to see trailers. Although I am really impressed by POKE's revamp of the orange films site, a clean&clear trailer panel up top and a  quick&dirty  cinema finder built in. We've just given the Orange Film portal a revamp. Orange customers can now take advantage of 2-for-1 trips to the flicks in three simple steps. Find your film, find your cinema using the handy postcode search, then book your tickets. Done. The Snap Reaction Video Box is a chance for film fans to give their genuine opinion on the movie they've just seen, so we're talking no-nonsense, tell-it-like-it-is, quick hit reviews. Pluse there's the usual film fare too, including s'leb interviews and news, polls, quizzes and all that jazz. And here's a tip. If you're doing an Orange Wednesday you can now double up on pizzas too. Hoorah. So you can either treat a friend, go Dutch and save cash, or, if you're a fat knacker, wait till your friend's gone home and chow down on two pizza Visit the Orange film website Read more at POKE

Andrew Brooks - Hidden Manchester

 I would love to see what this guy could do with Edinburgh, fantastic work. If you live in Manchester you can catch him at the Urbis until may 2009  Walking around any city it is not uncommon to catch glimpses of the world that exists beneath the polished surfaces of glass and steel. Snatched glances into an open grate, through a broken hoarding, behind a door ajar reveal, if only for a moment, the hidden world that serves to support our contemporary imaginings of the city. For most of us these moments of revelation, though fascinating for a second, are written off as mere distractions from our purpose in the city, an aside to our ever‐growing list of destinations loaded with more immediacy and purpose. However, for some these entrances to the city’s back‐stage are part of their everyday, entrances to the places that for some mean work and for others mean play. From 2nd December 2008 until May 2009 Urbis will be exhibiting a series of newly commissioned works from experimental photographer Andrew Paul Brooks documenting his journeys behind the scenes with Manchester’s official and unofficial custodians of the hidden city. Joining the unsung characters who maintain the city’s landmark buildings, the security personnel who patrol the empty spaces and Manchester’s own community of Urban Explorers the exhibition promises to reveal concealed, restricted and sometimes forgotten spaces that hover in the peripheral vision of the day‐to‐day like never before. See more of andrew brooks work Saw this on Urbis

visualising rising water levels

What a great piece of social graphic design: An undoubtedly devastating aspect of climate change is rising sea levels. It’s also one that many people in the UK no doubt find hard to visualise; severe flooding (Boscastle, 2004) and coastline erosion (Holderness, on-going) likely being the closest we get to experience its potential impact. In Bristol, a public arts project that sought to highlight the impact of rising seas comes to an end tomorrow night. Projecting watermark lines onto various buildings across the city, artist Chris Bodle has no doubt made many people stop and think. Read more on Creative Review

My kingdom for a EdTwestival ticket

After following the Twestivals popping up across the UK it seemed to totally pass me by that there was an edtwestival this Thurs. Hope it all goes well, raise lots of money! On Feb 12th, Edinburgh is joining over 180 cities around the world and hosting a Twestival (a “Twitter Festival”), donating 100% of money raised to Charity: Water. Listen to some world class live music, bid for Silverstone Grand Prix tickets and a host of other goodies in the auction, get a chance to win a Vodafone Netbook, crate of Ardbeg whisky or Flip Video Mino in the raffle, and most importantly, have a top night with Scotland’s flourishing Twitter community. There’ll be live video streaming from other Twestival cities around the UK and beyond, plus a way to fire all your tweets and pictures up on the walls (wifi dependent - fingers crossed). Bring your mobile or laptop and join the thousands of people around the world celebrating on the same day! Visit the EdTwestival website

2008 iDA- Winners

UK agency 'mN' took first place for digital in this years IDA awards with their BBC Climate Change: Bloom website. Well done  Mn! Lots of great design to drool over at the IDA site. The winners of the 2008 International Design Awards (IDA) competition have been named today.  IDA exists to celebrate the world’s most visionary designers, discover new and emerging talent, and promote the appreciation of design worldwide. Architects and designers of interiors, fashion, products, and graphics submitted over 1000 entries from 52 countries throughout the world, proving IDA’s global emphasis. Judging was a rigorous process, with winners receiving publication of their work in the 2008 International Design Awards art book, to be distributed to museum bookstores nationwide; promotion to over 100,000 design professionals and potential clients worldwide; year-long coverage on the International Design Awards website; and critical acclaim by our distinguished panel of judges. Visit Pink Berry  iDA- Winners

Stephen Fry encourages more twitter action than Obama

Click here to view an interview with Fry about twitter on the beeb Last Friday, Twitter was discussed on Friday Night with Jonathan Ross in front of an audience of over 4 million. It wasn't the punchline of a joke about 'young people' as Facebook and MySpace often are but discussed in earnest and with affection by two of the UK's best known media personalities.   Stephen Fry has become a huge fan of Twitter, a social networking service that thousands of people have signed up to, including many celebrities. He says he now has 50,000 'followers' who give him advice such as how to deal with a bat on the loose in his house... Hitwise has a nice graph showing that the exposure from the show boosted Twitter UK usage more than Obama's inauguration.   Saw this on the KMP Blog

The old malt cask labels

Love these, The Scotch Malt Whisky society could liberate a few ideas from these.  “Replicating the sample bottles sent to us from stock held at the Distilleries – these wee 20cl bottles appear to have been hand written by one of the team pulling the sample (full marks for legibility!). We select specific bottlings from the 700cl capacities and fill first about 150-200 of the 20cl bottles – so these are little “rarities” – small bottles, in small quantities, from a very small bottling, from a small family company. Fortunately Fred and Stewart are full size. They do allow the consumer however to taste a small amount before investing in the larger bottle (for himself or a Club) and they are also causing quite a stir in the gift giving sector of the whisky business.” 20 cl Old Malt Cask

Cadburys eyebrows

  Lets face it, the airport ad was good but tried to hard.. this one might just work Fallon has released the latest spot in its A Glass And A Half Productions series for Cadbury’s Dairy Milk. The ad follows the trend established by Gorilla and Trucks of combining a retro track with some good, clean fun, this time in the form of two eyebrow-dancing kids. When the kids are left alone in a photographer’s studio, 80s electro track Don’t Stop The Rock suddenly kicks in, and the duo begin their eyebrow moves. You have to wait until about 30 secs in for the first big laugh, but this ad looks set to provoke as many YouTube imitations as Gorilla. Saw it on CR Blog

Like a mashed potato

  How cool is this? Definitely made me smile. This is the fantastic new T-mobile advert which was filmed at 11am on Thursday 15th January 2009 at Liverpool Street station, London. Saw it on swissmiss

Gareth Dickey - Northern Irish Designer

   I was very impressed with the illustration and motion graphics work from Gareth Dickey, a Northern Irish designer. A quick search confirmed my thoughts, that he was an IMD student, a course I took myself. Great to see talent like this coming from the university. Gareth Dickey

Yorkshire Water know how to use online

Nice looking new site launched, to be honest though I was more interested in their youtube channel. Great to see companies looking beyond their own website when communicating with the public. Well done Yorkshire Water for having the guts, lets see more of it! Yorkshire Water has launched a new consumer site, created by digital marketing agency Swamp, to mark the beginning of an extensive digital campaign. Leeds-based Swamp was appointed by Yorkshire Water after a five-way pitch early last year. As well as creating the utility firm's new website, the agency has also developed a bespoke content management system. The new site enables Yorkshire Water customers to pay their bills and submit meter readings online, and report leaks or inform the supplier of a change of address. Saw it on the Drum

Durex balloon animals get it on

  A little friday fun.. Not much to say about this Durex ad made by NY animation studio Superfad for Atlanta agency Fitzgerald Co, except that it made us laugh. Apparently, everything is done in CGI. Shame, we had visions of a particularly filthy-minded party balloon folder twisting away in a studio somewhere… Saw it on CR Blog

British Heart Foundation get graphic

  Fantastic advert for the British Heart Foundation, aside from from the beautiful use of type and simple clean design it evokes all the right emotions. Brilliant. Sadly no embed code, not very good for tapping into viral marketing but oh, well. You can view it here  Designer Jonathan Barnbrook has brought his typographic prowess to bear on this new ad for the British Heart Foundation, created by Grey London. The spot, which is a touch more subtle than the heart disease ads we have seen of late, features a Virtual Heart Simulator, usually used by the medical profession as a teaching aid, alongside a typographic treatment by Barnbrook of various words from the voiceover.

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How we used the internet in 2008

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Virgin Atlantic - The sexist airline

A very polished ad celebrating Virgin Atlantic's anniversary, Creative Review wrote a great article that looks beyond the polish as asks if the message is right.. Twenty-five years ago, Virgin shook up the staid world of air travel with a service and brand that was refreshing and modern. It was a ‘challenger’ in the true sense of the word, fearlessly taking on big, bad old BA. So why has it chosen to celebrate that fact with such an old-fashioned ad, in every sense? Y & R in London is behind this new ad for Virgin Atlantic, which celebrates the airline’s 25th anniversary. Its retro styling has already had many critics raving but the message behind the ad seems even more outdated than its look. Read more on CR

What businesses do well in a recession? .. it might be web

The above graph shouldnt come as a surprise at the moment, the local pubs, charities, woolies and waterford crystal could maps this out for you. But what effect does it have on web? Budgets are coming down in advertising across the board but the slice of the pie that is staying with web is very positive. I was reading a few articles on this and while I may be looking for a positive slant, it could look a lot worse. There may be a push for business to look to invest online rather than in bricks and mortar. The economy will have a significant effect on how business on the internet develops over the course of 2009, experts have predicted. Speaking to .net magazine, Roger Greene of Ipswitch suggested that there will be more consolidation among web brands due to the sheer wealth of choice on offer to consumers in terms of e-commerce. "Less popular sites will disappear or be bought. There will be fewer portals and news sites and those that remain will have clearer differentiation," he commented. However, Neil Barton of Hostway added that online brands have an opportunity to grow their business in certain ways that high street companies cannot during the downturn.   He predicted that more web businesses will make greater use of Web 2.0 and social media technologies to attract customers and boost consumer feedback. According to a recent report from JP Morgan analyst Imran Khan, rising numbers of bankruptcies among bricks-and-mortar stores are likely to boost e-commerce business in the next 12 months. Bluhalo article The McKinsey report  The new Marketing