Next week, and for the first time, the most reputed names in advertising history are congregating in Manhattan. They include David Ogilvy, Phyllis Robinson, George Lois, Mary Wells Lawrence, and Shirley Polykoff.
LONDON – Northcliffe Media begins its ambitious programme of online launches today, with the first 10 sites in a rollout of 90, as it revamps its ‘this is’ online brand with Web 2.0 content and a strong focus on driving user-generated content.
LONDON – Pepsi has appointed CHI & Partners to advertise its vitamin-enhanced V Water brand without a pitch.
In a sign that the apocalypse is near (and enjoying a plate of Moons Over My Hammy), the hot new club in town is, apparently, Denny’s. Hoping to appeal to the youth demo, the chain is launching a “Denny’s AllNighter†multimedia promotion that includes, per Brandweek, a “dimly lit club ambiance†and alt-rock music from 10 p.m. to 5 a.m. (Can diners stay open that late? Aren’t there zoning laws?) The waitstaff, probably all MTV wannabes, will swap their crisp Denny’s slacks for T-shirts and jeans. Of course, there are blogs and social-networking components and an “Adopt a Band†contest that lets diners choose which groups get promotional support and free Denny’s food out on tour. The latter would probably compel most bands to make it big as quickly as possible so they can trade in the Denny’s fare for buffets at the Four Seasons. The tagline is a real oddity: “Nothing good happens after midnight—except Denny’s.†Actually, I’m too old and unhip to know.
—Posted by David Gianatasio
LONDON – Jagermeister has appointed digital agency Syzygy and its recently acquired sister agency Hi-Res! after a pitch to create a global internet platform for the alcohol brand.
Jumping on not one, but two, old bandwagons Wonderbra is launching a campaign to find Britain’s best breasts. If you have a D to G cup you can flaunt your stuff on the wonderbra site and win the possibility of becoming their model. There’s an open-call audition later this month where UK women can take part in a massive photo shoot. Each participant will be individually photographed, and the photos will be put together to one masive mosaic-style billboard ad (yep, that’s the second old bandwagon). To advertise the competition they’ve dusted off the tired old “knockers, jugs, headlights, melons” idea in a small “viral” that they will seed on social networking sites. We’ll see if the mosaic a.k.a the “biggest collection of cleavages” will be a “celebration of Britain’s busts” or just yet a tired old idea rehashed.
LONDON – Wonderbra is backing the launch of its famous push-up bra in D to G cup sizes with an integrated push to invite thousands of women to show off their cleavage for a billboard ad.
LONDON – BBC One’s coverage of last night’s Euro 2008 Group B encounter between Germany and Austria attracted 4.6m viewers, according to unofficial overnight ratings.
The 2008 Direct Lions have been handed out at Cannes today. JWT India took home the Grand Prix for their effort was to elevate The Times of India from merely being a social mouthpiece to a catalyst of social change. Click on the images to see them larger.
Grand Prix
Title: LEAD INDIA
Advertiser/Client: BENETT COLEMAN AND CO.
Product/Service: THE TIMES OF INDIA NEWSPAPER
DM/Advertising Agency, City: JWT INDIA, Mumbai
Credits:
Agnello Dias, National Creative Director
Debu Purkayastha, AVP+ Senior Creative Director
Vistasp Hodiwala, AVP+ Senior Creative Director
Arkadyuti Basu, AVP+ Senior Creative Director
Vinayak Gaikwad, Creative Director
Simone Patrick, Senior Copywriter
Kaushik Iyer, Junior Copywriter
Anuja Arora, Account Executive
LONDON – Britvic has appointed CHI & Partners to handle the advertising for vitamin enhanced drinks brand V-Water.
LONDON – Shoot, the 40-year-old children’s football magazine, is to close after a switch from monthly to weekly failed to resonate with consumers.
LONDON – Co-operative Financial Services has appointed event and marketing communications agency Imagination to work on a multi-million-pound branding and media project, following pitches for the account by a number of media agencies.
LONDON – Bauer Advertising has axed two head of market positions and created five associate publisher roles in a restructure of Bauer’s lifestyle and fashion weeklies.
LONDON – Gocompare.com, the online insurance comparison service, has appointed TBWA\Manchester to its £10m advertising account, following a competitive pitch.
Remember the WWF “hot water” cups that were given away at the important United Nations Climate Change Conference in Bali last December? You poured hot water in them and the the graphic of the world’s land mass vanished under the rising sea.
The Guardian is on top of this story, leading with: AP faces copyright row with bloggers. Seems that the AP has issued a takedown notice to Drudge Retort, a.k.a the left version of Drudge Report. You can read the Drudge Retort founder Rogers Cadenhead’s post about it here: AP Files 7 DMCA Takedowns Against Drudge Retort. In at least one case, I can see why the AP were annoyed: “The Retort has received a copyright complaint from a news organization about users who have posted the full text of its articles in their blog entries” – full text is not fair use and never was. But that is not the only organisation the AP is currently after, they also filed copyright lawsuits against the VeriSign division Moreover last fall which contentblogger dubbed: “Mining Disaster: Moreover’s Mined Web Content Draws AP Suit”. For the legally nerdy the Moreover/Verising lawsuit and the evidence from AP is available in two PDF documents at Paidcontent.org
Agence France-Presse filed a similar suit back in March 2005, arguing that Google was infringing AFP copyright by headlines, news summaries and photos, without the news agency’s permission – they settled out of court which “avoided tackling some thorny legal issues about fair use” as Juan Carlos Perez at IDG news services so eloquently put it.
As blogs, and “mining” services such as moreover – or even digg, reddit and other “link + short text” type of communities have been quoting headlines, a bit of an article and linking back to source for years without trouble I doubt AP will get any sympathy. Add to that the AP distributes local news on their wires without linking back to the original local newspaper as source of the report and folks might even call them hypocrites.
In the case of photographs, they already have egg on their face – recall when the AP was distributing “Spitzer Call Girl” myspace photos without permission, something that the Spitzer Call Girl’s lawyer didn’t take lying down.(sorry).
The web is a tricky thing. Quote (a little) and link has been the norm, and as far as anyone knew the legal way to do things, as long as you left photographs alone. Why hasn’t there been a bigger uproar over photographs being reposted, or hotlinked before?
Many moons ago (2004 actually) we were wondering why big old news media didn’t react to the hotlinking of images from sites like the Drudge Report, as hotlinking would be a) using an image without permission and b) using the bandwidth of the AP/newspaper server as well. Back then, none of the old newspapers people seemed to care one iota, and as the practice has been going on for years there’s few bloggers out there who give hotlinking a second thought. Or if they do, they probably only worry about the image vanishing from the web later.
LONDON – Ban Ki-moon, the United Nations’ Secretary-General, last night launched a memorial in central London that honours journalists and crew killed in the line of work.
LONDON – Wonderbra, the bra brand made famous by its iconic “Hello Boys” ads in the mid-90s, has launched a nationwide search for its next model.
CANNES – Glue London is leading the pack of UK agencies in the Cyber Lions competition at The Cannes Lions 2008 by picking up 10 shortlist entries.
LONDON – Primark has axed three of its clothing suppliers in southern India for using child labour, after the BBC’s ‘Panorama’ programme uncovered the scandal.
This is site is run by Sascha Endlicher, M.A., during ungodly late night hours. Wanna know more about him? Connect via Social Media by jumping to about.me/sascha.endlicher.
