One Show Pokes Fun Without Actually Making Concessions

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After all that awkward backtracking over how much agencies dish out for its pencil-shaped paperweights (where does all that money go?), The One Show is under pressure to lighten the strain on its PR team.

Magazine: Urban China Bootlegged by C-Lab for Volume

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Given the urgency of the topic, C-Lab has borrowed the bootleg format to quickly distribute observations, initiated in dialogue with Urban China, on the crisis and its management continue

Native Americans Don’t Want Their Meth.

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Alongside Partnership for a Drug-Free America, Publicis & Hal Riney have launched an anti-meth campaign targeted to American Indians and Inuits.

The FedEx Box: Both Medium and Message

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Diggin’ these prints by DM9 DDB/Brazil.

Handplay Advocates for Rubber Dish Gloves

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Gery Colombia interprets Scotch-Brite for whimsical clean-freaks with print ads where rubber gloves are manipulated in the shape of animal bits.

In Kids’ Clay World, Religion is Fun and Klansmen are Romantics

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At left is a print piece called “Black is Beautyfull,” in which a grinning clay Klansman offers a meager bouquet of flowers to a simpering black chick with a ‘fro.

Why Chain Yourself to a Rock When There’s Earth-Friendly Rouge?

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It’s an unfortunate stereotype that eco crusaders look more like the wildlife they seek to protect than they do their fellow man.

It’s Like ‘Honey, I Shrunk the Public Servants!’

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OLSON/Minneapolis promoted NSF International, a certification company that certifies things like bottled water and appliances, by depicting tiny laborers working tirelessly around your kitchen gear.

You Remain Anonymous, Criminals Don’t

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Hoping to battle the apparent escalation of violence in Vancouver and to encourage people to come forward if they have information about criminal activity, a new pro bono PSA campaign from DDB Canada informs, “You remain anonymous, criminals don’t.”

DG Bring the Boys Back to the Harbor

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In this fresh rendition of West Side Story Meets the Park Avenue Chippendales!, a confrontation simmers between two well-coiffed wolfpacks from different sides of town. Or maybe just different sides of the same yacht club.

Magazine review: OBJECTS – Journal for Applied Arts / Magazin für angewandte Künste

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A bilingual (german and english) magazine about trends and new approaches to crafts, including illustration, graphic design, textile art, ceramics, glass and book art continue

Finally, Blogworthy Flatbread.

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The other day AdFreak drew our attention to an Oscar Mayer ad that showcases a tasty-looking flatbread pita under a smarmy but irresistible headline: “Blogworthy.”

Mammoth Mountain Embraces the White Space

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Keeping to its preference for minimalism, David&Goliath demonstrate Mammoth Mountain’s … mammoth nature under two-word tagline “Play Big.”

Air France Plays the Sky’s Seductress

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Few airlines can boast stripes different from those of any other, but Air France pimps its merits with shots that diverge from the typical relaxed business-classer gazing mildly out the window.

Brandy, You’re a Fine Girl, But Scurvy — er, the Sea — is Calling.

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In a set of prints put together by THE REPUBLIK/Durham, boat manufacturer Wellcraft Marine Corp. appeals to salty sea dogs by emphasizing the rugged freedom and independent nature of life on choppy water.

Nivea Brings Tanning Oil to Church

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“The sun goes wherever you go” Nivea says — not too loudly, either — in “Church,” an ad for tanning oil.

Saks Arms New Ads with Soviet Kitsch

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Sensing a recession isn’t exactly an enabler for Jimmy Choos and Prada handbags, Saks Fifth Avenue takes on the marketing style of Communism … and Stolichnaya.

Nastia Liukin Strikes Pose for Max Azria

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Five-time Olympic medalist Nastia Liukin invades fashion rags for BCBG Max Azria’s latest ad campaign.

Volume and the JoAP are out

Two of my favourite mags The Journal of Aesthetics and Protest and Volume are out:

Volume is an architecture and urbanism magazine. It’s neither a highly specialized print that mere mortals like me find hard to approach nor is it one of those glossy Vogue-lookalikes with chichi spreads of fashionably ‘sustainable’ buildings. It’s not ‘something in between’ either.

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This issue presents many trends, people, ideas that might look like they do not directly belong to the world of architecture and urbanism but are perfectly pertinent and relevant to architects and urbanists. And because almost anything architects and urbanists do ends up concerning the hoi polloi (that’s you and me, my friend), there’s much food for thoughts and heated discussions in Volume 17:

The editors explain: At the close of this era of expansion and surplus Volume speculates on one of the period’s emblematic inventions: Content Management, or the collecting, organizing and sharing of digital information. Our retrospective appraisal of recent developments in the managing of information offers inside into the ability of Content Management to serve the current realities of digital abundance and material shortage, and to protect both vast and extremely limited quantities.

Jesse Seegers and Jeffrey Inaba quizz Ken Goldberg on burning dollar bills and other less trivial matters, Chris Anderson about ‘free’ culture and PageRanking on business cards. They also get Julien De Smedt to discuss his views on free-wheel experiementation, the proliferation of ‘post-OMA offices’, why not choosing and mismanaging can be valuable strategies. Benedict Clouette and Forrest Jessee’s interview with publisher Lars Müller (whose Face of Human Rights is on my must read list) evokes books as a form of content management.

Volume dives into almost mainstream US culture with an interview of Rachel Maddow (available online) and another one with Arianna Huffington (best enjoyed after having savoured this article about the so-called death of the blogosphere.)

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Entrance of the Svalbard Global Seed Vault. Credit: Mari Tefre / Global Crop Diversity Trust (more images)

Those are only a few of the many interviews of smart people by other smart people.

Just to contradict all the above i should add that many of the issues covered in Volume 17
1. are not interviews. C-LAB explores the World Heritage, the content management system for cultural and natural treasures. Easy happiness is at reach in “Architecture is Merciless”, a presentation by Jacques Herzog about Beijing’s Bird Nest and in a short series of photos that display how Vogt Landscape Architects transplant nature into a constructed context. “Seeds of Paranoia” gives the lowdown on the Svalbard Global Seed Vault. This must be one of the rare articles that goes beyond the hype aspect of the project.

2. openly belong to the world of architecture. For example, Professor of Architecture at Columbia University Mark Wigley has a short essay on architecture seen under the lens of content management.

The Journal of Aesthetics and Protest by the same publishers who released the very excellent the book, An Atlas of Radical Cartography.

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Among all paper magazines, JoA&P is probably the one most likely to truly and gently give rise to social changes. Smart, wonderfully edited and available for a mere $15, the magazine is heavily centered on the US scene and i wonder if we have anything similar in Europe. And if we don’t i wonder what we’re waiting for.

The 300 pages of the sixth issue are broken down in three ‘conceptual’ sections.

1. I Love To We is a call for a new terminology to describe the formations of grassroots cultural resistant practices. These “interventions, strategies and tactics in the territory” explore the war on terror and the global order. A quick selection of the many essays featured in this section: LA-based organization Bicicocina (or Bicycle Kitchen) describes its self-assigned mission to teach people to work on their own bikes. Lisa Anne Auerbach wrote an insightful essay on the new “Don’t Do It Yourself” battle triggered by corporations’ avid assault and capitalisation of the D.I.Y. culture. Aimee Le Duc analyzes what happens when an old police station in San Francisco is bought and transformed into a home and office by someone like artist and architect Bruce Tomb.

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Graffiti Wall

2. Antiwar Survey Respondents has almost 20 activists not only describe their antiwar activities but also answer vital questions such as “How do you measure success for this activity?’ and ‘In order to continue and be successful with this or other related activities, what would you do or need?’ The answers should convince readers that activist actions do have an impact and inspire them to join the movements or start their own.

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Center for Tactical Magic collaborating with UC Santa Cruz students on Wells Fargo Embargo

3. Another Theory Section. Under a title which could hardly get any more cloudy and bland are a handful of lessons learnt (sometimes the hard way) by artists and activists: problems encountered when trying to get art in public space, the recent history of the art collective in light of the persecution of the Critcal Art Ensemble, the danger of nostalgia to culture, etc.

Because Your University Should Affect Your Choice of Razor

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Right-slap on the back of the current issue of UC Berkeley’s California magazine is an ad for an officially licensed Gillette Fusion Power Razor.