Hasta La Creative!

(TrendHunter.com) Looking for gifts ideas for Dad?  Did you ever think of getting him a remote controlled beer keg? 

From a solar powered BBQ to a booze detecting GPS, this list features extraordinarily unique gift ideas. …

Nielsen. Don’t you find it weird that the company is the deal maker and breaker for most television entertainment? Receive some bad ratings according Nielsen and you can forget about it. You’re canceled. Erm… Nielsen still couts on a select pool of TV watchers to report their habits to the service, but yeah… According to Nielsen, they have 5,000 households in the national People Meter sample, approximately 20,000 households in the local metered market samples, approximately 1,000 metered homes for our national and local Hispanic measurement.”

Twenty-six thousand people total decide the whole shebang for the 100 million households in the country. That’s 2.6% of the population across all demos. Do you really really believe that they are tapping minorities, single women and college kids effectively? Give me a break. And you wonder why Arrested Development got canceled despite everyone and their mother loving it.

Nielsen. I’m just going to say what everyone is thinking – total poop, but the company is so entrenched in broadcast that really… who the hell can take them on? Well, other than Brooke Shields who has fought mightily for her show Lipstick Jungle. After looking into the data, NBC found that once TIVO was included the show’s numbers were on the increase and not so bad. Yo! Brooke! Don’t rely on Nielsen to save your show. Follow the lead of your comrade in arms, Theresa Falcon.

Falcon is Current TV’s Vice President of Research. She might also be the hero that content providers have been looking for. Falcon recently made a “plea to a group of top industry executives to help solve a vexing bias in the way TV households are sampled that handicaps smaller and emerging channels.” From Mediapost:

“-Analysis by Foster showing that smaller cable networks must reach disproportionately more of Nielsen’s panel households to generate comparable ratings. Foster implied this was due to a methodological glitch, and the fact that Nielsen’s total national sample of about 14,000 households is not nearly large enough to accurately represent smaller TV outlets as the medium continues to fragment.”

Falcon and CurrentTV are now using TNS, which is developing a new TV ratings system derived from actual digital set-top data directly from cable and satellite TV operators.

Nieslen. Crooks.

More Is Holy Than Thou Nielsen Missing The Online Numbers?

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New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media

(TrendHunter.com) From afar, ‘City Park’ looks like an elegant toile wallpaper print. Take a closer look, however, and you’ll see elements that are far more unsavory: pigeons, fire hydrants and rats.

‘City Park’ wallpaper…

We’ve all fantasized about making a living out of sex, drugs and poorly-tuned instruments.

Volkswagen looks to the Surrealists to promote its Polo BlueMotion’s “absurdly low consumption.” A Magritte-inspired print is at left; here’s another in the style of Dali.

I have found that all of these resources provide a constant flow of smart thinking that makes me a better, more informed marketing resource for my clients.

ESPN.com believes less is more when it comes to digital design (and I’d tend to agree).

According to The New York Times, the sports site is about to go a major design overhaul. Currently, sports fans are greeted by “intense coverage of every major sport from the get-go.”

John Skipper, ESPN’s executive vice president for content, says “There can be a thing as too much.”

Making ESPN.com as appealing to visitors as possible — and thus to advertisers — has taken on greater importance as the economic recession in general and in auto sales in particular have put pressure on the company’s television ad sales.

The new ESPN.com will give advertisers more options for displaying messages on its most heavily visited pages.

DETROIT (AdAge.com) — Amid all the turmoil in Motor City over the auto bailout, one carmaker has managed to set itself apart: Ford Motor Co. Ford CEO-President Alan Mulally told Congress earlier this month the automaker doesn't need a short-term bridge loan since the automaker isn't facing a near-term liquidity issue. So how did Ford manage its current position in Detroit's driver's seat? "I'd have to say one word: Mulally," said Bob Austin, founder of consultant Auto Futures Group.

“In prehistoric times, mankind often had only two choices in crisis situations: fight or flee. In modern times, humor offers us a third alternative; fight, flee – or laugh.”

– Robert Orben

A friend from India has sent AgencySpy visuals on how logos will look like when this abysmal economic weather finally passes. Enjoy.

See More Logos After The Jump…

continued…

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New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media

(TrendHunter.com) Comedy is highly subjective. What one person finds funny may enrage another. This seems to be the case with Bleed The World, a web site poking fun at the folks in the finance industry.

The ‘Feed the…