One of the things I like about driving across country are the regional brands one encounters along the way. This morning I woke in Asheville, NC--after driving in from Chicago--and made my way to Port City Java for my iced quad espresso. It was great.

A few hours later, I pulled over in Columbia, SC for one country steak biscuit and one country ham biscuit at Bojangles. If you enjoy salty, buttery dishes, Bojangles just might be the best fast food going.

Our minds are elsewhere this week, as our personal lives are changing dramatically for the better.

Shawn and Terri are the proud parents of a baby boy!

Tristan Reese Hartley
born 1/29/05 - 12:29pm
6lbs 1oz
19"

And while my news hardly compares with the Hartley clan's, I am thrilled at the prospects of my new job, which I begin tomorrow.

from New York Times: The creators of a fake advertisement for the Volkswagen Polo car that circulated on the Internet have apologized and promised not to repeat it, Volkswagen said on Monday.

The so-called viral ad, which was not authorized by Volkswagen or its advertising agencies, shows a suicide bomber detonating his explosives in a Polo parked outside a busy cafe, only to have the car absorb the blast.

The 20-second advertisement ends with the Volkswagen logo and the Polo's actual advertising motto: Small but Tough.

Volkswagen said in a statement that it had received sworn statements from the two creators, Dan Brooks and Lee Ford, acknowledging that they made the ad but had not intended for it to be distributed.

"The creators regret the distribution of the film, will not publicize it further and apologize unreservedly for the damage caused to Volkswagen," it said, adding that the company would now drop legal action against them.

Volkswagen had lodged a criminal complaint last week over the ad, which it called "an attack on Volkswagen's good name."

Now that this episode is behind us, let's take a moment to examine who did what, and why. Lee and Dan made a spec spot for their reel. That's all it was. Yet, almost all the commentary I saw on blogs (more numerous than I care to mention), went on and on about how VW didn't get it. That VW ought to wake up to the Cluetrain Manifesto now, before it's too late. Blah blah blah.

Lee and Dan are innocent--bloggers did get that part correct. The blogospere, on the other hand, is guilty (of recklessness). No big surprise there. This spot was never meant to be aired in public. It was only to be viewed in the private offices of ad agency creative directors intent on hiring a new team. It was not intended for VW's eyes, nor was it an example of VW customers making better advertising for their car company.

I just entered Wade's minimalist (in a good way) web site by chance, caught as I was by the telling Google AdSense header, "A Copywriter's Copywriter." So, I clicked.

This is what I brought back to share with you:

Only a copywriter's copywriter would care enough to make something good from the pains of legalese.

Thanks to Adfreak for clearing up the whole iwantmyvacation.com thing.

Los Angeles agency davidandgoliath is running prime time TV for a brand that never gets mentioned in the spots. The web address is all viewers have to go on, and this viewer has been too busy of late to properly look into it.

After a few clicks around the campy web site one is delivered to the Universal Studios Orlando Resort & Theme Park site. It's all about going to Orlando.

Schools have been banning text messaging devices and camera phones in an effort to curb cheating among students. Could digital music players be next? If you work for Microsoft and routinely sport an iPod on the Redmond, WA corporate campus, such a ban may not be far off.

According to Wired 80% of the Softies own a portable music player. And Apple's iPod is by far the most popular choice. So popular is the iPod, Microsoft executives are increasingly sending out memos frowning on its use.

Microsoft's software is used by dozens of competing music players from manufacturers like Creative Technology, Rio and Sony. And its Windows Media Audio, or WMA, format is supported by several online music stores, including Napster, Musicmatch and Wal-Mart, but not iTunes.

The NFL has come a long way in one year. They cut the Cheeze Whiz from the halftime menu and went with a live mini-concert from a rock legend, who obviously still rocks the house, or the world as the case may be.

Sir Paul opened his four-song set with "Drive My Car" right into a rockin' "Get Back". "Live And Let Live" from the Wings era was up next, then the former Beattle moved to the piano and delivered a sentimental "Hey Jude" closer.

"Thank you Super Bowl," said Sir Paul as he departed the stage. Exactly. Thank you Super Bowl.

p.s. The most memorable spot of the first half was from GoDaddy, if you ask me. Sometimes bad is good and this could be one of those times for the domain name purveyor.

From the looks of it, Napster put all their money in to the Super Bowl media buy. Their spot consisted primarily of camera card with two juxtaposed equations--probably not a good idea in a party atmosphere, since equations require concentration. At any rate, the "picture math" basically made the argument that iTunes is expensive and Napster is not.

Again, it's the bad is good ad model. Good, because it breaks through the clutter and makes its point in a memorable way. Bad, because award show judges (and maybe some consumers) won't like it. Not that that's bad. I'm just defining terms.

Unlike the football game itself, judging ads is a totally subjective exercise. Career Builder's "I'm done working with these monkeys" spots are funny for instance, but they're also tired. Animal humor always is. To my mind, the blunt approach taken by Napster and GoDaddy, while lacking sophistication, is more effective in this particular mix because of its very roughness (lack of production values).

from AdAge: Intelliseek of Cincinnati, a market research company, monitored 40 blogs during the Super Bowl to measure which ads were likely to generate the most buzz or controversy the day after the game.

"As for building buzz," said Intelliseek's marketing chief, Pete Blackshaw, "they've done a great job, but for a lot of people, it was just a cheap thrill and I'm not sure the ad will sustain itself with buzz."

Among Intelliseek's panel of bloggers the GoDaddy spot, created by the Ad Store of New York, was "polarizing," Mr. Blackshaw said, and some people were surprised it made it on the air.

In the interest of full disclosure, this domain is registered at GoDaddy.

Where's Geraldo? Where's Court TV? Doesn't matter. I'm glued to Adweek's play-by-play coverage of the trial of Shona Seifert and Thomas Early, two former Ogilvy executives accused of fraud and conspiracy in an attempt to make up a $3 million revenue shortfall by overbilling the government on the Office of National Drug Control Policy account.

Anyone looking for a revealing look at the kind of office politics, duplicity, and general CYA that occurs at ad agencies ought to check out Adweek's recaps. It seems prosecutors have been very aggressive in trying to expose how and why Ogilvy folks falsified their timesheets, and some of the witnesses have been caught in their own web of lies.

Really, there's nothing shocking here to anyone familiar with agency life; but usually, this kind of thing is the stuff of private gossip, making this trial somewhat enlightening.

I do have a couple of questions. Ogilvy is owned by WPP, a public holding company. So where, ultimately, does the pressure to maximize revenue come from? Are Seifert and Early just the fall guys here?

Cal Berkeley linguist, George Lakoff, talks eloquently about how politicians frame their messaging to achieve intended results. Those of us in the ad biz also know a little something about the practice of framing.

For a great example of framing, let's look at Wal-Mart. The world's largest retailer is running a documentary-style TV spot right now that zooms in on Gastonia, NC. In the spot we hear from local merchants ecstatic about all the traffic the local Wal-Mart store generates for their businesses, which happen to be located directly in the path of said traffic. If this argument is to be believed, Wal-Mart is good for small town America, for it throws off residual income to any and all in its path like a moneyed tornado.

But we never hear from the merchants who have long made up the town center. How do they feel about losing income to the low-priced giant on the periphery? Wal-Mart knows precisely how they feel, which is why they created the spot--to fight the growing community-level resistance to their never ending expansion.

"You know what killed the first crop of stupid $100 million Internet consumer service startups? Advertising. They all believed that they need to spend millions to build a brand. Today, we've got proof--every single (no exceptions!) Internet success is a success because of Unleashing the ideavirus. It's not TV ads. It's word of mouse." -Seth Godin

I pretty much agree with Mr. Godin on this. He is a smart one. Yet, there were some other factors that led to the dot bombing of America. Greed being primary among them. There would have been no infamous sock puppets had the venture capitalists held back the loot.

LA Times is running a piece on the return of internet radio. Since I listen to internet radio every day (I'm near a computer), I hadn't realized the medium had gone away. In fact, I'm still discovering new stations all the time. Just last week, thanks to Bret Dougherty, I found WXYC in Chapel Hill and it instantly became a new favorite.

Doc Searls didn't think much of the article. However, I did find some of it interesting. The notion that portability is the key to mass adoption is obvious, but also intriguing. For Walkman-style mobility to become an internet radio reality, Wi-Max must first become the standard in urban centers and along all interstates. Wi-Max blankets large areas with a high speed wireless signal, much like cellular networks or tertiary radio does today.

Apple could drive this thing like a go-cart if they made iPods capable of picking up such signals.

You know you're old when you find it necessary to take up Sir Paul's cause. And I'm not even from his generation, but the next.

One of the Adfreakers, Mark Dolliver to be exact, posted in favor of Sir Paul's Super Bowl halftime performance, as I did here a few days ago. Imagine my chagrin upon discovering blasphemy in the comments.

"I thought it sucked - plain and simple. Too old, too corny, too boring, sooo not worth my time....next time they should just hire PBS to do the halftime show...that might be more interesting then watching an old-man try and relive his glory days." -hpm

Let me get this right. The tripe that MTV serves is actually appetizing to some? Impossible.

"I am very pleased to announce that today I became an "intrapraneur." CooperKatz & Company, my employer, is launching a new practice that will carry the Micro Persuasion brand. You can read the full details on our first service offering in this press release we’re issuing today. My blog remains a personal site, however CK is borrowing the name because we feel it has incredible equity and it best expresses our vision." -Steve Rubel

This is a huge step in the right direction, not only for Steve and his p.r. firm, but for the industry at large.

I've been troubled of late by the growing number of fake blogs. A fake blog achieves nothing but buzz, and buzz isn't everything. Hopefully, with Micro Persuasion as a shining example, more people inside the communications industry (and on the client-side) will begin to see the value in real blogs.

HP's hard-charging CEO and chairman is out. Carly Fiorina, one of the highest ranking female executives in the world was dismissed today by HP's board of directors.

According to an AP report, board members said they fired Fiorina because she failed to execute a planned strategy of slashing costs and boosting revenue as quickly as directors had hoped.

CNN reports that Ms. Fiorina's golden parachute is worth $21,000,000 so I guess I won't be feeling too terribly sorry for her.

Wichita based B2B agency, Sullivan Higdon & Sink, is the first ad agency to my knowledge to provide a weekly podcast. The show, American Copywriter is the work of agency creatives John January and Tug McTighe.

According to the agency web site, John and Tug will share their unique take on the world of advertising, sports, music, TV, movies, pop culture, Halloween and really just about every topic imaginable. Basically, if John and Tug hear about a trend or an issue, they've got an opinion to share with everyone.

I have yet to listen to the entire show, but this is another big development, as it's only a matter of time before agencies begin to create podcasts for their clients.

from Business 2.0: A few lucky people actually look forward to the daily commute. Just ask one of about 300 Google employees who regularly go to and from the Googleplex in Mountain View, Calif., on the company's free Wi-Fi-equipped shuttles.

Google project manager Cari Spivack conceived of the Bay Area-wide busing program. "People have moved up to San Francisco because they know they can take the shuttle to work," she says.

The biodiesel-fueled shuttle and its carpool-lane privileges can cut a 90-minute commute in half.

Web access comes via a high-speed cellular data network and an 802.11g wireless router. "Riders tell me they're experiencing a boost in productivity," Spivack says. And, presumably, a lot less road rage.

If you haven't heard of Talon News' White House Correspondent Jeff Gannon, it's OK. There is no Jeff Gannon.

White House correspondents and bloggers did a little digging on Gannon after he tossed softball questions to President Bush and White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan at news conferences. Turns out Talon News is closely connected with the GOP, Jeff Gannon isn't his real name and his company also registered domain names such as Hotmilitarystud.com.

This article by the Washington Post's Howard Kurtz gives a good summary of recent events. Of course, bloggers all over the political spectrum such as DailyKos have been reporting on this for days.

No, it's not directly ad-related, but it should serve as yet another lesson that the blogosphere has the ability to sniff out a story, and the so-called "mainstream media" no longer exercises total control of news or information.

It's a new system of checks and balances---and ad agencies, PR firms and their clients ought to take note. Any marketer that engages in less-than-honest business practices or marketing techniques may get exposed--and quickly.

Boulder-based sparking juice company, Izze, somehow got its product into Brad Pitt's fridge.

During Heineken's 60-second Super Bowl spot starring the 41-year old actor, Pitt opens his fridge to find an empty sixer of Heineken, which leads him to head to the store for more. But he could have chosen another beverage--namely a pear-flavored Izze.

Reports indicate the spot, created by Wieden + Kennedy's Amersterdam office, cost $3.2 million or $53,333 per second to run on Fox. Given Izze's product placement lasted for about two seconds, the company received over $100,000 in free advertising (unless they paid for it).

Much as I hate to give Donny Deutsch and Donald Trump more publicity, last night's episode of "The Apprentice" was the advertising agency episode, in which the two teams, Magna and Net Worth, produced spec commercials for Dove body wash. See the results here. One looks like a badly edited iMovie, and the other looks like a porno minus the "bow-chikka-bow-bow" music.

"They both sucked," Deutsch tells Trump. And in an unprecedented move (apparently, since I truly don't watch this crappy show), both teams got called into the boardroom for a talk with The Donald.

I've said it before, and I'll say it again: These wanna-be "businesspeople" may not know anything about making ads or marketing Dove body wash, but that won't stop them: They're the ad industry's future clients.

from The Telegraph: Britain's biggest Ikea store opened at midnight yesterday - but closed just 40 minutes later as 6,000 frenzied shoppers stampeded for bargains, leaving 20 in need of hospital treatment.

One woman was said to have been threatened by a man with a mallet, and another waiting in the checkout queue was "mugged" for her cut-price sofa. Security guards were reported to have fled the scene.

Police were called and a fleet of nine ambulances ferried people to hospital with heat exhaustion and crush injuries.

A huge crowd had gathered for the opening of the Swedish furniture store in Edmonton, north London, entertained by fire eaters, stilt walkers and music. They stood patiently as Tom Williams, the store manager, chopped a log - the Swedish equivalent of cutting the ribbon.

But as his axe struck its final blow at midnight and the doors swung open, the crowd - three times the size expected - surged forward.

Mr Williams and his 750 "co-workers" could only watch helplessly as thousands of bargain-hunters raced for the soft furnishing department, determined to get their hands on one of 350 sofas, usually on sale for £325, for just £49 each.

In the beginning, there was Sega’s BETA-7 website, and it was good. Or at least original. Then came Burger King’s subservientchicken.com, and it, too, was good. Weird and stupid, but still good.

But then a bad thing happened. Your grandmother—followed by a bevy of Junior Account Executives and their bosses, various Brand Managers and a host of other AOL subscribers—caught on. And thus, the latest advertising cliché was born: the pseudo-site.

Now, apparently, you can’t offer a product for sale in the U.S. without creating an ad campaign that involves a fake controversy and corresponding fake website to go along with it. Witness lincolnfry.com (McDonald’s), axe2grind.net (Axe body spray) and iwantmyvacation.com (Universal Orlando Resort), to list those I’ve been exposed to in the last week or so. (In all fairness, the Universal site debuted last year, I think. Still, the trend is now in full swing and seems to be growing.)

Of course, ad agencies and their clients have been jumping on each others’ bandwagons in lieu of coming up with new stuff since time began. A fact you’d think journalists who cover the ad biz regularly would be the first to point out. Alas, The Wall Street Journal recently devoted an entire article to the news that McDonald’s was running a TV commercial that (pathetic drum-roll, please)….directs people to a web site! A sort-of wacky one! With fake blog entries!

Wow. Be sure to check out tomorrow’s big scoops on shaky cam, bleached film, mockumentary TV spots and print ads that make use of a crazy new thing called “white space.”

from Tim Nudd of Adweek: After getting canned on The Apprentice, Danny Kastner wrote a song called "15 Minutes of Fame." "Who is that knockin' at your door?/Oh my lord, it must be them, the paparazzi/Who else could it possibly be?" he sings. It's pure Kastner: a clueless yet charming mix of self-love and self-promotion, tempered by hippyish earnestness. It's almost worth visiting Kastner.com just to hear it.

This leisure suit can be yours for a mere $599

We couldn't resist asking if Kastner has plans for an album or a line of leisure clothing. Naturally, both are in the works. "I make a lot of my clothes," he says. "So I think I'm gonna do a deal and license that. And I've always been on the fringes of music success. The stuff on the show, that's just the corny stuff--I do serious stuff as well."

from Lewis Lazare: In another hard blow to the Chicago advertising industry, Grant/Jacoby, one of the city's oldest ad agencies, is believed to be on the verge of closing its doors for good, another apparent victim of the plague of bad management that has cast a pall over more than one shop in this city in recent years.

News of the agency's likely demise saddened those familiar with its long history. Over the decades, the mid-size shop, which in its heyday had billings of around $80 million, worked with some good clients, including Navistar, S.C. Johnson, Culligan and Roto Rooter.

It could not immediately be determined exactly how many employees would be affected by the shutdown, but one source believed as many as 25 people were still employed at the agency.

This is a bit off-topic, but I'm looking for a contact within Apple Computer, specifically in the area of customer/consumer relations. If any of our readers could help me out, I'd be most appreciative. Drop an email to shartley [at] gmail dot com

Additionally, I have around 50 Gmail invitations available. If anyone is still looking for a Gmail account, send me an email - to the same address above - with Adpulp Gmail in the subject line.

Update:
Thank you to those who emailed me regarding my iMac. The issue has be resolved. And I still have plenty of Gmail invites available.

Before you go home to Cabrini Green or Naperville or wherever, stop by the Talent Zoo After Hours party tonight at the Cactus Bar and Grill.

Nike's new black ball has golf world abuzz

A stunt at the FBR Open in which 4 tour pros used a black golf ball on a par 3 to promote a new Nike golf ball (Nike One Black), which is normally white, has now drawn unprecedented demand for production of the black ball. Now, Nike will begin a co-packaged promotion for the ball dropping in late February.

I initially posted this blurb on my personal site, only to find several visits from Wieden and Kennedy, Nike's agency. Now I'm wondering about the actual results of the promotion. Was this a stunt gone wile where consumer demand really was a surprise, or was there at least a hope that this would escalate to this result.

Any W+K or Nike people out there want to comment?

Last December we reported on the growing popularity of Kalashnikov vodka—namesake of famed Russian Lieutenant General Mikhail Kalashnikov, inventor of the AK-47. Now, the powerful Portman Group, an alcohol awareness advocacy group in the U.K., said the vodka's branding could link alcohol with violent behaviour.

According to Reuters, a Kalashnikov spokeswoman responded: "This is a funky and in-your-face brand, but we don't agree it causes people to take up armed conflict. We'll be working with the Portman Group because we have to," she added. "Our vodka will probably continue to be called Kalashnikov around the world, but something different in the UK."

According to the New York Times, Starbucks in partnership with Jim Beam Brands is introducing Starbucks Coffee Liquer today. The liqueur will be sold in bars, liquor stores and restaurants in 750-milliliter bottles for $22.99. It will not be available at Starbucks coffee outlets.

The liqueur is not the first stand-alone product the company has introduced. Starbucks joined with PepsiCo to bottle and distribute its Frappuccino drinks, and sells coffee ice cream through an agreement with Dreyer's Grand. The Pepsi and Dreyer's partnerships will represent a projected $86 million in income for the company this year, and liqueur sales will be a fraction of that, said Glenn Guard, a restaurant analyst with Legg Mason.

Thomas J. Flocco, the chief executive of Jim Beam, said his company had concocted a dozen cocktail starter recipes using the liqueur, including a "Seattle manhattan." Thirty more cocktails have been devised by bartenders.

I'm pleased to announce the presence of two new highly accomplished contributing writers, Danny G. and Wade Sturdivant. Danny G. is perhaps best known for his sometimes biting coverage on Talent Zoo. Wade is an Associate Creative Director at DDB Chicago.

I'm excited by this development for several reasons. For one, advertising, like any news room, is a totally collaborative environment. And four minds/voices are better than one. Certainly there is a place for the solo voice in blogs, but that's not this place. From day one AdPulp was conceived as a group blog. I contributed almost all the content at first because I had the time, and I wanted to establish the tone (hopefully more New York Post than New York Times) and direction for this new media vehicle.

Shortly after we launched last October, Adweek went live with their own group blog, Adfreak. At the time, I wondered if an old media machine could churn out a decent blog. The answer is unquestionably, yes. The Adfreakers adopt a much different voice than they do in their "I'm a real journalist" pieces. Now, maybe the question is, can a new school venture like this make a go of it as a credible, profitable news organization?

It appears the fraud and conspiracy trial against former Ogilvy executives Shona Seifert and Thomas Early will go to the jury for deliberation on Friday. Adweek's coverage of the summations is an excellent overview of the big points both sides are making.

From what I can tell, the government has done its homework here, and through a series of witnesses, e-mail exchanges, scribbled timesheets, and datebook entries, it appears that Ogilvy folks indeed tried to make up a $3 million revenue shortfall and use subtle language so as not to make it seem so obvious.

However, the defense maintains that Seifert and Early worked diligently to get up to speed with a difficult, bureaucratic client, and that the agency negotiated free commercial time worth in excess of $20 million--providing much more value than the revenue shortfall was worth.

But in addition to numbers, we get a peek behind the curtain of the catty world of ad agency office politics. Here's a juicy nugget from Adweek's summary:

In an attempt to reveal cracks in Seifert's testimony earlier this week, (assistant U.S. Attorney Lauren) Goldberg pointed to a seemingly trivial e-mail in which Seifert had made a joke about forgetting to include former contract manager Al DiOrio in a previous message. Seifert wrote that she supposed DiOrio, who was overweight, was "the same size" as everybody else when it came to e-mails.

On the stand, Seifert had insisted the remark was not a joke about DiOrio's weight. But Goldberg said, "She couldn't even own up to the fact she made a mean joke about Al DiOrio's size in an e-mail." The moment was made all the more uncomfortable for the defense because the jury had heard DiOrio ultimately died of diabetes following several amputations.

Whether all the evidence adds up to guilt or innocence in terms of fraud and conspiracy, I just don't know. But I think the whole ad industry, which already fights used car dealers for a bottom-feeding reputation, gets a black eye here.

Besides Adweek, Ad Age, and The New York Post, I haven't seen any other news outlets or blogs cover this case. Anyone wanna share their thoughts on this trial?

Hungry bargain hunters take notice. McDonald's is giving away free food. According to USA Today, McDonald's expects to hand out 4 million free samples of its Chicken Selects strips this weekend.

"People still think of us as a burger place," says Wade Thoma, vice president of U.S. menu management. "It will take a long time to convince people we're a great chicken place, too."

Seen the latest TV spots from American Airlines? They’re the ones that proudly state “We know why you fly.”

On behalf of the flying public, then, let me express great relief that American does indeed know why we fly. The thought of an airline being clueless as to why people utilize air travel is distressing to say the least, so I’m glad they’re spelling it out in no uncertain terms.

Actually, that tagline wouldn’t be such an easy target if the TV spots acknowledged more of the truth about flying today (i.e. how much it truly sucks) and gleaned a little humor or insight from that, instead of just trying really hard to be cute.

On another front—as if to intentionally make the disconnect between the tagline and real life even more apparent—we have the recent news from American that they’re eliminating pillows on all domestic flights as a cost-cutting measure. (Apparently, knowing why you fly and knowing you might like to sit comfortably while you fly are two completely different kinds of, um, knowing.) And all to save a measly (corporately speaking) $375,000.

A spokesman for American was quoted as saying that "customers have told us the most important thing to them is low air fares. Part of the way to provide low air fares is to reduce costs." Never mind that Southwest Airlines, long known as a low-fare leader, still manages to provide pillows on every flight.

Come to think of it, Southwest has done some decent advertising in recent years, too. Hmmm. Perhaps they know something American doesn’t.

from The Onion: Ben & Jerry's, the Vermont-based ice-cream manufacturer known for its progressive social mission, held a press conference Monday to introduce a new flavor celebrating Academy Award winner Michael Moore.

The Waffle Truth will honor the dynamic visionary by combining premium vanilla ice cream with strawberries, chocolate-covered waffle-cone bits, and a hint of cinnamon.

According to Ben & Jerry's press materials, The Waffle Truth rollout will include a nationwide tour by the company's promotional ice-cream wagon. The tour will begin its journey in Flint, MI and continue south to distribute free pints of ice cream in 14 Rust Belt cities suffering from post-industrial decline.

Ben McConnell and Jackie Huba have extended the idea of citizen journalism to the field of marketing. On their blog, Church of the Customer, they wax poetic about where they see this new development going.

"Traditional media structures are undergoing vast molecular changes that decentralize their power, diminish their reach and usurp their authority. This bubbling stew of change is creating the DNA for a new forum of marketing unlike any other. It may make brand managers accustomed to top-down message control blanch, but it's too late. The construct is set. Message control is obsolete. Marketing control is futile.

The citizen marketers are here."

One example of citizen marketing they offer up is the case of George Masters, the California school teacher who spent five months making a graphically rich TV spot for Apple. The thing that gets me about all this speculation and unwarranted exuberance is the assumption that Masters, and others like him, are actually offering their work to the client in question. They're not. The motivation is purely personal. Masters and the creative team behind the suicide bomber spot for VW that bounced around the web recently made their spots to showcase their abilities. That's all. There's nothing more to it.

How this central fact in this ongoing story has been overlooked is the part I'm most interested in exploring. It seems to me that several smart people who happen to blog (and the journalists who read them) are getting caught up in the blog bubble. It reminds me of the late 1990s when everyone with a half-baked web-based business idea thought their fortune was lurking around the next corner. We know how that worked out. So this is my message to my fellow bloggers--step away from the computer for a minute and realize that blogs, and the citizens behind them, are not poised to dethrone traditional journalism, any more than Final Cut Pro-equipped brand evangelists are due to overthrow traditional marketing.

Dawn is running a cause-related marketing program backed by TV advertising. In the spots no dishes are cleaned. Instead ducks soiled by industrial waste are cleaned.

According to Dawn's SaveADuck.com web site, it takes fifteen bottles of Dawn to save one duck from the horrors of an oil spill. The site also points out that half a million birds die each year from oil spills, leading me to think that the wildlife conservation market is a growth opportunity for Dawn.

USA Today and other newspapers have been following a story about identity theft that ought to scare the bezeejus out of you.

Criminals targeted ChoicePoint, a company that keeps a database containing over 19 billion records on Americans. According to the article, "The criminals opened 50 accounts and received volumes of data on consumers, including names, addresses, Social Security numbers and credit reports — information that ChoicePoint sells to businesses and government agencies."

Unless you want to live in an isolated shack like the Unabomber, there's no way to keep your personal information private. Everytime you apply for a supermarket "loyalty" card, or send in a warranty card for a toaster, or apply for a job, more and more details about your life get whisked away to a database. And there's simply no accounting for how the information gets used.

I wrote about this 3 years ago, and it's only gotten worse. Ad agencies and their clients are desperate to unearth more information about consumers and their habits in an effort to target them better. I think if more marketing people were victims of identity theft, we might think twice before we advocate collecting all this info.

Incidentally, the CEO of ChoicePoint didn't comment on the situation for several days after the story became public. He also wrote this book. I wonder what he left out.

from NY Times: Maurice Lévy, chief executive of Publicis Groupe is leading an effort to develop a public service marketing campaign promoting the idea of peace in the Middle East. The campaign would run simultaneously in Arabic and Hebrew, aimed at Israelis, Palestinians and - perhaps eventually - a wider audience.

"We can't do a lot on the political side, or the diplomatic side, but one of the things that communication people can do is help people understand each other better," he said. Mr. Lévy was born in Morocco after his family was forced to leave Spain under Franco and then Vichy France, and the plan is a personal one, not done on behalf of Publicis, he said.

The advertising campaign remains in the development stages. Mr. Lévy said there was no guarantee that it would ever appear. But the work that has been done signals the toppling of one crucial barrier. A handful of Israeli and Palestinian advertising and communications professionals - mainstream international agencies on the Israeli side and mostly smaller, local firms on the Palestinian side - are working together as a team. They are trying to come up with a proposal to present to political leaders, media owners and others at a meeting in May of the World Economic Forum in Jordan.

Tom Asacker points to a poignant comment left on Tom Peters' blog by AJ Hoge.

"People are moved by greatness...by madness...by beauty and magic and love and terror. Perhaps business people should junk the language and thought patterns of business—and adopt the language of poetry. Instead of building a profitable business how about creating a great beautiful & elegant works of art. Business as a collaborative art project. Instead of developing your brand, how about developing your genius (a la Thoreau). Instead of following a mission statement (ugh), why not follow your bliss."

While following your bliss is the exception, not the rule in business, some of the ad industry's best people have done precisely that. Russell Davies, an acccount planner at Wieden + Kennedy London recently unearthed a speech by Dan Wieden, which he generously shares on his blog.

I've extracted some of Dan's precious gems for your reading pleasure.

"The minute you think you know, the minute you go – oh, yeah, we’ve been here before, no sense reinventing the wheel – you stop learning, stop questioning, and start believing in your own wisdom, you’re dead. You’re not stupid anymore, you are fucking dead."

"I have this addiction to chaos. I love it when I’m a bit anxious. It’s a sickness, okay. But it works for me. And the older I get, the more I need what upsets me, shocks me, makes me squirm, or get angry. The older I get, the more I value what forces me to take a second look. The more I respect people who don’t automatically respect me."

"To me, money is like oxygen. You can’t live without it. But is not the reason for living."

Adweek has the initial report.

It didn't take the jury very long to reach a verdict. Yikes.

I might have more to say on this later. I think this may have huge implications for the ad industry.

Thoughts, anyone?

This always happens to me when it comes to technology purchases. I just got an iPod last week. And today Apple introduces a new line of iPod Minis and iPod Photos, with increased capacity on the Minis and lower prices on the Photos.

We are all just pawns in Steve Jobs' cosmic chess game.

from Promo Magazine: Country music sensation Shania Twain has teamed with Stetson Fragrances to develop and market a fragrance line.

Twain is a five-time Grammy winner and the best-selling female country artist of all time.

"The electricity that surrounds her stirs up emotions with heartfelt messages and moves millions of people around the world," Marsha Brooks, VP-marketing and business development for Coty Beauty USA, said in a statement.

The first fragrance is going to be called Shania by Stetson and will debut later this year, a Coty spokesperson said.

This article from London's Globe and Mail details the story of 2 guys who used Bryan Adams' upcoming new album as the focus of a fake viral site called Who Ordered Room Service?

I think viral advertising may have Jumped the Shark.

AdLand dives deeper into this discussion.

UPDATE: The Globe and Mail is based in Toronto, not London. Thanks to Constantinos for pointing out my American ignorance.

Earlier this week Neville Hobson had the opportunity to interview Michael Wiley, Director New Media, GM Communications, at General Motors. Here's an excerpt.

Neville: What are your primary objectives for the GM FastLane Blog?

Michael: To get beyond our old ways of communication with a new direct line of communication to all stakeholders. Typical communication is issuing press releases, talking to the media, who re-purpose your messages for you, and there's no way for customers to get their thoughts back to you. We've been wanting to create this direct line of communication so that our various stakeholders aren't going to message boards to talk about us - they have an opportunity to come and talk directly to us. We're big into getting feedback from our customers, employees and others, taking their comments to become a better company and develop better products. We're really getting some excellent feedback. Just about every discussion we have on the FastLane blog, we've had an excellent dialog.

Thanks to Jack Cheng for pointing us to this innovative product placement idea from Pizza Hut and Sony, where gamers can simply type "/pizza" and seamlessly send for a hot pie.

I don't know much about gamers and gaming, but I do know it's an obsessive habit. Therefore, building an order mechanism into the game itself is brilliant.

I woke this morning to an email from fbi.gov claiming I had visited 40+ illegal web sites. It went on to demand that I open a zip file and answer questions therein. Of course, I junked it at once. Just the same, it's nice to confirm it's all a phishing scam.

from CNET: The FBI is warning the public about malicious e-mails designed to appear as if they were generated by the law enforcement agency.

In a statement released late Tuesday, the FBI detailed the threat, which attempts to lure e-mail users into opening an attachment containing a computer virus.

The mail is disguised as correspondence warning people that their Internet use has been monitored by the FBI's Internet Fraud Complaint Center and that they have "accessed illegal Web sites." The e-mails then direct recipients to open the virus-laden attachment to answer a series of questions.

The FBI said it is currently investigating the origin of the malicious e-mail and indicated that it would never send unsolicited messages to the public. The agency further warned people against opening any e-mail attachment sent to them from an unknown sender.

If you haven't seen it yet, blogger and all-around media thinker Robin Sloan has created an 8-minute Flash movie called EPIC 2014 that you may find interesting. Or cool. Or scary. Or ridiculous. Either way, I dare you to watch and not post a comment.

Adam L. Penenberg an assistant professor at New York University, writing in Wired says, "It might be hard to believe that The Wall Street Journal is in danger of becoming irrelevant, but it is.

Because you have to subscribe to access both current news articles and the archive, the Journal is leaving only a faint footprint in cyberspace. I googled "Enron" -- an issue the Journal covered exhaustively, and which two of its reporters even wrote a book about -- and not one article appeared within the first 25 pages (250 results.)"

AdPulp.com is looking for a regular contributor or two from the west coast. Preferably, we'd like to see someone currently in an agency environment or brand shop, but it certainly isn't a requirement. All we insist upon is an ability to form coherent sentence or two, a love for the ad/marketing game, the ability to post a couple-three articles a week, and a willingness to stay somewhat objective in your writings.

What is in it for said contributors? First, we have nice-sized unique user-base who frequent this site on a daily basis. Here is your chance to strut your stuff in front of a targeted audience and get your name out. Second, anything you author is yours - we are about to launch a couple background applications which will allow you to be in control of any advertising that might appear on the permalinked page your entry resides on - which will give you the potential to earn a few bucks off of your content. We also have every major market in the US covered with the exception of the Pacific time zone - if you are looking for contacts in other markets, you don't have to go far to make some connections. We also have the top-bar of the site available to you for a couple days at a time if you ever want to pimp some of your work (and the space isn't being occupied by a paid sponsor). Finally, in the event AdPulp.com ever becomes a money making entity, you will be in the door for some cash.

If you are still reading this and have some interest, email Shawn - shartley [at] gmail dot com (also linked on the sidebar). Please take the time to write up a couple quick entries and include them in your email so we can evaluate your style as well as your offline contact information.

If you are interested but don't have the time commitment available to be a regular contributor, drop us a line anyway. We'd still love to have the occasional story from you (as well as your contact info in our Rolodex).

It’s always fascinating when a brand carefully crafts a public image but the reality is quite different.

And reading James Stewart’s revealing new book Disneywar really enraged me. See, I’m a Disney stockholder. Now my stock’s not worth much in the grand scheme of things, but it’s important to me. And the book gives got a fly-on-the-wall account of how shameless corporate backroom dealings have messed up a company in which I am, technically, part owner of.

The picture Stewart paints is the 180-degree opposite of the friendly image Disney has worked so hard to cultivate. Michael Eisner, Disney CEO since the mid-eighties, is presented as both an entertainment visionary and a two-faced egomaniac.

In one section, Stewart recounts in minute detail how Disney ended up paying $280 million in severance to former company Chairman Jeffrey Katzenberg because Eisner’s ego got in the way of approving a pre-negotiated deal to pay out a mere $90 million.

That’s $190 million down the crapper simply because Eisner couldn’t deal honestly with a man who’d also been one of his best friends for 20 years. Eisner is reportedly stepping down next year. Maybe my stock will finally start going up when he’s gone.

But seriously, if you like business books, Disneywar is a great read.

Blogger co-founder (and Nebraska native) Ev Williams (Blog) is now going after the podcasting market with Odeo, a new venture with Noah Glass (co-founder of ListenLab).

The New York Times kicks off with For a Start-Up, Visions of Profit in Podcasting (free registration required).

While still too much in its infancy to be considered an immediate threat to the radio industry, podcasting does present the prospect of a growing army of iPod-toting commuters who take programming decisions out of the hands of broadcasters and customize their own listening.

Odeo's founders say they believe that, as with other old and new media, conventional radio and podcasting can coexist in the long term. If, through podcasting, conventional radio programs are increasingly stored and played back on the listener's schedule, rather than the broadcaster's, then the trend could have the same time-shifting impact that TiVo-style video recorders have had on the viewing habits of television audiences

Ev also adds some details on his blog with How Odeo Happened

from The Telegraph: If there is one woman in the world who can state with conviction that "black IS the new black" it is Miuccia Prada.

She made that pronouncement after her stark and simple autumn/winter 2005/2006 collection at Milan Fashion week last night. No matter that she was wearing a white cotton shirt-dress with red high-heeled shoes at the time; perversity is part of Prada's charm.

"Black is a very important colour and it is coming back. After a while you get fed up with colour and print," she said. "Now it is time to be serious. Less fun, no frills. Last year we used fashion to escape from our problems. Now, we need to be more realistic and show ourselves to be more substantial."

Congrats to my buddy True and the rest of the gang at Point to Point Communications for their sweep of the Cleveland ADDY awards on Friday.

Point to Point has assumed the mantle of Cleveland’s best ad agency even though they’ve only been around for a few years.

In a city that seems terminally stuck in the past, a mindset even the agencies here embrace, it’s nice to see some new energy.

Point to Point’s expertise is in architectural, interior design and other “shelter” categories. Keep an eye on these guys.

Jason Kottke is an A-list blogger who recently quit his day job to pursue blogging full time. His revenue model of choice is the Pay Pal tip jar. Given the enormous traffic to his site, it may work.

According to Wired, Kottke is avoiding the ad-based revenue model because, as a one-man operation, there's no easy way to neatly separate editorial and advertising.

"Advertising introduces a third party into the relationship between me and my readers," Kottke said. "I don't want to be doing things on my site that are geared more to advertisers than to readers."

To me, this purist mentality seems misplaced, if not a tad crazy. Of course, it's perfectly fine if one can afford it. I guess time will tell if Jason can indeed afford to turn his back on this most obvious (and in most cases, benign) source of blog revenue.

from Lewis Lazare: A new campaign for Sierra Mist from BBDO/New York that broke Sunday night on the Academy Awards telecast is refreshingly different for several reasons. For one thing, the campaign employs a different approach, using an ensemble of sketch comedians in a series of improvised commercials that are positioned as "sitcommercials."

And it's great to note the work is -- for the most part -- intelligent in the way it tries to be humorous about Sierra Mist without resorting to gross, excessively dumb or needlessly shocking shenanigans to impress the teen and twentysomething target demographic.

None of the spots was fully scripted, we're told. Rather, the creative team at BBDO provided the core situation in each commercial, and then allowed the talent to use their skills to flesh out the proceedings. The resulting material was then smartly edited to create a finished 30-second spot.