One More Twitter Thing...

Pepsi UK is about to print its Twitter URL on millions of cans of cola.

"Twitter has officially reached mainstream" writes Stan Schroeder on Mashable - though he also speculates that it may turn out that Twitter has jumped the shark.

What do you think?

Gone with the windy...

Here's a brand new viral spot for Breyers Ice Cream. Trite, but you can't help but have a love/hate thing for Jane Krakowsky.


Find more videos like this on AdGabber

I'm biased in that I hated the movie - tried to watch it several times and never went the distance.

Twitter is here...

... but I don't care what you're doing now.

"Creating cold fusion in a mayonnaise jar?" Nope.

"Casting a curse on my Ex while making a sandwich?" Not interested.

"Reading Homer in the original Greek?" Not even close.

But the potential of the technology is pretty impressive. Here's a couple of people who are making the tweeters sing:

- Nestle is inviting Moms to play along with the home vrsion of the game. They can post tweets within JuicyJuice ad units that can appear anywhere on the net.

- And this one is all about how and why Twitter works. Carri Bugbee is a PR practitioner in Portland, Oregon and she's founding a Twitter Advertising Agency. She believes that the medium works because it quickly connects people with similar interests. (AdAge video)

As Spock* says, "Fascinating!"

(*I saw the new movie. It's great.)

Ads, ads everywhere

If you watched "Lost" last week you may have seen the Starship Enterprise come zooming out of the "O" in the opening sequence - a plug for the new Star Movie about to hit a screen near you.

This article in AdAge online reports on a whole lot of new places ads have appeared recently and it looks to be a broadening trend.

Another "How to" today

How Chris Hughes Helped Launch Facebook and the Barack Obama Campaign.

Here's how it starts:
"The untold story of how Chris Hughes, today only 25 years old, helped create two of the most successful startups in modern history, Facebook and the Barack Obama campaign."

Read it in Fast Company (thanks for the link to SmartBrief for Social Media).

Guerilla Gorilla

This morning's post is a "how to" on launching a successful viral video. The case studied is the much seen Gorilla Drummer for Cadbury.

Here's the link to the critique.

And if you haven't seen it - or would like to see it again, I know I did - here's the video:

Skin? Is It In? Beach Volleyball Says 'Yes'

As many often overlooked sports stuggle for attention, Beach Volleyball - which made its mark on the recent Olympics - seems to have taken the "ball by the horns."

This from Stuart Elliott's column today in the New York Times (free registration) on an advertising campaign for the Association of Volleyball Professionals (AVP).

What do you think? Does this degrade the sport? Or raise it to a higher level of awareness? Or somewhere in between?

Let me know!

Now You Can Bathe in Disney Culture 24/7

It's probably a sign that the much awaited apocalypse is finally near. (No, I'm not a fan of The Mouse, et al. Could you tell?)

But if you are, count $74.99 out your penny jar and you can join the club and live and breathe Disney to the ultimate.

Your membership gets you, among other goodies, a quarterly ad-free magazine, Disney twenty-three, which is described as "a hybrid entertainment and lifestyle magazine." Yikes! The plague is spreading.

My advice: see if one of Amazon's used book partners has a copy of Carl Hiaasen's screed-as-book, Team Rat. 'Nuf said.

Here's the story in this morning's MediaDailyNews.

HULU May Have An Auto-immune Problem

Hulu.com, my source for the best of Saturday Night Live, 30 Rock and more, has an apparently unwelcome partner in software developer Boxee - who recently figured out how to feed Hulu content to hi-def TVs.

But the folks at Hulu HQ (NBC, Universal Studios and FOX) didn't like it one bit.

Here's the latest story on MacUser by Dan Moren.

(Thanks for the heads-up to Phil Kann!)

Will We All Pay to Watch Commercials?

No, that headline's no fish-hook, it's a real question.

There's a lot of ways we get content to our various screens. See the New York Times Magazine issue on "Screens." (Come back for the link tomorrow.)

It probably started with YouTube - whose videos grow longer and more professional as time goes by. And last September, Amazon joined Hulu, iTunes and Netflix in streaming significant media.

But today's MediaPost OnlineVideoInsider takes on the topic of your ISP charging you for watching content online if you go over a monthly "limit" of bandwidth. And what if that content carries ads? Will consumers revolt? After all, we watch commercials before movies. And cable TV has ads, even though we pay for the extra channels on our TV service. And, accually, we already pay a fee to our ISP to have Hulu deliver an episode of 30 Rock. Should they charge you more for delivering more, or should you be rewarded for being a loyal customer?

AdRants Scoops Up a Mound of Super Bowl Ad Critiques

With tweets from AdFreak, AgencySpy and Adland, AdRants separated the wheat from the chaff.

Doritos still finishes strong.

Best Super Bowl Spot: "Doritos" Says USA Today

Super Bowl Sunday has become the ad business' 4th of July - "let's kick back, eat, drink and salute the the culture that is advertising!"

And USA Today's "Ad Meter" announced this morning that Doritos won the sack race. Watch the top 11 and vote your favorite.

Chris Rock Provides Inspiration to Business Guru

And in the pages of Harvard Business, yet. This morning Peter Sims described as "an author and strategic adviser specializing in leadership and innovation" wrote that "In an eerie way, Chris Rock innovates like Amazon does."

Here's the whole story.

What Medium Delivered You The Inauguration?

This morning Eric Franchi, senior vp of business development at Undertone Networks, takes a glance backwards and notes that much of the technology used by people attending or watching the Obama Inauguration either didn't exist at the time of the last inauguration - or was in it's infancy.

Here's the story on MediaPost's Online Video Insider.

If You Were Going To Feature Real Products in a TV Show...

... what would that TV show be about and what products could it spotlight?

Let's see, The Sopranos could feature big, black SUVs and, oh, maybe bullets. NCIS... maybe products used in autopsies like sponges and scalpels and rubber aprons. Law & Order? How about some of those lawyers (already on late night TV) who promise to get you money if you've "been in an accident?" Actually, that'd work for Sopranos, too.

Wait, there's one scenario that opens the door to almost any product - a show about an ad agency!

TNT's new Trust Me (premiering next Monday night at 10 pm) is that show. If you're a fan of Mad Men (as am I) we'll be watching just to see if it measures up. Remember, this is the show that springs from the experiences and imaginations of a couple of ad vets from Chicago.

I can't wait.

In the meantime, TNT, Unilever and - we assume - media planners everywhere are watching to see if "branded entertainment" - which will be practiced freely and unashamedly on Trust Me - breaks through in a way that 30-second commercials don't. Here's the story in this morning's New York Times (free access with registration).

Dunkin' Donuts Coffee Jumps on the "Optimism" Bandwagon

But Dunkin' does it better than most campaigns - like Pepsi (whose controversial new logo has been seen as possibly an egregious "borrow" of the Obama '88 graphic) or especially the heavy handed Coke "Open Happiness" campaign.

The DD Coffee campaign is themed "You 'kin do it."

A New York Times column (free registration) by Stuart Elliott quotes Boston agency Hill, Holliday, Connors, Cosmopulos - senior vice president and group creative director, Tom Cawley:

“If you need a treat because you’re so hard-working, you can do it,” Mr. Cawley says, summarizing what the theme is supposed to convey. “It’s a message of positivity without pandering.”

In developing the theme, everyone sought to avoid making it “come across as rah-rah or in a frivolous way,” he adds, because “that would have felt off.”

Similarly, the agency and Dunkin’ Donuts realize the economy is “a bad situation,” Mr. Cawley says, and do not want to appear as if they are trying “to capitalize on it.”

He poked fun at that kind of ad by offering a make-believe example: “‘Times are tough. That’s why we’re your cooking spray.’”

The article also has a link to the initial "anthem" TV spot.

I like the strategy and the execution except that any caffeine beverage might be substituted DDC if it didn't brand "'kin."

Aside: Dunkin' Donuts have claimed over and over that their coffee beats Starbucks for both taste and value:

Dunkin' Donuts Beat Starbucks National Taste Test - video powered by Metacafe

How Media Is Embracing Something Medium-rare: Cooperation With Its Competition

In this morning's MediaPost TV Board, Mitch Oscar writes about "co-opetition," in which several unlikely media bedmates - including the RIAA, the bad cop in music-sharing who are now working with with the Internet Service Providers who have been the "enablers" of free downloading, but may now become the good cops.

Lots more examples are also cited.

Creativity Top 5

See this week's five best ads as chosen by Creativity Magazine.

NY Agency Has a Big Idea. Detroit Big 3 Hasn't a Clue.

Ad execs from Madison Avenue agency Kelmenson, Davis & Associates have been trying for a year to put together a nonprofit domestic auto-industry forum that would make Americans aware of Detroit's importance to our nation's economy and culture.

KD&A think $50 million would do the trick in turning US auto buyers around (full disclosure, my wife and I bought a Ford Escape Hybrid last September - we love it!).

But the corporate jet boys from Motor City don't seem to get it and would rather claw each other to death. Have you seen the Chevy truck spots with Howie Long making fun of the dopey features of competitive vehicles? Yow! These guys may be doomed.

Move Over "Mad Men," TNT's Got A Big Idea

The critical acclaim for the ad-industry soap Mad Men on TMC has not been overlooked elsewhere in CableTVland.

TNT is about to debut an advertising drama called Trust Me on January 26th. This one - unlike Mad Men - is written and produced by a pair of actual ad veterans.

Here's today's story on AdAge's Madison+Vine.

Expect a critical appraisal here on January 27th, shortly after my 8:30 am class. And let me know what you think.