Some home truths.. if you’ve worked in Ad world and get digital then you’ll probably relate to most of this. Everyone knows they need to change, and it’s about bloody time they did, rather than making videos on old thinking vs new. Just change.

Shared by Simon J.

Lovely bit of work from Puma, The Hardchorus. An unlikely choir sing their hearts out for valentines and match day! Nice and simple Facebook integration allows you to get the message to your loved one. Would have been nice to have seen the personalisation in a spoken name, rather than text on screen, but no doubt budgets crushed that. Go make and share.

A new friend in NYC just sent me the link to the Chalkbot created by Deeplocal for Nike and the 2009 Tour de France, the idea lives on the website ‘Wear Yellow’.

In short you can send a message of hope and inspiration to cancer survivors and suffers. The idea is brought to life by placing that message in front of Lance Armstrong as he rides. The message is printed on the road, photographed and then sent back to a gallery where the author can forward to friends.

A brilliant example of digital physical ideas.

The video explains it better than I do.

Good to see NAB / ClemengerBBDO (Melbourne) using him and his technique in their latest ad ‘The Little Wonders’.

Created by Stink Digital for Philips new 21:9 cinema TV, commissioned by Tribal DDB Amsterdam. Must be watched, full screen and in HQ. First found on BoingBoing.

Via @art_s discovered Twitter Stream Graphs (screengrab), Twit Arcs and Twitter Spectrum. All provide data visualizations for twitter profiles and keywords – tools created by @JeffClark.

Tate Tracks by Fallon London. My favourite art space, the Tate Modern, reaching a new audience through the intersection of art and music. Gold. Remember observing this from afar.

Mentos intern campaign. With a media budget of $0 see how BBH New York created an idea and execution that became more than the media ever could have been… (be good to know if the original media budget was merged into the build?) archive website here.

Again, credit to CASEMOVIES for doing the hard yards on finding these.

Creative idea, channels and execution explained for the ‘Problem Playground’ campaign for Honda by Wieden + Kennedy London. Visit the campaign website here – which is slow, but worth the wait. Another good idea from the team at W+K – that is clearly delivered in all channels and brilliantly executed – beyond the special build!

Thanks to CASEMOVIES (my new favourite creative resource).

…and if you think the soundtrack is familiar… well it is. Remember the rescue scene from Life Aquatic? (its below) and the track is called Ping Island.

I found them on flickr, there’s currently 78 visual thinking diagrams

… and David, thanks for the hard work and the fact that you share the way you think.

1. Jump aboard the social media train!!

2. Brilliant articulation of the digital media landscape

3. But I’m an expert!

4. Stairway to [brand] heaven

5. Big ideas vs. micro strategies

6. Please no one

7. Day in the life

8. Spin that wheel

9. Touch my points

10. Could be me, apart from the leather wrist band and night vision contacts

My reason is that when I posted a Tweet on the fact that I was enjoying series one, within 24hrs Betty Draper started following me – soon after Ken Cosgrove and my intrigue got the better of me.

I especially like the fact that the Mad Men characters remain in character on Twitter and truly interact with those that engage them. What’s an even smarter move is the fact that characters talk to one another and give another layer to the shows plot.

One thing to remember is that when screenwriters develop characters for TV or film there is always a solid backstory. They’ll know the school the character went to, trauma they’ve had in their lives, successes etc. But it usually doesn’t get explored in the final show or film. What’s great about using Twitter in this context is that we get to explore that backstory (in part) and go deeper into the relationships and happenings around the show getting to know the characters more.

What’s fascinating is the fact that the real characters have also inspired clones and fan profiles on Twitter. The Betty Draper that followed me was a clone not the real one (who started following me 48hrs later). People have literally got into character – mimicking what a 60′s house wife or ad executive would be like.

Whilst exploring I found this comprehensive spreadsheet which counts the number of followers for Mad Men characters, character clones and fan profiles on Twitter (many thanks to @RobinG2 for taking the time).

Adding up the accumulated ‘followers’ you get to a figure of 57,619. Now I know their not unique, and no doubt fans of the show will follow multiple characters – but that’s one hell of a ‘social footprint’. People that love the show enough to follow a character, create a character clone or set up a fan profile is significant.

Below is a grab from @RobinG2 spreadsheet showing the evolution of followers over the course of the show. Click to enlarge.

Questionable title I know (perhaps you can suggest something better?). But I had to intro this great pic/ad with something. I wonder if Philips are the light bulb choice for Star Wars fans.

Found on FFFFOUND.

I’ve exhausted my ‘booster can’ already, mainly down to the fact that I didn’t know what I was doing… just clicked away on the arrows. Unsure when the booster gets replenished, but I need some speed.. got a long way to go to win this race.

So far I’ve been across some odd blogs, mainly on gardening, don’t know if that’s a secondary objective from Orange or what.

Again I think this is an outstanding idea. I’m flying across the web, being pushed from participating site to participating site, which is a laugh… its like a weird StumbleUpon hybrid with orange balloon animals.

Time to fly.

Poke are responsible [again]. They keep turning out great work for Orange and this looks like another online masterpiece.

What I’ve gleaned from a brief play is, its a balloon race across the internet! What does this actually mean though?

Well it seems that you participate in two ways;
1. As a site owner, embeding code (see floating Racoon bottom left of this page) to track passing balloons (aka site visitors)
2. A balloon owner, whom by visiting participating sites (like this one, and Faris’) can increase their balloon miles. I’d imagine that a media buy on major sites will feature banners that track ‘balloon miles’ too, so you can crank up your mileage.

Why participate? The balloon that flies the furthest wins an £18,000 holiday to Ibiza for themselves and 7 mates – plus other stuff, probably phones. Plus the fact that the idea is brilliant and you simply want to see how far you can go – wouldn’t you?

I’m facinated to see how this is actually going to rollout… page to page, site to site. Below is the personal widget you get once you get your balloon. This can be installed on everything from a social profile on Facebook, to your very own blog. I chose a Racoon, ultimately this is a far cooler animal than a dolphin, camel (or the other one). But I guess my ‘balloon miles’ will be recorded here for all to see… fingers crossed.

Get yourself a balloon and lets race!

The post in my mind captures what the Cluetrain predicted back in 1999, ‘the end of business as usual’. Today, our lives are transparent and on show through the social services that we choose to surround ourselves with, whether its flickr that tells it in pictures, twitter in 140 characters and Qik in realtime streaming video. We’re open to the world, our friends and family.

Its just logical for us to expect companies and brands to behave in the same way and not hide behind advertising, marketing and PR, but embrace the chance to have a relationship, the chance to have a dialogue.

Gary’s got the words and the way – so probably best you watch the clip.

Sent from the invincible Simon Wassef, my mirror on the world, on the other side of my desk.