[ paul isakson ]

hip hop violin - paul dateh and inka one

Another one courtesy of Bumped Heads. Made me think of Miri Ben-Ari, who I haven't listened to in a while.

mindmeister

Bumped Heads pointed out MindMeister earlier this week. Here's what they say about themselves:

MindMeister brings the concept of mind mapping to the web, using its facilities for real-time collaboration to allow truly global brainstorming sessions.     

Users can create, manage and share mind maps online and access them anytime, from anywhere. In brainstorming mode, fellow MindMeisters from around the world (or just in different rooms) can simultaneously work on the same mind map - and see each other's changes as they happen. Using integrated Skype calls, they can throw around new ideas and put them down on "paper" at the same time.      

I haven't really had a chance to play around with it yet, but thought I'd pass it along as it looks like it could be a helpful tool for your teams to use on occasion.

pardon the slow connection

While I try not to talk about myself or my company's work here, I thought I'd let everyone know that posts are going to be slow over the next few weeks.

As Sean let people know over on whizdumb, I've accepted a job in Minneapolis at space150 and will be moving up there shortly. I'm very excited about this new opportunity, the team I'll be working with (here are two of them), the things I'll be working on, and the agency. Not to mention getting to know and love a new city.

While I am in this transition, it's going to be harder to keep on top of the blog. I'll do my best to keep posting regularly, but in case I miss a chunk of time, now you know why.

Thanks in advance for your patience and as always, for stopping by.

design gangsta

Just a little design/ad humor for your weekend. Enjoy.

[ Found at Agency Spy ]

a music machine in a guinness? brilliant!

This one has been making the rounds, but I thought it was worth putting up in case you haven't seen it elsewhere. Watch a slightly larger version here.

a note about award shows & awards

On more than one occasion recently, I've been asked if I would be interested in posting something related to awards/award shows/an agency winning several awards. I'm not.

Generally speaking, I don't place much value on awards and award shows.* In my humble opinion, they can too easily encourage and reward bad behavior in this business.

Take for example, the New Denver Ad Club's new award show - the Denver 50. Their announcement talked a lot about how this new show is different than any other award show out there - that it's "idea centric." They've certainly put a lot of effort into it. (Which is no surprise. It's been one of their biggest priorities, if not THE biggest, since they started up.)

Maybe all that effort is why they got so excited that they announced it and the rules before they had the web site ready to accept entries and be a home for all the details. Maybe the over-excitement was the reason that they forgot to include anything about requiring actual results of the work, along with the strategy and insights behind the work, being submitted as part of the entry criteria/rules.

I'm all for recognizing great ideas that solve clients' problems and/or reach their objectives and are based in solid strategy and insight. If you're able to create something for a client that does all of this and happens to win an award also, then great. Good job. Nice work. You deserve to be rewarded.

But too many award shows are solely focused on the creative execution. They forget to consider if the work actually did anything for the client's business or was created out of any real strategy or insight. They end up rewarding work that creatively was great, but very likely may have never done a thing to help the client it was for accomplish their goals.

We don't need more of these types of award shows. In fact, we probably need fewer award shows. I've never seen winning an award as an objective on a client's marketing plan, agency assignment brief, etc. Nor have I seen it as a part of their metrics for judging the success of a marketing effort. With performance/ROI being a top priority among several CMOs now, we need to be focused on the things that matter. Winning awards is not one of them.

At the end of the day, it shouldn't matter how creative an idea was if it didn't do a thing to move the needle for the client. Rewarding creative for the sake of being creative is worthless. (Ooops, sorry. They're rewarding "ideas." Same thing still applies.)

*There are exceptions to this. Unfortunately, I can think of only one right now. I guess that's because I pretty much ignore anything that has to do with most award shows. If you've got others that are worthwhile, please let me know.

UPDATE: They've put up more details. Still no mention of results, strategy or insights, but they did pull out any and all mentions of the web site - Denver50.com.

múm - they made frogs smoke til they exploded

this week's mixed taste

 

August 16, 2007
Mixed Taste: Tag Team Lectures on Unrelated Topics
Prairie Dogs and Gertrude Stein
with Jonathon Proctor and Julie Carr

Two Speakers. Two Topics. Individually packaged.

The prairie dog is a small, burrowing rodent native to the grasslands of North America. Gertrude Stein was an avant-garde writer considered by many to be a pioneer in the development of modern literature and art.

The first speaker speaks on one topic for a half-hour. Then the second speaker speaks on a completely unrelated topic for a half-hour. Then there is question and answer together at the same time. During the first part of the program speakers are not allowed to make connections between the topics; during the question and answer anything can happen.

Special thanks to our Mixed Taste sponsor, The Residences at Belmar Plaza.
Reception 6PM
Main Event 6:30-8PM
Cost $10 ($5 members)

Register here.

The Lab at Belmar

[all taken from The Lab at Belmar's weekly email]

open closed

When you have a minute, check out Closed's web site. Why? When you click through to view "The Collections & Company Info" it goes into full screen mode. The navigation and interaction in this mode is pretty interesting and provides for a great brand experience in my opinion. I also like the clean overall design of the site - from the lines that draw in as you explore different items/pages to the way they show the products and models to the way they treated the typeface.

This is the first I've come across something like this, but if you've seen other sites that do this, please share in the comments to this post.

talent imitates, genius steals

Faris, a.k.a. TIGS, has been getting some well deserved coverage lately. First, he and Iain Tait were interviewed by IQadsTV. Then, TIGS was featured this past Tuesday on TypePad's Featured Blogs page. If you haven't been over to his blog, go there now. It's one of my favorites to spend time with regularly. Here's what TypePad had to say:

You're not blogging, you're "life caching". That's the emerging practice of recording and sharing your life through blogs and other tools - and it's one of the topics you'll find discussed on farisyakob, along with "naked thoughts on brands, media, communications, and tech." Among the most intriguing: Smart TV, which will serve commercials based on the shows you've been watching, and the various urban games that attempt to reclaim the cities we live in. There are similar observations on subjects as varied as ad agencies, culture, and the future - simply blog on, and  you'll get a fresh perspective  on them all.

Congrats Faris. Well deserved.

Also noteworthy is the blog featured in the post prior to TIGS - Hustler of Culture. Be sure to give it a read when you get a chance.