Art & Copy

Should probably be on every ad-person's must-see list:


ART & COPY trailer from Baldwin& on Vimeo.

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Jimmy Dean Entertains, but Will it Sell?

I'd been looking for this spot for a few days now. Finally it popped up on Adpulp. I love the quirky, "I Heart Huckabees" atmosphere they're creating with this campaign:



But then Adpulp has to come along and point out that the above spot sells the category, not the specific product.

Well shit. I have to admit they've got a point there. But it's just so damn entertaining to me. Let's look at another spot from the campaign:



Ok, now we're getting somewhere. We've got a benefit, albeit a vague one, but Jimmy Dean will make you full. That's at least something they can lay their claim to.

Now here's another spot:



Ohhhh. So now Jimmy Dean makes you happy. Happy Breakfast. Maybe that's a new saying, sorta like "Happy New Year." In any case, it's all coming together for me now. Jimmy dean fills you up, keeps you full, and gives you a happy breakfast. That sounds pretty good.

And the campaign continues with lots of similar commercials.

I like that there are so many variations on this one concept of the sun and cloud / planet / moon cast. It's great. So few brands have big coherent campaigns like this anymore. So many are doing a little something here then jumping to something else over there and then to something different.

There's also a few webisodes of interviews with the sun, moon, cloud, etc. Looks like they were added a couple years ago. Is this campaign really that old? Maybe I'm just out of the loop.

Shooting yourself in the foot

Earlier this week the people behind The Pirate Bay were convicted of piracy crimes in Sweden and sent to jail for a year. Of course, the media industry is calling this a big win over illegal piracy of their precious copyrighted materials. I call it delaying the inevitable.

The RIAA, the MPAA, the whomever thinks they should sue the fuck out of their customers next group, you are all sorely short-sighted.

Bottom line: Piracy will continue until legal alternatives are actually useful.

I could drone on about all the bullshit that has gone on with copyright infringment in the last decade or so, but I think we all know the story by now. Instead, I'll try to offer some insight.

Example of the problem:
One of the few shows I watch regularly on TV is Rescue Me. It is easily one of the most well-written and thoroughly interesting shows to be broadcast in a long time, but I digress. I choose not to pay for cable, so I have to rely on streaming internet sources for my Rescue Me fix since it plays on FX. Turns out that some dumbass at the network decided that the streaming episodes on Hulu should come out eight days after they play on broadcast TV.

Eight days.

Now if I'm an avid fan, and I have friends who are avid fans and I want to discuss episodes with them you have completely broken down my means to do so in a timely manner.

So what do I do? I bit torrent the episodes the next day. It takes about 20 minutes to download and I can watch them in HD without commercial interruption. I'd gladly save myself the hassle and watch them on Hulu with commercials, but they aren't available when I want them. So they lose.


Solution:
Make the episodes available online at the same time it is broadcast. Build in a chat room functionality. Get me engaged with other fans. Maybe get advertisers to sponsor special promotions to engage us during the normal broadcast commercial breaks. Make it a community.

Remember how CNN and Facebook teamed up to stream the inauguration with a live chat with your FB friends next to the streaming video? Bring that sort of engagement to TV shows. Let me crack jokes alongside SNL. Let me use your networks so you can more accurately gather stats about who watches your shows (and make nielsen families a thing of the past.)


The alternative is that the big networks drive more and more fans away in seach of better solutions. There is no reason why the big networks shouldn't implement something like what I'm suggesting. In fact, it's in their favor to capture and grow these online communities now before consumers form habits of getting their media fix from someone else.

Think long term solutions. Offer your fans what they want, when they want it.

Obsolete yourself before someone else does.

Odell Brewing Brews up the First Twitter Beer

Odell Brewing in Fort Collins, CO has decided to brew up the first "Twitter Brew." The beer's style, ingredients, tap handle, etc will all be chosen by followers of Odell's twitter. A few people have pointed out that 21st Amendment Brewing in San Fran did a twitter brew this spring, but it would seem to have been a twitter brew only in name, not in the way it was produced as the Odell version will be. Pretty cool stuff. From the press release:

A Twitter Taste in Your Mouth

Odell Brewing Releases First Twitter Community Brew

On May 30, 2009, Odell Brewing will release the first Twitter community inspired brew.

Followers have until April 19, 2009 to tweet their suggested beer styles for the first Twitter Brew poll. Subsequent polls will be conducted to determine beer qualities like color, strength, body, and hop character. Twittering beer lovers can also tweet ideas for beer names and tap handle designs.

The voting will end on May 8, 2009 and brewer, Jeff Doyle will then brew the Twitter Brew on Odell Brewing’s Pilot brewing system. “There are so many people who are interested in brewing but don’t really have the means to do it,” said Doyle. “The Twitter Brew will give them the chance to get involved with the whole process.”

Twitter brewers can try their beer at the brewery’s Tap Room during the tapping party on May 30, 2009.

Odell Brewing is a proud sponsor of the Cicerone Certification program and an award winning brewery, nationally and internationally: 2008 North American Beer Awards – gold medal for 5 Barrel Pale Ale. 2008 World Beer Cup® – gold medal for IPA, silver medal for Double Pilsner, silver medal for Cutthroat Porter. 2007 Great American Beer Festival® – gold medal for IPA, silver medal for Easy Street Wheat, bronze medal for Extra Special Red. 2007 Stockholm International Beer Festival – bronze medal for 5 Barrel Pale Ale. 2007 Australian International Beer Awards – silver medal for 90 Shilling, silver medal for Cutthroat Porter, silver medal for Easy Street Wheat and bronze medal for 5 Barrel Pale Ale.

Adidas Knows How to Party

In the US, sitting through a two minute commercial means having to watch a hooker-beating douchebag peddle some miracle cloth that can soak up all the shit you're constantly spilling on your floor. In some places, some mystical, magical, advertising wonderland, a two minute ad is revered and respected by advertisers and viewers alike. This is the result: something beautiful, something I want to watch.



(via Dear Jane Sample)

The Need for Pure, 100% Not-From-Concentrate Talent

The advertising industry never ceases to amaze me. The talent. The timeless ads. The fucking bullshit.

On a tip from Adpulp I just read this Newsweek piece on Peter Arnell. You know, Tropicana (and Pepsi) re-branding dude. Or maybe douche is more appropriate.

This quote from Arnell (single out on Adpulp as well) pretty much sums it up:

Arnell also can't understand the kerfuffle over his work for Tropicana. "Can you imagine such mishegoss over a freaking box of juice?" he says. "I can't believe that for the rest of my life I'm going to be known as Peter 'Tropicana' Arnell." He says Tropicana overreacted to complaints. "I have my own perspective on it. But it's not my brand. It's not my company. So what the hell? I got paid a lot of money, and I have 30 other projects. You move on." (Neil Campbell, president of Tropicana North America, says Tropicana will continue working with Arnell.)

If the Newsweek article is half true (and I believe it's more than that) then Arnell is a prime time asshole. But it's not really my place to berate Arnell, I'm sure he has his own not-a-fan club that will take care of that. Rather, this brings me to a plague of advertising: great minds getting recognized and paid for their greatness and then slipping into a coma of douchebaggery.

I have no doubt that Arnell is a fairly smart guy, you need to have a pretty good head on your shoulders to run an organization like his. I have no doubt that the countless other CDs and CEOs and other C-level executives that have risen to similar postions around the world are talented as well. But why do so many have to turn into ass-clowns?

Is it the money that corrupts? The power? The corner office?

I don't have an answer to that question.

But I do have a solution.

Bring in the juniors.

That's right. Let's give those who have no resonable claim to fame or fortune the chance to attain it. Let's re-inject the passion into the system. And let's make it a booster shot straight to the heart.

But, you might say, won't the juniors just become old douches in a few years?

Yes, some will. It is inevitable. But we must continue to flush the system of inpurities while gulping down a nutrient-rich double dose of high energy, fresh idea spouting youth.

I believe that deep down, most people are good. Even most people in advertising. I've run into far more immensly talented, genuinely caring souls than I have asshats in my brief ad career.

So what are you waiting for? Clients, juniors, seniors, and everyone inbetween or outside, I'm calling on you to boycott the bullshitters and champion the pure, passionate individuals around you. Flush out the old, move up the truely talented in the ranks and backfill with juniors.

Ummm, you taste that? That's pure, 100% not-from-concentrate talent. And it will do this industry some good.