Three Minds On Digital Marketing @ Organic

Put an unknown band in a plastic bubble on NY’s West Side Highway, throw the switch on 24 cameras, and let people watch whatever camera they want at any time of the day or night as the band records an album, snoozes, shaves their bodies… do you get interesting content?  I don’t know. Intermittently. 

Dr. Pepper’s new campaign takes that risk.  Built by our friends at Code & Theory, they take another interesting risk: this is the first time, to my knowledge, that such a massive amount of streaming video has been delivered through flash.  The conservative play was to use Windows Media Player, but the user experience is much better with the more customizable flash player and when you’re dealing with this amount of video and so many choices, the user experience could easily have gotten too messy to succeed.  I still don’t know if the campaign succeeds – right now all I can find is half a guy and some other guy’s shoulder – but I’m impressed with the way it was built.

http://www.drpepperbubble.com/

Matt Rosenberg

Google announced the release of a new addition to its Google Maps platform at the Where 2.0 conference this week. The Street View feature enables users to view 360 degrees of static street-level images. In a Street View enabled area users are able to navigate and zoom to 16x without leaving the image window. The first phase of the rollout covers five US cities – New York, San Francisco along with much of the Bay Area and Silicon Valley, Miami, Denver, and Las Vegas. If you live in one of these areas you can likely go online and take a look at a 3-D image of you home or office.

The 360 degree images which make the service possible were created using an eleven-lens, GPS enabled camera developed by Immersive Media. The Calgary-based company is capable of mapping large areas by mounting the camera on the roof of a car. Google describes the technology as “immersive photography.”

Microsoft’s recently launched Bird’s Eye Views feature for its Virtual Earth and Live Search platforms provides  similarly disconcerting ability to zoom in on static images of your home, business, or vital pieces of infrastructure . The two services are comparable with the main distinction being that the MS offering is from a 45 degree, north-facing, bird’s eye view.

Now, as marketers, all we need is a hybrid map for businesses or special offers. Think dynamic information superimposed on an image of a storefront or office. A tool that allows users to confine search to a visually selected area would also be nice. With steady improvements in web-based mapping functionality expect to see an explosion of location-based mashups very soon.

Thanks Anna and David.

Dan Neumann

I have always admired the creativity of out of home advertising in Asia, specifically in Tokyo.  It's an electronically vibrant city with an overwhelming amount of advertising spattered almost everywhere; advertisers are forced to develop executions which truly break through the clutter. 

To accomplish this, advertisers often develop ways to integrate real products into everyday life.  I wanted to share this image from a recent train journey with you. 

Chris Portella

CORRECTION: The photo is actually taken of me on a train in Seoul, not Tokyo.  My fellow travelers and I took an overwhelming amount of pictures which I mixed up.  Thanks for your comments everyone!  Overall, I was exposed, moved and impressed by out of home advertising in both countries and look forward to seeing what they think of next. 

Reinventing a tired category in the face of aggressive competition.
 
Solving the problem by mining nuggets of customer insight. Converting that insight into a design idea inspired by popular culture. Customizing the design and marketing strategies to different market segments.  

Sounds very familiar. 

Check out this BusinessWeek case study about the redesign of the Norelco razor. I found it very relevant to how we create online experiences.

Adam Turinas

At first glance, this looks like another one of those tired sci-fi themed websites. But then, looks can be deceiving...

DJ and musician Amon Tobin launches a website that allows his audience to interact with his music (and sounds) in a whole new realm. The title of this site says it all — it's an excursion to an immersive audio-visual environment.

Choose the HD version and then explore the field using the radar in the top left to find several different creatures (which are the big blips that show up on your radar). Once you get the hang of using the radar, finding the creatures is much easier. And once you have locked them into your line of vision, you can explore their different sounds.

Listen to all six sounds from each creature to unlock the complete sample, and see the creature perform for you. Each performance is unique and intriguing.

http://www.amontobin.com/field/

Yee Peng Chia 

I recently bought a t-shirt at  the Lacoste store in Soho. It was a pleasant experience with a knowledgeable and helpful salesperson. However besides that, it was a short and somewhat forgettable. At the end of the purchase the cashier asked for my postal address. I'm not sure why I surrendered it, as I normally never give such data away. But I did. Again, even that part was forgettable.
 
Usually, the next thing that would happen might be a promotion email (either way too soon or many months later), or a quarterly catalogue arrives on my door, or a perfume sample etc. Instead, a week or so later, a very cute hand written "Thank You" note appears in my mail box sent by normal post. It was written by Benjamin, the sales person. It was short, nice, fun, referenced my "red" shirt and offered to help again for any future needs. Not over the top in anyway.
 
The personal touch is a great way to win business; I want to go back, I want to shop there again, I want to give him another chance to connect with me, I'm feeling the draw already, I'm pondering my next trip to New York.

I’m a big fan of merging advertising and entertainment online. In an uncharacteristically Microsoft move, Microsoft has done a good job of interjecting humor into their marketing. They’ve created a video and microsite for a parody talk show featuring a stiff host and bumbling ex-CEO-turned-author as the guest.  

www.StuOsbornShow.com

The piece features Fred Willard and Michael Hitchcock, who have stared in several Christopher Guest movies, including Waiting for Guffman and Best in Show. According to the Wikipedia entry (yes, there is a corresponding Wikipedia entry for the campaign, but no MySpace profile), the piece was actually directed by Christopher Guest.

If you enjoy the Christopher Guest movies—which many of us do—you’re going to click the banner featuring these well known, funny actors. The microsite is high on entertainment, and low on the advertising. I think the intent of the campaign is to showcase a new MSN video sharing product called Soapbox, but that’s not at all apparent from the site. In any event, the site is quite amusing and definitely worth a click.

Jake Bennett

 

LiveScribe is like a tablet PC, without the tablet...or the PC.  I worked on it with my previous employer, Elastic Creative. Personal involvement aside, I think it has potential to be a great technology. It's basically a pen that digital records everything you write, as well as audio that might accompany your writing from, say, a university lecture.

The pen uses a custom paper that the company will sell at prices near standard paper. The custom paper can also be printed on certain standard printers.

http://www.livescribe.com/

Anthony Enos

I've worked in online advertising for the past 7 years and have grown to appreciate the medium for its effectiveness in storytelling, animation and interactivity. More and more I find that traditional ads are borrowing from the online ad principles to create experiences offline. There are often "sequenced" ads in magazines - spread out across several pages. This month, Vanity Fair is running a series of 20 different covers featuring Africa.

http://www.vanityfair.com/

To me this is another example of how the inspiration of interactive advertising has eaffected the offline world. One cover just isn't good enough when you can tell a larger story and reach a wider audience with twenty.

Kelley Barry 

So. Let’s see. This is what 400,000 British Pounds buys you these days. With the hubbub reaching a crescendo across the pond, it’s time to start laughing at the spectacle of overpaid designers going all retro ‘80s New York Subway tag with the frickin’ Olympic Games Logo in a hamfisted effort to make the games relevant for young people. Or so the news reports state. Right before they get to the positively scathing words.

One report (Fox News, natch!) goes so far as to say that the animated version found online can cause seizures. Elsewhere, a BBC interviewee gave this take as a measure of the logo’s unhipness (best read in an Ali G. voice): “the equivalent of yer Dad dancing at a party, down wiv the kids innit.” But so far the winning description for me has to be the BBC Sport-penned version: “It looks like a logo designed for young people by old people who don’t understand young people.” 

But whatever you think of it, at least graphic design is front and center in the consciousness of Britons and many others. Wolff-Olins, the logo’s designer, may not be digging the scrutiny, but at least their name is blazing from inbox to inbox faster than Ben Johnson.

Needless to say, this forest fire rages on. A petition is currently circulating to flat reject the logo. Meanwhile, the always-entertaining Sun commissioned a monkey, a blind lady and a 12-year-old boy to make logos—in two hours—as a demonstration of displeasure. After the jump, here are a few of the better takes from other Organics from our internal e-mail thread.

Daniel Turman, with mad props to Kelley Barry for starting the conversation!
 

Amnesty International launched this site that uses satellite imagery of Darfur to show villages that have been destroyed by militias and ones that are in danger of being destroyed. The goal is to allow anyone in the world to bear witness to the conflict and to see with their own eyes the evidence of the destruction and displacement.

“Thanks to high resolution satellite imagery, human rights advocates can now document abuses anywhere in the world - even in countries that are sealed off from on-the-ground researchers. All from 280 miles above the Earth's surface.

To make the Eyes on Darfur project possible, Amnesty International acquired commercially-available high resolution satellite imagery. The images were obtained in GeoTIFF format and imported into ERDAS Imagine and ArcGIS for viewing and analysis. The analysis of the images was undertaken by the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) to determine the extent of damage to the structures visible in each image.”
 
It’s a startlingly simple concept that effectively harnesses two advanced technologies (satellite imaging and the internet) to serve a noble cause.

Here's  the URL again: http://eyesondarfur.org

-Whitney Browne

This latest edition of the Air Jordan brand deploys full-screen 3D using the open source Flash library Papervision3D. See beautiful shots of basketball players (and sneakers) suspended in motion within a navigational 3D space (hint: click the up arrow). Navigate sideways (left and right arrows) for video.
This is a fine example of a new generation of websites that take advantage of the capabilities of Flash Player 9, to deliver a fully immersive experience by taking the user outside of the boundaries of the browser window.

http://www.jumpman23.com/xx2/ 

Yee Peng Chia 

As a bit of a foodie and an experimental chef, I find myself online almost daily looking for exciting new recipes to try. The first place I hit up is AllRecipes.com, which does a great job on wealth of content and community features. I can search for recipes via ingredients I have in the kitchen, rate recipes I’ve tried, read reviews of recipes, see pictures, browse categories, create a virtual recipe box, and even print out a usefully organized shopping list. What more could you ask for?

Well, recently I stumbled upon Rouxbe.com, a cross between an online cooking show and recipe resource. With its professionally shot videos that are heavy on high quality close-ups, it provides elegant instructional and inspirational qualities that are not available anywhere on AllRecipes. The site is loaded with your typical fun features like downloads, bookmarking, commenting, etc and some not-so-typical features such as separate music and VO track volumes. But what I am more excited about are the features that show a higher level of thought paid to the end user.
 

With thunderstorms predicted for last weekend in NY, I attempted to make a dent in a long list of household chores, one of which was to get up to date on my TV watching. Within no time I was stunned by what I was seeing on the networks. No, not regular summer programming - but a ridiculous 30 second mini-musical by Ask.com. The topic? Chicks with Swords. No kidding. This amazed me not because I hate musicals or because I am intrigued by chicks with swords for all the wrong reasons, I was amazed because Ask.com’s previous foray into post-butler, broadcast advertising was so very sedate that it stood out like a sore thumb: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fxaq15-0vww.
 
They are calling it Ask3D (the 3D stands for the three dimensions of searching - query expression, investigating results, and digging deeply into content). You used to have to visit three different pages or websites to see and search through each dimension but with Ask3D, it’s all there on one page – even if that one page looks like their web developers are still using “frames.” It begs the questions: Can Ask.com be sexy and serious at the same time? Can Ask.com be fun and not fundamentally boring? Can Ask.com provide me with answers?
 
It’ll be hard to best Google, but I’ll switch for a little while and see how I like it. If nothing else, it allows me to nicely customize my search screen, something I never considered would enhance my search experience.

Update: So far it doesn’t.

(Read more at John Battelle's blog)

Wayne 'Mitch' Mitchell 

Update: Spoiler Alert - for those of you who haven't seen the final episode of the Sopranos, stop reading now.

Adotas reports that fans were so disappointed by the abrupt blank screen ending to the final episode of the Sopranos last night that their "hate traffic" brought the HBO web site down for an extended period of time.

I'm your classic die-hard Sopranos fan, having immersed myself in the story over the past 8 years (can it really be that long?) - I have all currently available episodes on DVD and have watched the entire 86 episode series multiple times. I too was quite shocked by the abrupt ending last night and felt a sense of bewilderment, frustration and loss.  After all that hype and build-up, I was expecting more from David Chase ... then I thought a little bit more ... 

So, what was this all about? Was this another example of overpromising and underdelivering?  The blogosphere is full of commentary and opinions today. Seth Godin calls this the Expectation Paradox. Melanie McFarland of the Seattle Post believes that David Chase "left it up to viewers to spin their own denouement in a blank space before the end credits, if they weren't wondering whether the cable went out at the worst time possible."  She invites people to write their own ending to the series and the Soprano site offers fans an opportunity to provide their feedback on the finale.

So what do you think? Is this a cop-out? Is this TV embracing the Web 2.0 user-generated content paradigm? Is this a great example of how TV is morphing away from being a passive "let it wash over me" experience? Letting us all be co-creators of our own personal ending to the Soprano saga? ... or is Series 7 going to hit our screens in 2008?

David Feldt 

We've written a lot about virtual worlds on Threeminds.  Here's an interesting application that helps us experience our collective past. The Institute for Advanced Technology in the Humanities at the University of Virginia has collaborated to create a digital 3D model of Ancient Rome. Bernard Frischer, who led the project said, “This is the first step in the creation of a virtual time machine, which our children and grandchildren will use to study the history of Rome and many other great cities around the world.”
 
Sounds more fun than reading about Rome in an old text book! 
 
http://romereborn.virginia.edu/
 
Molly De La Rosa

I’m a big fan of Steven Johnson. In fact, reading his first book, Interface Culture, helped me wrap my brain around this digital age in which we live. I just came across his latest venture, a site called outside.in.

Devoted to hyper-local content, outside.in unites the wide range of voices that make up a local, or neighborhood community and brings it all together online. The site currently tracks over 3000 neighborhood in more than 50 cities. The content consists of aggregated blog posts emanating from a particular locale, along with resident profiles (aka “neighbors”) as well as event listings and news. The primary navigational device is a small Google Maps interface that allows the user to dynamically filter the page content based on geography...pretty cool.

Navigation aside, there are many amazing Google Maps mash-ups, including this time-lapse Brooklyn buzz map. Check it out.

This site is definitely worth keeping an eye on, as they figure out hyper-local advertising and develop more offerings.

Whitney Browne

Behold wis.dm, a site for those of us seeking the instant gratification of public opinion.

Anyone can ask a question, however your post must be answerable with a blunt "yes" or "no". Questions range from the inane "Do you like to lemon in your water?" to the philosophical "Is mankind capable of obtaining overall peace?". Intriguing questions can spark discourse in the comments section and users are ranked on their dialogue contributions. Based on your answers over time, you begin to see which members you are most compatible with (could this emerge into a potential dating site?)

Marketers' dream or screen suck? You decide.

Angela Di Pietro

• To get students to be conscious of their relation to space
• To critically examine where one exists in relation to one's perception of where power resides (i.e. "downtown")
• To see that the toughest barriers to overcome are psychological
• To become empowered by their own unique knowledge of their "space"
• To understand the relationship between figurative and physical boundaries

What emerged was a study in perspectives. Some kids highlighted personal or general landmarks by name. Others identified neighborhood landmarks by image or function. Some identified personal “footpaths,” with the only roads identified being those that connected home with places often visited. Many visually demonstrated the psychological divide between the city center and the neighborhood where they lived.

Viewing the results, I began wondering about the "why" and "how" of personal communication, and its intersection with the "where" in our lives.

How do our personal experiences, our knowledge, our point of view get communicated within the framework of “place?” How do we put perspective and context into location and distance? And are there any simple tools that can help users merge their knowledge and experience with cartography technologies online? The answer is yes: Platial.com.

Some of you may be aware that Facebook launched a polling service last week that allows you to run a flash poll across the Facebook network. You get to ask a single question and provide up to 5 multiple choice answers. The pricing is flexible as you pay per response. You can pay as little as .25 for a response or up to $1. The higher the price, the quicker your poll will be completed. We recently did a few polls here in New York and a $1/response poll was completed in about 25 minutes while a .25/response poll was completed in about 45 minutes.

In addition, you can segment your audience by interest, age, gender and location.

While this information isnt exactly scientific, its a great way to test the waters of an idea or get some insight from the community. A little knowledge can go a long way.

Chad Stoller

• market for online sales is reaching maturity
• retailers have upgraded their in-store shopping experience (e.g. Apple Store, Niketown, Starbucks) and customers are hungry for these experiences
  
• cross-channel integration has evolved and increasingly shoppers may order online and pick up their purchases in-store (e.g. Best Buy)

Need for concern? Is this the end of online commerce? The answer is a big "NO". Internet commerce is still growing at a pace that traditional merchants would envy. Online sales have grown exponentially in the past 10 years but online sales are now forecast to grow 11% this year vs. 40% last year.

No matter how you slice and dice the numbers, its clearly a wake-up call to marketers and digital agencies alike - it is time to evolve (online) customer experience once again.

David Feldt 

I recently discovered grocerylists.org, an ecclectic collection by Bill Keaggy, a graphic designer at the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.

Grocery lists?

According to Keaggy, "You really get a glimpse into people's lives" ... "A grocery list is like a diary, he says: utterly honest and not written for public consumption. Short and mysterious, it is the haiku of everyday life."

Keaggy recently published a book entitled "Milk Eggs Vodka" where he reprinted several hundred grocery lists in their crumpled, stained and misspelled glory (featured in AdAge). Read the Milk Eggs Vodka blog here.

As intrepid students of human nature, human behavior and constant seekers of insight, I am sure that we will be pouring over this treasure for some time to come! What's the story behind the shopping list on the left?

Enjoy!

The Insights Crew at Organic 

In honor of this week's Cannes Lions 2007, we present "Mad Men" - A term coined in the late 1950s to describe the advertising executives of Madison Avenue. (They coined it.)

And now a new show about the heyday of Advertising on AMC.

They smoke, they drink, they call women "broads" - and that's just 9 to 5.

"The show will have very few interruptions, with only two 3-minute breaks per hour. Each individual spot will be introduced with a Mad Men graphic that has a piece of trivia either about the brand being advertised or about advertising in general. For an appliance maker, for example, the graphic might point out that the shape of the product has been the same since 1960, when the show is set. (they are calling it MADvertising)

The show will also have some product integration in its first season, a tricky proposition considering its set in the 1960s."

Kelley Barry

In an attempt to connect with urban chic kids, Montreal agency Bleu Blanc Rouge has opened up an office inside a trendy downtown boutique. 

"We wanted to be in a location where the trendsetters are," says Hubert Sacy, senior partner of Bleu Blanc Rouge. While it's possible to understand youth from within an agency, Sacy notes "it's much more easy to do it on the spot.

"My job is to reach the right people with a legitimate message, ... you can do all the focus groups in the world," but nothing beats "some kid looking over your shoulder and saying 'that's crap.' "

I would certainly hope not.  It is a fantastic source for information gathering and sharing.  Some people think that Web 2.0 could be our downfall.  While I do not share that opinion, it is always good to know how the other side thinks and acts to be able to reply accordingly.  I read this article on MSNBC today about one such individual and his book that thinks Web 2.0 could turn out to be very bad for our culture, values and economy.  While the columnist doesn’t share the view of the writer of the book its an interesting read.
     
Check out Lessig’s response.   

And in a twist of irony, here's a WIKI version of the rebuttal.

its certainly not a neutral point of view and having every section titled “Fallacy” certainly doesn’t promote open-minded discussion! This actually proves Keen’s point, IMO.

What do you think? 

Rod MacQuarrie, Charlie Zicari and Eric Westen
 

As we await the iPhone launch nine days from now, BusinessWeek reports that Porsche is entering the high-end mobile phone business.  High-end fashion retailers like Gucci and Prada already have their iconic phones in the market and its interesting to see Porsche enter this market too.  Its part of the trend where technology and fashion are starting to merge.

According to the report, "Designed by Porsche, but engineered and manufactured by France-based Sagem, the $1,600 handset will debut in Britain, Dubai, and other overseas markets later this year. The phone is expected to reach the U.S. in early 2008, possibly through Porsche auto dealerships and the five U.S. Porsche Design stores."

Hopefully you'll be able to color-code your new Porsche phone with your new Cayenne. Will we see the phone experience and driving experience merge too?  Can't remember where you parked? Imagine being able to call your car and ask it to remind you. 

David Feldt 

The folks over at FreeWebs are sponsoring the upcoming WidgetCon in New York City on July 11th. The conference promises a full day lineup of speakers and presentations that should run the gamut from desktop and web widgets to the growing world of rich internet applications. If you are in NYC, we will see you there. In the mean time, you can register over here or via the widget below.

To promote Accelerade's high performance sports drink products, they have hired ultramarthoner, Dean Karnazes, to break the world record for a 24-hour distance run on a treadmill.  He has 8 hours to go!   I discovered this on Yahoo which was running an ad unit with a live stream of the event.
 
Watch it live now in an ad unit or on their website.

Chris Portella 

Thanks to Emily for this link!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f_8wuVEYMZ8

The Royal College of Art took issue with an inaccuracy in where Google Maps was tagging its location for their "Great Exhibition 2007".

Despite multiple attempts to email Google to correct the issue, all they received were automated responses.

In a flash of inspiration, the RCA created a solution that juxtaposes Google’s world (hyper-efficient, technical, cold) and the art world (creative, dramatic, clever).

http://www.robertsollis.com/page/pages/google/google.html (Scroll to the bottom to see their solution)

Stylish and brilliant!

Adam Turinas

The world of MMOGs has evolved and matured over the years and today the market is estimated to be worth billions of dollars with 30+ million avid gamers across the world and 80+ major titles in current circulation.

We've previously written about the big daddy of MMOGs - World of Warcraft (WoW) - and this past weekend the New York Times Magazine reported on the grey-market that has developed around these games. 

The fascinating article exposes the surreal life of a "Chinese Gold Farmer", Li Qiwen, who works 12 hours a day, 7 days a week, slaying dragons and collecting virtual gold coins in WoW. He is part of a $2 billion a year grey market for R. M. T (real-money-trading), a phenomena of buying and selling virtual goods. "It is estimated that there are thousands of businesses like it all over China, neither owned nor operated by the game companies from which they make their money. Collectively they employ an estimated 100,000 workers, who produce the bulk of all the goods in what has become a $1.8 billion worldwide trade in virtual items."

Julian Dibbell, the author of the article, has written a book entitled “Play Money: Or How I Quit My Day Job and Made Millions Trading Virtual Loot.” He reports that, "for every 100 gold coins he gathers, Li makes 10 yuan, or about $1.25, earning an effective wage of 30 cents an hour, more or less. The boss, in turn, receives $3 or more when he sells those same coins to an online retailer, who will sell them to the final customer (an American or European player) for as much as $20."

Read the article and watch the video to get a glimpse into Li's life.

David Feldt

If you know anything about HTML, this will astound you! You're not meant to be able to do this with basic HTML code.

Jim Bachalo

Bear Stearns has just published an interesting report on the long tail of media that addresses the world of user-generated-content and its effect on the traditional media markets, especially TV and film. It answers the following three questions:

1. How much demand is there for user-generated content (UGC)?
2. Can UGC actually be monetized?
3. Won’t “content always remain king”?

Their "long tail" thesis says that, "digital technology and economics are loosening barriers to entry in video production." The resultant increase in video content from many diverse sources is shifting value from content creators to aggregators and packagers of content.

Definitely worth a read!

Update: Business 2.0 comments on the escalating UGC aggregator / packager war.

It’s been a week since returning from the Overlap conference (entitled "Exploring new methods for business and innovation") and my head is still swimming with new ideas, even more questions, and a revised sense of direction.

Unlike most other conferences out there, Overlap has a refreshing approach:

"Overlap aims for an experience that is multidisciplinary, collaborative, pragmatic and ultimately human. The essential value of the Overlap lies in the conversation of a community of peers and in the full participation and engagement of all attendees. Session leaders play a critical role in provoking thought, creating avenues for conversation, and cultivating an environment that is safe and open for everyone to share their ideas. Each session aims to initiate spirited debate and focused consideration that moves the entire conversation forward."

It was a true Threeminds experience - here are some of my personal takeaways and thoughts: 

• On the relationship between design, innovation and business: design is the signal of human intention, innovation is the shift propelling us forward, and business is the mechanism for change. The common threat connecting all three? Messiness.

• Design thinking is integrative thinking. For any problem, the goal is determining the optimal balance between a (scientific) management approach (quantitative, analytical, and objective) and the humanistic (empathy, understanding, and imagination).

• The relationship between innovators and inventors. Inventors come up with new ideas. Innovators select and organize the right people and skill sets to implement them successfully.

• Why? Because we can.

• On design research: all the answers are already out there, the challenge is determining the right questions to ask.

• Questioning the business value of design: how can we measure design’s effect on business if its value is (all too often) still tied to shareholder performance? One option: design must be an integral part of business model innovation.

• In comparison to technology and/or market-driven approaches to innovation, social innovation considers both economic and human value.

• “Innovation” is more than a disruption. In most cases, it is about sustained organic growth and the progressive transformation of business models through subversive activities across organizational culture and processes. Innovation involves focusing on little changes and leveraging existing resources to make small improvements over time.

• Sustainable strategies adapt and focus on shaping behaviors rather than trying to predict the (unpredictable) future.

• Design is necessary but not sufficient for innovation.

• Design stewardship (rather than facilitation).

Join me at next year's event!

Audrey Carr 

The unprecedented hype and buzz surrounding the impending iPhone launch continues ... MSN is hosting a roundtable of authentic iPhone reviews from the following "anointed" journalists:

Newsweek's Steven Levy, the New York Times' David Pogue, Walt Mossberg and Katherine Boehret of the Wall Street Journal and USA Today's Ed Baig.

Read their collective reviews here.

For a contrarian point-of-view, watch the Ries Report where Al Ries "proves" that the iPhone (a convergence technology) will ultimately fail - He compares the current hype for the iPhone to that of the Ford Edsel in the last century, a product that never lived up to the hype. His thesis is that successful products are divergent by nature (iPod, for example), not convergent. 

As a born contrarian, my head says Al Ries is correct. However, my heart WANTS an iPhone!

Thanks to Laura McGowan for the link.

David Feldt 

Audi recently launched the new Audi TT in North America. In Toronto, we saw this promotional piece projected up onto buildings and roadsides all across the city. The 3D CG car rendering and animation was done by Realise Studio in a virtual windtunnel - I love the minimalistic approach and the great use of color and animation.

See more here.

Thanks to Jim Bachalo for the link.

Taking a cue from the Subservient Chicken of yore, perhaps ripping a page from the the ‘lifecasting’ playbook of SF vlogger Justin Kan from Justin.tv, Mentos just launched this new interactive site on Monday (6/25).

Trevor is a real person, 19 years old and out of school for the summer and is working from the Mentos offices in Ohio.  His sole purpose in life this summer is to do your bidding – no pre-recorded sequences or costumes, just ‘keeping it real’.  One cool thing about this – the big expense here isn’t the creative, but the fat video feed.  It will be interesting to see how this plays out over the summer ;)

Some comments from the interweb:

“In another online-video first, Mentos tears down the entire wall between its brand and its customers. And they bestow the dipomacy post to Trevor the intern. The Mentos Intern is available for live discussion, tasks and constant webcam.”

“Bonus: Brad, he needs a jingle :P
More bonus: I know this guy, and let me tell you, he's not acting at all when he does crazy things on camera.”

Read more blog comments here and read the press release here.

Jay Bain
 

I'm a movie fanatic and as the hot and humid Summer weather hits, I love to escape into my favorite movie theater to cool down. What do you do while you wait for the main feature to start? Watch some boring static ads? MSNBC.com has come up with a solution: NewsBreaker Live.  

Think of it as the Wii on steroids - Motion sensors throughout the movie theater track the audience's collective movement. Moviegoers swing, sway and rock in their seats as "human joysticks" that control the game. Working as a team, they direct the onscreen action using a ball and a long paddle like that in the classic Atari game "Breakout."

Read more about the NewsBreaker Live campaign experience here.

Joe Gamalinda 

(P. S.  Here's the online version) 

In a sweetly dark and twisted effort, Scion has created an underworld for users to play in. Existing amidst the pages of a gnarly old pop-up book titled “Book of Deviants”, users get to be a “Deviant” whose goal is to take back the world which is populated by “sheeple”. The book flips through a series of chapters to reveal pop-up scenes, each with its own novel challenge.

Car companies seem to repeatedly enjoy creating campaigns based on the familiar theme of “being unique in a dull, mundane world.”  We've seen this played out in many different ways over the years but this one captured my attention.

The execution is so fresh, all is forgiven.

http://www.littledeviant.com/

So much fun!

Mike Brooks

It’s as simple as an oak table, black back-drop and no motion graphics. For those of you, who enjoy the lost art of the interview, be amazed by the re-launched CharlieRose.com. It is a great video resource for knowledge from the most influence people in our society.

Paul McConnell

 
This is amazing, hypnotic and the cello in the background makes for a nice relaxing 3 minutes.
 
Claude Silver

Jeff Jarvis at BuzzMachine has found a cool marketplace for those hungry iPhoners who are locked into an existing contract with Verizon, Sprint or T-Mobile.

http://www.cellswapper.com

Interesting to see how much business they do in the next few weeks as iPhone Mania sweeps the nation.



 

So, iDay is over and I promise this is the last iPhone post you'll see on Threeminds (well, at least for the next 24 hours).

The razzamatazz continued all day with reports of people lining up all across the US.

Let's look at the numbers ...

eBay is listing the 8GB model for sale between $710 and $910! And yet, if you look at product availability across the country, no stores are sold out of iPhones and every store has stock for sale on Saturday morning (unless Apple's availability calculator has gone on the blink). So, why would anyone buy it off of eBay at a $110 - $310 premium?  Doesn't make any sense, right?

According to Jupiter Research:

"Apple's sales target of 10 million [its targeting a niche, high-end market after all] is modest compared with its established opposition in the media centric phone category: In just the last six months of 2006 -- not the 18 months that Apple is targeting -- Nokia sold 10 million N Series "multimedia computers" (i.e. media-centric smartphones)."