Brett Macfarlane

Chilling With Kanye in Paris

Came across an atypically typical Parisian occurrence last week on the second of my two one night layovers in Paris.

We grabbed some Velib's (the bike share scheme whose continued membership is my most beloved extravagance) for a night ride along Canal St. Martin.  

We rode down my favourite haunt, rue Bretagne, and stopped for a little projection performance on the bare wall overlooking Marché Enfants Rouge; the oldest covered market in Paris.  

The performance was watched by a couple hundred well dressed, coiffed and camera'ed up Parisians spilling out of Café Charlot onto the street.

The sort of event that seems to happen with great frequency in Paris; jammed together Parisians being Parisians making the most of their city streets to soak up a cultural spectacle that doesn't require tickets or a theatre.  Brilliant.

The track banging through the neighbourhood sounded, to obnoxiously quote myself, "like a French Kanye West."

Turns out it was Kanye West's new track New Slaves.  

This was one of 66 such events around the world that night, the same day the track was first performed on Saturday Night Live in America and streamed on kanyewest.com.

A fact I learned two days later, just now.

It reminded me that a few years back "trans-media" narratives were a bit of a thing, but they seem to have gotten lost under the umbrella of integration.

Inherently, good and fresh media with a perspective on our world is transmedia.  Even if it only existed originally in one place.  

Transmedia isn't the chart with all the plumbing of the internet - it is the real way creative things flow.   The way them permeate all channels in ways that cannot be 100% predicted.

It is the idea over the technique.  Both are important but technique is meaningless without idea.

Sure it was marketing, what isn't - but if it wasn't interesting and genuinely compelling to begin with, I wouldn't have stopped on Saturday and taken some shots, publications wouldn't have written about it and I wouldn't be caring about it now.

There was no branding or "messaging".  I had to figure it out for myself.  How atypically memorable.

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Everything Has Always Communicated

It is an old adage that everythign commmunicates, whether you intend to or not.

But, in many ways this has become limited as everything changes so much and so frequently.  Or at least we perceive it to.

Consequently, things that last become mundane and of low communication value, in case something changes tomorrow.

But, if something is designed to last, even just a few years, it can be used in helpful and elegant ways.  Even something like a plate can be informative, suggestive and environmentally responsible by avoiding the need of another surface to need to be bought, printed and handed out.

Sadly, the above was just a "retro" design, yet enduring in its asthetic intrigue and a whistful sense of longing for it to be usable today.  But, in a time where everyone is falling over themselves to be just in time, there is something confident and remarkable about being timeless. 

DSK Design Boom

 

While the internet and rolling 24hr news channels did what they do best - breathly moment by moment updates on what is happenning, the dailies and weeklies in France did what they do best - provide context, colour and the big picture analysis of what happened.

A man is facing prospect of trial.  The media has put the world's coverage of the situation on trial, so to the American Justice system, the French justice system, the IMF, the Socialist Party, a nations view's on privacy and the behavior of powerful old men.  All brought to life in words and illustration.

 

 

Best Part of May Day (Rock n'Roll)

The best part of May Day?

This Guy:

In the middle of hundreds of thousands of socialists, communists, lenninist, unionists and others this guy stompted on the hood of his Triumph and rocked.

There is something visceral and I love about the energy of manifestations in France.  People giving a damn and taking to the streets.  It also feels in some ways like a time past.  People now have other options to inspire and instill change.  This guy did feel like a time before I was born when rock and roll was the voice of disent.

The crowd tends to be older at these manifestions, 50 something.  I was in Prague in 2000 during the IMF protests/riots- I was 23 and many others seemed about my age.  Maybe it feels old on the street because the youth are at home doing change rather than walking down the street yelling about change.  More likely, as with most things in our frangmenting world the new and the old are equally important to moving forward.

Don't worry it's going to be great.

Noticed: Paris, 4th arr

Links of articles my mom mailed me / an idea I might get around to making

 

My mom sends me links.  Okay, not not by email or some internet tool like Delicious, but articles cut out of her analog newspaper and mailed to me in France.

It is not a new behavior, growing up she would hand me the paper and tell me to read it.  When I wnt off to university the good folks at US Postal Service passed the articles on to me.  Then, back it he same city but my own residence she would build them up and every time we met a small package of clippings was always passed on.

Tools of delivery changed but behavior has never wavered.

Now, despite my never ended steam of news and articles there are few I love and devour more eagerly than my inter-family diplomatic pouch that arrives every fortnight thanks to France Poste.

I don't want her to stop. I love the effort and things that my mom sends only because she think I might like it.  So pure.  Not because she wants to be a influencer or show people how cool she is by what she likes.  Just a sincere sharing of what she thought I might appreciate.  So motherly.  So sincere.

Articles these days tend to be about:

- Recommendation of places in Paris or London (place I spend a lot of time)

- Articles on the advertising world of Canada

-Things about friends of mine or people I grew up with

- An interesting bit about the business of sport (side interest of mine)

- Tips on raising plants (we are a family of people who seemingly growing things)

So, I thought it would be nice for me to share these pure, un-tampered links with the world.  It is a neat idea.  I might get around to making it.  Till then the articles are safely kep in a small envelope.

Band of Brothers

Came across a band of brothers today.

Off to play some music in sychronicity. Bass for one and violin the other.

Watching an episode of Jersey Shore (in French subtitles) sharing
equally earphones and some quality popular MTV culture.

While sporting matching Nike AF1s sharing the bond of social status.

Being French they were united by a deep, heated and well informed
political and metaphysical debate over the meaning of Snookie and the
presumed promiscuity of all American women.  In particular the cadre
known as sorority girls.

Just a couple of brothers, who may not be related by blood, doing what
brothers do.

How to Politely Tell Someone to Shut Up

Ana/digital

The digital machine created the analog chit to access the digital world. Experience design informed ultimate security mechanism - once code is input the physical chit will be forgotten, then discarded. No latency. Craft art direction choosing dot matrix style font. Nostalgic, implies low security, therefore nothing worth stealing. Brand voice: courteous and direct. Overall, an excellent piece of multiple-platform communication.  

Noticed: The Residence Eating PR

Go west

Noticed: Expo 86

Expo 86, along with a few other cornerstone events made Vancouver, and began our insecure obsession with being "world class."  I was 10 the summer of '86 and went to the Expo nearly every day and can probably disturbingly piece together the nightly fireworks/laser show with immense detail.

Noticed the above on some hoarding over the weekend in between posters for movies and Axe's latest product.  Wonder if Expo 86 artifacts will increasingly appear in the year coming up to the Olympics.  Will this new event that marks out city compel us to unearth past events and moments that define us.

I must say though that the lack of progress in the field of robots is deeply disturbing, in 23 years, have we really only gone from Expo Ernie to Asimo?  (Note: if Expo Ernie was actually a small human inside a mascot shell and in fact not robotic as I beleived as a maluable child, please disregard this slanderous quip towards the bipedal awesomeness of Asimo.)

Noticed: evolution of a West Coast cultural artifact

A big different between cultural artifacts from brand/advertising stuff is that it is permanent.  But this is increasingly less so.

Above is a fresh take of the famous (in these parts of the world at least) of the Patterson bigfoot film that without fail I've seen in some form every year my entire life.  It holds such cultural signifance it always maintains a permanent part of life around these parts.

Been thinking a lot lately how one of the mast amazing assets of the web is that when you create something great, it lives in perpetuity.  Traditional advertising existed as long as the media buy ran.  Traditional digital followed a similar flighting - the website would exist until business changes or technology necessitated replacing the old one, the banner ads floated about till the buy ran out.  Brand who are doing interesting things are facing what to do with stuff you've created, that doesn't go away?

Subservient Chicken still floats about.  And we're currently working on multiple software ideas for brands that once released, the incremental cost of keeping them available is nil.  Though once made available the ability to erase every copy is nil.  If you look at the Wopper Freakout films they will always be floating out there and appear periodically in searches.  The brand baggage just got bigger.

Which is really good, if you are brand with conviction and long term vision.  When recognizing that what you create today can live in perpetuity it actually helps you think longer term.   And probably is paralyzing for some brands because you will freak out on the thought of this strategy/platform/idea will never go away.  At least before we could end the TV buy and not get fired if you did something that sucked.

As with a lot of these evolving forces and consideration I hope if further forces brands to do great and interesting things.  Not just throw crap out there and hope nobody notices because that's the easier stuff to sell up the ladder. 

Yes?  Maybe?  Or not really?

Noticed: Sticker Based Anthropology @ Mt. Baker

A freezer outside the general store just down the hill from stubbornly rustic ski & snowboard area Mt. Baker in Washington state is a real life collage of brands, thoughts and ideas meaningful to the hard core boarder set.

Whose building our bridges?

Apparently they don't make engineers like they used to, or maybe it's just a crop needing a bit more work.

The profession of engineering has always intrigued me, likely as the product of two grandfather who were engineers.  Their role as the realists in the creative process of what you're building is vital to it staying up.  Their role as the enablers of figuring out and highlighting what's possible is vital to making it stunning, functional and enduring.

If I did it all over again, and loved math a bit more, I'd become an engineer.  But I'm perfectly happy being a brand engineer.  Nobody dies or gets arrested when it fails.  We just cry.  A lot.  Then blog about it...

Fire Your Lame Job

But before your fire that lame job, you might want to secure a less lame one, like say WK12, but don't delay as you've only got 2 weeks to make some thing.

Free Dumb

Free Dumb, not to be confused with what I do, by Dave Barnes.

Bored?

 

Noticed: Democracy in Action

Noticed at the local farmer's market.

Noticed: Where Irony Comes From

True irony comes from a bin of unwanted trucker hats abandoned in a Goodwill store on the backside of Main St. Walla Walla Washington.  Here's what it looks like, waiting quietly for local college students and hipster bands rolling through town.

Note: for European reader the trucker hat reference may not cross the pond.  Maybe an equal corollary would be a bin of Royal Post caps in the Oxfam shop around the corner from a small town's main square.  Still not following me, then this street guide to irony will help.

Noticed: Vancouverism - the London Exhibit

For the readers dialing in from London England (not Ontario) a little piece of my hometown is on display in your home town.  Vancouver is a very young city and it's downtown core has seen a tremendous amount of development the past couple decades.  Very controlled development mind you and an exhibit at Canada House in Trafalgar square details what this new form of urban development, Vancouverism, is all about.

Citizens of this city, renown for their incredible ability to complain, have a love hate relationship with what Vancouver has become.  It is convenient, well planned, though sometime devoid of a sense of place amongst all the towers of glass.  But despite our West Coast cynicism, when other cities around the world are looking at what you're doing and even replicating you have to figure we're doing something right.

And for those of us not in jolly London to visit the exhibition we'll just have to be satisfied with this post from The Guardian.

Noticed: PR by the Busload

Nobody is better at the self promotion game than Crispin these days.  Charles Saatchi must be impressed.  Maybe CPG should attempt a take over of Washington Mutual or Lehman Brothers as their next act...

Noticed: Steam Power

Noticed: more brilliant back alley branding.  I really want to do a ride along with these guys, more for the demonlition than the disposal.  Wonder if they use locamotives in the deomonition.

These guys, get kudos for the keep it real branding, but must say I'm not as keen for a ride along.  Maybe they need to focus more on excellence.

Noticed: Excellence

Noticed, in the alley behind my place.  Next time I need some excellence I'll be sure to give these guys a call.  Looks like they also design and fix thermal systems, whatever those are.

Noticed: New Marketing Reality

Noticed: not Banksy

Noticed: not Banksy in SOHO. But Mikey seems to like it.

Incognito

Camouflauge to make your next guerrilla urban marketing campaign truly guerrilla.

MTV Moonman

Noticed:

My old friend the MTV Moonman twitters, be sure to follow breathlessly.  That's me kicking it with him a few months ago in his office at the MTV offices.  (Yes, I know I am wearing shorts, but they were the Latin American offices in South Beach.  I had the most clothes on of anybody there...)  He's pretty chill, but not the most talkative type but with those gloves there is no way actually does his own twittering.  Plus that's way beneith someone who's into technology at a NASA level.

I would actually be really interested in the twitters of the person who twitters on behalf of the Moonman.

dawdlr

It's really interesting when digital drives something in the real world and vice versa.  Kind of like Think Secret but more optimistic (presumably) it dawdlr.  It's for the anti-Twitterers out there.  Or for that one twitter that really really meant something.

When your done contributing to this, give a little something to dawdlr.

Monday fun

Personally, I like a quiet night at home on a Monday eve.  Fortunately, if you're looking for something to do or are the competitive type, there is this:

It's official

Following some intense data analytics, econometric modeling and in depth ethnography it is now official that 14.5 seconds ago at 11:06 Pacific Standard Time, Facebook officially hit the Tipping Point.

Looks like it's all downhill from here.  The backlash is in full flight.  As many have mused that blogging time has now been replaced by Facebook time, it will now remain to be discovered whether blogging now becomes retro cool taking back time ownership from Facebook. 

To help illustrate the exact moment of the Tipping Point the research staff at Think Small prepared the following visual.

Gone till September

The plannershere and blogosphere sure are quiet these days.  Which is good, because that means people still enjoy doing summer like things and haven't replaced family time time and face to face social interactions with real live human beings.  Though I do miss all the delightful idealistic brand talk.

I'm sure come September and the return of bland weather a glut of great brand thinking will unleash itself.

As for the photo, yes, I'm sure you are thinking that's where I spend my summer vacations.  On a 175 foot yacht.  As do most ad folks.  Sorry to disappoint but I actually just saw this after getting off my $2.25 water taxi ride across English Bay.

Hotel Meeting Room

I don't know what is more odd.  The fact that a hotel has a meeting room called the Haliburton.  Or the fact that the folks at Arby's rented it out.

(yes I know that, that Halliburton has to l's but really who notices that)

I really just thought this was incredibly random. That's all.

Really?

Noticed today in Chicago: a new use for an old product.

A bit messed up if you ask me.

Visual analogy

Just thought this is kind of cool.  It's a visual analogy of sorts from Springwise's new business idea summary.

I've always thought of analogies in their "story" or verbal nature, but this is a neat way to bring one to life differently.  Would love to find an opportunity to create one and apply.  Maybe using a football team, house or better yet, a Hayes manual type thing.

Caution though, just cause it's visual, it's not to be confused with an allegory.  Lets save those for the art directors otherwise it will suck...

Pain London

In London for  a layover.  Walked along the Thames to the Millenium Bridge and then Tate Modern.  Lots of Londoners running, which is great, but they all look to be very unhappy and experiencing far too much pain and suffering.  Poor chaps them...

Prototypical Car Ad

Noticed: the prototypical car ad formula:

interesting location + vehicle in every frame + quick cuts + robust camera movement + aggressive secret agent driving maneuvers + catchy music track + couple shots of "target consumer" driving the vehicle = one unforgettable ad

Seed

  If I wasn't in advertising I'd be in the magazine business.  There is something great about a single bound package of information, all tied together with a specific theme and design, well thought out, well written and edited for me the reader.  And, they update it every month - just enough time to read,enjoy, revisit and digest the contents.  (Maxim excluded, no need to digest.) 

I was really excited recently to discover a great new magazine called Seed.  With the tagline Science is Culture. It is like Wired for the scientifically curious.  Seed is a very timely release if you ask me as we seem to be on the verge of an age of scientific awareness.  Global warming appears to becoming a reality not a myth, sustainability is on people's consciousness and with organic food going mainstream we're aware of how our food is produced. 

It will be great if we rekindle our childhood interest in science, and even exploration.  Seed is great because they make science accessible to the lay person (me) and relevant to our daily lives by giving it cultural context.  The current issue has this great article on the role of the Colbert Report on elevating scientific awareness.

It will be interesting to see if this magazine takes off.  It might be the perfect time for such a publication and another example of our curiosity.   

Domination

Yikes, with this apparent patent application Google takes contextual type based classified adds into the real world to help ensure further commodification of products and eroded brand goodwill premiums.  At least it will be more environmentally friendly and reactive than door hangers.

Noticed: discovery

spy kit
Originally uploaded by immaculate aaron.

It used to be that you go to a bookstore to wander around and enjoy the discover of finding a new book. I still like to do that but have too many books in my next to read pile. So I'm under a self imposed ban from Chapters.

But of late I've noticed the same sense of discover in places like YouTubewww.youtube.com and Flickr. Sometimes when I'm there I'll throw in a search term of something that comes to mind. Just to see what comes up. Sometimes it is quite mundane but other times surprising. I just searched "tool kit" and up came reams of photos of peoples tool kits, survival kits and spy kits disassembled like this one. Kind of neat to see the physicality of an activity through the objects used.

noticed - frivolous use of Cannes olive leaf thing

There are few better ways to spend a Sunday morning than to read the Sunday New York Times.  The movie section is always massive.  Reading through last weekend's I started to notice a trend amongst ads for movies currently in theatres - excessive and frivolous use of the olive leaf thing that films winning at the Cannes Film Festival use to denote their accolades.  I don't know if the olive leaf thingy was something started by Cannes, or its real origin, but all the other festivals - famous and obscure - have also started using it.  Looks like movie studios are starting to abuse it by going as far as to use the olive leaf thing to denote positive reviews from critics.  Which Obviously they are trying to make it look like the films are winning a tonne of awards because it is so good (even when they aren't.)

I predict this will devalue the olive leaf thing - kind of like how the Livstrong bracelet, a brilliant tool to drive awareness and raise funds, lost it's cachet after every cause and their dog came out with their version.

Notced: me!

As pointed out before, I (as do you whether you admit it or not) like the looks of my name.

So it was with much delight I received this photo taken by Scott Barr (an aspiring account guy for anyone in Vancouver who needs a future rock star) currently in Melbourne.  Glad to see my name is honored on the other side of the planet, but we will need to make them aware of the slight typo.

noticed - wood

Went shopping the other day in Whistler.  Noticed a lot of use of wood as an accent feature in retails stores.  Kind of like it.