23.07.2009 by Zoltan

Sueños de Papel by Cristina Guitian

The wonderfully talented Cristina Guitian has just finished a new mural behind her studio in Dalston, London. Poetic and irreverent as ever, its called ‘Sueños de Papel’ or ‘Paper Dreams’ in English.

Apologies for the shitty low-res camera phone shots, it’s all I had on me! Anyway I’m always amazed at how naturally her style transfers between the radically different scales of paper and wall. Something which is much more difficult than it sounds.

And if you’re interested in learning more about her process, she was recently interviewed by Don’t Panic

19.07.2009 by Zoltan

Babel With Me

BabelWithMe is freakin’ amazing, and although its not a fish that lives in your ear, would make Douglas Adams himself proud!

“Communicate with anyone, anywhere in up to 45 languages. BabelWith.me is a simple, free group chat that automatically translates your conversation as you type.”

Welcome to the future!

17.07.2009 by Zoltan

Looking for more interesting work?

Aren’t we all? And especially with clients who are willing to put their nuts on the line for a change. Well so is IMC2 Dallas, and they’re doing something really really smart about it.

They’ve essentially created their own grant/fund that is open to clients. There’s USD$500,000 of their money in the pot – available in 50k chunks – which is certainly nothing to be sniffed at. The only condition is that said clients grow some balls before applying.

What a brilliant way to drum up the kind of new business that we’re all looking for. Now if they only applied the same creative thinking to changing their agency name…

via AdAge

17.07.2009 by Zoltan

Future Routers

Future Routers is a great little colab design project between Goldsmiths and Talk Talk (appalling customer service, even if they have interesting corporate comms projects) that re-imagines the humble broadband router into something nicer/smarter – essentially designed around people rather than technology.

My favourite is the snappily titled ‘Energy Saver’ above, which has 4 hooks for house keys. When the last person to leave home takes their keys, it switches itself off. Presumably it switches on again when the keys are deposited back, but it doesn’t actually state that anywhere :(

via CR Blog

15.07.2009 by Zoltan

The Power of the YouTube aka United Breaks Guitars

I don’t normally go in for country music, but this is something else.

Dave Carroll got screwed by United Airlines, they refused to take responsibility for breaking his guitar. After 12 months of useless phone calls appealing to the corporate beasties, he decided instead to write a song and post it on the youtube.

Nearly 3,000,000 views later and after coverage on CNN et. al., United decided to play ball. To Dave’s credit he told them to fuck off, because by now he was having fun and they were hurting badly.

Major PR hassle (read: expense) and serious customer fallout over a $3,500 dollar guitar. Go figure. Another case of big brands with zero understanding that the balance of power has shifted away from them and firmly into the hands of their (creative) customers.

06.07.2009 by Zoltan

Next time someone asks you for a viral…

…send them this absolutely fucking insane video and ask if they’re really prepared to make the same tenuous link of association between their brand and *something* mind-bending or unbelievable and of interest to their target.

And if their answer is no, then you can tactfully turn the conversation towards something like (ineffective) display advertising which is probably what they really wanted anyway…

03.07.2009 by Zoltan

Cannes 2009

I am not going to pretend to compete with all the clatter out there about Cannes.

Whatever you think about advertising, there are some pretty amazing examples and more than a few which make the hair on your neck stand up. We all get this emotional response when we come up with a good idea. Much more rare is that other people get the same feeling when all is said and done.

Either way get over to the Cannes site, watch the videos and get learned. Believe me it’ll be the most productive 2 hours of this year.

01.07.2009 by Zoltan

Facebook Vanity URL = check!

Thanks to everyone who helped us over the 100 fans mark on the FB. We’ve now claimed our rightful vanity URL and can forever be found at facebook.com/boredomisyourfault.