Here Be Monsters|blog

Transmedia storytellling - the way forward

It's so blindly obvious that it's taken me three years to see it, but some of the most successful brands today have actually been embracing transmedia storytelling for sometime. What's been lacking has been the cohesive strategic overview that allows for a stronger relationship between all the separate elements oh and of course, that sodding desire agencies have for media hierarchy.

If you're not over familiar with the term, the mightily impressive Henry Jenkins who came up with it, describes it thus,

Transmedia storytelling represents a process where integral elements of a fiction get dispersed systematically across multiple delivery channels for the purpose of creating a unified and coordinated entertainment experience. Ideally, each medium makes it own unique contribution to the unfolding of the story.

I urge you to click on the link. It will be how brands/campaigns will be created and judged in the future.

Oh and the rather nice cityscape is by a fab illustrator called Borja Bonaque.

It's the long cuddle of the law

I like this, it's a little whimsical and odd, but why not. I like the fact that I don't know if it's an 'offical' ad or some quirky personal film. Either way I think it approaches the subject matter in a very fresh way - which is always a good thing. I also love the fact that it gets the message across very clearly without using words.

New ads coming your way #7

Richard Funch so rocks. Expect to see him on billboards very soon, maybe for BA, maybe for AT&T, maybe even Sony PSP. Don't move along, plenty more to see here

Not now, Stanley

This is a smart product/app tie up. Well, it's not is it. I should have been. Could have been if it were done a year ago, but coming late to the party and offering an identical app to that already exists isn't smart at all. It's the opposite. It's stupid. And annoying and, well rude.

Come the party by all means but don't hide your vodka under the sofa and snog someone's lady friend. Dance, chat, entertain and be an active guest

Maybe it'll be the best the spirit level app.  It's currently no 15 in the download top20, with iHandy Level no.1. So maybe it's not that good either.

Still they're tried.

Three tailors

There are three tailor shops in a street all next to each other.

To drum up business the first one, puts a sign in the window, THE BEST TAILORS IN THE COUNTRY.

The next tailor feels he's gotta do something, so he thinks he has to do something. So he puts a sign in his window that reads, THE BEST TAILORS IN THE WORLD.

The third tailor, now has to do something, he does something that the others didn't do, he thinks a bit, before sticking his sign in the window, which reads, THE BEST TAILORS IN THE STREET.

Which one would you go to?

So, don't tell me you're the best a man can get, the ultimate driving machine or any other ego boosting crap, remember, I'm just hearing you tell me a lie.

Many things of beauty

Jessica Hische is a designer, illustrator and typographer from Brooklyn, she's also very talented. enjoy.

 

New ads coming your way #6

This is just one of those lovingly executed ideas that is so going to have it's heart ripped out and end up in an ad. My money is on mobile communications, or maybe a broadband offering, but don't be surprised if you see a car logo or the COI dangling from the end of it.

Million, billion. what's the difference? Just a single letter, right?

From the ever wonderful Ad Contrarian comes one of those lists bloggers do when they feel compelled to post but don't really have much to say. 1 to 5 are so so, but 6 is a blinder.

it doesn't have to be all bad, honest

There's a great article in the New Yorker, about why marketing in a recession is important.  well worth reading, but it can basically be summed up in this extract.

The academics Peter Dickson and Joseph Giglierano have argued that companies have to worry about two kinds of failure: “sinking the boat” (wrecking the company by making a bad bet) or “missing the boat” (letting a great opportunity pass). Today, most companies are far more worried about sinking the boat than about missing it. That’s why the opportunity to do what Kellogg did exists. That’s also why it’s so nerve-racking to try it

Worth the read, especially as it's not too long and packed with the sort of facts you can throw out to make yourself look extra smart.

is this where it's all going?

I think I hate PizzaHut for listening to whoever suggested this was a good idea. And if you can't be bothered to click on, this, then let me tell you that PizzaHut have placed an ad offering an internship, or, as they so wittily like to refer to it -and how you'll laugh at this, so you will -, a twinternship. Because they want some pimply, debt-ridden college kid to twitter for them this summer. Hence internship + twitter  = twinternship

And they would like you to believe it's a real job too, with real responsibilities that include:

• Sharing insights and experiences via social media such as Facebook, Twitter and YouTube.
• Attending marketing meetings, ad shoots and other events; monitoring social media for happenings that may be of interest to loyal Pizza Hut fans
• Working on PR programmes.

Now there's two ways you can interpretate this.

1. Pizza Hut don't understand any of this yoofy social media life stylie stuff and don't know anyone who does either and so would like to get someone who is young enough and cheap enough to do some dabbling in it for them.

Or

2. Pizza Hut couldn't really give a shit about this yoofy social media life stylie stuff and don't know anyone who does either and so would like to get someone who is young enough and cheap enough to do some dabbling in it for them.

wii/google mash up

I guess in someways this is a pointless/useless post. (It's amazing what spending a week in the company of a 6 year old will do to your brain. - it being Easter hols here in London and all).

Anyway, the picture is of a wii and google's street view mashup. The deal is, you go jogging on the wii via a road route shown through street view. The best of both worlds.

The pointlessness being that it's only available in Japan - and I have no idea where I found this out. Sorry.

But what I will say, is that I get as excited about stuff like this as I use to get about the latest Cunningham ad.

Makes me proud

I should come clean here, Scamp annoys the hell out of me. Our views are poles apart as far as how we see creatives, the role of advertising and the future of both. But so what? We're all entitled to our own views and we should never shy away from expressing them - after all, having an opinion and expressing it is a massive part of what being a creative is about.

Plus we should always be prepared to have our views challenged.

So when he put up the slides from a talk he gave on what being a creative is, I wasn't surprised to find myself shaking my head and tutting by slide 3, waving my fist by slide 8 and shouting obscenties and banging the table by slide 21.

What I was surprised at were the comments, the majority of which shared my opinion. Maybe creatives are finally growing up. I do hope so.

G20 Protests

I love that I live in a country that allows people to protest, in fact I wish people did it more often.

Less keen on the fact that I live in a country where 24 news coverage means repeating the same hysterical nonsense over and over again - yes, I'm talking to you Sky and BBC - maybe now's the time to be more honest, it's not so much 24 news coverage as, news updates every three hours then repeated for two, 24 hours a day.

Much more entertaining and informative is getting the info from those on twitter, enjoying these people right now. At least the updates happen when something changes.

And not only that, but the type of updates also bring the event closer to home. Intimacy is in the detail, not in the broad strokes of a situation.

Some smart client/agency relationship will understand this and be working right now on what they could/should be doing to make the most of Glastonbury, FA Cup, Wimbledon F1, etc in the year of the twitter.