The Human Wry Corporation

Adrift.

2011-11-17T11:41:00.013+07:00

On ceding Siamese territories to the east of the Mekhong to the French, Rama V ensured he would remain forever in the annals of Thai folklore. More than for advancing – and uniting – the country through key infrastructure reforms, the king has become remembered, and fondly so, for the act of sacrificing a 'limb' to save the 'body'.

Over the last hundred years, though, the continuation of the nation's modernization in the shape of industrial zones, housing estates and entertainment complexes has been so unchecked that it has transformed the Thai central basin into a concrete jungle with little of the natural irrigation once provided by canals, forests and fields.

And now, as the contents of hundreds of thousands of suburban addresses of Thailand’s lower and middle classes float abandoned in stagnant waters, in the wake of northern run-off that’s been trapped by the city ‘big bag’ wall, Thailand is again making a sacrifice.

This time, however, the flood is proof that unifying nationalistic rhetoric is not exactly watertight. The convenient truth, for Bangkok, is that the city must be saved to save the country. The real truth is though that the ‘body’ has become severed from the ‘head’. The two are on separate courses: from the capital the country has truly come adrift.

*Frame grabs from the forthcoming short film from The Human Eye Corporation.

Brief encounter.

2011-07-13T16:41:00.021+07:00

My now chronic bête noire with book covers means that other than stare daily at my copy of Seven Hundred Penguins or flick through Joe Kral's Flickr collection I have to either hunt down a used edition for every single copy of whatever it is I want to read or forever enter the bookshop with trepidation.

The more than tolerable alternative to the very pleasing growing shift towards Penguin reissuing titles that evoke the old Penguins of the mid 20th Century though has done quite a lot to allay my fear of being forced to read a book with a cover I simply detest. Enter Mini Modern Classics – brief bites of storytelling ranging from Beckett to Camus, Kafka to Saki to Woolf in bold, stark, silver modern livery.

This set of fifty titles also work well if you’re trying to wean yourself back onto narratives of 140 characters+ from a life of ceaseless microblogging, Ulysses now more than ever strikes you as too daunting and you find flash fiction more of a, er, flash in the pan.

And what's more, it's not just the design or brevity that's appealing. The tiny form of these Mini Modern Classics is clearly here no small factor: they are easy to pick up and slip into your back pocket and out again – that is if you don't get to finish the tale (sometimes only a few pages long) in a single leg of your daily commute.

The right tone dialed.

2011-07-07T00:43:00.012+07:00

Rather than the usual publicity tour or even the more progressive book trailer, to launch her new collection poet Heather Christle, at set times every day throughout the first half of July, will read a poem to anyone who calls her.

Turning her back on online verse via digital social media platforms for a communication channel far more personal, Christle has decided to opt for what she herself describes as the "...intimate distance a telephone creates." How fitting.

Man beats dog.

2011-06-18T15:12:00.002+07:00

In spite of the dismal failure of their ‘no-vote’ stance there was unquestionable insight behind the biting political satire of the PAD faux-election campaign. Utilising deeply-rooted, colourful idioms and featuring a menagerie of 'wild beasts' – buffalo, tiger, dog, monitor lizard, crocodile, and monkey – to underscore the growing suspicion that neither government nor opposition could be trusted, the PAD posters succeeded in rousing the populace like never before, but ultimately failed to match the level of execution of a witty Punch cartoon or a emotional Adbusters DIY pop-up and will be forced now to bow to another hound.

And while some marketing points, too – and a couple of seats in the house to boot – must go to the slimy, obnoxious and brutal (but brutally honest) massage parlour tycoon Chuwit for not using a sledgehammer in his paraphernalia, it was Yingluck Shinawatra, somewhat regrettably, that really triumphed – in terms of branding as well as votes.

Much has been written about Yingluck’s campaign and an unprecedented amount in English – mostly concerning poster execution. And while I would obviously side with Baker over Somtow, the poster in question itself is really no great wonder (the reduction of the size of her family name aside) – a well-styled, well-lit, retouched studio shot will always easily outshine the staid graduation head shots and cheap and cheery expressions in wind cheaters we’re used to seeing during election season in Bangkok. Here though truly, it’s the strategy and not the execution that stands out.

Admittedly since the Obama campaign, not has there been this kind of genius at play. Putting up an arguably attractive woman with a name that reads as ‘girl’, ‘lucky’ and ‘love’ – depending on which language you read it in – for election as your PM candidate to a gravely superstitious audience in a world dominated by lazy, corrupt men is the single most cunning political maneuvre in Thailand since probably her brother was last in the country.

As evil as he may be, and as feral and savage, Thaksin has pitted and won with human intelligence over animal instinct, and worryingly has continued to leave many drooling, so in need of a leader, they lap it up.

Dark forces.

2011-06-06T07:56:00.011+07:00

Untitled, 2010 by Simon Brewer from a collection entitled The Necessary Tension of Possibility.

It's really no coincidence that I draw inspiration from the same bleak corner of the soul as this talented London-based photographer. Indeed, part of his assertion is that lurking in the DNA of all brothers and sisters is a shadowy predilection. With my brother and I it seems manifest – quite innocuously – in a regular fondness for aesthetic and thematic darkness, rather than with outright evil; with his ‘brother’ – the subject of this set of photographs and accompanying essay – brother of the Khmer Rouge, chief executioner Kang Kek Iew, or as he was known by his nom de guerre Comrade Duch, the contention in full is that with all humankind there is as much a propensity for good as there is a propensity for evil.

To some this is startlingly brave optimism; to many it would be dismissed – as would all the surviving members of the regime – in order to as Earnest Becker says to escape from evil, as part of the very expression of flight from death itself. The artist Simon Brewer, meanwhile, pursues in this work that is to become his first solo show, what Thomas Aquinas posited nearly eight-hundred years ago, that “Nothing that is wholly evil can exist.” This, Brewer maintains, “...presents itself most strikingly in the context of the most abhorrent of acts.” which explains, at least in part, the lure of Duch.

Shot at the scene of multiple atrocities, the Tuol Sleng prison, more commonly known as S-21, but previously a French Lycée, while Duch was on trial, Brewer’s work demonstrates an awe-inspiring vision: his ability to capture the tension between apprehension and exposure in warm daylight hues and the darkest shadows of solid, imperceptible nothingness. His contrasts between neat lines of orderliness of what once was a school room, and the crude, almost cancerous brickwork of the torture chamber annex with its brutal, butchered holes further stress what the photographer himself states as, “...(the) conflict between forces of good and evil manifest in the human psyche...”

What if though this is a battle without surrender? Are we to become Hopkins' carrion?

"Me? or me that fought him? O which one? is it each one? That night, that year /
Of now done darkness I wretch lay wrestling with (my God!) my God."

Speechless.

2011-05-16T02:41:00.008+07:00

I usually steer away from talking about music, only because it’s said that talking about music is like dancing about architecture, though on witnessing the pure magnetizing, religious experience of Japanese band Mono live – the shift from quiet to quiet to loud and from dark to light, at once lush and terrifying, the silence in between the notes (as an apparent tip of the hat to John Cage), the narrative quality of subtle light colour changes, the sitting, the stirring, the counting of notes and the majestic splendour of it all – I’m forced to try and put it into words and I’m still left wanting.

I’ll shut up now.

Images via Stereotypingmusic and Eyeball.fm.

Firmly planted.

2011-05-15T03:02:00.010+07:00

After unsuccessfully fencing the area off and bringing the heavies in to no avail, the Bangkok Metropolitan Authority, guardian of footpaths all over the city, have turned to a rather self-defeating measure to keep away the über-popular throng of post-9pm Siam street vendors along the Rama 1 roadside from continuing to flog their fashions.

Not only hasn’t welding a 200-metre molehill-like plant bed slap bang in the middle of the sidewalk deterred vendors from selling their wears – shirts, bags and the like are hung nightly in, on and around the monstrosity – it of course severely impedes the pedestrian thoroughfare at all times of day.

In short: both sides are planted firmly; neither side will budge.

Just shit.

2011-03-22T09:37:00.006+07:00

Iran might think the 2012 Olympics logo represents a veiled pro-Israeli conspiracy in support of the installation of Zion, but Britain’s dislike for the pink jagged design, even after three years of getting used to is simple: the man on the street just thinks it’s shit – as he has now expressed graphically with bill posters around the capital.

Via Crackunit.

Ugly is the new Biutiful.

2011-03-20T11:11:00.000+07:00

Through largely dropping his now trademark interwoven, non-linear syuzhet and wiping all but a hint of the familiar counterpoint of the American dream from the script (mere talk of a ski-ing holiday in The Alps as opposed to a model career, middle-class family planning or adventure tourism), Biutiful is a leaner and also meaner Alejandro González Iñárritu film – more visceral and possibly more disturbing than any other.

And this shift is not, it seems, an anomaly.

Even this year’s Academy Awards – the self-congratulating farce that they are – featured a swath of bleak contenders. With Black Swan, Blue Valentine, Rabbit Hole and The Fighter there is a discernable move towards the raw, the mournful, the fierce and the vulnerable.

And A Winter's Bone is still yet to come to my local screen.

Not all white.

2011-03-11T13:32:00.004+07:00

Seemigly bound so securely by the artificial nationalism of Thaification, caught up in the wave of now rampant fanatical patriotism and oblivious to the frailty of the once disparate fragments that comprise the modern-day nation-state of Thailand, Bangkok-based advertiser Oishi saw it fit to castigate it’s own sisters (and brothers) in public.

Playing with the mechanics of such (BTS) signage that suggests you give up your seat for the handicapped, the old and the ordained, the banner ad read, quite shockingly, (in translation): This seat is reserved for white-skinned people. The desired effect of the pink Oishi amino drink was to appeal to the believed widespread desire to attain bright, glowing white skin.

Fortunately, a large enough proportion of the population are happy with their skin as it is and via a local online weboard community successfully petioned to have the offensive banner removed.

Image/graphic via TMRC.

Non-scents.

2011-02-01T11:15:00.004+07:00

Producing soap from beer isn’t new, but when Singha extend their product line to include such a body care product, it does make one wonder if it was achieved without changing any of the (essential) product ingredients in a cunning reappropriation of raw materials.

Sneaky hollow.

2011-01-30T20:21:00.007+07:00

A growing trend for provincial hotels Asia-wide it seems is to

plough all of the renovation budget into a boutique styling of the facade and lobby, whilst leaving the rooms themselves (several storeys up) in their original thread-bare state – a reality you only witness after you’ve paid upfront.

But who cares though as long as everyone on the street thinks you're staying somewhere swanky?

Bare necessities.

2010-11-26T07:25:00.000+07:00

Although demonstrating Tippex's product benefit with bleeding-edge freshness, (by combining playing with its media environment in a way only previously seen with the Cyberbullying Cry of the Dolphins spot and offering up the kind of open-ended narrative options that are usually the preserve of Choose Your Own Adventure lit,) A Hunter Shoots a Bear is sadly seriously blighted by the one necessity of all great dramatic storytelling – solid, natural acting. The hammy, over-wrought voiceovers we get seriously and frustratingly undermine what is otherwise brilliant piece of work.

Good put down.

2010-11-19T08:39:00.000+07:00

Bar the slightly over-cooked musical crescendo, the super-crisp shirt and cakey make up,Thai mobile carrier DTAC hit a tone almost pitch perfect with Disconnect to Connect to bravely suggest that consumers use their phones less.

Dotty.

2010-11-15T08:48:00.002+07:00

With Dot – featuring the world’s officially smallest stop-motion animation character – W+K again demonstrate the kind of mad dedication one needs to produce truly outstanding work.

A waste of energy.

2010-10-03T16:43:00.004+07:00

Like many, I found 10:10's No Pressure film offensive – but unlike most my contentions were its weak creative mechanism and the advertiser's u-turn rather than its supposed bad taste.

For ads with vignettes such as these to have any true relevance they need to be linked to a strong and specific end line that leaves a clear takeout for the audience – not open-ended, throwaway gags or comedy shock tactics. Such, I suppose, is the gulf between TV and TVC. Richard Curtis directed.

Add to that the equally totally inexcusable explicit, public admittance of having “missed the mark” (not part of a pre-planned PR stunt as the initial pulling of the film perhaps was) and you are left with the biggest waste of energy I've seen in a long time.

(Worth seeing just for the controversial blood and guts though obviously.)

Sign of the times.

2010-09-14T19:23:00.000+07:00

In the shadows of the vandalism and theft of Bangkok's Ratchaprasong sign, the city is seeing a new breed of street insignia spring up, with the specific goal of duping the motorist as s/he snails forward in the gridlock.

With marketing real estate at a premium and anything now fair game it seems, brands are taking ever more desperate measures to get under the radar and into the consumer psyche – even if it means stealing legitimacy from the highways as this cheeky invasion of corporate signs in disguise testifies.

And while one can understand how hospitals and even hotels justify their street presence – condominiums and golf clubs clearly have no place on the road, though the community is admirably it appears answering back en masse directly with self-authored content.

Spot the dummy.

2010-09-01T01:25:00.001+07:00

Not the first time the boys in brown have enlisted body doubles, the Thai police nationwide have begun to plant wounded mannequins, their twisted torsos smeared in fake blood, alongside right-offs as a part of an innovative deterrent to scare motorists from being, er, real dummies and driving drunk.

Via Jalopnik.

Photography Gary Inman. Retouched by THEC.

Last but not least.

2010-08-27T09:04:00.003+07:00

Moulded in the self-effacing image of Avis and owing much to the banality of a particular line of Alan Partridge bedroom banter, this piece of M&C Saatchi print – promoting Dixons' online-only, low-cost store – is an authentic, distinctive and daring piece of branding that brings the call for action to the fore.

If only the message too was executed in a more dynamic medium, it would have surely won big at this year's Cannes Lions.

Scary Spice.

2010-08-17T15:34:00.011+07:00

For maximising the potential of social media in masterly fashion I take my hat off to W+K – but, strategy aside, and ignoring the fact that the Old Spice executions rely more heavily on irony than insight, I'm really not being swept away with the online tide because I just can't erase the stench of the anticlimax of unwrapping a present and finding a gift pack of aftershave, deodorant spray and talc rather than a toy or at least some chocolate bursting out of my stocking on Christmas morning.

Specifically, while the multiple online replies are the result of a superb piece of planning, the branding is scarily really just dressing (smelly) mutton up as lamb.

A glutton for punishment.

2010-06-11T01:23:00.000+07:00

Like hungry Chinese ghosts with a surplus of food but with mouths too small to ingest even the tiniest of morsels, it appears we're beginning to drown in the one thing that we treasure the most – oil.

Landing the ego.

2010-06-10T13:46:00.006+07:00

Gone are the days when sending a pizza to a hiring ECD is enough to grab his/her attention, in the Tweenies you have to make yourself heard digitally with something truly bleeding edge – like the kind of stunt writer/director Alec Brownstein pulled off. By playing to the egos of Gerry Graf, David Droga, Tony Granger, Ian Reichenthal and Scott Vitrone, Alec got both a job at Y&R New York and won two pencils and a Clio while he was at it. By simply purchasing Google Ad Words for the creative directors' names, which costs him $6 in total, he communicated his talent to them directly in the one place he knew to find them online – Googling themselves.

Via ID3.

Future tense.

2010-06-04T08:51:00.000+07:00

Already an eleven million-plus viral Youtube hit, the centre piece of W+K's Nike 2010 World Cup campaign is a three-minute spot built on the tension surrounding the future impact of success and failure on the pitch – with a good or bad pass or tackle – with players' lives off the pitch.

The likes of Wayne Rooney and Ronaldo flash-future themselves into the colourful lives of national heroes and villains in scenarios that include an English trash trailer park, a maternity ward, a South American shopping channel, an episode of The Simpsons and Youtube itself, and cameos that go further to prove – Pepsi take note – that with the right level and tone of drama a commercial can successfully host a roster of stars.

(What's the story) mourning or glory?

2010-05-24T11:16:00.016+07:00

The apocalyptic counterstrike and mayhem of the consequent meltdown of wednesday the 19th may have carved a large chunk out of both the Bangkok cityscape and the collective middle to upper-class psyche, leaving a still-weeping, iconic wound that will fester for years to come, but the real loss – which has largely been ignored, and which will never truly be known in full is of those (on both sides) killed fighting in the street battles leading up to and in the final flourishes of the crackdown.

At the loss of city infrastructure many are sad and quite rightly so. At the loss of businesses many are angry and quite understandably so. Of the loss of duped pawns in an old money versus new money political game, no one really knows.

Witnessing the debris first-hand in the hours after the fall and subsequent sacking of Ratchaprasong, smoking malls, burnt-out stores, vandalized banks and charred ATMs, melted phone booths, smashed glass, broken paving stones and bullet holes were visible at every turn, as well as the remnants of looting littered in shop fronts all around – stripped mannequins, coat hangers, security tags, big-brand boxes and bags and even the odd piece of merchandise. But in the embers of what was Bangkok's elite playground, too, lay thousands upon thousands of simple items of lost property: ordinary shoes, clothes and bedding, cooking equipment and food itself – the possessions of a large number of protestors, possessions that seemed discarded before a mass, hurried, unplanned exit. Or worse still. We will never know.

Even factoring in the relocation of several thousand people to Wat Pathumwanaram pre-crackdown, the half-cooked noodles, unpacked clothes, broken, orphaned shoes, unfinished soup, cheap, multi-coloured space blankets and square traditional Thai pillows, suggest an interruption of truly unknown proportions – but now the loss of a sandal or two is being seen as nowhere nearly as grave as the loss of a knock-down party frock. The unpurchased party dress is being deemed of greater importance than the only pair of shoes you own.

And that's understandable – when the state are also claiming the high moral ground, mourning over the tragic material loss of city infrastructure, as well as reveling in a glorious victory over terrorism. But as microblogger Ethan Schmohawke quickly pointed out: "...the Thai regime should realize that you can either crush an opponent or paint yourself as the victim, but you can't really so both..." – not least for the fact that when you do both, when both views are mutually held, an increasingly feverish, polarized stance is further galvanized, a stance that does not allow for any other side to this story.

(Frame grabs, from my upcoming documentary, shot at Siam Square and Ratchaprasong on the 20th of May, 2010.)

Breaking the mould.

2010-04-16T22:02:00.006+07:00

Whimsical, eclectic Japanese/Hong kong product design duo The (aka Sherwood and Mihoko) have permanently changed the food container category with a simple but deadly (at least seemingly so) bag to protect homemade lunches from as they say, "...sticky-fingered coworkers or schoolyard bullies...". Their anti-theft lunch bags combine the practical and playful to keep away any potential rotten thieves.

Via Teehan + Lax.

The great firewall of China.

2010-04-02T23:29:00.003+07:00

What China censors online.

By Information is Beautiful.

Via Angus Whines.

Panda bared.

2010-04-02T22:58:00.004+07:00

Whether it's comic books or Kungfu Panda, pruned poodles, photo-stickers or Harry Potter, roti buns, AF, yellow, pink or red shirts, Korean boy bands, Twilight, anime eyes or BB messaging, the fickle Thai frenzy bandwagon continues to flitter from one fad to the next.

And with a whole TV channel dedicated to Lin Ping the Panda, streaming live video 24 hours a day – monitoring the animal in exactly the same position in its cage, toys occasionally thrown in to add colour to the frame – one is left wondering what will eventually be of the panda when the press strip down his qualifications for stardom. Lin Ping, I suspect, will probably conveniently get sent back to China where he'll be left to ponder his career/life.

Art by Lora Zombie.

Nestlé crunch.

2010-03-23T00:06:00.015+07:00

Writing big cheques for social media gurus to hook up your Twitter to your Facebook and your blogfeed to your RSS Reader might be both unnecessary and foolish, but equally running headlong DIY into the online world too can be dangerous – that is particularly so if your brand is super-unscrupulous and you lack basic manners, like Nestle.

Having 92, 242 fans on your Facebook Fan Page is not always a good thing. In short: epic social media fail.

Via White and Wong.

The hurt locked in.

2010-03-18T12:02:00.018+07:00

In spite of having both declared outright war on their arch-Oscar enemy and being hunted by former bomb-disposal experts, the tension, drama and gritty realism of the narrative of The Hurt Locker won (over) the film Academy Awards – and though for all its heroism leaves you feeling a taste of victory that is bitter for altogether different reasons.

Bomb diffusion maybe the most perfectly desired metaphor for America's role in the continuing Middle East conflict, but The Hurt Locker uses this as a guise to lure one into a false sense of approval, cheating one into jingoistic pride so that by the time we see the protagonist shooting at some faceless Middle Eastern 007 baddies the whole cinema is cheering – an effect that is heightened by the sense of relief that our key trio's initial desert encounter is with handsome, English Ralph Fiennes and not local Arab militia. There's no such relief though when we (eventually) realise the film is pro-war patriotism dressed up as peace.

One can understand the vast amounts of hurt locked in after the 9/11 tragedy, but is this sort of ethnocentric group therapy the way forward? No. And as so as a movie, this deserves to, er, bomb.

The power of dreams.

2010-02-15T09:25:00.002+07:00

While over at bleeding-edge blog The Musings of an Opinionated Sod I was reminded (again) of the power (and economy) of simplicity, clarity and candour in Asian marketing. Sex, in one form or other, is one of the dreams that sell; status – if you want to split the atom – is the other.

This was brought into sharp relief as my head returned to the psychobabble of the brief on my desk. Much of the marketing that surrounds us is blighted by impossibly broad and unobtainable communication objectives, a target market that's often as wide as the world market itself and the continual pestering of mass client intervention that W+K talk of here. The autonomy that Bernbach secured with Avis only very few (can) (dare) look for.

In the rural Cambodian shantytown of Poipet (described by the Lonely Planet as "the armpit of Southeast Asia") subsistence living forces a brevity and directness unheard of in the region's glitzy, excessive, neon capitals onto the locksmith and his brand. His communications – which contain the essential requisites, for his specific target, product illustration (literally, here) and call for action, are boosted by a simple but killer injection of emotional value – the power and status associated with getting a step closer to fulfilling one's dreams of (and with) owning Honda, even if it's just a key ring, at first.

Write it off.

2010-02-03T18:45:00.003+07:00

More a passport office for the next life, rather than a graveyard for business careers in this one, Cards of Change celebrates the positives of being sacked by giving those that have been freshly laid off license to rewrite the scope of their new world post-job on their own business card. Online group therapy for a world still in recession.

Set up by former TBWA/Chiat/Day employees, united in Unknownlab.

Hitting back.

2010-02-03T13:03:00.005+07:00

I've for a long time been a fan of the subversion of media in and by advertising – as in, and excuse the unabashed self-promotion, THEC's Thailand Open campaign – though this Cyberbullying spot is the first time I've seen media made as the idea online.

Although the video production quality is a just a bit too polished and the faux Youtube graphic ever so slightly off (both points are really only caveats) this work really punches.

Not taking stick anymore.

2010-01-30T09:43:00.001+07:00

Fulfilling the societal potential Brand Republic's Rory Sutherland talks of while rejecting the weapons of Naomi Klein's noughties activism – propaganda, protests, lawsuits and boycotts – in favour of coaxing reform of vendor behaviour positively with financial reward and improved reputation, Carrotmob are re-enforcing the most basic rule of the market: that the market holds the force.

The collective support of outlets that apply previously agreed-upon changes to social and environmental working practices and procedures is achieved through none other than the materialist's favourite pastime – shopping.

At a supermarket aisle near you soon.

All we need.

2010-01-21T00:06:00.009+07:00

I have a vile contempt for the use of emoticons and other such faddy pseudo-punctuation, but this, the SarcMark, for sarcasm – the first serious addition to the Arboretus Punctuationitis – there is a need for. Really.

Via The Guardian.

Prize draw.

2009-12-31T15:31:00.001+07:00

Offering cash rewards to grasses of benefit fraudsters is one thing, but actually giving bounty directly to criminals seems an altogether wilder crime-tackling tactic – though scheming Bangkok police recently faked a prize draw by sending out congratulatory letters informing over a dozen convicted criminals that their ID card numbers had been picked out of a hat and they'd won big, all in a sly attempt to draw the hard criminals in.

The cons, many of them months on the run and among them rapists and thieves, were pounced on when they turned up to collect the swag – TV sets and cash cheques being amongst the advertised prizes – and given rather less attractive jail sentences instead.

Via popular redneck expat forum ThaiVisa.

How does £3.50 sound?

2009-12-04T09:15:00.000+07:00

Following on from Schofield's marvelous vendor bullying spot comes another dramatization of the poor treatment of creative freelancers – this time in animated form using Xtranormal's Text-to-movie software.

Mental Designer's Graphic designer Versus Client melds all the madness and patronizing megalomania of every bitch of a client you've ever met into one brutal assault on honest decency, undervaluing and disregarding the creative process and spitting in the face of professionalism with the common client insult of half-hearted familiarity.

Obey the lure.

2009-11-30T15:48:00.005+07:00

While the police mannequins that have popped up on Bangkok street corners over the past few months have not really posed a serious deterrent – as the boys in brown, in their last, permanent inactive posts, are far too easy to detect as being the dummies they are from a distance of even a block away – there is one theory that this is all part of a bigger, less innocuous ploy.

Eventually, so familiar with seeing the plastic patrol cops all over town, Bangkok drivers may be lured into a false sense of security and naturally begin to speed by every intersection, confident that the only eyes upon them are resin; though the real police meanwhile may just take advantage of this lax attitude and reappear on duty, keeping as still as the dummies themselves (something that shouldn't prove to difficult for some considering their lack of manoeuvrability) thus catching out the lackadaisical motorists and fining them (all very fairly) on the spot.

Photography by Asit Prueangwet.

Downside up.

2009-11-29T10:16:00.000+07:00

Thailand has long demonstrated true creative innovation in the fields of graphic, interior and product design but has, quite understandably, never been famed for its inventive use of English copy – not for want of trying – though the corner now might have been turned.

Either error has played the mother of invention and a poor parking lot signage order (double the amount of 'up' signs needed and no 'downs') forced Bumrungrad hospital into a resourceful rethink, or the signs are part of a deliberate design choice with an intentional economy of words. Either way it's a playful inversion and a sign that the craft of copywriting is on the, er, up.

Photography by Asit Prueangwet.

Plane Stupid.

2009-11-27T00:23:00.011+07:00

In spite of rising scepticism – specifically the exposure of the conspiracy behind the 'anthropogenic warming myth' – climate change propaganda is continuing to get stronger it seems with agencies like Mother London creating hard-hitting commercials for the anti-aviation expansion group Plane Stupid featuring dead polar bears falling from the sky.

And whether or not you buy into the stat that there are more bears now than in 19XX, if you think shorthaul flights are, er, a bare necessity then in my opinion you are plane stupid. Our earth needs looking after whether it's getting dangerously hot or not right now and filling the atmosphere with CO2 is never (ever) going to make the world a better place to live.

Directed by Rattling Stick's Danny Kleinman.

Via Brand Republic.

The unfairest of them all.

2009-11-01T12:04:00.004+07:00

Having spent too much in the hands of Apple Care recently, I'm starting to feel like duped Snow White. Despite the fact that I put my Mac through daily processor-heavy full-HD FCP rendering it still doesn't really seem fair.

Nothing though would sway me to switch to the world of PC.

Stencil by Banksy.

Slee-py TV?

2009-10-20T00:00:00.004+07:00

With either malfunctioning units in the case of the Sondhi assassination attempt or unverifiable footage in the case of the King Power airport scandal, the CCTV unit has come under some scrutiny in Thailand of late.

It's still surprising though that dreamy, suburban hi-so shopper oasis The Crystal has stuck its neck out be offering customers that little extra bit of personalised car park care in the shape of security guards strategically sat aloft in high-seat Baywatch beach chairs – as although the context switch (from beach or tennis court to car lot) is a deft and innovative design move, it remains strangely DIY for such a luxury mall.

As to its efficiency, only time will tell. The guards we saw appeared upright and hawk-like when we were there exposed by the midday sun – even though the car lot was empty – but what with their general reputation for a snooze, we just hope that when dusk arrives sleepiness won't kick in.

Photography by Asit Prueangwet.

A nice change.

2009-10-13T23:55:00.001+07:00

It's easy to knock True as a brand for their unfocussed and frivolous product line extensions and general air of unwarranted hype – but for showcasing relevant, utile and engaging design such as this one has to tip one's hat.

Easily mistaken as an architectural leftover or structural orphan, Thai architect Duangrit Bunnag's Magic Mirror, housed on the third floor of True's Siam Square boutique store, is a cleverly understated piece of function-led design that ensures you never have leave the fitting room to show off what you're trying on. The electrical current that charges the crystaline film that renders the walls opaque (for while you're getting changed) is disengaged when the door is pulled ajar, allowing the glass to return to its transparent state when you're ready to parade whatever you've picked up from off the rail.

The really nice change though is the appearance of such a truly genuine triumph of design in a site of such popular appeal.

Photography by Asit Prueangwet.

Modeled by Kwan & Gift.

Sillapim.

2009-10-11T14:14:00.015+07:00

With US regulators extending current laws to end blogger payola I thought as an act of defiance I'd celebrate the occasion with some rampant cronyistic promotion.

Cutely-dubbed Thai illustrator and designer Sillapim (real name = Pimduan Watcharapruk, sillapin = artist in Thai) produces spectacular hand-drawn pieces in ink with luscious lines and exquisite organic details.

Check out her blog here.

Sweet home.

2009-09-29T11:57:00.015+07:00

Once a luxury (think 867 cable stations) and now the bane of many gadget geeks, choice or rather a desire to have it filtrated into a united form, has motivated 173 mostly frothy comments and 153 diggs, a response that has in turn egged on web programmers and platform providers Teehan + Lax to actualize a dream interface the pair were initially only speculating about in their blog.

The dream app is a live iPhone home screen featuring bespoke, scrollable lists of notifications tracking everything from missed calls, unread email and calendar events to Facebook, Twitter and Tripit updates. T+L describe it as: "A screen that doesn't require you to scan for red dots with numbers inside of them. Instead it displays information and notifications of things that are new and relevant to you."

Deadly simple and very sweet.

Follow T+L's progress on Twitter.

'Sor' point.

2009-08-18T01:55:00.008+07:00

To manipulate the impact of the truth via a mass media smokescreen relying on the timely release of important news from one government department to distract public attention away from the error or evil of another is without question wicked; to attempt to achieve this effect through trumping one's own foul play with still greater controversy is pure insanity – though it seems such an improbable ploy may not be entirely without success.

It's by no mere coincidence that in a matter of days the Thai Ministry of Culture have unveiled their motion-picture industries ratings system and announced their plan to sponsor the historical epic Tamnan Somdej Phra Naresuan (Legend of King Naresuan) Parts III and IV. Neither moves have gone totally unnoticed, though as per usual it's the back pages and the web blogs where all the real reporting is going on – largely the result of course of self-censorship.

Bangkok Post columnist Kong Rithdee points out both banning and cutting of a film are still possible and that it remains uncertain if the board will demand scenes cut before issuing a rating or not. And while it’s this hidden seventh category – apparent by its omission or at least lack of icon – which has caused the most consternation (as it clearly poses the greatest threat to filmmakers) it's the ส่งเสริม (promote) category that is, in my view, potentially the most worrying – especially in light of the financial aid that seems to be given to particular films of a certain ilk.

(Khun Kong also makes a case for the unjustness of arguably Thailand’s most successful film director receiving funding for his latest project while hundreds of indie filmmakers are left translating their treatments so they can hunt for cash overseas.)

Not only will the existence of official endorsement allow (possibly even encourage) censors to act corruptly, pocketing bribes for an official stamp of approval, but with such an official PR blessing in place (unquestionably as part of a continued overall panic to force the populous to abide to a strict conservative moral code) the very fabric of the currently flagging Thai liberal culture will be put under threat – with anyone at least slightly susceptible to a fad being turned away from the avant-garde by being turned on to screenings of didactic, preachy poppycock and pointless, saccharine fluff.

Via one of my favourite Thai-based Twitterers – Wise Kwai.

Pretty vacant?

2009-08-14T13:09:00.005+07:00

Numbers are everything. Looks are more.

Pretty or pretty vacant?

Spotted in Bangkok marble mall Mahboonkrong.

A cut above.

2009-08-10T18:39:00.007+07:00

Business cards that allow brand ambassadors (= staff) to demonstrate brand talent to potential citizens/clients on the spot. What Stefan Sagmeister was going on about back at Adfest last year.

For the Glamour Institute of Hair & Design.

Via Swiss Miss.

Far from child's play.

2009-08-10T09:23:00.003+07:00

Another campaign for the much-scammed Land Rover brand, but nothing complicated or tenuous, just super-efficient, clear-as-day dramatization of the thought – truly powerful as a piece of communication as the execution is so startlingly close to the insight.

All in all, deadly simple – but far from easy to pull off.

Animal farm.

2009-08-03T11:58:00.002+07:00

I never give much time to the forwarded junk that enters my email inbox, but with all this talk of remodeling the financial architecture of the world the following models seemed relevant.

Socialism: You have two cows, and you give one to your neighbour.

Communism: You have two cows. The State takes both and gives you some milk.

Fascism: You have two cows. The State takes both and sells you some milk.

Nazism: You have two cows. The State takes both and shoots you.

Bureaucratism: You have two cows. The State takes both, shoots one, milks the other, then throws the milk away.

Traditional Capitalism: You have two cows. You sell one and buy a bull. Your herd multiplies, and the economy grows. You sell them and retire on the income.

Surrealism: You have two giraffes. The government requires you to take harmonica lessons.

A Corporation: You have two cows. You sell one, and force the other to produce the milk of four cows. Later, you hire a consultant to analyse why the cow has dropped dead.

Via Nicky.

The good isn't always the enemy of the great.

2009-07-29T16:19:00.010+07:00

Permanently secure in the annals of common trivia, the often-posited myth that The Great Wall of China is the only man-made structure that can be seen from space isn't the only falsehood surrounding the architectural feat. Ironically, the very legend itself cunningly reinforces a greater lie about The Wall: that the wall is in fact a wall.

It isn't. What it is is rather a series of (admittedly in some cases extremely lengthy) walls, though often with quite significant gaps in between.

From a cursory look at historical accounts, it seems that where hillocks and crests prevailed various dynasties largely (and lazily) got away with leaving chunks out, giving the impression (from a distance at least) of wall where in fact there was none – a technique that has lead to more than one long-term Beijing expat friend trying to put me off visiting the (tourist part of the) site, contending that it's a bit of a cheat, not that exciting and therefore ultimately only actually worthy of being called 'The Good Wall'.

Good here is though really truly great, with this illusion of defence deserving of going down in history as one of the most effective pieces of tactical communication ever – bar perhaps the Greeks' Trojan Horse. For a smaller than apparently necessary investment, the Chinese have done well. Even if The Great Wall hasn't always been entirely successful at keeping the Mongols out, the structure has kept enough tourists and Trivial Pursuits gamers in awe over the last century or so to be worthy of the title.

Thanks to heavyweight, Think Tank-winning blogger Tantramar for jogging my memory.

Free-lancing.

2009-06-29T10:08:00.011+07:00

Working freelance or as part of a small creative collective or even boutique agency puts you at the mercy of larger corporations, with their in-demand demeanor, unflinching, hard-faced approach to negotiating, archaic, bureaucratic finance departments and sluggish payment processes.

Bullied exasperatingly so by bigger corporate fish, one is left wondering how ludicrous this vendor-client power play would seem if translated to other sectors – and that's just the thought that motivated this Scofield Editorial film.

And while this does leave you wondering how many of the production crew worked on the job for nothing, it is spot on, nonetheless, and therefore a great use of their free time – really.

Sharp thinking?

2009-06-25T20:35:00.012+07:00

O&M Bangkok won Silver at Cannes this year for a campaign for Wusthof knives...

...after not winning at Cannes (but everywhere else) last year with the same ad for Black & Decker.

Pizza rebut.

2009-06-13T00:08:00.008+07:00

Lack of authenticity has long been a personal grievance of mine, so often and so vast is the chasm between advertising claim and actuality, but in the case of Pizza Hut (Thailand) it is how the corporate giant pays for the promise that is preposterous.

As obvious and dull as it is as a USP, speed is mindlessly wheeled out again in this category, only of course in the capital, Bangkok, legendary traffic and tropical thunderstorms make delivery an impossible proposition to deliver on – though that doesn't stop Pizza Hut from offering (proudly and aggressively via print, web and call center) this deal: if your delivery's late, you get your total order for free. Which is fine if the company foots the bill, but they don't – they only pay half; the delivery guy or girl pays the rest.

And herein lies the trick. It's a corporate gamble, but the odds are heavily in favour of Pizza Hut, as in most cases their almost unanimously Buddhist, 100% superstitious consumer base will react to the fawning self-pity of the failed delivery guy or girl at the door with either sympathy, compassion or เกรงใจ.

Whatever one's response the late arrival of one's pizza leaves a tremendously nasty taste in the mouth – either in the knowledge that the delivery staff (who earn little more than the national daily Thai minimum wage of between 148 and 203 baht or between 4-6 USD) caught in traffic or rain will be docked up to two day's wages or because you the consumer are left eating cold, paid-for pizza and feeling cheated.

Either way it is a scam – a scam that has been going on since 2003.

And this is from a parent company awarded for personal staff development.

Brands that favour their consumer base at the expense of their underpaid staff or that cheat their consumer base with guilt need to be exposed.

Let this be the beginning of a boycott – until the company can pay for tardiness themselves.

Easily hooked.

2009-06-11T01:17:00.007+07:00

It's easy to get hooked by good design.

Via Droog.

Star Lores.

2009-06-01T23:26:00.002+07:00

Under normal circumstances you realise I leave film criticism to the likes of Philip French, Xan Brooks, Jason Solomons, or even Adam and Matty at Filmspotting, but by boldly going where no captain of any Trek narrative has gone before, Abrams has forced me into comment.

By adopting the fairy tale functions of Russian formalist Valdimir Propp, Abrams slickly propels what would have been a trek into a skywalk. Having Roddenberry's science fiction cast reading from Lucas' fantasy script is genius and tantamount to having The Beatles playing The Stones, though it's his adherence to Vulcan logic that's clearly his masterstroke: featuring Nimoy in cameo and therefore dovetailing the film with the 60s series. The love triangle between Spock, Kirk and the now lovely Uhura adds romance where before there was only bromance and leaves the audience begging to know who will be star-dating who in the sequel.

No bull.

2009-05-09T12:47:00.006+07:00

While over at The Musings of an Opinionated Sod a brand of bog roll really not to be, er, poo-pooed boldly presented itself.

Initially art (not novelty) and now a fully-fledged FMCG, Jed Ela's ShitBegone is really no bull. As the Poop Report so clearly states "ShitBegone is art masquarading as commerce, and is succeeding in both worlds", and as Jed Ela himself tidily explains in perfect marketspeak, the piece, essentially a by-product of Duchampian readymades and commodity-art, is now in full "commodity stream" – while fulfilling one of the key contemporary functions of modern art: operating as a "system for the production of knowledge."

Capping the occasion.

2009-05-04T12:01:00.008+07:00

Seeing as I actually do have all my best ideas in the bathroom – something I've attributed to both the sudden physical shift from my working space to the smallest room in the house, and to the intense, fiery red walls of my own hong nam – I decided to celebrate the enlightenment (elevating the process to a contemporary creative custom) with a 'Brain' shower cap from Bangkok's quirky product design studio Propaganda.

That's as far as it goes though and so the purchase of a Dive Slate will just have to wait.

Delete.

2009-05-04T09:16:00.007+07:00

We've seen the street fight back before in the shape of pockets of Brandalism, but now direct volunteer action has reached an unprecedented scale – with NYC collective New York Street Advertising Takeover (or NYSAT) whitewashing 126 unregistered (and unsightly) bill boards that were up until now being used illegally. And the good news too is that in most cases the replacement imagery is more pleasing to the eye than the typical corporate clutter that it's supplanted.

Via social media master Neil Perkin.

Snatch Wars.

2009-04-22T13:38:00.006+07:00

I don't usually bother with Youtube remixes but this is quality.

Brick Vader, 'London's Lord of the Sith', stars in a mash-up collision of the East End and our favourite galaxy far, far away.

Via Igor.

Real bite.

2009-04-15T02:14:00.002+07:00

After the recent furore concerning Middle Eastern/Asian scam work, (covered here by Anibus, here by Scamp and here by the Opinionated Sod) it's great to see some work from the region with real bite produced for a client that actually belongs to an agency.

And not only does this work tie in nicely with our penchant for pink/brown art direction, our continuing Easter chocolate theme and at least one other post featuring work involving teeth, it's also another, er, shining example of boundary-smashing stuff for Colgate.

If this runs, then really hats off to Y&R – for turning you back on interruptive/distractive advertising, putting creative before media buying and for taking on the logistical feat of embedding a piece of communication within the product of another brand. It was worth every gram of fat you put on chewing through however many Haagen-Dazs or Hershey's you did to get to the idea.

Via the consistently enlightening Angus Whines.

Sweet design.

2009-04-12T14:01:00.007+07:00

Candy for the eyes or aural pleasure in the shape of sexy, sultry, anthropomorphic phone calls featuring the Chocolat Factory product offering telling you how much it wants you?

Either way, instant online gratification is all yours from a bold but tasteful brand that offers more appetizing bites than chocolate body parts.

Ultimately more a functional factory than a steamy site; cute rather than hot – but, of course, less fattening than the real thing.

One product range that deserves the axe.

2009-04-12T09:38:00.003+07:00

I've been lobbying clients for the alignment of product and brand communications for some time now, and truly believe that it's often the product that needs tweaking (read: overhauling) as much as the communications. The metamorphosis though must always be based on an authentic, compelling and resonant insight. And with the Axe Dark Temptation it isn't.

My initial instinct was that this range had an odd, er, flavour, and from my cursory check of on online opinions hundreds of others (mainly women) appear to agree; but in real terms the strategy flaw is this: as much as (mainstream) heterosexual men want to be attractive to women, they also want a fragrance that doesn't compromise their own sense of masculine identity.

And if you're a gay man, then the proposition (more chicks) doesn't have any pull at all.

A futher issue is that the product reeks of desperation. Do potential consumer targets also purchase genital-enlargement pills, I wonder?

As an Easter gimmick, I'll give it to you, the Axe chocolate line is certainly more original than some of the Cadbury's Creme That Egg entries, but ultimately the over the middle and long-term a chocolate deodorant is really going to start to smell off.

And I'd usually some credit to an idea that seemed to make perfect sense in the shower but then not in the real world, though I somehow think that wasn't even the case here.

Showing teeth.

2009-04-10T11:15:00.006+07:00

Visually strong problem-solution illustration for a dentist by Michael Hane & Remo Caminada.

Via the appropriately titled SeeSaw blog.

Black is the new green.

2009-04-09T13:20:00.001+07:00

Google's more cosmetic response to Earth Hour though reeks of greenwash.

Earth-moving?

2009-04-09T12:10:00.005+07:00

Call it purely symbolic, but it still shows some kind of strength to withhold your product offering in the name of environmentalism, as Nat Geo did last week in suspending all programming for exactly 60 minutes during Earth Hour.

No hope.

2009-04-05T22:35:00.009+07:00

I spotted this Japanese brand of cigarettes for sale when on one of my jaunts in Cambodia recently. Hope takes the grand prix for ironic brand names.

Thanks to John Allman for the image.

An untimely departure.

2009-04-05T09:00:00.005+07:00

Just as the wise are beginning to accept a need for a full-on toxic flush and just as the rest of us are finding frugality in fending off the temptation to shop, this shamelessly evil monster of a campaign enters into the arena. Never before have I reviled such a piece of marketing. Puma's Hello seemed a bit limp conceptually but was generally fairly harmless, but this beast is both bereft of ideas and guilty of pure and wanton voracity; evil also for its sheer size, garish design and unrivaled ubiquity.

In a world where only the fittest brands will survive, success will ultimately come from participatory, consumer-centred, non-disruptive communications with utility and bite – but in the meantime corporations are preying on the weaknesses of the consumer, seeing them more as a victim than a citizen. One could argue that there's never been a more vital need for money and therefore Visa are offering a valid service, but really in this climate such giants ought to be demonstrating tough love and offering to slash your debt, not wildly offering to increase it. The financial success of any credit operator rides on their ability to get their clients to borrow and get into the red. Their strategy is fundamentally of getting you to lose money. They call it 'money management', but however it's phrased it's tantamount to an increase in credit and therefore an increase in debt. However you look at this stuff, it's untimely and evil.

She didn't do it.

2009-04-04T18:42:00.014+07:00

Usually I leave film criticism to Philip French and others that have made a profession out of it – even though filmmaking is a large part of what I do – but I am, occasionally, forced to comment. And this is one of those occasions.

A big fan of Danny Boyle – and in particular his early trilogy of Shallow Grave, Trainspotting and A Life Less Ordinary – I enjoyed his recent Slumdog Millionaire, as clearly much of the world did, sweeping the boards at the Academy Awards and the BAFTAs as it did, but felt the film was marred by a couple of gaping flaws.

Firstly, unless one is Luhrmann, Gilliam or a melodramatic Bollywood director, one has to choose between fantasy or social realism – or risk fusing them awkwardly. (And just because your film is shot in Bombay doesn't make you a Bollywood director.) The naivety and level of education attributed to the protagonist in Slumdog so far exceeds that of a boy with Jamal's slum background his meteoric rise seems just too implausible – no matter how many didactic, life-revealing experiences he has had.

My real contention though with Slumdog is with its title. To give away the outcome of a film in the film name is to have the dénouement unravelled before you've even bought your cinema ticket. And this is exacerbated further by the fact that the film is being toted as 'the feelgood movie of the decade' on posters the world over. If the title didn't give it away, at no point during the movie is anyone unsure as to the conclusion – especially as the film is feelbad until five minutes from the end. In short, calling the film Slumdog Millionaire is tantamount to calling Othello She Didn't Do It.

Low-cost living.

2009-03-23T09:03:00.001+07:00

I owe McDonald's some lovin' after pointing you to this corporate intervention and this sick subvertisement.

This very witty and laid back spot – shot by maverick LA-based director Jayson Moyer (one half of Thunderbird, the team behind Little Joy's Unattainable) – isn't McDonald's most recent TV work but quite perhaps their most portentous as every sector of every industry (including low-cost tanning) is really now beginning to feel the pinch.

God is the idea.

2009-03-20T17:47:00.003+07:00

In an attempt to deliver themselves from the evil of mediocrity and the wickedness of the commonplace, increasingly now advertising creatives are beginning to question one of the very core tenets of their trade: the existence of the idea as God. Over the last year or two, the deity has been re-born in execution or in some cases media, much to the acclaim of the award judges and online ad hunters all over; but for the first time ever our neat advertising axiom has been completely turned on its head: God now is the idea (or not depending on which London bus stop you're at.)

In a moment of absurd evangelical atheism, writer Ariane Sherine decided to counter what she saw as threatening religious rhetoric promising hell and damnation to non-Christians – and what started out as a vain plea on The Guardian's CIF blog has transformed into a world-wide and web-wide cult.

The Atheist Bus Campaign – originally to be funded entirely by public donations (Richard Dawkins, author of The God Delusion, donated more than £5000) but ultimately largely sponsored by The Humanist Association – has garnered more PR than any single piece of marketing in the last year, the buzz including several Guardian articles and two Scamp blog posts attracting over one hundred comments each.

For all its striking design and cocky pink copy, the ad has a shamefully obvious strategic flaw. The inclusion of 'probably' – admittedly forced on the advertisers by the Advertising Standards Agency, but embraced by both Sherine and Dawkins – puts the proposition more than a step away from atheism. In fact, it makes the line fatally agnostic.

And considering Sherine's initial issue with the pro-Christian propaganda (that it was errant and unsubstantiated) this piece seems oddly much the same, except that – and this is my second qualm – it’s trying to spread or unsell a faith.

It's one thing promoting rational, empirical, science-based atheism but it seems a little below the belt (and a real sin in the ad agency world) to base a campaign on the possible shortcomings of your competitors. Rather than making futile attempts to disprove a faith – and funding the cocaine habits of London-based media buyers – why not be part of the solution for our dying earth and put your energy into a real cause?

101 braindead ways to fill a brochure.

2009-03-10T18:24:00.014+07:00

Creative clichés to be avoided like the, er, plague.

Via Scamp.

Zero credit.

2009-03-08T11:23:00.005+07:00

Go? In a word, no.

Bucking the trend.

2009-03-05T07:21:00.004+07:00

A fine example of the type of authenticity that's necessary to give your brand true bite.

Forbidden fruit.

2009-03-04T19:36:00.003+07:00

With my other half threatening to get the new MacBook Pro I felt, for a moment, like Adam in the Garden of Eden.

Illustration by Banksy.

Via Visualize.

Dry wit.

2009-03-02T20:32:00.009+07:00

Someone, somewhere on Ads of the World has probably seen this before, but I certainly thought it was, er, fresh.

Work by Rick and Barney.

Via Scamp.

Krafty buggers.

2009-02-20T23:09:00.004+07:00

As our good friend and punk planner Charles Frith has pointed out, these are indeed profound times. As even ATL blog god Scamp has noted, the future is elsewhere. And as many advertisers continue to churn out disruptive, hard sell dirge – with increasingly mad abandon as the fiscal year-end approaches – we must tip our hat to Kraft for offering a digital experience that has real value through pure and canny utility.

In the shape of the iFood Assistant iPhone application, Kraft have made a wily move directly related to audience insight. The iFood Assistant application offers recipes, shopping lists, cooking lesson video clips and even a store locator to help you find all you need for your next meal.

So useful is the app, Kraft have even actually got away with charging for it – a lifetime fee of 99 cents. Though revenue's just the beginning of the benefits for the food giant. iFood Assistant not only acts as a platform for a stream of brand communications, directing a willing consumer base to buy Kraft everything but the software also functions as an open channel for other branded content.

Via Brandweek.

End to a Bushy tale.

2009-01-22T08:43:00.006+07:00

Positioning is everything – as this cheeky ad for hair removal professionals Veet testifies in the Sydney Daily Telegraph.

Respect to Euro RSCG Sydney.

Via The Inspiration Room.

Bagsy.

2009-01-17T17:29:00.014+07:00

The only thing worse than finding your bag has been thrown around by airport 'chuckers' is not being able to find your bag at all – and that doesn't always mean that it isn't there, it's just hard to distinguish from the luggage of all the other people who benefitted from that Samsonite recession sale.

Handily, Jump and Artoyz have developed customizable luggage that lets you verbally or pictorially tag your bag in a way that hopefully sets you apart from the rest. Not sure how much use this would have been though on US Airways flight 1549.

Via Notcot.

Worthy ape.

2009-01-07T11:05:00.000+07:00

When a piece of work that was conceived in 2007 is being toted as best ad of 2008, you know it must be good. And it is.

And when a piece of work has been spoofed and reworked online as much as it has (with popular Wonderbra and Children In Need parodies) you know that it'll take a truly special remix to even be worthy of really mentioning in the same breath. And it has.

The abstract and much lauded viral spot, 'Gorilla' by Fallon for Cadburys – which secured 500,000 Youtube hits in its first week of release and over 3 million hits in total – has finally been aped perfectly by this worthy work for IFAW.

Via Happy Thought.

iPhone Mini.

2009-01-05T08:18:00.004+07:00

It's one thing copying a best selling brand name but an altogether different matter second guessing corporate giants and adding to a product line with fake versions of products that don't actually exist (yet). With Asian markets feeling the pinch of the global credit crunch though, it's really not surprising that second to making your own money is making up your own merchandise.

Available in IT malls regionwide, the iPhone Mini comes in three colours, first-gen grey, black and sparkly pink, and according to vendors boasts a key USP – the size of the iPhone Mini makes the tiny device particularly suitable for one's Asian mistress' petite hands.

Make note.

2009-01-02T15:27:00.003+07:00

The counterfeit racket in Southeast Asia it seems is not just limited to fair-game FMCGs and luxury goods like VCDs and Gucci handbags. Over the last year or two, street vendors have stepped up production to include specialist items like guide books and even pharmaceuticlas to their respective product ranges. And now, hard hit by the world economic collapse, those desperate enough – taking initiative from the US Federal Reserve – have moved into the big time and have started printing their own money (adding support to my case over the increasing fragility of the power of the message communicated by hard currency.)

In spite of anti-counterfeit features, over the last few weeks thousands of fake 1000-baht bank notes have been found circulating in Thailand – though the real sting is that's it not just the forgers (if caught) who get punished, but any unsuspecting citizen found passing dodgy cash along, unwittingly or not it seems.

Slow is smooth; smooth is fast.

2008-12-28T11:14:00.005+07:00

Christmas messages are often the bane of Christmas – dull and predictable in both content and delivery and only usually surprising in what they omit rather than what they contain. This year, thanks to Channel Four, and the President of Iran, Mahmoud Ahmedinejad, the whole affair has been fraught with controversy.

This post is the closest I’m going to get to one – this year or any year. And it comes in the form of a book review – a first for THWC.

I spotted In Praise Of Slow gathering dust (appropriately or not) in the bargain basement of my local Kinokuniya on Christmas Eve – oddly only days before the universal truth that is the headline of this post was passed onto me by a journalist and spiritual commentator friend of mine, Bevan Powrie. In doing so he had inadvertently lead me to the book – during what I felt like was an episode of his biurnal recurrence syndrome, but which he assures me was pure synchronicity, albeit a strong case of.

What compounded the oddity was that though this title is a long lost cousin of a family of exposes that I have read (including No Logo, Fast Food Nation, Authenticity and Blink) I’d never even come across this title, not even once, though it was written over four years ago. I guess I am just, er, slow. And I was about to see why that wasn’t a bad thing.

Though I find the existence of this collection of tributes to steady social revolutionaries (that denounce haste rather than pace and whose MO is about finding tempo giusto) more interesting than the actual book or its contents, my initial contention was, rather ironically, the book’s pace.

Stretching three points over 250 pages seemed a little gratuitous; the leisurely examples unnecessary, but I guess that’s Honore’s point – perhaps the very intention of the book is to encourage (read: force) the reader into long, drawn out appreciation.

Slow is also padded for another reason – to sell – but I would have paid more for an abridged version. [Interestingly enough, Honore almost anticipates (foretells) this.] Sidestep the filling if you like and the introduction and the conclusion go some way to telling his story.

In all fairness he does give the reader a pointer – but unfortunately it doesn't come soon enough. The chapter on reading slowly came, for me at 200-odd pages in, too late in the book – as I was already whizzing through the thing when it flagged me down. (Perhaps I'd be better off with Gleik's Faster. )

In spite of my initial criticisms though there are a number of profound insights within the pages of this text – along with of course understanding the how and why of Bevan’s message. And it wasn’t that the clock, rather than the steam engine or the Spinning Jenny, as my history master had me believe, was the single most important invention/fulcrum of the European industrial revolution; nor that time is the new money, the new currency of the 21st Century (apt though that it is as we collectively mourn the death of the dollar); more that in using time and speed to hide from death, we divide up time in such a way we become more acutely and bitterly aware of our end.

This is as fundamental as a message can get.

Whether you're manically scouring the shelves at Woolworths or crazily shopping online there's something in here for you (somewhere) – though I wouldn't necessarily rush out and buy a copy.

A wave of festive joy.

2008-12-24T07:57:00.001+07:00

Via Swiss Miss.

Fraud.

2008-12-21T19:34:00.016+07:00

We're all in the serious economic mess we're in right now because of the gravest piece of miscommunication of our generation. We trusted in the equity and value of the biggest brand of them all – the US dollar – and it was lying all along

Don't just do something, stand there.

2008-12-18T20:46:00.011+07:00

The vacuum of collective global anxiety has been filled to the brim by such colossal economic worry that our terminal fear over our environment it seems has been entirely displaced – even though the two issues are of course inextricably linked (by oil for one at least) – but the news is though that that has all changed now and in the shape of CNBC's Green Your Routine campaign hope has sprung forth.

And what makes this piece of communication so special is not just that the message is deadly simple or that it's based on a killer insight, but that it's totally indelible and entirely alive and well and living in the solution. (All valid additions to Scamp's slogan list.)

So like the campaign I'm praising, I'm going to big up the solution (in my title and image, which is quite a departure from the initial sketch that was this post originally – a bitch about another campaign, Think Green).

Firstly though, Think Green – a campaign that my friend and fellow blogger, Charles Frith has already made reference to astutely (here) – and a campaign that is the antithesis of GYR. It's a trendily-designed but ultimately wayward piece of rubbish with a core proposition that is dead – because asks it's audience to think and not act. The one execution I saw started with a vague comparison (that a large tree was equivalent to a 12,000-BTU air conditioning unit) before then limply moving on to suggest the reader plant trees. There is such a massive gulf between message and action (unless it was an ambient piece of course and I missed a dozen spades and a pile of earth and a packet of seedlings), that the thing must have just been conceived to earn the brand behind it social credit. (Ads from self-serving brands posing as concerned corporates may quite possibly be part of the reason why the green cause has trailed off.) Ironically, this is a total exercise in wastefulness.

Back to (part of) the solution. It's clearly in everything we do – as GYR tells us – but perhaps it's also in what we don't do. Perhaps the earth is telling us something and the economic headlock we're in is the earth's way of keeping us from doing too much. Perhaps we should be doing more by doing less.

Another one bites the dust.

2008-12-16T20:56:00.013+07:00

I try as I can to keep the focus of this blog and not get drawn into other spheres of debate, but when into the arena of lies and skullduggery that is politics blasts its truthful way a piece of communication most apt and cutting I can no longer refrain – even if I'm about two years late in taking note.

As yet another Thai prime minister is jilted, reminded I am of the poignant and powerful imagery of Thai Privy Councilor Prem Tinsulanonda. On the eve of the 2006 Coup d'état, Prem revealed piecemeal in an interview to the Far Eastern Economic Review the elements of an analogy that explains part of the paradigm that is the constitutional monarchy of the Kingdom of Thailand. (And one that shines a great amount of light on the response – or rather lack of – to the recent airport siege.) In this revealing interview, Prem likens the Thai prime minister to a jockey; the Thai government to a horse and in doing so shows a deep and true understanding of his brand, Thailand, an understanding that most brand managers in this part of the world can only dream of.

Eye-opener.

2008-12-11T11:36:00.009+07:00

Media agency Sybolix's graffiti campaign for Channel 4's Celebrity Big Brother – which uses cleaning fluid and water as an alternative to paint – truly caught my, er, eye. And not just for its carbon-friendly formula.

Smudged out of underpass tile grime, this work is both fresh and on-brand, and will hopefully set a precedent for ad agencies (and clients) all over, showing as it does that digital isn't the only alternative to paper and ink. (An approach Stefan Sagmeister has of course pioneered in advertising's sister industry of graphic design.)

It is, though, the low production cost that makes the work really such groundbreaking stuff. And if Happy Thought feels the piece's impermanence fails to justifies its price tag, I can only think that Sybolix must have charged real big for creative. (And fair enough, really.)

As for its ephemeral quality, I'm convinced the buzz such killer work creates far outweighs its fragility. And anyway, if the piece suffers from brandalism as this Sony work did, it's not like it's hard to reproduce or to find another dirty wall, now is it?

Via Happy Thought.

Brandalism.

2008-12-05T11:41:00.005+07:00

It's not just local councils who police the canvas of the streets; the underground's at it too – with a war on branded street art. Just try to get under the radar and become sub culture and you enter a world of apparently more genuine and authentic communicators intolerant of the empty promises of marketing, where Sony stencils like these get obliterated in minutes.

If only the same forces exercised such power and taste above the line.

Via Happy Thought.

Not property.

2008-11-23T07:04:00.019+07:00

A corporation that's manufactured products long considered to be part of the public domain and therefore entirely free from actual or legal ownership (ball point pens, cigarette lighters, razors etc) has now, quite bizarrely, extended its product line to include the ultimate status object – the mobile phone.

Snatching a pen from a coworker's desk, pocketing another smoker's lighter or helping oneself to a razor from somebody else's bathroom cabinet (at least in one's student days) are actions that have all somehow escaped reprimand since these disposable products first arrived on the shelves back in the 1980s. Now, with the advent of a BIC mobile, are phones suddenly going to become disposable, too?

Retailing at 49 Euros and currently only available in France, the BIC phone is ready to go in more ways than one. It comes with 60 free minutes, the battery charged, and the SIM card already in place.

Obsession.

2008-11-10T21:34:00.003+07:00

Having recently bigged up French graffiti artist Zevs and paid homage to other subvertisements I thought it only right to post my personal Banksy favourite.

If ever there were a yardstick for insights, then this would be it. Planners and creatives take note.

Via Flickr.

Obamarama.

2008-11-09T12:59:00.006+07:00

Bang Gang perfectly visualize the teutonic political shift I was getting at in my last post.

Change.

2008-11-08T18:52:00.008+07:00

Ad Age's Pete Snyder provides a comprehensive analysis of Barack Obama's exploitation of time shifting and consumer control, but for some unexplained reason chooses to ignore the brutal simplicity and single-mindedness of the brand strategy behind the election win.

Both far and deeply-reaching, the relevance, consistency, resonance and sheer power of the positioning statement, 'change', is quite remarkable. And when you consider the accompanying visual imagery – a seismic reversal of a colour (white) that has been predominant since the inauguration of George Washington in 1789 – you have a real milestone in marketing, as well as political, history.

The idea is not dead.

2008-11-05T09:03:00.005+07:00

Creative genius handed down from one of the godfathers of advertising Dave Trott.

"I was at art school in New York, and one of the projects we were given was to advertise yourself. Like everyone else I started by thinking what was different about me. Then, once I’d got that sorted, I wrote some ads. Then thinking about the best media for it. Then we all went along to class to present our ideas.

The two guys who used to teach our class were from Doyle Dane Bernbach, and Delehanty Kurnit & Geller, two of the hottest agencies in town. As we were waiting they walked in with faces like death. They sat with their heads in their hands. They looked up at us with tears in their eyes. They said, “There isn’t going to be a class tonight.” They said, “We’ve just received this letter from the Dean. The best person in the class has been killed in a car crash. She was the person with the brightest future of her entire year, and now it’s all gone. If there was anyone in this entire year who was going to make an impact, anyone who was going to be great, it was her. And now she’s gone.”

They went on like that for about twenty minutes. And then she walked in. She’d been waiting outside the door, listening while they did her advertising for her. When she walked in they were speechless. They didn’t know whether to be relieved or hit her. They were so angry they just walked out. She knew that, in America, when anyone dies they get an automatic eulogy. So she had the Dean write the letter about the car crash, to get her teachers to advertise her themselves.

When they calmed down, they repeated that story all over town. They even carried the letter in their wallets to show advertising people all over New York. She became so famous that, by the time she got out of art school, she could have walked into a job at pretty much any agency on Madison Avenue. Now what I say is, if you need permission to be creative, you’re not really creative. You’re safe."

Dave Trott

Lovin' it.

2008-11-01T14:36:00.010+07:00

This corporate intervention by French graffiti artist Zevs dramatically illustrates the putrid nitrate slime found in many a burger – with bright yellow paint. Obviously not a fan of fast food but the artist at work it appears seems to be lovin' it.

Check out his other visual kidnappings here.

Via Pingmag.

Sick subvertisement.

2008-10-30T14:26:00.002+07:00

This abducted Millennium billboard further illustrates a growing trend in participant-friendly brand communications. Good to see the approach thriving in offline as well as digital communities.

Via Mucking About.

Bus(h) stop.

2008-10-25T14:13:00.007+07:00

Like most buses, one could argue this post is too late to get us where we want to go.

(We'll be there soon – in a matter of days.)

Via Funmint.

Shell sure.

2008-10-12T18:32:00.003+07:00

It appears that HSBC haven't totally cornered the market in tailored localization.

As this gas station pump sticker in Vientiane, Laos testifies, Shell seem to be reworking their long-running slogan – albeit organically, from the bottom up, in the most far flung of places, in order to conquer the world one language* at a time.

* 'Shell Sure' is a direct transliteration of the most natural, colloquial rendering of the slogan in Laos (and Thai) both in terms of diction and syntax.

The lifecycle of a blog post.

2008-09-27T10:00:00.005+07:00

If you want an example of what this might look like, check out one of the more controversial posts on splendid UK ad blog Scamp.

Via The Wrong Advices.

Lost in translation.

2008-09-27T01:38:00.009+07:00

A classic version of the 'What the client wanted' diagram with just a bit of spin.

This more developed version I created at Project Cartoon.

Phuket.

2008-09-13T09:32:00.002+07:00

I'm not one to rely on cheap throwaway gags in my blog and neither do I commend such behaviour in advertising but couldn't avoid posting this.

Stinking of desperation but quite understandable in these hard times, budget carrier Air Asia are not pulling any punches by employing this long running joke among ignorant British package tourists to Thailand as a headline. I guess in a bid to ensure that they're not the next XL, Air Asia probably just thought well, er, Phuket.