I personally love my iGadgets and digital hookups, but have we become a little too reliant on these products? So much so that it’s sucking up that precious bit of slack we once had that allowed us some space to think?

The famous Maltese philosopher Edward De Bono believes that the overly social media which defines the modern era is making us intellectually lazy, and too reliant on technology to do our thinking for us. Recent UCLA research confirms this stating that the internet, video games and all manner of technological multitasking is making us less reliant on our magical minds.

Technology and information is obviously useful, but sometimes it can be just as useful to have a time out; to say adios to your electronic addictions and hello to your own thoughts.

On the toilet, in the shower, on holiday – it’s no secret that we come up with our best thinking when we have space to think things through properly. The world’s most successful inventor, 81 year old Japanese eccentric Dr NakaMats (creator of the floppy disk and hundreds of other clever inventions), still takes notes while swimming underwater (using his self-designed Plexiglass Waterproof Notepad of course). This is where he comes up with all of his best ideas, and I think he’s onto something.

With Facebook sneakily fading out privacy underneath our indifferent noses, and now Google+ tracking and monitoring our life with every click, how can we find the space to think? How can we free ourselves from this technological servitude and regain the spontaneity that’s required for truly great ideas to rise and flourish?

Perhaps the next trend will be Unsocial Media? I had an idea today (in the shower, obviously) for a new App – the Air App™. Plug it in and it automatically shuts off you phone, email, iTunes, Twitter, Facebook and every other supposedly indispensible technological accessory, App and website in your life.

Now get ready to do absolutely nothing. Take a deep breath and relax – your brain will do the rest. Then as soon as your AirTime™ has expired, the Apps and gadgets will return, and a technological tsunami will engulf your life once more. But for a few precious moments, you will be able to think. Oh, the luxury of nothing….

Hub Group needs a great SAM or AD to join the team.

This is the perfect role for an account service professional with a passion for consumer insight, great creative work, production excellence and is looking for a better work/life balance.

You will have a great deal of autonomy and support/mentoring as you need it. You will have your own projects to run and support the Managing Director in new business.

All account service members are highly strategic and very much involved in the creative process so we encourage your passion and ideas.

A lucrative incentive scheme is available for all team members. Digital will be a big part of the role, so a passion and experience in this area would be preferable.

• Mainstream advertising campaign experience (TV, radio, outdoor, press)
• Brand design experience (logo, collateral, packaging)
• Digital campaign experience (website, banners, social, viral)
• Media Agency liaison experience (digital and mainstream)
• Strategic planning involvement
• Job quoting and managing job costs
• Print experience a bonus

Sometimes they seem like a perfect fit, and sometimes less so, but they almost always generate publicity. And isn’t that the point?

When a brand ambassador goes bad (i.e.entangled in a’scandal’ that contradicts the image the brand wants to portray), shareholders and executives panic, the media goes on the attack, and the public takes to Twitter to have a dig (or in those innocent pre-internet days they’d have what’s known as a ‘conversation’ with a ‘human being’). That is to say, the brand is being talked about.

During the cola wars of the 80s, Coke and Pepsi realised that the right endorsement would help them sell more fizzy drink. Pepsi signed up Madonna for a $5 million year-long endorsement contract. Then she released one of the most controversial music videos of all time, Like a Prayer, in which she sleeps with Jesus. Religious groups protested and Pepsi got scared, terminating the relationship. They still allowed her to keep the $5 million though – probably because the publicity generated far exceeded that figure.

More recently, Tiger Woods’ well-documented sexual indiscretions and the resulting backlash lost him a number of lucrative sponsorships from brands unwilling to be associated with a serial philanderer. However some brands decided he was worth the risk and stayed with him, including Nike (who know a thing or two about endorsements).

A twist on the bad brand ambassador concept happened last year, when Jersey’s brightest (no really, he glows orange) Mike “The Situation” Sorrentino was the subject of a statement released by Abercrombie & Fitch. They expressed concern over the reality TV star’s fondness for the brand, which they thought was contrary to their aspirational nature, and offered him money to wear a different brand. The ensuing publicity was huge, and A&F’s PR team would have received a tidy bonus. Or perhaps Abercrombie owe thanks to Mike, because their sales actually dropped after they banned him from wearing their gear. This would have actually been a huge shock to them… perhaps they really didn’t know their audience after all? In protest Mike wore a Abercrombie & Fitch style tee with the slogan “The Fitchuation”.

And let’s not forget that Australian celebs are no strangers to brand scandals. Shane Warne was paid a sizable fee to endorse Nicorette, but was subsequently seen having a smoke on a number of occasions in 1999. The then Australian Test vice-captain was forced to admit he smoked five days before the end of his four-month sponsorship deal, after discovering a London newspaper was going to publish a photo of him smoking in a Barbados bar. He said he had smoked one cigarette, the only one since he’d quit on New Year’s Day. The company said Warne had “shown considerable willpower in reducing his 40-a-day habit for the last four-month period” while using the product. However, one Australian cricket fan said she saw Warne smoking at least two cigarettes at a nightclub in March.

But the fact is that when it comes to the occasional celebrity misstep, many brands are prepared to take a risk and echo the sentiments of Oscar Wilde: “The only thing worse than being talked about is not being talked about.”

Paul Findlay | Creative Director

As far as the public was concerned, the man was the brand and the brand was the man. His uniform of black turtleneck, blue jeans and white sneakers was as iconic as Jerry Seinfeld’s getup, and the Apple brand mark itself, and although he was one of the richest CEOs in the world, he was also sort of your mate Jobsie. My Facebook feed was filled with tributes from friends, despairing over the loss of the man who gave us our most prized gadgets. Since when did we cry over CEOs? Evidence of just how successful a marketer Steve Jobs was…

In reality, Steve Jobs the brand was at odds with the man himself. A perfectionist and micromanager, he probably wasn’t quite as affable as you think, and even had a reputation for being a bully. There are heaps of stories about his harsh management style and how he’d push through his ideas and shoot down those he disagreed with (Adidas apparently cancelled a $10+ million iAd campaign due to his control freak tendencies). I suppose you can say this is all part and parcel, good point…

…But he even micromanaged his family. A strict pescetarian, it’s claimed that Jobs regulated his children’s diet, telling them what and when to eat it, and there’s no TV in the Jobsie household. It’s a lifestyle more in line with a Buddhist monk (Jobs was actually married in a Buddhist ceremony) than the larger than life CEO of such a fun and fashionable brand.

By many accounts he just wasn’t that nice. But does that even matter? Didn’t the innovative, world-changing products that he developed and fearlessly pushed through bring enough joy into people’s lives to cancel out his own less than lovely personality quirks? There’s a fine line between genius and insanity, and it seems pointless to critique a brilliant mind for its occasional flaws. And having never met the man myself, I don’t actually know what he was like – none of us do.

But here’s what I do know. He was a brave man that took business risks that changed technology and the world. He was a clever man who understood the importance of customer experience, and consequently made half the developed world his customer. He was a marketing visionary who realised the value of brand and knew just how to leverage the potential of his own one. And he was the driving force behind one of the most successful and iconic brands in the world, using willpower and vision to impact us all. It’s easy to speak ill of the dead. It’s a lot harder to emulate their successes. Good luck to new Apple CEO Tim Cook. He’s got a big turtleneck to fill.

Paul Findlay | Creative Director

I don’t know about you, but with all the nonstop ‘i’ talk, I’ve been enjoying the exact flip – Strip it right back to that old fashioned goodness I say! A friend recently gave me an old Sony record player (you know the classic one with walnut wooden veneer sides) as a house warming present. So I went looking for an old amp and some speakers to set it off – as much as the guy in the store wanted me to buy these Yamaha speakers ‘because they sound far more superior’ sorry Jim, no sale!! – I just love the sound of that nostalgic crackle and the warmth that comes from vinyl, you can listen to that clean sound anywhere – funnily enough my almost new Bose system is still sitting in an unpacked box.

…Anyway my point is that a few interesting businesses are popping up that celebrate the luxury of low-fi and some even take it a step further and hero the tradition of true craftsmanship, an art that seems to be extinct these days. For example here’s a brand called Dodocase (ah, see what they’re doing here with the brand name!…) who make great cases and covers for iPad’s (and other gadgets) using original book binding techniques, to make your iPad feel more like a hard backed book or Moleskin, rather than a computer. They’re also keeping these old trades in business through the process – It’s a really good story http://www.dodocase.com/blogs/about.

I’ve always been a sucker for a hand made product, you do tend to pay a bit more but the quality shines through and they really are built to last – It’s also good to know it keeps the classic values (and businesses) of the artisan alive at the same time.