Imagine how long it must have taken to co-ordinate this? Japanese band Sour get it. See, a little bit of time and effort has a whole lot of effect, I can’t imagine this would have cost them that much at all to create. Not to mention it’s a great song.

All the people in the video are fans of the band that are filmed over webcams.

My favourite bit is the little hug at the end, it cracks me up.

Thanks to @303 and @abroadabroadeh for sharing, made my morning.

As a kid I always thought 'Sherlock' was a ranking title, like Detective or Constable...

Observe:

• Finish book on train in morning.
• Trusty book exchange at work lets me done with only copies of obtuse sci-fi books, the DaVinci Code and some VHS tapes. Not very commuter friendly.
• Go to buy book on way home, decide on next book in Shopaholic series.
• Get overly offended that I have to pay almost $30 for a paperback book. I mean seriously who are they kidding?
• Remember $10 penguins at front of store.
• Put back overpriced chicklit book. (Don’t get me wrong, I really like Kinsella’s books, but a girl needs to budget).
• Buy Popular Penguin, (I know it doesn’t really matter what I choose because I know I’m going to get my money’s worth).
• Write blog instead of reading book.
• Read book.
• Lust after Robert Downey Jnr in anticipation of Holmes. (I know what I’ll be doing Boxing Day this year).

AMC have done a really good job with this campaign – MadmenYourself.

I’ve seen so many avatars change the last week, be it on Facebook or Twitter. It really is one of the most effective campaigns I’ve seen like this.

I think it works because:

1. they let you customise – we are all individuals (apologies to Monty Python).
2. they making it so damn easy to share – people are lazy, they want things to be easy. Being able to choose from 3 different downloads is hardly an amazing feature, but it’s so suggestive and easy that I just want to change my social network pics to my MadMen avatar.
3. they pull you in. They aren’t pushing and selling the show/product. You know it’s there, if you share the url you know it’s for Mad Men, but it isn’t aggressive. But you get suckered in by their funky graphics.

Strangely, I now feel like I need a cigarette…

I need Shazam for flower photos

I wish I had written down the name of this orchid. Does anyone know? I snapped it at the San Francisco Conservatory of Flowers. The description was about how the orchid had been cultivated to look like lipstick marks. It’s such a lovely idea – that someone would dedicate themselves to creating the perfect ‘kiss’ on an orchid.

I’ll have to admit that most of my knowledge about orchids comes from reading The Orchid Thief by Susan Orlean and watching Adaptation. Which, while thoroughly enjoyable,  I’m not sure is an entirely accurate depiction of the orchid world.

I was going to do a book review of The Orchid Thief, but I’ve been distracted by this feature on Google Books, which I have not noticed before:

Google Maps - The Orchid Thief

They’ve integrated Google maps and now show “Places mentioned in this book”. Just imagine when all online books allow you to whisk off to anywhere in the world that is listed in the book. With photographs and weather reports and local news. Or linked directly to a dictionary or thesaurus so you can know right away what a word or a culture reference is. It seems such a natural progression of the technology as linear narratives start to decline. As far as I know there isn’t anything doing this yet. Does anyone know examples of online or digital books doing this for novels or non-fiction books?

Who the hell wants a whole bag of blue M&Ms?

The very basis behind this idea is stupid. An entire bag of blue M&Ms!

Two by Two, Hands of Blue!

I picked up a bag without even looking at the promo on it. We opened them up in the movie theater and obviously being dark a few handfuls in thought, this is weird, all blue M&Ms so far.

Now I know some people say that all the colours taste the same, but they really don’t. They smell different so of course they’re going to taste different.

I felt entirely ripped off – when I buy M&Ms I want the whole range of colours, not just the colour I like the least. I mean to be fair it could have been any other colour I probably wouldn’t have cared as much.

I won’t by buying M&Ms for a while now, even if they are finishing up their stupid promotion.

If this has whetted your M&M appetitie, then Glen E. Burgess has an interesting post on some of the more interesting details of M&Ms . Did you know M&Ms stand for Mars and Murrie, founders of the Mars company?

1. Insult your audience

Do you really think that your audience won’t make comparisons? The original drumming gorilla ad has to be one of the most shared online videos. Even my dad has seen it, which is saying something. What, you think because we’re in Australia we’ve never heard of Phil Collins? That we won’t recognise one of the most well known drum solos out there? Seriously. That’s right, we all live underground in Oz and we’ve only just gotten this swish bang thing called electricity and one day we might be able to use the technology from the future. We hear it is called The World Wide Web.

2. Poor production values

Paul McIntyre at The Age reports that “Jeff Swann Cadbury’s general manager for chocolate marketing, says Cadbury deliberately did not apply ‘too much craft’ to the ad to reflect how people were making their own versions of the ad online.”

That might work as an excuse if they had dubbed the ad with some unknown local act and shown it on YouTube.

But they didn’t. They licensed one of the best selling Australian singles to play in television commercial spot. Worse, it doesn’t sync up at all with the gorilla’s drumming rhythm. It might as well be a badly dubbed Febreeze ad that they dumped on the Australian market and we’re expected to believe they’ve taken time in thinking about us because there aren’t any American accents in the ad.

3. Diffuse your offering

Yes everyone loves remixing their favourite lolcat, and great if you’ve got an audience and a fan base out there that is doing the same and spreading your ad around. But what was really the point in doing this for your own ad? Especially when you do it worse than some of the ‘amateur’ remixes out there.

On the flip side it makes me worried that all this escapism is a reflection of how tough times are.

Look at the most popular films from the 1930s, the rise of Hollywood and escapist musicals and dance movies. Top Hat (1935) is a great example of this. You would never know from just watching Fred and Ginger movies what the world was really like at that time.

Book covers - Excellent Women by Barbara Pym and Sense and Sensibility by Jane Austen

I’m loving all these beautiful hardbacks that are available at the moment. Publishers really need to up their game with so many books available online. They really need to focus on the tactile experience.

Just gorgeous.

Looking for more book cover porn?

I’ve been lurking at David Drummond’s blog for a while and he always provides a great break from my text heavy rss feeds with his beautiful book covers.

]]> https://mockingbirdpie.wordpress.com/2009/04/28/judging-a-book-by-its-cover/feed/ 0 92 robynemu Book covers - Excellent Women by Barbara Pym and Sense and Sensibility by Jane Austen https://mockingbirdpie.wordpress.com/2009/04/22/where-the-wild-things-rock/ https://mockingbirdpie.wordpress.com/2009/04/22/where-the-wild-things-rock/#respond Wed, 22 Apr 2009 08:30:19 +0000 http://mockingbirdpie.wordpress.com/?p=42 Continue reading →]]>

If I could marry a film trailer, it would be this one for Spike Jonze’s Where the Wild Things Are.

I’m so in love with I’m actually a little bit worried that the movie is going to disappoint me, because this trailer just sends thrills down my back every time I see it.

Why?

1. It captures your interest

It reminds me of the Jim Henson movies that I used to love as a kid – Labyrinth, The Dark Crystal (actually I didn’t love The Dark Crystal that much, it scared the beejesus out of me). Using ‘real monsters’ just gives the film more texture and depth, I’m so glad that they didn’t make The Wild Things entirely CG.

2. It doesn’t give too much away

Arcade Fire‘s ‘Wake Up’ is hauntingly beautiful soundtrack for this trailer.

Quick extract of the lyrics if you weren’t listening close enough:

If the children don’t grow up,
our bodies get bigger but our hearts get torn up.
We’re just a million little gods causin’ rain storms turnin’ every good thing to rust.

It immediately transports you to Max’s world and your own childhood. I’m so sick of watching trailers for movies that give the entire plot of the movie away. Do studios seriously think that I’m going to pay money to go see some crappy movie when they’ve summarised the plot for me in 90 seconds and shown me scenes from the last ten minutes of the film. I don’t think so. (Well actually obviously I have gone and seen some, otherwise I wouldn’t be able to tell you that the entire movie is shown in the trailer.)

3. It leaves you wanting more

I’m really interested as to how they’re going to make this into a full length film seeing as Maurice Sendak’s beautiful book is only about ten sentances long. With Dave Eggers on board I have total faith. The only problem is I have no idea how I’m going to wait until the Australian release date – December 09 – to see this. Guess I’ll just have to settle for re-watching the preview.

Who’s the more foolish – the fool, or the fool who follows him?

– Obi-wan Kenobi, Star Wars

April Fools day brings out the creative types at all sorts of companies and it’s not surprising that those right-brainers over at  Think Geek pulled off one of the best pranks I’ve seen with their Tauntaun Sleeping Bag.

And I thought they smelled bad on the outside.

Why this works as an April Fools joke:

1. It fits with the brand

The trick with April Fools gags is that they have to be realistic enough to have you going, most of the ones that I saw this year were so obvious that you knew before you finished reading them. Yeah Google and Sherrin, I’m looking at you. Amusing, but I doubt anyone thought for a second that the G-ball was real.

Think Geek already sells ridiculously awesome Star Wars fan boy merch like Star Wars Cookbooks and R2-D2 Pepper grinders, is it really that difficult to imagine they would sell a sleeping bag as well?

2. It looks real because it is real

This prank is so convincing, because some chick actually made the sleeping bag! (Electricsoup, sorry I can’t find your real name). Check out her photos. I mean unless you have an amazingly good master from the Photoshop Guild at your work you can’t fake a picture like that.

Honourable mentions for keeping it real need to go out to the BBC’s Flying Penguins from 2008 with Terry Jones narrating (there are still people commenting on the YouTube page how they can’t believe it!)

3. People want it

My husband argued with me as whether this was real, he wanted to order one for our nephew and was devastated that they didn’t make one for large geeky white males. It wasn’t until he clicked on the ‘Buy Now’ button that the prank was revealed for what it really was.

In fact, it appears that so many people thought it was real and wanted their very own Tauntaun belly to curl up in that ThinkGeek are trying to actually make the sleeping bag.

4. People aren’t offended by it

People don’t feel ridiculed when they find out it isn’t real. As a general rule people don’t like to feel like their trust has been abused. Dumb people don’t like having it rubbed in their face that they’re dumb, and smart people like it even less.

While I admit it amused me that CW11 was stupid enough to pick this Urban Prankster’s Best Ever Funeral flash mob as a real news story. It still left me feeling kind of dirty. See point 3 above – who really wants a flash mob at a funeral? No-one, not even Greedo.

5. It pays attention to detail

My favourite thing about this prank is the lightsaber zipper. Throw in the intestine print on the inside of the bag, and you can just imagine yourself caught in blizzard in Hoth. See, it’s the small things that count!

I love that, ThinkGeek not only came up with a hilarious prank, but that they also executed it so well. That’s what makes it work people. If the Tauntaun had a sword slicing it’s guts open it wouldn’t have been nearly as successful.