Enterpreneurship. How Le Pain Quotidien Makes it in Moscow.

Januar 4th, 2012 • Brands, Experimental
Tags: Brands, Enterpreneurship, Food, Le Pain Quotidien, Moscow, Russia, Truth, World

Le Pain Quotidien, the bakery-café brand founded in Brussels in 1990, is well-known in London, France and New York, but few realize it’s a hit in Russia, where the premium bakery is a go-to for expats and upscale residents in Moscow. This footage from brandchannel explains the challenges such a brand faces when entering one of the most exciting markets in the world: Russia. Or to be more precise: Moscow.

Catvertising. How a small Canadian Agency revolutionizes Marketing (again).

November 14th, 2011 • Experimental, Fake, We like
Tags: Agencies, Cats, Cool, Experimental, Funny, Pink Pony, Viral

Canadian agency John St does it again. After staging Pink Pony, the mother of all award videos, last year they are now ready for the next step: a Catvertising Agency. John St: The time is ripe.

Stuff We Like. Selfcontrolfreak’s Interactive Videos.

Oktober 20th, 2011 • Experimental, People, Tech, We like
Tags: Amsterdam, Cool, Creativity, Experimental, Funny, Gaming, intelligent, Pechakuchanight, People, selfcontrolfreak, Tech, video, visual, We like

Last night I attended Amsterdam’s Pechakucha Night at Roest. Most of you probably know the concept: Random people present their business concept/idea/art theory/whatever on 20 slides and they only have 20 seconds for each page before a heartless Powerpoint algorithm switches to the next one. The one person that definitely stood out for me was Olivier Otten – a young Dutch Creative/Developer who tries to play with very playful ways to interact with video under the name Selfcontrolfreak.

I don’t want to say much more. Just one thing. Gamification is not about badges and check-ins. Traditional playful, interactive metaphors have been around since the 1990s. But even two decades later I know of few platforms which are as much fun as this one.

Check out his 22 simple, playful video examples and start playing with Selfcontrolfreak.

Anrealage. An 8-Bit Showroom in Tokyo.

Oktober 10th, 2011 • Experimental, Retail
Tags: anrealage, Cool, Creativity, Design, diesign, Experimental, Fashion, Ideas, japan, Kunihiko Morinaga, Lifestyle, People, Presentation, Retail, tokyo, visual, World

8-Bit? Yawn. We have seen pretty much everything in 8 Bit already. Except a store concept. Experimental Japanese designer Kunihiko Morinaga has built this showroom for the F/W collection of his label Anrealage in Tokyo. I think 8-bit is pretty close to getting buried very soon – but I think Mr Morinaga’s showroom is a fantastic final scream.

Read more »

This Morning’s Hot Shit. The new Facebook Features.

September 23rd, 2011 • 1 comment Experimental, Social, Social Business, Strategy, Tech, Tools
Tags: Facebook, Semantic Web, social network, Social Networks, Timeline

My new Facebook Timeline has arrived. After yesterday’s f8 announcement (great overview here) I really think we are about to see the ‘profound changes’ that mashable talked about yesterday morning.

Hacking Facebook to set up Timeline is a rather simple. Techcrunch has published a handy DIY guide this morning. But only I am currently able to see my timeline right now.

What it does is really to replace my profile with a nice, interactive biography on one page. The Timeline stops everytime Facebook identifies important steps in my life. My sister’s birth certainly was one of these events (even though at that point I didn’t necessarily agree). And I am invited to upload baby photos of her. Cheesy and nice.

Timeline is a new, pretty cool metaphor that really adds a new perspective to Facebook. Facebook as a lifelong diary – well actually…a living diary. Long term not just super-today.

But there is much more that I find interesting.

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Adbusting. More Skateparks for Denmark.

September 14th, 2011 • 2 comments Experimental
Tags: Campaign, denmark, Funny, Lifestyle, ooh, Politics

I have to admit since Denmark found it necessary to re-initiate border controls because of some right-wingers there is something dislikable about Danish politics. Anyway Ali’s Skate Gear, a Skate shop in Copenhagen, just showed that this is not true at all. Check out their nice adbusting idea for more Skate Parks.

Well…to be honest – I think it was an award project idea by DDB Denmark. But anyway.

via whudat

Hiroshima. A Panoramic View from August 1945.

August 10th, 2011 • Experimental, Politics
Tags: history, Panorama, photo, Politics, sad, visual, War, World

August 6, 1945 was a turning point for mankind. At 8.15am the mushroom cloud of the world’s first Atomic Bomb rose over the City of Hiroshima, killing hundreds of thousands and pushing mankind into a future threatened by constant mutual destruction. Hiroshima and Nagasaki influenced my life even five decades later. As a kid growing up in Germany of the 1980s Cold War era I knew everything about the bomb. Years later the fear of it made me study Politics and specialize in security Politics (writing my thesis about Nuclear Proliferation in North Korea).

Last week the world mourned the end of Hiroshima and Nagasaki for the 66th time. I just stumbled upon this breathtaking 360 panoramic view of the city of Hiroshima, taken in August 1945. As there were really few pictures of the actual bombing this is one of the most shocking views I have ever seen. What you see below used to be a buzzing city of 330,000 inhabitants.

The Panorama consists of 5 pieces taken by U.S. and Japanes photographers. I have integrated Piece 1 and Piece 3. Find all the other pieces here.

Hiroshima after the Atomic Bomb (1 of 5) by Shigeo Hayashi in Japan

The following Panorama was shot from a different position by the American photographer Harbert F Austin Jr.

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Soulbot 3000. Looks great, safely contains human Souls.

Juli 20th, 2011 • Experimental
Tags: Cool, Creativity, Design, Experimental, Future, Ideas, Presentation, products, video

They say that we all lose 21 grams at the exact moment of death. They say that it’s the weight of the human soul. Soulbot 3000 is now able to contain this amorphous mass: The Soul. Thanks to Andreas Wannerstedt for making Soulbot 3000 possible.

(via Fubiz)

Sweet. Sagres sculptures a Chocolate Website.

Juni 15th, 2011 • Experimental, We like
Tags: Beer, Brands, Cool, Creativity, Design, Funny, Ideas, Interface, Sagres, visual, We like, Website

I am not entirely sure how I should feel about a chocolate-flavored stout. But at least it’s a novelty – both as a product as well as an interactive experience. Portugese brewer Sagres has just launched a website made of real chocolate to promote its new “Sagres preta chocolate”. To make the interactive experience become as choco as possible the whole website was designed and sculptured by chocolatier Victor Nunes before it was photographed to become components for the online venue. (via adweek)

Here is the making of

Here is the beautiful result.

BMW. The Revenge of the Lonely Copywriter.

Mai 27th, 2011 • Allgemein, Brands, Experimental
Tags: Automotive, Banner, bmw, Cool, Copy, Copywriting, Creativity, Experimental, Funny, Ideas, visual

I don’t know how to call these ads/banners/posters that you see sometime when a copywriter is supposed to write a really long text for once. You know…when you get surprised by a format which is copy, copy, copy and it goes on and on.

It’s one of the saddest ad formats. The copywriter knows nobody is going to read it. He knows his copy is cursed to serve as long typography here. And that is why he is holding an inner monologue in this type of ad format where he consistently speaks to the reader as a copywriter – not necessary as a brand – thanking the reader that he fights his way through his copy. What makes it even sadder: Most often it is indeed great copy.

Check out this banner ad for BMW. It was done by the Canadian agency Cundari and it starts as a 300-by-250-pixel box. And then it expands and expands and expands. When moused over it turns into a 18,000 pixels high monster—that’s 20 feet—with more than 5,500 words of copy going on and on (and on and on).

As usual. The copywriter wrote a great text. But I always feel a certain sadness when I see letters mutating into typo. Great banner idea. But I think after years of working as a copywriter I know what this poor guy went through who wrote that. (via Bannerblog)

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