Book snobs, cover your ears. Booktrack, the platform that provides intelligent synced audio content to e-books has just secured another NZ$7.5M in funding. And the education market is where much of the potential looks to be.

Following on from a story we wrote today which delves into the discrimination against gingers, nor should male cheerleaders be put down, as humorously explored by this Foster’s ad which provides an autobiographical account of the life of the male cheerleader.

They [some arbitrary people] say things come around in cycles and it appears to be true, particularly of fashion. Who thought we’d see the likes of platform shoes again (let alone silver ones) or those tattoo-chokers which were popular in the 90s and most recently flares have also started making a come back. Who woulda thunk it. But what else is making a come back is ginger, the hideous root as well as the golden follicle, which for the purposes of this article, we shall dub the gingernaissance. One brand which has cottoned on to the trend is Karma Cola which has even released a zine about ginger/gingers to celebrate its Gingerella Ginger Ale concoction.

News is bad, mmmmmkay. And the often negative, simplistic and sensationalist stories favoured by the media—and the ‘if it bleeds it leads’ mentality that was skewered brilliantly in Nightcrawler—often clouds the fact that, by many measures, there has never been a better time to be alive. There have been plenty of efforts at focusing on good news rather than bad, like The Philosopher’s Mail or, more virally, Upworthy. And, as part of its ‘Is Mankind? campaign, Airbnb is trying to do the same by producing the ‘Daily Kindness Bulletin’ and showcasing what it feels is some much-needed positivity.

Over 9000 designs were submitted online as part of the government’s $27 million flag consideration campaign (and many of them were ‘avin’ a laff). But businessman and philanthropist Gareth Morgan, who is a big proponent of changing the flag—”to bury this artefact that tells a lie and is an insult to Maoridom”—didn’t feel the brief was adequate, didn’t feel people understood the history of the existing flag and didn’t feel the Treaty of Waitangi was being placed at the core of the process. So he decided to stump up $20k for an alternative competition and incentivise designers to come up with something that would tell the story of New Zealand. And Auckland design agency Studio Alexander beat out around 1000 entries for the prize with ‘Wā kāinga / Home’.

Two of the country’s most successful trade titles, New Zealand Doctor and Pharmacy Today, have changed hands.

For the 14th time, New Zealand’s most trusted brands have been named by Reader’s Digest and the top three—Whittaker’s, Dettol and Toyota—remains unchanged from last year, with Whittaker’s making it four years on the trot at the top.

When I was about six (after sneakily watching one-too-many scary movies) I thought I could turn myself into a cool vampire with a special potion made out of potato chips and juice that had been left on a window sill overnight to gain extra “power”. Turns out old Raro and soggy chicken chips only makes you spew, yet I still had the confidence and imagination to try. And that’s the message this new ad by Tower is getting across by asking children the rather odd question: “What would you do if a penguin stole your bike?”

As has been the case in previous years, we have whittled down the numerous weekly winners since our last survey to 52 contenders, from which an overall winner and the People’s Champion will be selected.

Tourism New Zealand has taken the unique approach of teaming up with Facebook and production company Symphony to create an online series for its latest campaign which follows the adventures of a young couple travelling around the country in a Kombi.

Our weekly wrap of good things, strange things, funny things and other things from inside the intertubes.

Whether it’s a tipi, a treehouse or a big boot, there are plenty of strange Airbnb rentals available. But a spot in a stadium is one we haven’t seen before. That’s what Airbnb and NZ Rugby have done to celebrate the Bledisloe Cup Match on August 15, with a competition offering four people the chance to win an overnight stay in a remodelled, All Blacks-themed box. PLUS: Airbnb’s new ad and the ensuing parodies.

Shoplifters are the scourge of retailers and, according to Retail NZ, theft from customers and staff was costing local businesses $1 billion a year in 2013. But Harvey Nichols has decided to put the kleptos to good use for an ad campaign that uses real CCTV footage spliced with villainous cartoon heads for a campaign offering customers legal freebies.

Powershop has ruffled a few feathers once again with an ad by Doublefish playing on the Greek crisis to promote its referral scheme for existing customers, but its flagrant use of advertising seems to be working as though its CEO admits the market is tough he says Powershop is holding its own.

I can still remember when I first began noticing Spotify back in 2012. Perhaps I was a little late in the game, but I didn’t start paying attention until my Facebook feed became filled with “[Insert friend’s name] listened to [insert track] on Spotify”. At first I found this mildly annoying thinking “What the hell is Spotify” while simultaneously feeling shocked to discover some of the crap my friends were listening to. But soon enough I found myself on the platform, figuring out what it was all about, running to my computer like most early users to turn down the blaring ads and like most other early users I was pretty adamant I wouldn’t be paying for it. But things change and New Zealand has embraced the service with open arms as one of the highest growing streaming markets in the world. We had the rare opportunity to have a chat with Spotify about how it’s doing in New Zealand, its branding partnerships, New Zealand’s piracy problem, the threat of Apple Music and more.

When it comes to surprises, the most you’re likely to get from the established taxi industry is another arbitrary fee ($3 extra to pay using EFTPOS? Come on). But, in keeping with its desire to turn the transport industry upside down, Uber often looks to surprise its existing users—and add more new ones—by delivering more than just humans. So, as part of a global campaign that is set to deliver ice cream to 253 cities on Friday, inhabitants of Auckland, Hamilton, Wellington, Christchurch and Queenstown will be able to request a tub of Giapo’s hokey pokey gelato. And it’s working with Hyundai on the promotion as well.

In a bid to assist mothers who have heard the Frozen soundtrack once too many times but don’t really want navigate the online catalogues of children’s music, Pandora has teamed up with Huggies to develop a radio station dedicated to musical tastes of the youngest of young’uns.

Big data is being hyped by pretty much every marketer at the moment. But the phrase itself has for some time been a bit of a misnomer, because what we understand as ‘big data’ can these days be carried around in a flash drive smaller than pen. As it turns out, this hasn’t always been the case. In its early days, data storage quite literally necessitated a big solution. Pictures taken in 1956 illustrate just how burdensome it was for IBM to transport the now measly 3.75 megabytes of storage space.