Ever since Telecom did the splits back in 2011, there have been rumours that the ‘New Telecom’ might not stick with its name, which carries with it a fair bit of equity but also a fair bit of monopolistic baggage. And where there’s smoke, there’s fire, because Telecom has announced that it will change its name to Spark later in the year.

Crowd Goes Wild is inviting viewers of the show to pimp up their rides as part of a competition that offers an all-expenses-paid trip to Melbourne to watch the 2014 Formula 1 race to be held in the city between 13 and 16 March.

There’s a bit of an arms race when it comes of offices at the moment, and particularly when it comes to tech companies, which appear to have a desire to out-cool each other with their massive HQs and quirky additions (check out this Vanity Fair story about what Apple, Facebook, Google and others are doing in Silicon Valley and San Fran at the moment). But New York-based digital creative shop The Barbarian Group has upped the stakes by showing off what is undoubtedly the coolest desk ever created.

Vodafone is giving Snapchat a baptism of fire among students at Canterbury and Otago University orientation weeks. It’s a targeted test that will decide whether the telco uses the messaging platform for future promotions.

Coca-Cola shows it really does have a sense of humour — and is about more than sugar and caffeine — with a new video suggesting devices usually used for dogs could cure our social media compulsions.

Augview’s augmented reality app opens a whole new view of utility infrastructure under our city streets, but the makers also see big possibilities for creative marketers and outdoor games. The company has already has interest in virtual universes in outdoor spaces.

What is Big Data? Well, if you believe a quote that’s been doing the rounds for a few years now and seems to be popular on the conference circuit, it’s exactly like teenage sex.

Birdseye UK is set to create food madness with the very social Mashtags, potatoes transformed into @ symbols, smiley emoticons and hashtags. Seems the humble french fry was just too straight (or crinkled) for the discerning digital generation.

BNZ is capitalising on the increasing blur between professional and personal use of social media, arming staff to get social on its behalf. That’s evident in its current bid to promote the YouMoney tool with a road trip to university campuses.

Google has awarded Kiwi AdWords partner Localist for AdWords quality in a category open to its group of premier small and medium business Premier AdWords partners on both sides of the Tasman. The quality score measures how relevant ads are to users.

Bullseye’s Moments campaign, which sees Auckland Airport arrival and departure experiences shared in photo and video, played a part in its business director securing a Sitecore award for digital strategy.

If you’ve ever run into a fellow mall shopper because you or they are staring down at their mobile phone, you’ll appreciate US brand Caribou Coffee’s efforts to make a show of what its users are posting on Pinterest.

A crazy mash of retro style game graphics and actual bobsled footage is the Jamaica Tourist Board’s attempt to get fans during the Sochi Olympics. We can’t help but point the finger at Cool Runnings.

If the TVC for this Chinese online dating service is anything to go by, the country seems to prefer luring lonely hearts with guilt than the prospect of a happy relationship. So why not throw in a grandmother desperate to see her granddaughter at the altar?

The creator of the Android app Caller Ads, currently being piloted, is targeting telcos and advertisers that have messages to push to prepay mobile users. The cloud-based service’s first iteration is like an audio pre-roll subscribers opt to take before a call.

BBDO New York tapped into the boundless imagination of a child to create a spot that oozes creativity while simultaneously applauding the awesomeness of mums (or moms) who work for GE. Every scene in the slick ad brings an absurd idea of a child to life, and thereby shows that the extent of possibility is directly proportional to how far the imagination can stretch.

The ad industry often seems like a young man’s game. But there’s no substitute for experience, as renowned copywriter Paul Burke wrote recently. And, if you’re wondering when you’ll come up with that brilliant product innovation, that revolutionary campaign idea or perhaps that long-awaited solution to the world’s energy needs, turns out you might have to wait a while.

Rather than falling into the regular sports advertising trope of the burly sports star making a great play, the team at &Some* has instead opted for a fan-centric approach that doesn’t hold the promise of victory. The idea behind the ‘game of hearts’ campaign comes to life most evidently in the print versions, which feature the faces and quotes of six different Voadfone Warriors fans—both male and female—of different ages.

Jim Beam’s integrated global campaign Make History hit New Zealand shores last week with TVCs shot and produced largely in our country. The clips were produced by Auckland company Ruskin and directed by Nathan Price.

For the past few years, the Iron Maidens—Sarah Walker, Sophie Pascoe and Lisa Carrington—have been promoting the culinary pleasures of the flesh. But NZ Beef and Lamb has taken a slightly different tack with its new ‘Tough Standards, Tender Results’ campaign, which shows how the butchery trade has changed throughout the years and aims to reinforce the attributes of the New Zealand Beef & Lamb Quality Mark.

In this series, we talk to Kiwi keyboard tappers that have managed to shift from the personal realm of blogging to create online media brands that are widely read (and in some cases profitable). In this segment, we chat to Jenene Crossan, the founder and current director of nzgirl.