Start “Wheedling” says a bright green button in an email sent to me over the weekend. Its owner and namesake uses the verb to mean buying and selling online, but in the last six months it’s taken on a new meaning in programming circles – software that fails spectacularly.
Creativity and originality go together like peas in a pod. But Auckland designer Kate Cullinane’s thesis, a book called Sample Copy: An Exploration of the Role of Copying in Design, takes the stance that imitation is a part of the creative process. And it’s just won an international Art Directors Club Gold Cube award, as well as being named in the top three in the global Type Directors Club Awards for Typographic Excellence (the final rankings will be announced in July).
Rejoice, industry award cravers, because go has been pushed on the call for entries for the TVNZ-NZ Marketing Awards.
Igloo TV and Slingshot have gotten into bed with each other, the former to get inside of more homes and the latter to sweeten the deal for its products.
Scoop Media’s He announced the launch in conjunction with a $5000 internship awarded in conjunction with AUT’s Pacific Media Centre, which runs pacific.scoop.co.nz using a team…
Lou Kuegler moves up the chain in Asia, Ngage Media finds a new head of sales, Icebreaker focuses on digital, Accentuate adds some academic rigour, Purple Sherbert announces a little addition, and Mi9 adds another.
Amidst news of massive job cuts, Telecom is sprinkling something more positive into the mix with the launch of its new business incubator called Digital Ventures.
For the past few years, Unitec, Special Group and Naked—which has recently closed and been reborn as Open—have tried to bring a bit more chutzpah to the education sector and change the impression of the institution in potential students’ minds, first with the ‘Change Starts Here’ docu-ads and then with the trade-focused follow-up, ‘We Make the People who Make it’. And in a slightly surprising victory, the campaign managed to beat out the big boys for the best in show prize at last night’s Media Awards at the Langham.
.99 is often thought of as a retail shop. That is its main area of expertise, of course, and there’s no doubt its production processes and studio facilities are a big part of its appeal to clients—and one of the major reasons it won five out of five pitches in recent months and managed to recover super quickly from a horror year in 2012. But it has had its creative moments as well, perhaps none more so than the inflight videos for Air New Zealand, and it’s shown its creative stripes once again for one of its new clients Genesis Energy, with a brand refresh that centres around a split-screen TVC that shows how the company is ‘in it for you’.
Paul Spain isn’t your average media personality. The scruffy haired 40-year-old geek owns IT company Gorilla Technology, has more phones than all the pockets in his wardrobe to hold them in and is incredibly up to date with the latest gossip on the government’s fibre roll out. Spain is a technology podcaster – and he also happens to be the country’s top one at that.
The Auckland Unitary Plan is an important step for the future of the country’s biggest city. So, rather than leaving it to the usual folk who interact with/complain about the bureaucrats, it’s hoping to get a wide range of society to consider the issues and help guide the decision-making. And to help do that, and at the same time simplify some rather complex issues, Auckland Council has released an online housing simulator.
The awards for DraftFCB’s Driving Dogs campaign keep rolling in, this time getting the top gong from Yahoo.
Auckland-based software company Propellerhead held a house-warming party for its new office on Drake Street. The refurbished warehouse space is a stone’s throw away from the redone Victoria Park Markets and boy is it fancy.
None of the entrants for the March round of the Orca awards were deemed good enough to take the prize, but the judges handed out two merit certificates for two campaigns with very different alcohol messages for Crafty Beggars and the Health Promotion Agency (nee ALAC).
The Sony Xperia Z mixes beautiful design on the outside with powerful electronic gadgetry on the inside. The phone gives Samsung a run for its money in the Android market and asks Apple the awkward question: “when are you gonna catch up?”
Eccentric millionaire, technologist and alleged pirate Kim Dotcom is currently sitting at second on Time’s list of 100 most influential people in 2013. In the online poll Dotcom has around 82,000 supporters and 5,400 detractors for his claim as this year’s most influential person.
Not long ago OHbaby! was announcing the launch of its new tablet edition. And now the independent title is celebrating another milestone: its first ever mainstream TV ad.
US craft beer exports rose 72 percent last year compared to 2011 numbers and while New Zealand still has a long way to go to reach the approximately 15 percent of market share craft beer holds stateside, similarly impressive growth trends exist in New Zealand. So as the movement gains steam—among both brewers and drinkers—Super Liquor is aiming to bring those two segments closer together with its Craftology initiative, which is part loyalty scheme, part content marketing and part kerrazzzee idea dreamed up while sitting around having a beer.
It’s only taken a year and half, but Google Play Music is finally available in New Zealand.
Convenience stores are often busy and cluttered, but new premium coffee and food brand Motto hopes to offer an oasis amongst the mad rush, with a splash of colour and a chirpy tone.
The news that Naked was shutting up shop in New Zealand surfaced a couple of weeks ago, and there were a few differences of opinion from the major players on the reasons behind the closure. But Matt O’Sullivan, as expected, has now launched his new entity: Open.
Urban strategist Charles Landry on what makes a city creative, how to inspire curiosity and why strategic agility is key.
We’re suckers for Old Spice ads. So much so that the various campaigns by Wieden + Kennedy have almost removed the stigma of dadness surrounding the brand. Its most recent campaign, Mr Wolfdog, stuck the boot into marketing in completely absurd fashion, but the products remained at the centre. And the latest work for its new bar soaps do much the same, with some magnificent songs that poke fun at old school soap ads.
We live in fat times and the supposedly duplicitous actions of the companies responsible for producing the food and drinks that play a part in this bodily expansion are often blamed for it. But the Government is attempting to address the issue and has signed off on new standards for health claims on labels that aim to reduce misleading marketing and help consumers make better-informed decisions.
Give praise for the return of Tim, the rebirth of Hubbards and the arrival of Tip Top’s Nourish Our Kids.
The New Zealand outdoor marketplace now has a big new name in its midst, with the biggest player in the Australian outdoor market rebranding nearly one thousand poster and billboard sites across New Zealand’s shopping centres, universities and Auckland airport from Eye to Ooh! Media.
Tip Top bread, a George Weston Foods brand, gained a few fans when chief executive Greg Coffey announced the establishment of its Nourish Our Kids programme on Campbell Live in February. The new initiative is a long-term commitment to work with Kidscan and help alleviate child hunger—and it fitted in nicely with Campbell Live’s quest to bring attention to and create solutions for child poverty. And now it’s promoting the programme with a simple but effective TV ad showing two very different worlds colliding.
While visiting New York in 1987, Dick Hubbard told his wife Diana about his idea to start a cereal company that would “make New Zealand proud and healthier at the same time”. Since then it has grown into a sizeable business that continues its breakfast battle with big beasts like Sanitarium and Kellogg’s. But it’s trying to up its game with a new integrated campaign via Hunter.
A time traveller stranded in New Zealand seeks help in the NZ Herald’s classifieds section to go back in time and warn younger self.
Tired of the increasing “tabloidisation” of news media, James Wendelborn took it upon himself to see if New Zealand’s largest paper had succumbed. During his spare time he collected and analysed the front page of every weekday issue of the NZ Herald in 2012 looking for tawdry tales and what ever the print edition of linkbait is. Last week he revealed the results of his year-long project called Selling the News.