In Created, Susan Krashinsky reports that contractor/HGTV celeb Mike Holmes will launch a mag for DIYers. "Think of it as Martha Stewart Living, only sweatier," she quips.

In Noted, she brings us a laid-off Vancouver copywriter who scored a job with Crispin Porter + Bogusky using Twitter.

Krashinsky also gets a quick quote from DDB Canada CD Cosmo Campbell, whose recent work for the Canadian Tourist Commission was named in the top 10 of Forbes magazine's Best Travel Campaigns.

Read More >> I admit, I was taken aback.

Just today, I heard "Hi, Billy Mays back again for the Awesome Auger" emanating from my TV set. In fact, his commercials have been running all week.

Until just now, it struck me as somewhat insensitive on the part of the the good people at Awesome, seeing as the poor man is barely buried. What if his wife ran across it while channel-surfing? Wouldn't viewers who'd heard about his untimely demise find the whole appeal to their pocketbooks a bit...well...crass? Not to mention morbid?

Apparently not.

Read More >> Strategy has released the shortlist for its 2009 Media Agency of the Year award. The magazine has also announced the 12 firms who made its 2009 Agency of the Year shortlist.

Winners for both awards will be named during Strategy's Agency of the Year gala this fall. The event will also reveal Strategy's 2009 Media Director of the Year and Next Media Star.

Read More >> Adweek reports that several digital out-of-home networks have begun to offer bundles that include a mobile component.



It's a combination that, to me at least, just makes sense. Deliver a message while a consumer is out and about, and keep the conversation going on his or her so-called "third screen." Sounds like a very flexible platform that can serve as the basis of a totally new kind of marketer/consumer interaction.

And apparently, it's paying off.

Read More >> Susan Krashinsky chats with Janet Kestin, co-CCO of Oglivy & Mather Toronto. Kestin served on the Film jury at Cannes Lions this year and says that this year's entries signify a tipping point in the industry. Meanwhile, in an AP story, writer Julie Scott profiles Cervelo Cycle, a Canadian bike manufacturer that has just launched a pro cycling test team.

Read More >> POSTAL CODES ARE SO YESTERDAY

In this social-networking era, "friend" has become a verb. For marketers, online friends are a powerful tool, as well.

Two companies, 33Across and Media6Degrees, have begun examining how people interact with friends on sites such as MySpace and Facebook, to identify who might be disposed to buy certain products.

It's a more advanced way of tracking a company's demographic than traditional methods, such as collecting postal codes from customers.

Read More >> Because it's Friday, something fun.

Notice anything unusual about their uniforms? Once you do, I bet you'll watch through right to the end. When was the last time you did that with a flight safety video?



Read More >> Ad Age and Creativity magazines have teamed up to publish their first-ever "Art of Outdoor."

In an introduction to the special report, Ad Age editor Jonah Bloom explains the thinking behind this enterprise: "[o]utdoor's biggest asset today may be that as audiences on every other channel are split into ever decreasing fragments, it can still operate on a mass, broadcast level. And, just as [Saatchi & Saatchi's famous] "Labour Isn't Working" billboard [for Britain's Conservative Party in 1978] ended up as an accidental case study in the power of integrated media, so today's out-of-home efforts are increasingly often integral parts of bigger digital campaigns...Creatives are clearly enjoying the ability to link the mass-market power of a poster to the personal power of the internet."

Read More >>

Billy Mays, the high-volume voice of Oxi Clean and other direct-market products, is dead at the age of 50.

Read More >> 

Ad Age has a short piece about Michael Jackson's equally short career doing commercials.

Read More >> Susan Krashinsky looks at street marketing.

"At a time when the ad industry's most daunting challenge is to break through the clutter and speak to the consumer directly, the once scoffed-at form of salesmanship has new cachet for its personalized consumer touch," she writes.

In Created, Krashinsky brings us a provocative campaign by Ottawa's Newcap Radio that aims to encourage Canadians to think more positively about the economy. In Noted, she reports on TBWA\Hunt\Lascaris Johannesburg's award-winning campaign for the Zimbabwean newspaper and Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer's speech at Cannes. And in Quoted, she cites Mark Nishiguchi, a managing partner at Noise Digital. The Vancouver-based agency is taking home a Bronze in the Cyber category for ZombieSingles.com.


Read More >> OLYMPIC WOW MOMENTS

Samsung, a Vancouver Winter Olympics sponsor, this week unveiled its theme for the Games: "Discover your every WOW moment." WOW stands for Wireless Olympic Works and the plan is to have fans use their Samsung mobile phones to receive real-time Games updates, an Olympic first.

The company also unveiled its Samsung Olympic Visual Identity System, to be used during Samsung's Games-related marketing events and promotional activities. The design is inspired by the shape of a mobile phone, the natural scenery of Vancouver, and incorporates the "Inukshuk," a symbol of harmony.

Read More >>