I love Sushi!

June is almost over... This has made me smile all month on the calendar on my desk so I thought I'll share it with you! Way to go Rob, cool work ;o)

Rambling: digital, names and stuff

Photo by aeu04117

I was reading the digital supplement to Campaign earlier. I don't read Campaign that much these days, generally getting my industry information from blogs rather than the press. But apparently the conversations that took place in the lunch they organised gravitated around some things I've been thinking about on and off for quite a while - mainly around the place of digital agencies, the name "digital" itself, and such vast topics.

I've been thinking I would wait until having really thought the whole thing through before blogging about it (Probably with some romantic notion of it being completely amazing and ground breaking) but actually I've been thinking about maybe doing something for the past 8 months and never starting, so I'm using the blog to draft some ideas and things will take shape over time.

Names are very important and human beings are pretty addicted to labeling stuff ever since the rise of language. And it's damn useful to be able to make sense of this whole wide world around us. Also, in numerous mythologies and folklore names hold great power, you can even practice ancient forms of magic with someone's/something's true name.

If there's one thing we surely kept from the myths, I think it is that names still hold a lot of importance in our minds, whether consciously or in the background - all the time. Looking at it from that point of view, it isn't that surprising there are so many arguments around what to call a digital agency (not "digital" apparently is the new thing). The number of words that have tempted to or have been used so far to describe an industry is ridiculously huge, and most are right and wrong at the same time, depending on what you're referring to.

Essentially I thing the whole names argument is a function of the technologies used and the work developed and/or created evolving faster than anyone can name and describe them.

But for all these ingenious buzzwords, does it really matter? It's all about communication and experiences in the end. Do people in the real world really want to know how the company that built this nice website/banner/interactive wall/application/widget/thing defines itself..?

I think that's it for now. I may give that some more structure later on. next rambling about the rift between digital and advertising (which I get on some level, but I find completely silly overall)

The Great Football Giveaway - Happening now in Uganda

I wrote about the Great Football Giveaway a few months ago when I found out about it and donated a few balls - I think it's a brilliant idea!

Duncan Thomas and a team of volunteers have collected donations for 3000 footballs to give away in Uganda and they are in the middle of it right now, I wanted to share the email I received from them:

Hi Willem,

Well we’re approaching the mid point of The Great Football Giveaway in Uganda and finally have found somewhere where we can send you a quick update. We have been joined by our full team of volunteers – Paul & I, Beth, Lisa Ben & Rick, as we continue our journey across rural Uganda, traveling East to West.

In the first two weeks we have already visited over 50 schools in rural areas, many orphan centres, programmes for partially & severely disabled children, and linked up with a number of local NGOs. The passion that people have here for caring for their own is both extraordinary and inspirational. We have already distributed over 1,000 footballs and netballs direct to the children and the reactions have been breathtaking.

The majority of schools visited have had very poor resources and we have seen that those fortunate enough to have a football have often either borrowed it from a neighbouring school, or are using very old balls in poor condition. We have also had many opportunities to “stop & swap” homemade rag balls for those we have brought, with children in villages, or those playing by the side of the road. Reactions have varied from shock followed by excitement, to excitement followed by yet more excitement. So many smiles…

In brief everywhere we have gone across some of the most rural areas of Uganda, we have seen the kids go wild with joy and have often left a legacy of chaos and hysteria in the schools we’ve visited. The beginning of next week sees us leave the East of the country and travel in an arc across the north towards the hotter climate of the West. But more of the later… Thank you so much for the balls you’ve given us to give to the kids here. Already there are tens of thousands of children that will have enjoyed kicking & throwing them around and we still have another 2,000 balls to give away. Even if we had to return today, this project has already been a huge success, so thank you.

All the best

Duncan

A really inspiring project, and I encourage you to check out the site and the video.

The Visitor

I was lucky to be invited by a friend for a press screening of a movie yesterday, so I might as well write about it given it's the point.

And moreover because I thought this was an absolutely beautiful movie, definitely one of the best - if not the best - I've seen in a long time. The Visitor will be released in the UK on the 4th July and I really recommend everyone to go see it.

The movie is the story of a lonely man whose life is changed by the unexpected encounter with a Syrian musician in New-York and by the rediscovery of music and rythm in his life. There are a lot more to it than this and it's a really short sum up, though you can read more about the movie elsewhere (Future Movies review), and view the trailor here. I thought the shots and photography were beautiful and the acting is great. It deals with a lot of pretty tough topics in a very real way and at the same time is humourous, emotional, and overall very humane.

Playing Balloonacy

Not really news by now, but I love the new Poke campaign for Orange! I'm playing the game and I certainly intend for my camel to be a serious contender!!

Click here to support Socrates the camel, or click in the box on the right side bar =>

Just brilliant, I love playing games. The concept makes me think of PMOG a lot (which I'm completely addicted to - tell me if you'd like an invite for the Beta!). The web is turning into a gigantic playground interwoven in any site, and I think that's very cool ;o)

PMOG

I just found out about PMOG, the passively multiplayer online game, from Russell's blog, he sent me an invite and I'm already loving it!

I love games but never wanted to get into a MMORPG like World of Warcraft for fear of spending way too much time on it, but this is great, it just translates all the hours I spend surfing the web anyway into a game experience! It's still in Beta, but it looks pretty cool.

Tell me if you'd like me to send you an invite! Come and play!

Deezer

Just a quick snippet given I haven't written anything here in 3 weeks, need to get rid of the cobwebs and give this blog at least a semblance of life ;o)

Lots of things have been going on in April, and I'm not going to go over everything now, but this is my favourite find of the weekend, I went to Paris and Orleans and to visit some friends and family and one of my best friends converted me to Deezer - I'm loving it!

Deezer is a (French - woohoo!) online music service, way better than Last.fm or Pandora in that being a radio is only one of it's functions - it's also accessible wherever you live - and completely free! In addition to being able to search and listen to any title from a very large array of different artists, users can also create their own playlists and upload all their MP3 so that your whole music library can be available online anywhere, anytime. It also ha a strong community element, where you can make friends and then be able to listen to their own playlists, enabling people to hook up with people with similar music tastes and discover more bands.

My friend told me of a couple of occasions where he saved parties from dying by overtaking the host's computer, logging into Deezer and launching one of his wild party music playlists full blast ;o)

I'm just starting in the Deezer world, but check here if you want to be my musical friend!

That's my mate Jo aka BMF

Temporary Autonomous Arts Brighton 2008

Saturday, I went to the latest TAA (Temporary Autonomous Arts) event happening in Brighton (Portslade). The festival was on from the 2nd to the 5th April and my friend Ben stayed there for the whole thing.

In their words:

TAA's are free, open access art exhibitions that take place in disused and reclaimed spaces throughout the UK.

Reclaiming space that has no other immediate purpose, we will be repairing, making safe and improving the building we use before transforming it into a vibrant, organic, techno artistic statement. [...]

Artists, musicians, writers and performers who otherwise would have no outlet, are invited to display their work uninhibited by the normal constraints placed on the current artistic climate. The space will be used respectfully and intelligently, for genuine community development, creating fields of opportunity for a future at no cost or harm to anyone else. We want to exhibit all forms of artwork; drawings, paintings, sculptures big and small, photography, installations and more. Showcasing poets and vocalists, films and performance, words and concepts born out of the free party underground movement. These spaces of reclaimed freedom have been making a significant contribution to an alternative art world.

It was very cool, all sorts of beautiful and sometimes strange artworks were all over the place, from graffiti to metalworks, projection of short films, paintings, live music in the evening, good food, etc. All in a friendly atmosphere with some pretty interesting people, it was well worth it! I'll definitely be checking when it will be happening next year!

I uploaded some pics on Flickr, check them out here: link

iris & Contagious - Under the Influence

"We're turning the boring industry conference on its head and taking it out on the town"

Organised jointly by iris and Contagious, come round Borough Market in London on April 17th for some serious marketing/creative talks, booze, and inspiration!!



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Rather disturbing

I just randomly came across this ad that I found cool, though quite disturbing. It might be well known, but I'd never seen it before...