radio42 : closed

von thecod | Apr. 4, 2005 | Blog

radio42 finally had to close down. The big corporations like SONY-BMG, UNIVERSAL, EMI and WARNER – who are responsible for most of the sh** on the music market, managed to close down (amongst others, I assume) one of the few web radio stations who actually didn’t play much of the big guys sh** but rather good music from small labels. But because the big guys are going to court against ALL web radios, radio42 is also part of this.

I am furious about this. Not only do these guys produce so much sh** per year, now they even stop the good music from running.
radio42 suggests not to buy any CDs from any of these companies any longer and this is exactly what I’ll stick to. No more CDs from SONY-BMG, UNIVERSAL, EMI and WARNER.

Multi-function ad absurdum

von thecod | Apr. 3, 2005 | Blog

Ever wondered, if the multi-function approach can stop? Here is someone who found a not extremely important but very nice gadget that has no mp3 player integrated. But it should do, according to him. And if you also always felt like there is an mp3 player missing in your PEZ, then you can pre-order this thing. You don’t have to pay – it’s only for Patrick (who has a license agreement from PEZ) to find out about potential demand.
Nice idea, but I think I’ll skip this one. Haven’t even felt the need to have a PEZ – with or without the added functionalities.I wonder if Patrick also thought about the fact, that an integrated digicam would round up the whole tool?

(via)

The relevance of stress

von thecod | Apr. 2, 2005 | Blog

Having spent the last couple of weeks working late (and on the weekends) I have had rather unpleasant stress levels. Short timings, insufficient briefings, incomplete teams and a bunch of deliverables. And of course I asked myself the one question: what happens if we (I) fail. But at the end of the day, I calmed myself with the one reassuring thought that every advertising person can and should remember every time things are dire:

We only do advertising.

No one will suffer if we are a day late or if the ads don’t perform quite as well as they should. What is lost if an ad comes out the day after the product launch? No customer will really notice, only the experts. And if the product is supposed to be sold for more than two days, then one day shouldn’t make a difference. It would only make a difference in terms of perfectionism. And for our clients, as they might face a dent in their reputation within their company. This is, for any service oriented agency, a desaster, because the client wasn’t served right, and the agency will also loose reputation.
But honestly. Did anyone suffer or die of the consequences? I haven’t even heard yet of anyone loosing his job because a campaign was done right. I have heard of people being sacked, because that continuously happens, yes. But not because of only one wrong campaign.

A doctor I heard of, does very „routine“ jobs on rather critical parts of the human body and knows how long it takes him: heart surgery: 4h, lung transplantation: 8h. And sometimes he does several of both a day – yes, working up to 16h-20h operating.

This I call relevant stress!

If something goes wrong there, the stakes are high. It’s not only about deadlines and reputation (it’s not even about money). It’s about life and death.

So enjoy the harmless playground of advertising while you can and be happy that you don’t have a job, where things really matter…

Who will have the last shot in the spamming war?

von thecod | März 24, 2005 | Blog

Adfreak references an article that announces IBMs new tool which spams the spammers.
It basically sends all spam back to its originator. But, as Adfreak rightly assumes, this will probably just result in a huge trench war…
And honestly, can this program really differentiate between actual sender and possibly faked email addresses? Will innocent people be spammed, because people hijacked their email addresses? This should better be sorted out…

long absence – sorry. but here is a nice ad in an unusual place

von thecod | März 24, 2005 | Blog

I have been overwhelmed with worked the last couple of weeks. Tight projects with unpleasant working hours. You know what I mean.
But on one of my flights I found this in airport bathroom:

The copy says, more or less: „even more sweatier hands you can get in the new mercedes cls from Sixt“. However, here it doesn’t say „sweaty“ in German, but instead they chose a word which means almost the same but could also refer to the fact that your hands are wet.
Nice placement, nice idea…