Advertising: Movies, TVs and Magazines Work Together in Web Campaign

As major marketers shift more of their advertising spending to the Web, media companies like Hearst Magazines are scrambling to keep up.

New York Times

AdMob Offers First Facebook Mobile Advertising Solution

San Mateo based mobile advertising solutions provider AdMob has announced AdMob for Facebook Mobile, a mobile advertising solution for developers of third-party Facebook applications.

AdMob has enabled optimized mobile ads for Facebook Mobile, which developers can use to monetize their mobile applications. Developers can start showing ads and earning money immediately.

AdMob for Facebook Mobile is said to be the first monetization solution for Facebook Mobile developers.

TechCrunch

AOL To Announce Internet "Do-Not-Track" List

Most consumers are familiar with do-not-call lists, which are meant to keep telemarketers from phoning them. Soon people will be able to sign up for do-not-track lists, which will help shield their Web surfing habits from the prying eyes of marketers.

Huffington Post

Who needs an ad agency when your corporation is a cult?

I guess there's not much point in doing creative development when when someone's already made your commercial, and tested it, for you. An 18-year-old student from Leeds gets his youtube video polished up a bit to be the television commercial for Apple’s new iPod Touch.

New York Times

In Foray Into TV, Google Is to Track Ad Audiences

Google plans to announce a partnership with Nielsen to give advertisers a better snapshot of how many people are viewing television commercials on a second-by-second basis.

New York Times

WPP Group Buys a Top Digital Agency

The WPP Group, the giant advertising company, bought Blast Radius, a leading interactive agency, as part of a digital shopping spree.

New York Times

Facebook Experiments With Ads Targeting People’s Interests

The big promise of advertising on social networks has always been the ability to target members by their own self-proclaimed interests and demographics. Facebook, as expected, has quietly taken a step in that direction with its Facebook Flyers ads (these are sidebar advertising widgets that Facebook still controls, as opposed to the majority of ad inventory on Facebook that falls under its deal with Microsoft). In terms of revenues, these Flyers probably don’t amount to much yet, but this is one Faecbook experiment worth keeping an eye on.

TechCrunch

Smelly screens selling beer on the streets

The aroma-emitting Kaoru Digital Signage display will be appearing in front of a Tokyo beer hall called Kirin City from October 21 and will assault the noses of passers-by with scents of orange and lemon and the eyes with video of foaming jugs of beer.

Apparently, the men in suits reckon the citrus is “associated with beer” so the field test resulting in crowds flocking to the bar like journalists to, well, a bar will show that they’re correct. Either way, each installation uses ultrasound to vaporize aromatic oils and can waft the result over 500 cubic meters.

Digital World Tokyo

BlinkBox: User Generated Ads For Movies, TV (and it’s fun)

A new UK startup launches on Monday called BlinkBox. Users take pre-created clips from movies and television shows (the clips can be shortened by the user) and add a personalized message at the beginning.

TechCrunch

Sony's Virtual World Brand-Friendly

A couple of announcements indicating that Sony's upcoming PlayStationHome (site, wiki) virtual world will have plenty of ad inventory:

GameIndustry.biz: "SCEA has announced the formation of an in-game advertising business unit. Although the in-game advertising unit will be responsible for incorporating advertising across all PlayStation platforms, its emphasis will be on PlayStation Home, which 'will present opportunities for SCEA to deliver dynamic, relevant advertisements in game.'" [Oct 8 2007]

Advertising Lab

If You Thought a Half-Hour of TV Was Worth 4 Minutes, Here’s Proof

The mini-episodes of discontinued TV programs, to be shown online, are part of a Pepsi campaign designed to celebrate the brand’s old logos, slogans and jingles.

New York Times

Instacritique: Why Pan Creative Work When You Can Get A Nifty Web Applet To Do It For You?

Award season is in full swing, and the Andy's have taken an amusing approach on their website with the instacritique. This neat little interactive applet allows you to pit your creative genius against a panel of world-class creative judges. My recommendation: Let Jose Molla confuse you from his hammock, its a breathtakingly beautiful story of subtlety and dense metaphor about albino's and interior decorating.

Coals to Newcastle: The Donald Hands Out Free Money on the Upper East Side

Donald Trump’s people hand out free money outside the Barnes & Noble at 5th Avenue and 46th Street, to promote Mr. Trump’s new book, Think Big and Kick Ass in Business and Life.


New York Observer

AdReady Lets You Create Tacky Home Loan Ads Too

Display ads have generally been the purview of larger brand name companies who can afford the cost of creating highly visual or dynamic ads. However, Aaron Finn and his team at AdReady want to bring banner advertising to even the little guys.

TechCrunch

‘Dexter’ campaign gets away with murder

It’s not just kids who are freaked out by Showtime’s advertising for Dexter, the program about a forensics expert who moonlights as a serial killer. A new viral campaign is scaring the bejeezus out of plenty of adults. Those with a macabre sense of humor should visit SliceoflifeTV.com, where you can enter a friend’s name and a few other details. Soon enough, the friend gets an e-mail link to a video news report that makes it look like he or she has been targeted by a serial killer. Of course, the most successful virals are often the ones that either humiliate or terrify (see the old Ring Two viral from the U.K.). For the easily gullible, this Dexter effort more than fits the bill, as New York Times ad writer Louise Story found out when she sent it to a few friends and family (some of whom may have stopped speaking to her). The campaign was produced by London-based digital agency Ralph, which happily reports that in the U.K. it “proved so controversial that Ralph received calls of complaint from the public and London’s Scotland Yard Police.”

AdFreak

The New Advertising Outlet: Your Life

Huge amounts of advertising money are flowing out of the traditional media and into alternatives — even as ad budgets in general are growing.

New York Times

Viral Campaign for 'Alive' TV Series Launches Before the Show Exists

In an extremely premature bid to build audience buzz and hook a network partner, the producers of a new sci-fi/horror TV series shoot a few clips and drop some clues online before the show's even in the can.

Wired

XBox Live Arcade gets its first advergame

Now the Xbox 360's downloadable game service is getting its own advergame, as Microsoft today announced that Toyota's Yaris will be one of this week's Xbox Live Arcade Wednesday releases. The game lets players hop behind the wheel of one of three new Yaris models and race through oddly twisting tracks, shooting enemies with a tentacle rooted in the car's hood, collecting loose coins, and unlocking a dozen new Xbox Live achievements along the way.

Gamespot

Volvo ad turns audience into joysticks

Interactive car advert lets moviegoers get behind the virtual wheel by waving their arms around.

Gamespot

Coffee: Illy House-in-a-Shipping-Container Comes to NYC

What looks like a rusty old shipping container from the outside turns into a posh "living space" at the touch of a button in this Quik House by Adam Kalkin. More than a mere concept, it's a fully...

Full Article at Gizmodo