Just send around this video. Job done.
Tag Archive for 'agency'
That utterly bizarre McCann Erickson Manchester video is back online again. I mean seriously, what the fuck?
This looks interesting, a new agency set up by old colleagues Robin (from back in the day, ‘when niggaz had waves, Gazelle shades, and corn braids’ i.e Clarity and Nathan from MRM). I <heart> the name ‘we are social’, makes me feel all warm inside.
Hello, we are social. We are a conversation agency. We help brands to listen, understand and engage in conversations in social media.
Incisive Media to axe up to 50 jobs - Brand Republic News - Brand Republic
LONDON - Business media company Incisive Media is to cut up to 50 jobs, or 6% of its workforce.
According to a source at the company, James Hanbury, UK and Asia chief executive, informed staff this week of the need to make the cuts to its 800-strong workforce.
Incisive has been affected by the downturn in some of its markets such as mortgages and finance.
[From Incisive Media to axe up to 50 jobs - Brand Republic News - Brand Republic]
I was a dot com paper millionaire and I got were these lousy stickers (Clarity, where I worked during the boom was bought by Proxicom for £66m…. I got options…. I got nothing, oh apart from these stickers) Happy times anyway!
Intel ad placement, originally uploaded by simiant.
While I was at McCann one of the big Global campaigns that went through was Multiply for Intel. Last week in a cinema in Greenwich I saw this stunning placement and sniggered.
Done by Sapient London and really rather quite good.
When I started working commercially in the internet back in 98 (Oh! 10 year anniversary, Yay! ) the Agency that I worked in then had 5 kinds of people working for it:
Account Managers, Project Managers, Designers, Back End Developers, Front End Developers
That was it. Five. There wasn’t even much of a sense of rank or hierarchy. Look inside a Digital Agency now and it will look something like this:
All those discipline above exist, but may have within them 5 to 7 levels of seniority. The tech Department may have separated into technology disciplines: MS Practice, Java Practice, Data Warehousing etc. The creative department will now contain traditional Designers as well as Copywriters (of an advertising ilk), Flash Designers (not Flash Developers… they sit in Tech), more traditional Creative Teams of two if the Agency is biased towards online campaigns, 3D Animators, Video & Motion Graphics specialists. New disciplines have emerged or transfered form another mediums: Editorial and Content (written), Information Architects, Usability Experts, Usability Testers, Interaction Designers, User Experience Architects……. Planners, Strategists, SEO & SEM experts and so on…
The point is that many of the Digital Agencies that exist today are pretty mature, despite only been 10 to 15 years old. The people who have worked there through this period, now really do know their stuff. Forces to be reckoned with, digitally…. So why are most ‘traditional agencies’ now trying to compete with these guys on their ground? Advertising dollars, no shock there.
If you look at what digital agencies are trying to do, they all want a piece of the Traditional Agencies action… they’re now talking about Branding, Advertising and so on. The reason here not being dollars, but one of ego’s. Digital people now realise it’s ‘their day’, and after ten years of scavenging the crumbs of advertising dollars, want a seat at the table just like their big brother at the Ad Agency. Traditional Agencies on the other hand are now all talking Digital ‘cos that’s the way it’s going isn’t it… uh…. computers’. Both as bad as the other. The point is, both kinds of agency have fathoms of deep expertise in their own areas. Where is the experience deeper? On the traditional side, it’s been around longer.
‘Digital’ people who have grown up in web agencies do know a lot about technology, the internet, the world wide web and the magic therein that can be woven. Where we can lack experience is in a deep understanding of things like Branding, Design, Advertising, PR. Despite what we may think, we still have a lot to learn. It’s interesting that recently both AKQA and Digitas have launched content offerings: AKQA Film and Digitas - The Third Act. Why? Is that what thy are really good at?
According to McCann Ericsson we are all moody here in Blighty. (No shit Sherlock) Anyway, just thought it compared nicely to yesterdays post about the BBC’s WHITE | Spectrum…. which has a way lovelier execution. Though McCanns drawings are nice.
So lets face it, I guess 90% of people who call themselves a User Experience Architect, except some really old, beardy types, grew up and gained all their experience in and around the Internet. The thing is that can leave your experience or designing experiences a little narrow. My tips:
1. Go get yourself a job in one of the large integrated networks for a few years, such as McCann or Ogilvy and gain an appreciation of what Media Planning, Advertising, Branding, Experiential and PR are and how they can all work together (despite what you think you wont gain this sat in a pure Web Shop even if you do have the odd meeting with your sister agencies).
2. Get a job in an Agency that does little or no web at all…. i.e. right outside your comfort zone. This can realy help re-set your perspective on what experience design is, having to frame it around other mediums that aren’t screen based.
Go on, it will make you a better person.
LBI Is now publishing a ‘magazine’ and on first glance it looks quite interesting: LBIQ. “We’re not experiencing a ‘digital revolution’ and this isn’t a ‘digital age’ any more than the 50s were the ‘atomic age’ or the 60s the ‘space age’. We simply live, as we always have done, in fast-changing times. LBiQ is a response to this frantic pace of change, and it’s one that responds from an attitude and point of view that we’ve shamelessly stolen from Ferris Bueller: “Life moves pretty fast. If you don’t stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it.”
Even though this is in dollars, which everyone knows is like basically toy money at the moment, it’s nice to know that my profession, when it comes to salaries, is teh winrar.
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