Absolut New Orleans

This is great.

"At the Tales of the Cocktail festival this week in New Orleans a new version of Absolut vodka is being launched. The festival is an annual event celebrating the art of mixology. For the first time, the Swedish vodka company is naming a flavor for a city. Absolut New Orleans is mango-flavored with a black pepper kick. The flavor is meant to capture the unique spirit of the city. The vodka will be a limited run of 35,000 cases and will sell for $19. The best part of the new is that the vodka is expected to raise $2 million for five Gulf Coast charities. Future city vodkas with a similar charitable aspect are planned for the future."

Read more here.

Connection Planning Conference

The site is finally live! Sign up for email updates. Check it out at http://www.polygamousweddings.com



Still in the process of confirming speakers but here's a leak!

October 26, 2007
New Orleans, LA [NOLA!!!]

Speakers:
Ed Cotton; Butler Shine Stern & Partners
Adrian Ho; Zeus Jones
Jim Elms; Barkley Evergreen & Partners
Gareth Kay; Modernista
Demian Brink; Boone/Oakley

Venue:
Le Chat Noir - a Cabaret Theater and Piano Bar located in a restored turn of the century New Orleans townhouse (715 St. Charles Avenue).

Also, the same weekend as the Voodoo Music Festival with Smashing Pumpkins and Rage Against The Machine!

Join the Facebook Group here if you plan on attending. Feel free to invite people.

I can barely contain myself.

I'm taking the day off next Friday for the opening (I'm not kidding) if anyone wants to join me here in New York.

Well, we get a bunch of summer Fridays to take off, so I'm not really taking the day "off," just using one of my days...

(just thought some clarification was in order, I mean, I'm not completely stupid.)

But now that I think about it, a movie of this magnitude does kind of warrant a day off. Think about it...

Here's a funny thing spotted in this great city.

Anyone hiring junior planners?

I have a good book here.

AAAA Conference

Question #1 - Is anyone going to the AAAA Conference in San Diego on August 5th? I'll be there.

Question #2 - I'm driving from San Diego to San Francisco immediately after the conference. Does anyone want to take a road trip to go say hello to Josh and Sergio?

Walk it out mashup

This is hilarious.

Yahoo for Friday!

The world's tallest man shakes hands with the man hoping to be officially declared the shortest by the Guinness Book of Records.

Meathead

link

Chris Farley lives.

For some reason i can't get a title in here. Anyway, Flight of the Chonchords. Ya'll dig? I'm still undecided but I'm thinking yay.

17 days left...

This makes me happy.

Rough noise pick-up, but worth watching.
Found it a bit back when I couldn't get their other song "Trains to Brazil" out of my head... MONDAY.

Seattle-based artist Chris Jordan had an insight! It was hard for people to really absorb the meaning of large scale facts, like 426,000 cell phones are retired each day. So he decided to create art that visually represented some of the most unbelievable statistics about our consumption habits as a society. The result is a fascinating exhibition -- not sure how many pieces -- that according to the artist must be seen in person to get the concept. It is on display until the end of the month at the Von Lintel Gallery in NYC. If anyone finds out if it is traveling anywhere, I would love to hear about it if the West Coast is involved.

Check it out at http://www.chrisjordan.com/current_set2.php

Ethan Haas was right.

Let me start this off by saying, unfortunately I have yet to see the new Transformers Movie. During the trailer, however, there appears quite the teaser. It eventually points to a website just put up http://www.ethanhaaswasright.com/
Why the hell does this matter? It's the beginning of what can only be the latest and greatest Alternative Reality Game.
ARG's are the most exciting thing to evolve our industry in years. Years and years. Talk all you want about open dialogue,user-generated, new media and holistic branding campaigns. ARG's amalgamate all of those concepts and breathes life into it. Often they create whole ancillary worlds of interactivity that organically grow out of the original. Anyway. Solve the puzzles and sign up. It took me a bit for the first few, and then I fully went in search of the cheat for the last.
No, we didn't do it here- to me it has the feeling of Cloudmakers. Maybe Mekanism?

Interwebular chronicle hacking

http://jetblue.com/about/ourcompany/flightlog/index.html

4th

Hope it begins with a cold beer, keeps going after too much BBQ, crests as you watch fireworks boom, and ends will all your fingers still attached.

Tuesday

24NOLA.com

http://www.24nola.com/build.php

Tell all your friends. Official launch next Monday supported by aggressive interactive campaign.

Poor little guy.

TOM

http://www.simpsonsmovie.com/main.html

Cool.

LINK

Monday

-sannah kvist

Aunt Jackie

Just wrote a post on my blog. As you guys know, I've been following dance moves within hip hop culture for a long time now and I've started to put some of the pieces together to understand how dancing is influential within that culture. I know the majority of you do not listen to Hip Hop but putting aside what you personally think about it, take a look at the post here. It's still kind of rough but would love to know what you planners think!

Check this website out

Aftertoomany.com

The videos are pretty shocking!

It was done by Grey in San Fran...definitely had a planner involved!

I miss all you guys and gals and wish the best to you all:)

The wind.

The wind's job.

Funny

give a man a pig and he'll eat for a day

give a boy a gun and he'll eat for a year.

mmmm bacon

Hey. This is neat.

A designer that works here sent me this.
They're made by one of his friends.

hoodies!

DAN DEACON - CRYSTAL CAT

Like fireworks in your brain.

Madison Square Park

You better be there Kumar!

love it.

Urban Hustler

http://promomagazine.com/research/other/urban_hustlers_emerge_study_060607/index.html

The group, rooted in hip-hop and street culture, is really defined more by psychographic standards than by their demographics. The segment “transcends race, ethnicity and geography,” Pettigrew said. “The mentality is their starting point is irrelevant.”

Urban Hustlers have a particular affinity for a range of products, including cars, high-end apparel and shoes, entertainment, cell phones and technology. They place a high premium on fashion and lifestyle and frequently use social networking sites to find and share information. And with an estimated $90 billion in spending power, that’s an important point for marketers.

Trumpet

http://adage.com/article?article_id=116986

"Well then, goodaye mate!"

I swear I have better things to do...

...I just coudn't pass this up.

that's one hell of a snack

And Ed's too!

Meet Ande!

We found her abandoned about two weeks ago and I have decided to keep her.

She's good for my heart!

They Call Me...Mixed Mediums

New Orleans. America's Horniest City.

"One tequila, two tequila, three tequila, floor" t-shirts have finally been resigned to the thrift store pile and we've decided to take matters into our own hands.

In true New Orleans fashion, we've slowly created six different shirt designs in lieu of giving into the temptation of Bourbon being down the street.

A percentage of proceeds from the sale of the Jolly Trumpeter shirt will go to the Louis Armstrong Foundation and the Louis Armstrong Jazz Camp. If you end up buying one, only thing we ask is that you wear your Mardi Gras beads with them. We know you have them stashed somewhere! Thanks in advance, tell all your friends and drop us a note if you're in town.

http://www.dirtycoast.com/trumpet

AT AT THE PLAYGROUND

Old School Shorts?

Anyone seen the ad on the reverse side of the back cover of the May 21 Sports Illustrated?
Check it.

Bay to Breakers

Total lunacy. It's like a walking costume party/race/Mardi Gras. Seven miles across the whole of San Francisco. Everyone arrives (that are drinking in the race, as opposed to running in it) around 7am at the start. Then you follow the closed course thru downtown, up thru some neighborhoods, and finally down into Golden Gate park. Very hard to describe. Very awesome to go.

Beware: Peter Cottontail

Sarcastic animals crack me up

These ads for the Toronto Zoo made my day.

See two more at:
http://www.adverbox.com/toronto-zoo/

where is my placenta?

yummy viewing experience.

awesome!

America rocks!

Memories from last years planning conference

Adcenter on NPR

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=10169159

Re:Inflatible Titanic

Twitter

In another way to keep in touch with each other in a stalker way, I have finally signed up for Twitter. I know I'm about three months late but I do have to say this site is super cool.

My screename on there is mikekarnj. Sign up now. Add me. Stalk each other.

Hey Norm...If you were a hotdog, would ya eat yerself?

Will Ferrell - Harry Caray Weekend Update

Add to My Profile | More Videos

Rituals

This article is good.

BBDO, in contrast, came up with five that occur every day in every part of the world: "preparing for battle" (the morning ritual), "feasting" (reconnecting with your tribe over food), "sexing up" (primping), "returning to camp" (leaving the work place), and "protecting yourself for the future" (the ritual before bed).

About 41% of Chinese respondents said they schedule sex, for example, while only 3% of Russians do—and 7% of Americans.

http://www.businessweek.com/bwdaily/dnflash/content/may2007/db20070510_522420.htm

It's Friday. So, why not.

Meanwhile....

According to Fast Company jobs that will become extinct by 2016 include bloggers, ad creatives, auto mechanics, US high-tech jobs and Indian call centre operators.

Indian calls centre operators have the same relevance level as ad creatives.
Happy Friday.

Ford turns luxury cars into Fords.

First Ford acquires Jaguar and turns their X-type into a glorified Mercury.

Then they acquire Land Rover whose new LR2 looks like an Explorer.

What gives?

Starburst

Seen this commercial?



Now learn the dance.

http://www.starburst.com/iamalittlelad/

Cosmic...

little biotches

i'm so glad i'm not in high school anymore.

New Dance

3RD FLO (formely Heizman Boyz) - Do The Heisman On That...



As the Adcenter '06 Hip Hop Culture guru, here is a new dance that will be big this summer. It's so new, the music video isn't even out yet. It's not even being played on the radio either. But, like always, you'll be in the know. Learn the dance and bust it out. You'll be cool because you'll know how to do the Heisman.

This kind of reminds me of that NY Times article about cumulative advantage.

The reason is that when people tend to like what other people like, differences in popularity are subject to what is called “cumulative advantage,” or the “rich get richer” effect. This means that if one object happens to be slightly more popular than another at just the right point, it will tend to become more popular still.

This youtube video has over a million hits. Why? Who knows but's it a great example of bypassing mainstream and becoming mainstream. Similar to the long tail theory. Kind of like the hip-hop version of the Arctic Monkeys. Mark my words, they will be big this summer if not this year.

You heard it hear first.