Advertising
Truth in advertising
June 2, 2005 If you’re an average person with a fundamental understanding of the laws of physics, you’ll no doubt from time to time leap off the couch when you see the claims of a television commercial and scream “that is utter bollocks!” It seems some people agree with you, at least about Gillette’s US advertising claims about its new M3Power razor. Judge Janet C. Hall of the United States District Court, District of Connecticut, yesterday granted Schick a preliminary injunction against false advertising claims by Gillette for its M3Power razor. Judge Hall determined that Gillette's claim that the M3Power raises hair up and away from the skin is both "unsubstantiated and inaccurate." The court found that that the product demonstrations in Gillette's advertising are "greatly exaggerated" and "literally false." Read More
ADVERGAMING: Microsoft plans to turn gaming into marketing and audience generation opportunities
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May 31, 2005 Microsoft's next generation gaming console has been designed not just as a gaming environment but as a new kind of marketplace. Microsoft's new Xbox 360 console game system has been engineered to accommodate and advance advergaming concepts as never before and the company's global audience of gamers will be sold aggressively to marketers when the product hits the stores in Q3, 2005. Picture this. At the start of the season, 250,000 people sign on at US$10 a head to play a head-to-head 30 race series. The prize - US$1,000,000. Coming to the final rounds, the global audience watching the racing on-line could be measured in the millions, particularly if the events are promoted using Microsoft's media savvy. Synthetic Formula 1 indeed!! Read More
And then there were three: Nintendo shows its hand
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May 18, 2005 Nintendo last night unveiled its contender for the heavyweight clash of the games console – called Nintendo Revolution. Surprisingly, very few specifics of the Revolution internals were disclosed – there will be wi-fi networking, wireless controllers, two USB 2.0 ports, and DS memory card slots but no details of the processor and graphics chips upon which the machine is based other than that the microprocessor will be an IBM developed with Toshiba. Like the Microsoft Xbox 360 and Sony PlayStation 3, the Nintendo Revolution will be backwards compatible with previous game systems though the unlike Sony and Microsoft, the Revolution will be able to play Nintendo games from the last two decades. The company was also clear to point out that unlike its competitors, it does not seek to be the centrepiece of the loungeroom.
The Revolution is the successor to the Nintendo GameCube that finished a distant third in a field of three in the current generation of game consoles and the company’s future is dependent on the success of the machine. Since the release of its first home video game system in 1983, Nintendo has sold nearly 2 billion video games and more than 336 million hardware units globally, creating enduring industry icons such as Mario and Donkey Kong and launching popular culture franchise phenomena such as Metroid, Zelda and Pokemon. Nintendo appears set to continue to target a younger audience than its competitors and the Revolution looks set to have a lower price point too. Read More
Sony Computer launches powerful PS3 backwards compatible with PS and PS2
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May 17, 2005 In case you’re wondering why the ground is shaking, the game console giants are preparing for the launch of their next generation gaming devices at the Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3) tomorrow. Last time around, Nintendo, Sony and Microsoft sold more than 100 million units between them with Sony winning the round convincingly. Penetration into loungerooms is so high in most countries that this next generation of consoles will probably be the centrepiece of the home entertainment system – this is an incredibly important strategic battle to win in the convergence war. Last week Microsoft was the first to come out swinging when it unveiled its next generation X-Box 360 and although little detail about the machine was released, there was plenty of hype and chest thumping. In most markets, Microsoft is the heavyweight, take-no-prisoners market leader, so it's interesting to see the company attempting to come from behind in the game console market. Last night Sony revealed its PLAYSTATION3 (PS3) but unlike Microsoft, which sold the sizzle and not the sausage, Sony has unveiled the detail of a technological masterpiece. The PS3 incorporates what is arguably the world's most advanced Cell processor with supercomputer-like power plus backwards compatibility with the PS2 which sold roughly two thirds of all game consoles in the current generation. In the new console game, Microsoft may have fired the first shots, but Sony has leapt to the fore with its first foray and it’ll be one hell of a fight. Now all that remains is for Nintendo to enter the fray. Read More
The first US$1,000,000 computer game tournament
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May 14, 2005 As the world evolves rapidly into a digital age, the skills to which we ascribe value are changing rapidly. A good billiards player once signified a “misspent youth” but you’d be hard pressed to explain that to the hundreds of professional billiards and pool players on the planet … and who would have thought a century ago that someone would be paid a king’s ransom to kick an inflated pig’s bladder around a paddock. And you don’t need to go back too far to see computer and video games regarded by parents, the education system and main media as a complete waste of time. Now, the world’s best videogamers earn US$250,000 plus a year and this week the first US$1,000,000 tournament was announced. Given the rate of penetration growth into households, world championship gaming skills will undoubtedly be worth a lot more in time to come. It's now quite conceivable that we'll see videogamers earning as much as elite sportspeople. Read More
The rise and fall and rise of the Internet
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May 7, 2005 The Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) and PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) this week released the Internet Advertising Revenue Report including final numbers for Q3, Q4 and full-year 2004. If there was any doubt that the internet was back as a major force in the world of advertising and communications, it was dispelled by the reportThe report states that Search, Classifieds, Display and Rich Media continue to grow at a healthy rate. Overall industry revenues rose nearly 33 percent over 2003 totaling over US$9.6 billion and exceeded the previous revenue record in 2000 by nearly 20 percent. Q4 2004 revenues totaled a record US$2.69 billion, marking the highest quarter ever reported. Read More
The World’s most advanced (and expensive) Sony Playstation peripherals
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One of the star attractions at recent motor shows around Australia has been Mitsubishi’s Lancer Evolution rally simulators, even if judged solely by the length of the queues waiting to strap into the genuine rally seats, in the genuine rally cars that simulate the rally driving experience with more authenticity than you would have thought possible. The simulators were developed for Mitsubishi by technophiles Rodney Robertson and Associates and began with two Mitsubishi Lancers and got waaaay more complex from there. The idea was to build two linked rally car replicas and have them side-by-side with the choice of two very large rear projection screens in front of the cars, or where space and circumstances dictated a lesser set-up, two large bonnet-mounted Plasma panel displays. The experience is VERY realistic.
America's Army game approaches five million downloads
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February 25, 2005 The statistics for the "America's Army: Operations" computer game are surreal. Launched on July 4, 2002, the game was downloaded by more than a million people in the first fortnight and the total number of registered on-line players is now approaching five million, making it one of the five most popular on-line PC action games because of its absolute authenticity. It aught to be authentic - it was developed by the US Army and at a development cost of just US$7.5 million, it might just be the most effective on-line advertising spend in history to this point in time ... and now there's a sequel. Read More
Klever Shopping cart begins roll-out
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Feb. 23, 2005 Klever Marketing has begun licensing its technologies for electronic display and messaging devices mounted on the handles of supermarket shopping carts, the penultimate step in bringing its KleverKart shopping carts to market. The KleverKart features a built-in wireless computer that shoppers can use as a self-service assistant to scan items to check the price, a store directory to easily locate the item, automatically generated shopping lists based on individual consumer's prior history (via a loyalty card), seasonal promotions, electronic coupons, recipes (so you don't get home without all the ingredients) and you can even follow news and local weather. Read More
Product Placement in Advertising
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February 16, 2005 Nobody is surprised anymore that movies and TV programs seek payment for allowing brands to make appearances in programs. Just as journalistic war reporting has become ‘embedded’ with the military, so too has brand advertising become ‘embedded’ with the mass media. When the current movie “Sideways” eulogized pinot noir wine, USA sales of it for January (2005) shot up 22%. After release of the movie “About Schmidt” in 2002 starring Jack Nicholson, child sponsorships for aid agency ‘Plan International’ quadrupled. (Nicholson played a retiree whose world is falling apart and by sponsoring a young Tanzanian boy, Ndugu, he finds something to live for.) While ‘Plan International’ did not pay to be in the film, it illustrates the potency of product placement! Is it any wonder that brands and companies are prepared to pay to get into the movies? Read More
Invisible digital post-it notes
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February 12, 2005 In the future, cell phone users will be able to leave messages anywhere in the form of what might be termed electronic post-its. They will be able to post virtual messages referring to a specific location wherever they are needed. Siemens researchers have now created the technical basis and the computer programs for this "digital graffiti service." Post-its are exceedingly practical. They're a handy way of letting people know if you've gone out quickly to shop or to lunch, or for reminding you to do things. However, you can't stick these yellow memos in mid-air - at least not yet. But that will be possible in future with the virtual post-its from Siemens Corporate Technology's research laboratory in Munich. Dieter Kolb's team of specialists have developed computer programs that assign cell phone messages to specific locations. Read More
Haptic Arm Wrestling hits the net
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December 14, 2004 An internet facilitated "haptic" arm-wrestling machine devised to teach children "hands-on" applications of networking in the digital age is the hit of American museums and may spawn a new sports craze. The Haptic Arm Wrestling machine, currently on display at 6 science museums, including the New York Hall of Science in Queens, the Tech Museum in San Jose, and the Imaginarium in Alaska, allows contestants to arm wrestle remote human opponents over the internet while watching live video and audio feeds. Read More
Common sense 101 - The Most Hated Advertising Techniques
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December 7, 2004 If you suddenly found that your company was doing something that resulted in a very negative response from your customers, would you stop doing it? If your answer is YES and you have a web site that runs advertising or your company runs web advertising, you'd better read this. Read More
Real world gaming with a GPS-capable mobile phone
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December 6, 2004 The growing utilisation of GPS technology in mobile phones has spawned an interesting new form of real-world interaction with with the announcement of the "RayGun" a fast-paced location game from Glofun. RayGun combines the mental intensity of a video game with the physical intensity of a sport, where the real world serves as the game board. Read More
Holo-Dek offers new concept in interactive gaming
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December 3, 2004 Straight from the set of Star Trek comes the "Holo-Dek", a unique virtual venue that offers multiplayer gaming on a fast-LAN network where all the action is projected onto high-definition viewing screens ranging from 6 to 16 feet in size. Complete with full-surround 7.1 Dolby sound, the result is an immersive environment that dominates the senses, delivering another step towards fully-fledged virtual reality and a blueprint for future interactive gaming theatres. Read More
Xbox brings a Virtual Personal Trainer to gaming
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November 27, 2004 The gaming market is expanding it's audience through the growth of the "edutainment" genre, with titles like "Yourself!Fitness" for the Xbox, Playstation and PC targeting gamers, women and a wider audience who want a workout from a personal "Virtual Trainer" in the comfort of their own home. Created by responDESIGN , this new approach to personal fitness takes the often sedentary pastime of gaming and gives it a healthy impetus. Customers will also be able to purchase the game online and sign up for newsletters, promotions and tips from Maya, the Yourself!Fitness Virtual Personal Trainer. Read More
Pac-Man classic arcade game enters augmented reality
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November 26, 2004 The latest application of augmented reality has hit the streets of Singapore - a physically interactive version of the classic arcade game 'Pac-Man'. Developed at the National University of Singapore's Mixed Reality Lab,
the "Human Pac- Man" is a working prototype that recreates the groundbreaking 1980 game within a new kind of computing experience. Players interact with each other and the digitised, 3D "Pacworld" environment overlaid on their field of vision through the use of wearble computers, a headset and goggles. One player acts as Pac-Man and the others roleplay the Ghosts, tracking each other down real-world streets or corridors with GPS receivers and motion technology linked to a central computer by a wireless LAN network. Read More
Trading cards get a DVD upgrade
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November 20, 2004 Sports trading cards have been with us for more than 100 years - a curious collectible that began as a tobacco and chewing gum promotion and has evolved into almost a currency in its own right. Now there's a new development which appears to be gathering strength as football trading cards get the multimedia treatment with the release of DVD Cardz. The DVD Card release will unite football fans with the latest in multimedia technology, bridging the gap between traditional football stickers and the contemporary video gaming industry. The cardz work in PlayStation 2 and X-box consoles, as well as standard DVD players and DVD-ROM drives. Each one contains 570 MB of interactive match video, superb photography, player stats, bios, music, trivia and strategy games. Read More
Automotive advertising shifts gear
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November 21, 2004 The success of a new advertising campaign from Citroën marks not only a coup for the company in the promotion of its latest model - the C4 - but a more general trend in automobile advertising that aims to grab the attention of an ad-weary public using an off-beat, creative edge. This trend (most notably demonstrated by the Honda Accord Euro 'Cog' television commercial of 2003) sees the C4 promoted by sophisticated animation in the form of a dancing robot. By generating a ‘wow’ factor rather than presenting the consumer with ‘just another car on the road’, Citroën has also benefited from widespread distribution of the ad via viral email networks . Read More
Broadband Phantom Game Service to launch in 2005
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November 17, 2004 Thanks to a strategic alliance with Limelight Networks, the Phantom Game Service from Infinium Labs is poised to deliver end-to-end subscription game services delivered over broadband, offering gamers a broad library of titles on-demand to a global market. Read More
Halo 2 Headset delivers superior gameplay
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November 15, 2004 The convergence of real-world technologies with online
gaming continues with the release of the GameCom Halo 2 lightweight communications headset from Plantronics, the brand Neil Armstrong used to give his historic "One small step for man" transmission from the moon in 1969.
GameCom Halo 2 was engineered specifically for the Xbox gaming system and the highly anticipated sequel to Halo, the best-selling game from Bungie Studios. Read More
New boardgame dispels wine tasting myths
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November 14, 2004 Move over, Monopoly - Winerd, The Wine Tasting Game That Crushes Grape Fears is a new approach to improving wine knowledge for connoisseurs and amateurs alike. Created by Tamara Leigh Murphy, a private wine instructor and former chef, and Richard Murphy of Winerd Entertainment, the board game brings the fun of wine tasting to the masses and dispels the notion that wine has to be intimidating. Read More
New Marketing Medium Turns Cans Into Ads
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November 2, 2004 Ambient media continues to invade every available niche left in our lives. This week it’s the top of your drink can, as a new can-top 5 layer plastic label made its debut at the Fort Lauderdale International Boat Show, with cans of Coca-Cola sporting the new ADVERCAN labels. America alone consumes 260 billion cans per year, so ADVERCAN has developed what it claims is the world's first Can Top Media Campaign.
Five years in development, the six-layer plastic ADVERCAN label serves as both an advertising medium and a "Cleancap" designed to keep the can top clean from the bottling plant to the store shelf. Read More
Media Fragmentation – changing ways of using media
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November 2, 2004 New media forms, predominantly the internet and Pay TV, are changing our media consumption habits. In a recent presentation by Roy Morgan Research Chief Executive Michele Levine, the company's ongoing changes to its research methodologies were outlined, indicating just how many media are competing for our precious time. The accompanying chart clearly illustrates the rise in the Internet as a new force in media consumption. We also have links to the entire presentation. Read More
Get the Tamagotchi connection
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Parents beware! The next generation of virtual Tamagotchi pets has arrived and the Tamagotchi Connection now has infrared capabilities allowing it to interact with other digital pets - and even breed! Read More
Serious Car Racing Simulator
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As computer games and graphics head quickly towards highly-detailed realism, we can expect some pretty interesting computer peripherals to be built in coming decades. The genre of computer game which almost everyone can relate to is driving/racing a car plus there's a whole generation of fans out there who absorb every detail of the sport it is emulating - accordingly, car racing is the realism genre which has had the most attention from game developers, and is now so realistic that many genuine elite-level racers learn new circuits prior to setting wheel on them by playing the official games for that particular franchise of racing, such a Formula One, V8 Supercars or MotoGP. Every competitor, car, corner, braking area, trackside marquis ad infinitum is true in detail. Read More
Playstation 2 trimmed down
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Sony has announced the release next month of the trimmed down Playstation 2. While inheriting the basic functions and design philosophy of the current PlayStation 2 (SCPH-50000), the internal architecture has been completely redesigned, resulting in a slimmer and more lightweight design. Internal volume has been reduced by 75%, weight has been halved, and thickness trimmed down to 2.8 cm (thickness of current model is 7.8 cm). Equipped with an integrated Ethernet port for network gaming, the new PlayStation 2 sets new standards in the fusion of design and functionality. Read More
The Digital Video Recorder a threat to television advertising
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The era of the digital video recorder is looming large as new research studies emerging from the US indicate that 15% of all Internet households have connected their computers to a TV or stereo, that DVR users spend 60% of their TV time watching recorded programs and that when watching recorded programs, they skip 92% of commercials. Further, 75% of households with these PC/CE connections play music on their PC through a stereo and over 40% have viewed digital photos on their TV. "Music and imaging applications are much more important than video to these consumers," said John Barrett, director of research for Parks Associates. "People don't need a computer to watch video on their TV. However, they do need a computer if they want to view digital photos on their TV." Read More
3-D adds new dimension to jigsaw puzzles
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For more than 200 years jigsaw puzzles have remained pretty much the same. While they have grown larger in size and more intricate and complex, they have always been designed with two dimensions in mind, until now.
Puzzleball, by Australian company Blue Opal, is the world’s first 3-D plastic spherical jigsaw puzzle, adding a new dimension to the two dimensional world of jigsaw puzzles. In its completed form it measures 23 cm in diameter and is comprised of 540 interlocking plastic pieces, which hold its spherical shape without any internal support or glue. Read More
SingStar - Battle of the lounge room rockstars!
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Lounge room karaoke has gone to the next level thanks to Playstation 2 and the Sony SingStar Party game, which turns everyone into an Idol superstar. Building upon the original SingStar module that enables players to analyse their pitch, tone and rhythm whilst singing, SingStar Party now adds competitive multiplayer modes for between two to eight players to test their vocal abilities against each other in an open battle of the mic. Read More
Playstation EyeToy 2 offers surveillance camera
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The next version of Sony's Eyetoy Play due later this year can be used as a security camera as well as for dancing, karaoke and gameplaying further strengthening the Playstation's as a hub for home services and entertainment. Budding detectives can set up their SpyToy to secretly capture photos or record video of intruders, or they can record their own stealth message that will pop up on the television screen should anyone cross the threshold. Read More
Happy Birthday to the View-Master
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The View-Master is a toy which people of all ages remember vividly from their childhood. It's one of those rare high-tech inventions that has maintained massive appeal across multiple generations and this month it is celebrating its 65th anniversary. Despite numerous new media devices entering its domain since it first hit the market in 1939, its appeal remains strong and the View-Master has now sold more than a billion units. Read More
France Telecom develops flexible display clothing
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In a bid to develop a new prototype for clothing which communicates with the surroundings, France Telecom has developed an integrated flexible screen to display animated graphics on the wearer. Researchers at France Telecom have recently developed operational prototypes of flexible colour screens integrated into clothing, opening up new horizons for services that let users display images on the clothes they wear. Read More
Sony EyeToy adds Video Conferencing to the Playstation 2
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Sony Computer Entertainment Europe (SCEE) has unveiled the latest title in the ‘EyeToy’ family. ‘EyeToy: Chat’ is yet another pointer to the versatility of the PlayStation2 (PS2) as a home entertainment system by adding videophone functionality.
On show at the E3 Expo and expected in stores in s... Read More
The Insane Company you Work for
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The corporation is many things to many people. To some it is the devil incarnate, to others it is the instrument by which they earn a living and in the American legal sense, it is a person. Under American law, companies are accorded the same privileges as humans – all of the same protections and rights. A landmark film entitled “The Corporation” puts forward the notion that if the corporation is a person, then that person is insane. Read More
