You have definitely heard of Queensland Tourism’s Best Job In The World. You may have also heard that Osama bin Laden applied for the position… and was rejected. I know the people who put together the video (and no, it is not me). I observed as it evolved from a Friday afternoon joke to appearing as homepage headlines on international news sites and generating comment from politicians.
While the whole exercise was rather pointless, it is further proof of the power that the internet has in generating mass audiences very quickly. …

Would you use home brand washing powder? Or home brand vitamins? Or home brand condoms? These might be the only option you have soon.
Last month Nielsen research found that supermarket home brands had increased 22.1% in grocery share. This reflects an international trend with the sales of home brand products rising by 30% in the UK.  There are a number of reasons for this including the increased difficulty for new brands to get into the major supermarkets, consumers trialing lower cost products in tougher economic times (aka The Aldi …

Twitter is packed full of self help gurus, social media experts and bored housewives. As it approaches the mainstream it is going to be joined by a range of interesting people with equally interesting occupations. Here are ten occupations I’m looking forward to following…
1. Doctor

2. Parking Inspector 

3. House Cleaner

4. Bartender

5. Bus Driver

6. Postman

7. Personal Trainer

8. Mechanic

9. Judge

10. Stock Trader

Social applications are the flavour of the month. And for good reason – they are incredibly popular. I don’t need to tell you this. But just because you have a new technology it doesn’t mean that you have to try and force it into the social square.
This thought was triggered by Google Latitude which was launched earlier this month. In a nutshell, Google Latitude tells you where your friends are at this very instant. For more info, Zoe has a nice summary here. The concept interested me and I wanted …

There’s no doubt that the economic downturn has affected the way we work. For some, this means that we can no longer get away with using the stationary order to order bulldog clips to keep your cereal fresh. For others, it means that there is no longer work.
For me, as a communications planner, it has had two major consequences:1) Budgets have been cut (this is a no brainer and we are all aware of it)2) Planning has gone out the window
It’s the second consequence that I was having troble with.Watching …

I was talking to a colleague talking today about the Victorian bushfires. They made a great point that disasters such as these reveal the polar opposites in the Australian people. There is the good, the brave, the strong represented by the victims, firefighters and generous donators. And there is the cowardly, the disturbed and the heartless represented by the arsonists, looters and scammers. Thankfully, the former far outweigh the latter.
It’s also great to see former baddies turn into goodies – for the moment anyway. We have the major banks donating …

I’ve lugged this box of CD’s to four different houses over the last four years and have never unpacked it. There’s no need. All the music I want is now on my computer. So the time has come to make a decision and I need your help.
What should I do with these artifacts?
a) Send them back to record labels for them to provide me a DRM free copy Apple styleb) Set up a stall at the markets right next to the record collectors to freak them outc) Use them for …

For the past six months, I took the same congested route to work every day. You could be guaranteed to see the same cars, the same roadworks and the same creepy guy sitting on the park bench watching women exercise. The one thing that was always different and momentarily distracted me from the boredom was a small scrolling LCD screen out the front of a nondescript motel named ‘The Wellington‘.
Every day I would drive past and see messages such as these…
“Well done Clarke – 98 not out” in response to …

Here’s an idea that I think would dramatically increase conversation and involvement on blogs and forums.
I rarely view blog posts twice. Even if I comment on a blog post I won’t go back to check if my comment has sparked a reaction. And I won’t subscribe to comments as I don’t want 1000’s of emails per day. Similarly, when I respond to someone who has left a comment on my blog, I doubt whether they actually view that reply. Essentially, the conversation can be as constructive as the “pretty …

What’s going to win the TV ratings for the three major networks this year? Boobs, bums, bullets, bonking, brawls, balls, bruises and bad language if you ask Nine. The problem is: how do you promote realistically in primetime? You can’t. And that’s why Channel Nine have attempted to release it virally and ‘anonymously’.
First, we had the Underbelly 2 uncut preview. The suspicion was that it was ‘leaked’ by Nine (forgive me, there will be a lot of inverted commers used because I am implying eg. Thorpie has a male ‘friend’). …