T-Mobile announced a partnership with Yahoo! that will allow them to show banner adverts on T-Mobile’s Web’n'Walk portal.
I’ve been using The Mobile Internet (in addition to The Computer Internet) for a couple of years now. I only really use it when I’m very bored or I’m not able to get on to The Computer Internet. It looks like these ads will only roll out across the Web’n'Walk portal, which is still stuck in 1998 back when brands believed that people actually want to use generic portals. Could it be that the only reason people go to the Web’n'Walk portal is because it’s almost impossible to change your home page?
Apparently, “mobile advertising will be enormous for the industry”, but I think many advertisers, particularly for eCommerce would have trouble buying media on The Mobile Internet if there is no measurable goal i.e. the user can’t use their credit card on The Mobile Internet. Until the telecoms stop charging 40% on reverse SMS and come up with an appropriate payment mechanism, eCommerce will not be getting on board. And that ultimately means that the market wont get any traction.
The thought of blinking punch-the-monkey banner ads springs to mind. There is limited screen estate as-is, it’s like using The Computer Internet but through back-to-front binoculars. Fudging the user’s experience up with invasive, targeted banner adverts is a sure-fire way to ensure that 2008 is NOT the ‘key year’ for mobile Internet.
As ShockAbsorber is one of our clients, I feel it important to keep abreast of news in the lingerie sector. So here’s a great little app from Knicker Picker that allows you to view models wearing the underwear you might be thinking about buying. There is definatitely something voyeuristic about it
I haven’t heard the phrase ‘culture jamming’ since Naomi Klein’s No Logo but there’s a fair bit of talk about some grousome appearances hitting the high streets of the LDN.
Targets seem to be large brands such as Vodaphone, Pimms and The Bee Movie. The latter is surprising given that it’s a movie targeted at children. Culture jamming can be humourous, intelligent and insightful but this is none of those things and doesn’t achieve much more than to boost the exposure of the brand itself. Here’s The Decapitator’s Flickr group where people are falling over themselves to gush about how incredibly ‘genius’ and ‘awesome’ it is. Culture jamming started in the mid-80s and doesn’t always involve outdoor media, it can be an event such as Buy Nothing Day. I’m not going to get myself into trouble by posting my favourites but feel free to check out this pool on Flickr. Another good place for culture jamming ephemera is AdBusters.
Since 9.50pm, Tuesday night, just before one of those M&S ads that are getting way too tired but still manage to make your mouth water. During Gorday ‘fucking’ Ramsay’s Kitchen Nightmares in which he somewhat accurately described an entrepreneurial maitre-de as a “fat idiot” and “a weak man”. I’m not talking about Ramsay, it was the advert for a new product by Durex which can only be described as a vibrating cock ring. I was online at the time (I’m a multi-channel grown-up, after all) so, I had to look online at durex.co.uk. The web site took about 50 seconds to load up and it wasn’t a large file size. This indicated that there was a very large number of people taking a look at the same time. Could this make advertising sex toys on prime-time TV acceptable? I doubt it, from a buying perspective, they did great, Ramsay loves to use the word ‘fuck’ a lot. Which tends to suggest that the audience is less likely to be shocked. Of course, this doesn’t mean to say they are going to purchase a vibrating cock ring.
The concept is great and they keep it very much on the monogamist side with phrases on their site like ’spicy twosomes’ and the simple fact that the thing is shaped like an engagement ring. Of course, the ad itself is totally positioned around monogamy and marriage.
It’s a shame they didn’t get their new web site sorted in time, the one that’s up at the moment is total crap.
