youtube
Daytime TV Advertising
As part of the wonderful stupor of being a new dad I’ve ended up watching too much daytime TV. And as a result seeing too many daytime TV ads. I have learned much. National Geographic have whored themselves out to co-brand some air…
Walk On The Wild Side
On Saturday evenings at roundabout 6pm on BBC is my favourite new TV show. It’s called Walk on the Wild Side. The premise is very very simple. It’s people doing funny voiceovers on top of lovely nature footage. It’s the shorter simpler…
In B Flat
This is great. http://www.inbflat.net/ Last year I blogged about the idea of doing something a bit similar. But this lovely chap took a different (much better and more realistic) approach, and made something that really works. It’s been…
Fast DJ Setups – Another Reason To Love YouTube
I just love the mini-cults that you find on YouTube sometimes. This is my favourite find for a while. Mobile Disc Jockey’s setting up their rigs time-lapse style… And (love his YouTube overlay at the start – we should all use that…
The Most Amazing Training Video Ever
How to hand out a free magazine on the streets of London presented by Shortlist’s publisher Mike Soutar… I LOLed multiple times and had my mouth agog for most of it. Absolute comedy gold. You really couldn’t make that shit up. “It makes…
Samsung Go All Out in Cute Attack
How are you going to show off the big bright screen of your new mobile phone? Use it as the centerpiece in loads of scenes with super-cute animals. How can it not fail? They’d be better not having a mega-sucky website that has absolutely…
How to ‘Do The Internet’ with Little Boots and Imogen Heap
There’s lots that us try-hard webby / advertising folk can learn from these young ladies about how to ‘do’ social networks and audience engagement. I hate myself for even writing about this stuff in ‘those’ terms. The words ‘audience…
Merry Christmas and Muppet Hip Hop
I’ve had a nice Christmas, hope you have too. This clip made me feel ready for NYE: via: Musiclikedirt
54 Million Views For A Ticking Noise
I’m sure most of you have seen this. But I saw it again the other day and was as tickled by it as I was the first time I saw it. Such a simple lovely little thing. And it’s got 54 million views and counting. That’s a lot of views. But I’m…
Urban Play Amsterdam – Moving Forest
I was in Amsterdam at the weekend and was lucky enough to pass through a bunch of things that were going on as part of the Urban Play festival. I particularly liked the mobile forest. I’m not sure it was supposed to be this mobile… But…
Wario Land – Shake it! Wii Advertising
This YouTube Channel for Wario Land is great. We’ve seen the technique before, but it really works here and was a genuine surprise. (Sorry, I guess I’ve spoiled it already, but take a look). And the game looks great too. The Wario…
Techno Viking’s Route on Google Maps
Größere Kartenansicht Thanks to Andy Polaine for the link to the map. I couldn’t help but open it in Goolge Earth. Then I started fantasising about how great it’s going to be once they add Street View to Berlin. Then I can retrace the…
More Church and Bass
It’s like a funny sledgehammer. Crude but brutally effective. I love the fact they’ve started using annotations to add another layer of humour too. And another… It can’t be long before someone does one of these as a proper promo video… And…
5 Games You Need to Know About
I’m not a hardcore gamer. I play games very occasionally. I’d like to spend more time doing it. But I think I’ll save it till I retire. Games are bound to be super-awesome then and I’ll have loads of time to waste. Here are 5 games that…
I Heart Flight of the Conchords A Lot
I know lots of people know about The Flight of the Conchords, and I know that it’s not new. But there are a few people who’ve either not heard of it, or for some reason resisted. This post is for you. I’m loving it so much I feel the need…
Crisps and Conversations
I’ve been a bit of a sceptic about interactivity and FMCGs. Most of the time they just create digital litter. Maybe it’s just because I’m a big fan of crisps. But Walkers seem to be doing some peculiarly interesting things around…
I Haven’t Got Anything Interesting To Say Today
I’m almost ready to write something marginally profound. But my brain’s a little too tired to pull it off, so I thought some of you might like this instead: I was going to say how it reminded me of Zip-a-dee-doo-dah but without the Acid…
At The End of the Day
Like shooting fish in a barrel. But there’s a bit in the middle that’s a minor stroke of genius (I won’t spoil it)… Originally found at jiggmiester’s Tumblr.
The Finest Sweatshirt in the World?
I bought me one of these Nike x Loopwheeler AW77 sweatshirts: From the Nike 1948 store in Shoreditch. I’ve been wearing it for 3 days straight. And I can’t take it off. It truly is the finest sweatshirt I’ve ever owned. I don’t normally…
Augmented Reality Museum Tour
A nice way of adding interactivity to a museum / exhibit. It’s just a glimpse of what’s possible (in German but you’ll get the idea): More information on the project here (in English).
More AR Madness
Jason at work just sent me this: Wow.
Examples of Amazing Augmented Reality
I’ve been doing a bit of digging around the whole Augmented Reality thing recently and thought I ought to share a few of my favourite things… Carcade – cool! Micro Machines on AR acid Absolutely and totally mind-blowing game taking place…
Forget the Congestion Charge
Mauro, one of our lovely young creatives was talking to me about beating up a car in Street Fighter 2. And I was sort of like: “what?”. And he was like: “when you see it you’ll totally remember”. And he sent it to me. And I was like…
I’m Doing Christmas and It’s Doing Me In
The Christmas briefs are in… Aaaaaargh… People moaning about Christmas decorations in the shops in October can shut right up. I’m going to be fed up with the whole thing before Argos even puts Slade on rotation. I’m working on two of them…
Orange Unlit Tour – Welcome Hedluv
We’re putting on a tour with Orange. It’s part of the whole ‘I am’ thing. The Unlit Tour is about an artist going on the road and creating his own ‘I am’ story as he goes. The tour is going to be ‘made by everyone’. From the people who…
YouTube and Music
An odd thing happened to me on Saturday night. I was playing some music through the stereo via my laptop. Sophie started humming a tune that she wanted to hear and I thought I could recognise what it was. So I tried to find the track. But…
Fleshmap – Body Parts in Music
This site’s got some brilliant visualisations of how often various body parts are mentioned in different genres of music. Once you’re there you can drill down into the various genres and see what’s occurring. Which is nice. But the best…
Musical Madness – Kidda – Under The Sun Remix
Sorry, I know it’s been a few musicy posts in a row. But I had to share this. It’s perhaps the most bonkers track I’ve heard recently. It’s hard to describe its genre, it’s basically like speeded up funk / soul, meets happy hardcore, meets…
An Amazing Animated Gif Video
Absolutely incredible – also from http://www.perishfactory.com/. It’s just one long scrolling scene made up of thousands of animated gifs. I quite like the song too, it’s jolly. Whoops, almost forgot the track is by The Sea and Cake and…
Bomb the Bass Butterfingers Video
I love this completely and utterly. The track is amazing and the video is wonderfully simple… It’s Butterfingers by Bomb the Bass (featuring Fujiya & Miyagi). There’s a high quality quicktime version here with much better audio.
Lords of the Dance
It’s been a very very long time since I posted a Silly Moment in Techno. This made me laugh so hard that people around the office were concerned for my welfare. Thank you Andy, you made my day.
Making A YouTube Band
If you play solo clips from YouTube on the same page at the same time it sounds oddly like a band (kinda). I’ve got a project on the go to try and make an interesting random YouTube band maker. But I need some help. See what it sounds like…
Kinder Under Threat
I never thought I’d be ranting about chocolate eggs. It makes me feel unclean and slightly deranged. I’m hopefully going to manage to fend off the voice in my left ear going: “you’re just like one of those people you hate, the ones who…
The Girl Effect
The design of this charity site is really lovely. To my ill-trained eyes the typography is nice. And I like their promo film too. Everything about just feels like it works together. And they made sharing so easy I’d have felt mean not doing…
iPhone as VJ / DJ Controller via Midi
I know someone who is holding out on getting an iPhone because he was a bit scathing about them when they first came out. He’s scared of being shown up as a fool and a traitor when he gets one. This video is just another example of the…
Looks Like Carphone Warehouse, Smells (and Sounds) Like Minilogue
Minilogue video by Kristopher Storm (Music by Minilogue). Carphone Warehouse ad by Kristopher Storm (Music by Minilogue). I’m really confused. Everything in my brain is shutting down and I’ve got no idea what to say about it. My groove has…
Sometimes It’s Hard
Poke NY’s unofficial motto is Don’t Give Up (at least it was last time I was there). There’s various versions of it all round the office. At first I wasn’t sure I liked it. But I’ve grown to realise that it’s a really important skill and…
A $5 Laser Show – OMG OMG OMG!
I love lasers and music. I just do. So I almost wet myself when I saw this great video of a $5 laser show: Full instructions on how to make your own are here. Or Dr Altman will take you through all the necessary steps right here: Perhaps…
Making Art With Microsoft Office
It’s kind of ironic that the only Microsoft tool that has an ‘art’ mode is Word. Who could miss its amazing ‘Word Art’ feature – if you’ve never played with it, go into the ‘insert’ menu and choose ‘picture’, then in the picture menu…
Creative Similarities?
On the David Elsewhere stuff Tim just commented: I liked spike’s version from a year or two ago. With a link to this video: It’s a different thing doing a different job. But I can see how one would perhaps make you think of the other. For…
David Elsewhere and Motorola
Here’s a new thing that Poke have just finished. Well it’s not completely new. It’s taken a bit of time to get out into the world for various reasons. in fact some of the very eagle-eyed amongst you might have noticed that I posted some of…
TPS Reports in RTM
I just noticed this in the Remember the Milk task manager in Gmail. The default task is “TPS Report 5pm”. For some reasons TPS reports chimed a bell with me. Then I remembered they’re featured in the legendary film Office Space: In reality…
upl8.tv from Poke NY
The chaps at Poke NY have just spawned a new thing of total awesomeness. Basically it’s a YouTube viewer that allows you to browse YouTube clips using just the space bar. You visit the site and start watching. If you don’t like the clip…
One Of The Greatest Quotes Ever…
It’s nice to be back… TV is not vulgar and prurient and dumb because the people who compose the audience are vulgar and dumb. Television is the way it is simply because people tend to be extremely similar in their vulgar and prurient and…
FHM Go Beatboxing – So Nearly Brilliant
A guy from FHM learns to beatbox. Then enters the UK Beatbox Championships. The video is really nice, fun and kind of educational. “Buh, keh, buh, keh, ts, ts. I’m getting it. I’m really getting it…” The clip above is basically a teaser…
Contact Juggling As I Believe It’s Called
I normally find this kind of thing a bit sort-of cringe inducing. But this guy is absolutely phenomenal. I also quite liked this clip of a bunch of glass-ball nerds just mucking around and having a jolly good time. UPDATE: I started to…
Red Bull Music Academy – Brilliant
I’ve not really looked into the Red Bull Music Academy stuff before. IT’S AMAZING. There’s some brilliant video lectures and an awesome podcast. It’s like TED for cool music. The lectures are full of heroic musical dudes from bunch of…
A Weekend of Boom Blox
I couldn’t find Wii Fit anywhere this weekend. And even Mario Kart seemed to be sold out at most places so I took a punt and bought Boom Blox for the Wii instead. Net result. A very sore arm and many hours wasted. It’s a brilliant game…
The End of Busy Week
Calls for something special… Penguin wins, hands down.
ABC3D – The Most Brilliant Book Video Ever
Sorry if this is old hat, it’s been seen by quite a few people on YouTube. But it’s one of those things that even if you’ve seen it before, you’ll be happier after seeing it again
The Perfect Music for Anything Ever
The world didn’t really need any more music after Africa by Toto did it? We’re just being greedy. Although there is a natty nu-balearic re-make by Rune Lindbaek which featured on his Klubb Kebab album last year, which I think I’ve got…
Two Things I Thought Everyone Had Seen, But Turns Out They Haven’t, Yet
If you have seen these already, sorry. I thought that they’d done the rounds but I’ve mentioned both of them to a few people who’ve all looked at me blankly. So I thought I should share… Facebook in real life: And this guy who breaks out a…
YouTube vs Last.fm
Nicely executed mashup of last.fm and YouTube made by a guy called Tim Bormans. It looks slick and works pretty well – to view it click here. It’s easy to make your own personalised music video channel, as long as you’ve got a last.fm…
2 Amazing Videos
Both entries to Radiohead related competitions. This first one was a D&AD brief last year for a video for a Thom Yorke track. It won. It’s quite dark. But it works it’s simplicity nicely. And this from the ever stunning Flight404. Have…
My Talk at Under The Influence
Here’s the talk I did at Iris’ excellent Under the Influence day. It’s basically about digital experiences and magic and how the two are interconnected. Hope it’s OK – from my perspective I think it wanders a bit at the end (I sort of ran…
Remixed Dancing Videos
I’ve had one of these saved for a while, but when I found the other I thought it was time to post them as a set. I don’t know why, they just tickle me. And this one from Romania (thanks to whoever sent this link to me via del.icio.us – I…
The UNICEF Tap Project
I’d never seen the full case study of this amazing campaign before. It’s just great. Probably old news to many of you. But still brilliant.
It’s a Safetergent WTF
A classic: “It’s not a detergent it’s a safetergent”. I just saw this on TV and couldn’t believe it. I didn’t think I’d be able to share it, but thanks to the all-seeing YouTube I can. Hooray.
Google Visualisation Gadgets – Cool
I discovered the world of visualisation gadgets through this excellent blog: http://digitalurban.blogspot.com/ They’re things that can basically turn a table full of boring data into interactive gadgets that you can publish and share as…
Art of Noise: Moments in Love
A classic bit of 80s Balearic tunage. What’s not to love. A proper classic. Not 100% sold on the video though
Packshots vs Reality
This German site has photos of 100 product packs and shows them alongside photos of ‘the real thing’. Surprise surprise, the packs look better. Via: metafilter
Oh My Good Lord
Sophie’s brother introduced me to the work of Larry Carlson yesterday. Half of me wishes he hadn’t. It’s like a portal into a strange dimension that makes you feel kind of odd. But you can’t help sticking around to see what happens next…
Please God Let This Be The Last…
The world can’t cope with any more toppling objects. Perhaps Pot Noodle can be the nail in the coffin of tipping stuff. (Oh, apart from the coffin-based domino rally that I’m going to do very soon…)
The Rise of The Ad Man 2.0
[I’ve written this post once already. I got to the end of it just as someone phoned me up. I picked up the phone. Fumbled it. And dropped it on my laptop which duly crashed in a spectacular fashion. The second revision is slightly shorter…
My New Invention – Suspense Pregnancy Kits
Pregnancy tests are a staple of TV drama. You can’t have a soap opera without the cliffhanger moment when someone is waiting in a bathroom staring at a wet little stick to find out if they’re up the duff or not. And these days the…
Yet Another Silly Moment in Techno
Is this techno viking‘s mum? Or grandma? Very scary indeed.
Scratching Hand
Nice inspiration for an ad. Anyone, anyone
Ohmygod Dancing
Sorry, last one of the day I promise. I just couldn’t not share this incredible body popping. Wow! This evening’s show has been kindly supported by StumbleUpon Video. Thanking you.
Computer Music Skillz
Sorry for the flurry of posts. It’s the first excitable surfing I’ve done in a while. I am so envious of this guy’s ability with his computer music equipment: Here’s some more beatfoolery: Jealous.
Poor Portishead
I feel dead sorry for Portishead. They were stunning. And then they became the soundtrack to a thing that no-one wanted to be. But their music skills are good: And reading about them in the Observer made me like them again. I love the fact…
Fun Fun Fun auf der Autobahn
Wowza. This 12 minute tripped out animation for Kraftwerk’s seminal Autobahn is quite something. Buy the DVD (or VHS) and find out more here.
If I Was 17 Again
24 hour clock
24 hour art installation
Typographic Synthesizer – So Good It’s Magic!
You know sometimes when you see something so amazing that you almost forget to breathe while you’re looking at it. Well I’m just about finished hyperventilating after the end of this video. The guys at Meek.fm have created something that…
That’s a Mermaid?
It’s amazing what YouTube throws up in it’s ‘related videos’ section: For me, that’s not a mermaid. This is a mermaid: I’d have loved to see Tom Hanks fall in love with the top one though.
Pre-YouTube Silly Moments In Techno
I should probably start a separate category in the blog for this stuff. It just seems to keep on coming… I loved this clip for a couple of reasons. Firstly, it’s a bunch of cheeky young ravers from Edinburgh. I would have been living there…
4×4 Meme: More About Me
I got tagged by blackbeltjones with the 4×4 meme. So I rolled over and became a part of it. Plus it gives me a chance for some totally self-absorbed and pointless blogging. It looks like this meme has mutated a bit over time, but I’m going…
Awesome Elvis Dancing in The Park
Another bit of creative dance from elsewhere in the world… Thanks to Mr Polaine for the link – genius.
Comments and Community on YouTube
Knotty commented on the YouTube Cyber Haterz thing with: I don’t know why people even bother with YouTube comments… Imagine if you had to listen to every bitchy comment people made to their TV? I was thinking about that when I posted the…
International YouTube Skate Cyber Haterz
This is one of the best little YouTube community dramas that I’ve ever seen. I’m going to try and tell the story as best I can, but I’m sure I’m not going to do it justice… It all starts with popininmyhood posting this video entitled…
Monkeys and Drums and Stuff
Scamp has written a really good piece about ideas and their appropriation by advertising. It specifically talks about the Cadbury’s Gorilla and the fact that it was originally pitched to someone else, and there was once a drumming Gorilla…
Shit Disco – OK
Simple, but effective… For some reason I kept imagining an interactive version of the video that acts a bit like a Guitar Hero style game
Star Test
From back when computers were really cool (the late 1980s I think). A Channel 4 show where celebrities were interviewed by ‘a computer’. I used to love Star Test. I can’t remember why, but I did.
Loon Dancing to Make You Feel OK
I rarely get angry. It’s not in my nature. But I got an email today that made me so angry that I really felt it, physically. The only way I could shake it off was by watching people dancing like loons. It made the bad feelings go away…
The Best Online Music Toy Ever
This is the simplest and best thing I’ve ever seen for creating music fast. It’s massively usable. You can literally get into it by clicking a few keys – admittedly you’ll be making derivative euro-dance. But it’ll sound totally competent…
The Omelette Bomb
My trip to Manchester was made awesome by witnessing ‘The Omelette Bomb’ – a piece of extreme Teppanyaki showboating the likes of which I’ve never seen before… Thank goodness I had my camera with me
Hot “New” Dance Step
Forget jumpstyle. This is the hot new dance step (well it was hot and new in 1930)… Check the user ‘GoodOldDays‘ for loads of great vintage videos. There’s some amazing stuff in there.
Dancing man wearing a horse mask cooks wild mushrooms
Last night I was moaning about having one of those days. This morning I’ve seen a dancing man wearing a horse mask cook wild mushrooms. Everything suddenly seems different.
McDonalds’ Freakout
I’ve got no clue what’s going on… Comment is all pure guesswork. If you can clarify please do… Is this an ad from Japan? Is this a really mentalist remix of an ad from Japan (it really gets going about 2/3 the way in)? This really does…
Tutortainment or Entertorials
Connected to the entertaining demos post the other day. I love the way that these Photoshop Tutorials manage to tell a story of marital breakdown and infidelity through a bunch of nerdy design-tip-screencasts. I was laughing out loud at…
The Scientist – The Bee
Was doing a bit of tidying in the loft today and came across this bit of vinyl. Even 17 years after its release it’s still got skills… If I had a filing system for my records I’d struggle knowing where to put it.
Geometry Wars – Particle Man
This ad for Geometry Wars I liked. It’s almost another kind of entertaining demo, sort of: It makes me smile and chuckle. They’ve also got some bonkers online advertising which I can’t actually find right now. And the website is also…
P-p-p-product D-d-d-demos – The Beardyman Way
I’ve been looking around for interesting product demos recently. We’ve been talking to clients how demos can be both entertaining and informative. A couple of well-known entertaining product demos that spring to mind are Ikea’s Dream…
Mangement Techniques
Where I work it’s all very nicey nicey. Which makes for a nice place to work. But sometimes I wonder whether it’s the best way of getting the best out of people. This clip inspired me to think about alternative styles of motivation… (From…
Youth Trend Watch: Hardstyle, Hardjump & Jumpstyle
This started out being a silly moment in techno post. But it’s grown into something far more important. Something that trend watchers and marketeers around the world have to pay heed to. It started with this clip from Malaysia: A few…
Soupy Norman
There’s quite a lot of re-dubbed comedy in the world. Much of it I don’t care for that much. But this re-dubbing of the Polish soap opera ‘First Love’ to make it a story about Irish Folk made me laugh out loud. For all the details consult…
Toy Hacking
I’m really excited about the upcoming Toy Hacking workshop. I’m all signed-up and ready to go, but still quite in the dark about what I’ll actually come away from it being able to do. In my fantasy vision I’ll become some kind of mad…
Stockhausen’s Helicopters
One of the things I’m trying to do differently this year (not a resolution as such) is to avoid reading the trashy free papers that come as part of the commuting package. I’m pretty sure their particular brand of reporting-lite has…
I’m Baaaaack
But I’ve got blank page syndrome. I can’t think of anything interesting to write. Computers are scaring me. I’ve not sorted out my photos yet. And I’ve got jetlag. But to bring in the New Year, here’s the greatest advert I saw whilst in…
Funny Moments in Bongo-jams
And here’s a ‘moment in techno’ but one that’s not funny, it just looks mega. Clubs in the North were / are good… Witness the effect of tearing pianos on the drug-addled minds of northern clubbers ;-) I reckon in the early 90s hands were…
A TV Ad That Made Me Laugh
This new TV ad for Carling lager made me laugh out loud. Mr Cherkoff take note ;-) (from Twitter feed earlier today)…
More Electronic Music On Mainstream TV
Lord knows how these connections get made, but I stumbled on a second clip from ‘old TV’ featuring another seminal moment in electronic music. This time it’s Giorgio Moroder on German TV… (Amazingly good quality video clip too!)
Robotic Boogie, Metal Mickey, That’s Life!
Today I love YouTube more than I ever thought I’d be able to love a video sharing site
Animation That Freaked My Groove
This guy Cyriak lives in Brighton. I’m not sure I’d like to meet him… He has got some crazy skills going on though, kind of like B3ta meets Chris Cunningham. And if that doesn’t scare you. Check this: And to prove that it’s not all scary…
WWF Paper Boat on the Telly
It floats!!! Very excited to see the WWF paper boat floating around covered in signatures on the telly last night. Firstly on the BBC News: Then on Newsnight: There’s lots of reasons why we decided that a piece of purely online activity…
Nice Vid
The music of Whitest Boy Alive, I like. Optical illusions, I like. Videos that synch-up the noises and the pictures, I like. Therefore, this video, I like.
Asi’s FaceBook Apps Analysis
Asi’s gone and done one of his mega posts. Now he’s moved from looking at the top 100 YouTube clips to looking at the top 100 FaceBook apps. Nice work. And very useful for lots of people… No Man’s Blog – Facebook Applications Trend Report 1…
The Internet (now in handy book form!)
David McCandless has been doing bits and pieces for Poke as long as Poke’s been around. In fact he’s written lots of the funnier words on the funnier projects that we’ve done. So it’s nice that someone gave him a book deal. And if he can…
Orange Unlimited Interactive TV
There’s one unfortunate things about Interactive TV ads, not that many people really get to see them. Which is a shame when they’re sometimes as lovely as this: Thanks to YouTube ‘ordinary’ people without Murdochian Red Buttons can now see…
Fire Video Gets Honours, But Why?
The video from yesterday of the fire got a link from the Guardian’s News Blog. Their embedding of the video in their blog meant that the clip had over 6,000 views yesterday which meant that it got the following ‘honours’ on YouTube. I was…
Minority Report Wii
Elaborate hack that makes the Wii work like that crazy fingertip Minority Report interface that everyone loves so much. It’s quite a long time before it gets to the money shot and it’s quite high in geekiness. via: PSFK
Big Fire
Ooooh there’s a big fire in East London, you can see it out of our window… The Fire Brigade say: Warehouse fire – Waterden Road The London Fire Brigade has been called to reports of a fire at a warehouse on Waterden Road, East London, E15…
This Internet Will Never Catch On
Following on from the Eva Pascoe and Tony Wilson post the other day. So many great moments, I really like the bit about emoticons… “Turn your head to the left… A little frowny face…”. Classic.
Zoo Advertising
What is it about Zoo advertising. This is the 3rd Zoo ad I’ve posted on here. This time it’s the San Francisco Zoo. I guess this is really just a press ad turned into a short movie, but given the costs of putting something on the Internet…
Post-it Note Waterfall
Reminded me of the end of the new Guinness Ad (only much cheaper). They look like the Diet Coke / Mentos guys. I think they might be
How Stuff Dates
I kind of love this track. But it sort of doesn’t seem to make sense any more. And the video has aged really really badly too. The original (E2:E4 by Manuel Gottsching) has aged much better in my humble opinion. It might be the cheesy…
Making Good Shit Stick Is Tough
Don’t get me wrong. I love the meritocratic world of the web. Good stuff floats, average stuff gets suspended in the sea of mediocrity and bad stuff sinks without trace. And that’s the way it ought to be. It used to be really easy. Back in…
Another Scary Moment in Techno
Even scarier than techno Viking. If that’s possible.
Tony Wilson and Eva Pascoe on the Internet
Awesome footage. Eva Pascoe (founder of Cyberia and member of the digerati) tells Tony Wilson all about the internet. [Update: Thanks to Steve for the link to the newer better version of the video – nice one mate]
This Busker is Well Good
Saw him in North Laine on Saturday. This epic psychedelic trance improv was just part of his set. A proper one-man-band with mad skills. Again sorry for the video quality. I think I might have to invest in some kind of camera that can do…
This Made Me Feel Jolly
5 Years Later by Noah and the Whale.
Mini – Lunchbreak Moonwalking
Yesterday I blogged about theotherlunchbreak.com – Mini’s really nice lunchtime learning sessions. I managed to get along to the ‘Learn to Moonwalk’ session and it was great! Sorry about the rubbish quality – my phone video camera just…
Sony’s RecYou
There’s been mutterings of recyou.jp around for a few days. It’s a very slick Japanese flash site for Sony Walkman. It’s quite hard to navigate your way through it, I managed by trial and error rather than a knowledge of Japanese…
Web 3.0 Doesn’t Sound Like Much Fun
I wasn’t going to post this as it’s not all that enlightening. It’s from a few months ago and is Eric Schmidt (Google CEO) talking about web 3.0 as a bunch of lightweight free distributable micro applications / services. Which is all very…
This Brought A Tear To My Eye
The Great Escape by Patrick Watson. I was listening to the stunning To Build a Home by Cinematic Orchestra and thought I should find out more about Mr Watson (who guests on the track) and it led me to this clip. Simply beautiful.
Urban Youth Past and Present
Back in the day urban culture used to look so much more friendly… These days it’s so much more serious and less fun: The first lot are still hanging round in a little gang. But they look like nice boys, maybe even a little camp. They’ve…
The Changing Nature of Information
By the same guy who did the great thing about Web2.0 in a similar style. Very nice. It’s a really good quick summary of a lot of the things talked about in David Weinberger’s Everything is Miscellaneous.
Drive Thru Rap
I’m late to these judging by the dates that the videos were posted, but I’m not sure how widely they’ve been seen. Just another one of those ‘funny’ ‘little’ online things that feels really odd and not particularly outstanding (to me), but…
Saving the World One Design at a Time
Ben’s blog is always great. But here’s a bit of greatness that you should make a special effort to read: I’m a designer, use me better – it’s Ben’s presentation from the Applied Green conference. It’s just dead good. It shows that…
Charlie Brooker – More Cocks and (She)Cocks in Advertising
I do find Charlie Brooker amusing. I think I’d find it a bit painful being so dark all the time, but I admire him for it
Blogger Relations – Digital Agencies Suck at it Too
In retrospect I shouldn’t have had a go at the Ogilvy PR Blogger Outreach Code of Ethics – incidentally they’re back with a V2 which you can find here. Having looked at some of the things I’ve been getting recently, people involved in this…
Skate – Nice Game, Nice Campaign
There’s a new game coming out called Skate. I think you should be able to guess what it’s about. It looks absolutely stunning, not sure that this clip will do it justice. I think they’ve also done some cool stuff with the control system by…
Will It Blend vs Invincible Chuck Norris
Two meme mashups in just one day. Internet you are really spoiling us… Thanks Knotty!
I’m Gonna Be Rockin The Commute
I’ve always wanted to be a guitar hero, but couldn’t face the callouses. Now I can create earnest rock music on the train… Jam Sessions on the Nintendo DS. I’ve pre-ordered and am waiting
The Best Whistling Clipart Ever
From the slightly overplayed but still very nice ‘Young Folks’ by Peter, Bjorn and John.
This Mix Album Is Good (Real Good)
I got a mix album today that is quite exceptional. It’s rare that a DJ mix gets me excited these days, I’ve heard a lot of them over the last 18 years or so, and they generally stopped being remarkable to me a while ago. The odd one…
Internet People – The Meta Viral
Job done. Absolutely superb.
Silly Moments in Techno
Techno clubs aren’t normally renowned for their sense of humour. But here’s a couple of moments where things go a little funny. A rather odd reaction to a rather odd track called Heater by Samin at the Outhouse Festival. And this from the…
Sharing Audio On YouTube
It’s interesting that people are using YouTube as a way of sharing audio. Obviously it’s not designed as an audio sharing site, but it does the job pretty well. I’m guessing that people are using it this way because: 1. YouTube has a…
Researchers Hip 2 Da Kidz
This from today’s ‘The London Paper’: Yup that’s about the size of it… And entries to the Tiddlywinks championships have been down this year, researchers blame YouTube.…
Cravendale Do a Very Very Good Thing
W+K London and Unit9 have made a really brilliant thing. It’s part multi-player interactive game/muckabout. Part UGC. Part video editor… http://www.milkmatters.co.uk It follows on from the really nice Cravendale ads that are on TV. You can…
I Love Unlikely Internet Heroes
I always feel a bit lame blogging stuff that’s been on BoingBoing, but I couldn’t resist Ronald Jenkees. Read their post for more details.
Making Do
The most excellent Giles who is the creator of the most excellent Edward Monkton posted a link in the comments section of the Bonfire of the Brands post. But it’s such an excellent link that I thought I had to float it to the top. Robert…
Toshio Iwai’s Tenori-On From Yamaha
Toshio Iwai has made a load of cool audio widgety things. The thing I know best is Electroplankton on the Nintendo DS. But he’s done lots of other stuff too. I’ve just come across his latest device to hit the streets, Tenori-On, it’s a bit…
Now That’s What I Call a Table!
This has been around for a while, but someone just sent it round work again. Stunning bit of physical interface shenanigans
Heroic Ads – New Bravia
I can’t help myself. I’ve been contacted by the online PR guys who are ‘seeding’ the new Bravia ad. Part of me wants to not play ball, but the other part of me wants to see what’s going on. I do like the ads and I’m interested to see what…
Shift Happens – Watch This Video
The second thought provoking animation of the week… Watch it. It’s good. Makes me realise that understanding and appreciating bits and bytes is really important. And maybe one day I’ll be able to apply it to something that makes a…
Awesome Mechanics
If your favourite game as a kid was Mouse Trap, and you enjoyed the Honda Cog advert be prepared to waste 9.10 of your life smiling through this compilation of idents for Japanese TV show Pythagoraswitch. via: BoingBoing
The Mullet Strategy
Business up front. Party out the back. MySpace, Youtube, Wikipedia they’re all employing ‘The Mullet Strategy’. Genius, read a bit more at: http://buzzfeed.com/buzz/The_Mullet_Strategy
Great Climate Change Video
Forget about An Inconvenient Truth, it’s all long and boring and stuff. Watch this instead… To my mind this deserves to have a lot more views than it’s had – so I’m going to make it my mission to get more people to see it. Please blog it…
Prison Dancing
The clip of prisoners doing the Thriller dance has been featured all over the place, in case you missed it, here it is: But I looked about and found these two which are less impressive from a choreography point of view. But somehow I found…
The 7 Deadly Sins of Digital
There’s a bunch of things that people who are just getting into digital always seem to propose at some point or another. I guess they’re things that are part of the learning process. Things that a lot of us have done, and hopefully learned…
Reverend and The Makers @ Concorde 2
I don’t go to ‘gigs’ that much anymore. So much so that even the word ‘gig’ makes me cringe with it’s approaching-an-age-where-you-shouldn’t-be-going-to-gigs-anymore-ness. Anyway I was lucky enough to get to go and see Reverend and the…
What I learned from ‘We Love Technology’
&tI promised to write some more about We Love Technology 2007, but I’m not going to write that much about the content of the talks. There are much better bloggers out there doing that kind…
They Just Had To… Blend an iPhone
I thought I’d posted the Blendtec ‘Will it blend?’ ads from YouTube before, but it doesn’t look like I did. Anyway I thought they were great, genuinely viral ads. Showing a slightly geeky professor / home shopping channel presenter…
Sometimes Titles Just Spoil Things
I didn’t really know how to title this post, if I’d given it an obvious title it’ll spoil the film… If you like what the film is suggesting have a look at this, it’s something that we can do in the UK.
World of Warcraft vs The Proclaimers
I didn’t think I’d ever post anything about The Proclaimers on here. But then I didn’t think I’d ever laugh out loud at a World of Warcraft video on YouTube either
Daft Hands
You have to give it a minute or so before it gets going, but have patience, it’s worth it. It’s just really simple and charming, but a great bit of technique and something someone’s obviously put a lot of work into. I can see it getting…
Extreme Dancing Skills
Dramatic Chipmunk (or Prairie Dog)
Lauded as ‘the best 5 second clip on the Internet’ – and you know what, they might be right: Then come the literally hundreds of ‘remixes’… Silent Movie: Kill Bill: Star Wars: It’s a gift that just keeps on giving… If you want to see the…
Vimeo Ads
Vimeo have just redesigned their site (they’re a video sharing site a bit like YouTube). They’ve always had a nicely designed site and I think I quite like the new version too. One thing I really liked was their approach to ads – they’re…
Do I Like Vimeo?
I like the player of Vimeo. I quite like the design of Vimeo. I like the fact it’s smaller than YouTube. I like the thing that shows activity on the homepage, it’s nice and it makes it feel active and stuff. But then I saw this: And I…
The 2012 Mashup Olympics
Thanks Cookie. Update: Weds 13th – the video is ‘unavailable’. “This video is no longer available due to a copyright claim by London Organising Committee of the Olympic Games and Paralympic Games Limited”. They aren’t liking mashups then
Prank Call
Prank calls are sometimes just a bit rubbish, they’re just too easy. But this one made me laugh out loud. There’s no video just sound.
I take back what I said…
The MySpace community is alive and well. Under this clip (which really is the ultimate in nerdism) I spotted this comment: wow some one shuld have checked some numbers before making something like this, (un less its was made just for kicks…
Is YouTube Really a Community?
I’ve often argued that one of the things that ‘makes’ YouTube is its community. But I’ve just been looking at the comments around one particular clip and wondering just what kind of community it is. It’s less like a close-knit rural…
Food and Music
Is this a new food show format? Or perhaps M&S could quit the food-porn ads and do this instead ;-) And while we’re on the topic of music and food, in case you’ve not seen it:
10 Reasons Why Digital is Better Than Advertising – Number 2
OK, you have to know some stuff to put things on the Internet, but not that much. Just look at the people in 80% of YouTube videos, do they look like they know how to do complicated computer stuff? Or use a VCR? Or open a tin? In spite of…
10 Reasons Why Digital is Better Than Advertising
Photo borrowed from: http://www.flickr.com/photos/laurelfan/46008873/ I started writing this list of 10 things after I chaired a debate at the D&AD about ‘Consumers In Control’ which basically turned into a mass venting of frustrations…
YouTube is An Insult
It struck me the other day that “You Tube” is actually a Scottish insult. If you don’t believe me here’s an article from 2003 that lists ‘tube’ as an offical insult: Scotland on Sunday – Put this in your Paisley briefcase, ya wido
Arcade Reality
This is very cool. I want to see more things that use phone camera’s like this. I don’t know why, I just do.
Just Plain Wonderful
No need to say anything really… Thanks to David for the link
53 o’s – Amazing Lo-Fi Site
One of the best sites I’ve seen in ages. It’s very old-school and very very lo-fi. But also some moments of real genius gooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooogle.com/ or as it’s otherwise known: 53 o’s Particular moment of…
DJ Wiij
One of the best URLs I’ve seen in a while DJwiij.com (that’s pronounced deejay weejay). Basically it’s a site dedicated to using the Nintendo Wii’s remote controls as DJ interface tools. Not sure how practical it is, or whether it’s just a…
User Archived Content
From my occasional series of ‘here’s something from the musical archives that’s pretty cool’ posts. I love the fact that YouTube allows for the sharing of this kind of content. It’s probably not strictly ‘legal’. And it’s not strictly…
I’m in Viral Shock!
Bumped into this piece for Mountain Dew over at Faris’ Blog. As I commented over there. I’m in shock. It’s a ‘viral’ that I like. And I liked it so much I passed it on. Making it really and truly ‘viral’. I’ve got to go and lie down
Venice Project Becomes Joost
The project formerly known as The Venice Project has now turned into Joost. It’s the latest venture from the guys behind Skype and in a nutshell it hopes to do to television what Skype did to telephones. As they put it: ‘taking the best of…
Rolf on Sand
Imagine if Rolf Harris was as good with sand as he is with a stylaphone, a wobbleboard and big paintbrushes… I think that’s quite lovely.
My Top Stuff of 2006
I’ve been thinking about doing a post on stuff I’ve liked in 2006, if you’ve got a blog it seems like you have to. But I didn’t know what to put in it or how to organise it. But I got re-inspired by The Design Conspiracy annual (a thing of…
Strings of Life
A few reasons to post this clip: It’s one of the greatest techno records of all time. It shows the value of experimentation, and how a ‘mistake’ can create something incredible. When he talks about the making of the track you realise that…
I Love Second Life
Someone mentioned to me that they were surprised by how much I hate Second Life, so I probably need to put the record straight. I don’t hate Second Life. In fact I love Second Life – above you can see my alter ego Taito Dahlstrom wearing…
Yoda’s Freaky Eye
Meet my Yoda Furby. As you can see it’s a quality piece of Star Wars merchandise. If a little bit repetative. I’ve had him for a few years now and he’s been hibernating in a box for the last couple. I found him the other day and…
Amen to That
This is a long video clip. 18 mins in total. And it might bore you if you’re not a music geek. It’s all about how a 6 second drum loop from the B-Side of a single by The Winston Brothers, released in 1969, has become a cornerstone of…
Uh-oh Flashmobbing’s Back
And this time around, thanks to YouTube, you can witness it from multiple angles! I always thought that flashmobbing was a bit twee and a bit “aren’t we all wacky”, and I still have reservations. But, if I’m being honest, it looks a bit…
Second Life Primer
This video makes Second Life look pretty interesting (although I do sense a bit of hyperbole in there…). Personally I still can’t get my head into Second Life. Changing my outfit was by far the most interesting bit. via Big Picture
YouTube Haters
Asi who writes the excellent No Man’s Blog left a comment yesterday about the fact that slating YouTube is very much the in-thing to do right now. And he left me a link or two. Having read a bit more around the topic it seems to be shaping…
Forrester: YouTube is goin’ down
A Forrester blog (Devices, Media, And the Future of Everything) has a post from one of their analysts that predicts that copyright will be the downfall of YouTube. He draws parallels with what happened to old-Napster. Certainly an…
When good ads go bad…
I like the new advert for 3. The one for free Email and IM on your phone. If you’ve not seen it, here it is: I was really really disappointed when I opened up my weekly Zoo magazine (it’s a work thing, honest) to see this press version of…
Trains are cool
Came across this yesterday: The London to Brighton train ride in 2 mins. Reminds me of the Star Guitar video for the Chemical Brothers by Michel Gondry. I’m not sure if the music almost sounds similar too, or whether that’s just…
Random YouTube Clip
There are no words… There are no words needed… Thanks Tobie.
YouTube Value on TechCrunch
Even though their site has issues with it’s error messages (see below), it’s undoubtedly worth quite a lot of money. This article on TechCrunch has a good top line discussion on how much it might be worth and outlines the big challenges…
Application Love
After an earlier gripe about YouTube’s shoddy error message, here’s a beautiful piece of application design that’s cheered me up no end. From the brilliant and ever useful backpackit.com and their writeboard (collaborative document editing…
Errors in Errors
It’s been a wee while since I posted an interface gripe. So here’s one I got today at YouTube: So, what’s wrong with this? 500 Internal Server Error. That sounds like a lot of waiters with gut problems. Serious. What did I do wrong? I must…
Something Wonderful
On YouTube. It’s true. A thing of beauty. Simple, elegant, straightforward beauty… Via noodlepie.
Big Chill Human Snail Race
Here’s a little clip I made of the Human Snail Race at the Big Chill festival this year. Someone showed me the ‘Silent Movie Mode’ on my digital camera and it became quite a hit (it puts stuff in black and white and speeds it up a bit)…
Clipart Art
I’ve always had a strange passion for clipart. It’s pretty much the most lifeless form of illustration that exists. But ironically people use it to add life to presentations and documents. I have my own idea for a clipart project that I’ll…
Bully – The Game
2 posts about game related things in one day. Perhaps I’m turning into a wannabe gamer without even knowing it. I just had to post this trailer for the new Rockstar game ‘Bully’, it looks amazing. Given their history with games like Grand…
Coke do good
Coke have been getting quite a lot of slating for various things that they’ve been doing online. Poor user generated content, ill conceived non-virals, etc. Not sure where this came from, but for me this is a ‘viral’ movie. I bet it was…
WhenWeRollWeRollBig.com
A response from the Agency.com camp regarding the Subway video. It’s basically saying: “we did it, we got people talking, that’s the whole point”. I’m sure the debate will rage on around whether this is just a good piece of…
Agency.com ‘viral’ pitch video
OK, I’m going to give credit where it’s due: hats off to Agency.com for nailing their colours to the mast (in a very public way) and for using web stuff to talk about web stuff. Credit over. Maybe it’s just a cultural thing. But this video…
What's hot on YouTube
Really useful breakdown of the 100 most viewed clips on YouTube. Nice work: No Man’s Blog: YouTube trends report #1 The top line is that of the top 100: 58 are user generated content 31 are music videos 4 are commercial adverts 3 are…
Mentos Do Good
Mentos Turns Coke/Mentos Geysers Into Video Contest – this article says it as well as I could, so I’m not going to repeat it. But I suppose you need to know what it is, so here’s a quick summary. Put Mentos in Coke. Booooooosh. Quite…
How hip hop changed
Modern hip hop videos don’t look like this… Thought it was interesting as a social snapshot of the early 80s in New York. Plus there’s some great fashions and urban landscapes in there.
Get a Mac – TV Ads
Apple – Get a Mac – Watch The TV Ads – OK, they’re playing up all the old stereotypes, but they’re well casted, well written and don’t mess about. Expect about a gazillion spoofs from PC lovers on YouTube before the week is out…
Stephen Colbert – Amazing Video
There’s been lots of stuff in the press about this address from a Whitehouse dinner. Stepen Colbert gives one of the funniest and most cutting speeches I’ve ever heard. Absolutely ripping into George W. – who’s sitting right next to him…
YouTube’s Big Bill
In the last 6 months video has really started to take off online. There’s a whole host of new video sharing sites springing up. But hosting video costs money. Lots of money. This article: Your Tube, Whose Dime? – Forbes.com estimates that…
User Generated Content
Well this is the reality of it. This lovingly crafted piece of home-made UK hip-hop has spawned absolutely loads of mashups / remixes / re-edits. Just shows there’s nowt as queer as folk eh. Oh, and just to prove that entrepreneurialism is…