trees are people too

When I was young and things were rad, I once was lucky enough to attend the royal melbourne show. Everyone knows that the only good things about the show are the llamas and the showbags, and not only were both plentiful, but in the glory days of my youth the bounty of a good showbag cost only a couple of dollars. Inflation is a cruel thing.

My absolute pride and joy was a Shera, Princess of Power showbag that I purchased containing a set of cuffs, a sword and her magical headress. Never ever will I forget how much I adored the costume in that showbag, and so it was with delight that I discovered He Man and the other masters of the universe reinvented for the new millenium, set for a night saving the world donned in fresh kicks and the latest high street fashions.

Heroes then, hipsters now. And Skeletor – just as endearing as ever. Looks eerily like an old manager of mine. Fortunately, it seems like they are in the process making the movie, so we kids of the 80s can be reacquainted once more. Hurry up, I say.

Thank you yet again, NFG.

not a very long time ago I read a rather entertaining book by a charming young man called joshua ferris called then we came to the end.

A rather biting satire about the self importance of the advertising industry and its inhabitants, the book tracks the employees of a chicago ad agency who struggle with the burden of saving the world daily through careful choice of prose and font and the irresistible addition of 10% lactic acid to any product in order to boost sales. The book turned out to be a fortuitous introduction to what was in store for me in my new career.

I was fondly reminded of the book when I more recently stumbled upon the glorious business guys on business trips. Luckily my new work place is nothing like this, but it brings back vivid memories of those that have been. Something for everyone, I am sure.

It’s taken me a little while to learn, but the beauty of an ending means that it always precedes a new beginning. I’m endeavoring to approach all endings with this attitude from now on. Good luck to me.

Today marks the end of an era for me (unfortunately a relatively short one) at my first job in the way out world of advertising. Turns out it was not all that way out, but it is certainly turbulent.

Tomorrow I start my new job at interactive agency Visual Jazz, possibly one of Melbourne’s best interactive agencies, and I am terribly excited. For this reason this post shall follow a theme of things that are fresh, clean, new and good. And so they shall be.

For instance, how about a fancy new pair of chopsticks that double as weapons. Or perhaps some fresh insight into the lyrisicm of hip hop. I have even found a new found respect for the latest ghetto names.

A new method for finding stolen bikes, a new found aversion to tweeting too much, and a new love of cats (and stick figures).

Here’s to new beginnings, new journeys, new people and new experiences. I’m excited. Stay tuned for the next episode…

I may or may not have a touch of the SADs. Winter has been comparatively mild this year, but oh how I wish it would end. It’s not that I have anything personal against you, August, but the grey, wind and rain can fuck right off. It’s hard, I find, in the muted colours of winter to find perspective, hope, humour and light. And so it was fortunate that this came to my rescue.

The passive-aggressive (and just plain aggressive) notes website is run by Kerry Miller, with examples contributed by readers worldwide. Many are simply enchanting, especially at a time when my own relationship with work places (and the outside world in general) feels a little strained :cough:

To top off this brighter day, via her website I also discovered some fine apostrophe abuse, the thoughtful Ironic Sans and the outstanding cake wrecks (which I had forgotten the wonders of). Thank you Kerry, and the lovely We made this, for the fix.

After an epic cycling adventure on the weekend (with epic = horribly unfit and adventure = getting lost), on Sunday I came down with a lovely case of something nasty. As a result, I have spent some time on the internet looking for self-help remedies. I am all for self diagnosis (aided by the internet, thank you very much), except that to my dismay I discovered that my symptoms meant I had contracted strep throat, pneumonia, depression and TB, not to mention swine flu and bipolar. I am sure to die. But  in my quest for the antidote, I stumbled upon some help – and these beautiful pieces.

Beautiful design combined with minimal bullshit and pretense is what I love best, and so this made me feel slightly better. These guys have it all. A crisp and ergonomic website, appealing ethics and ideology, and gorgeous, tactile packaging that makes me wish that advertising was more integrated with the appearance of the final product. Simply browsing the website improved my health no end. Yes, the content may be a little cad (witty, dry product banter is getting hard to sustain). And yes, it probably won’t change the world like some other things I have seen this week. But it made me feel happy, even for just a moment.

After all, sometimes even superman loses his super, and needs a little help.

Oh ever so busy. Busy at work, busy at play, busy on bikes and busy drinking booze. Yes, some things never change. But winter is so fabulously frantic that it is nearly half over, and soon it will be spring again and time for parks, sun, wine, cheese and grassy rashes.

Work has been absorbing and exhausting, not just because they threw us an end of year party (aka we-found-some-left-over-funds-at-the-end-of-the-financial-year party) complete with kegs of cocktails, but also because of the buzz that is the Cannes Lions, the importance of which would have eluded me just over a year ago, but now has some significant relevance (or so I’m told) due to my new choice of career. While the majority seems to be industry-indulging bollocks, occasional gems are worth their weight in…uh…gold lions. Such as this spot from Tribal DDB Amsterdam.

(much better quality here).

Winning awards seems to be quite important to our agency, despite some views to the contrary and our seeming inability to do so (this year, at least). But it also serves as a valid excuse to take the time to seek out and peruse the most innovative and fabulous work from around the world. Images that disarm you, media placement to delight you and innovation that leaves you breathless (not to mention petrified).

But in the end, it is still far away from the commercial and capitalist world that the most wonderful art is occurring; incredible music, magical imagery (below, and courtesy of Mark Sartain), and fabulously pertinent writing.

It is digital expeditions that make discovery all of these treasures possible, not TV or press or radio. I am enchanted without being sold ideas, persuaded without being told what I need. And sometimes, just by chance, you stumble upon something that is all sorts of wonderful.

Just a quick one, for I have been frantic at work and at play. I have delved into the criminal world, built and ingested colourful things and started on slightly more academic indulgences (that’s right, I be book learnin’) as the winter months creep in.

But it was only recently that I discovered a new favourite blog – the fabulous photographic witterings that persuade me to look at this fucking hipster. I was always taught that looking smart is about possessing style, not being fashionable (of which I am neither, not fashionable nor stylish, in the conventional sense of the word) and so this website has brought me endless hours of pleasant bemusement and bewilderment. Is it cutting edge style? Victimless fashion? Do people truly have time to look so incredibly hideous?

Simultaneously, as I continue my quest for a more profound and precocious blogging style, it was with some delight that I discovered this story about the success of blogs being turned into books… one of them being my new found and fabulous documentation of hipsterisms. After long analysis of the development of print into hypertext and beyond, the communication of ideas and stories through digital platforms such as blogs, we often circled back to the question – could a blog be produced as a book… and would it work?

The general consensus was that as a book, blog content lacked all the qualities that made it so very intriguing – its ability to be conversational, easily disseminated, accessible, interactive, media rich and transient. But perhaps blogs that are predominantly image-based are different stories (pun intended). As mentioned in the article, we also have blogs such as the famous stuff white people like and the tasty this is why you’re fat being translated to print, perfect for bedtime reading.

It will be interesting to see what else transpires, and whether we might soon have Boing Boing: An Unabridged Directory, or Dlisted: True Tales of Horror. After all (and as the creator of latfh.com pointed out), why wouldn’t people want to buy a book of images they can get online for free??

The possibilities, it seems, are printable. Now please excuse me, I need to go and reserve my copy asap, for the eight copies of this will surely sell out fast.

What a fabulous concept and website this is from a digital agency that has just come to my attention, based in Sweden and known as Daddy.

Combining a beautifully designed website with all the things that are exciting about digital: interaction, discovery, accessibility, reach, integration, strategy and conversation… not to mention the inclusion of some of my favourite things – small trees and big words.

I am a little slow on the uptake (I missed the experiment, afterall) but needed to give props for such beautiful work. These are the kind of ideas and executions I want to be working with… Why must all the good things come from Sweden??

I am not sure such an accomplished digital agency exists here in Australia, but I am searching for it. Meanwhile we will continue to tinker with overworked web developers and under resourced digital strategy departments… sigh.

Big props to crackunit for bringing this lovely job to my attention. And for his unrelenting advocacy of the importance of digital. It feels good.

Following on from the theme of Advertising 101, another humorous analogy of what is now my everyday life. :sigh:

With thanks to a fine new blog I have discovered, Insights and Ideas which is written by a young man named Tim who lives locally and whom I hope to meet some day.

Perhaps everything would be alright if I just had one of these:

Although it seems to be missing the actual time display, which brings its functionality into question. I guess it wouldn’t really matter. You’d be so busy transforming you would lose all sense of time anyway. Courtesy of the ever inspiring Toxel.

The japanese are the best purveyors of quirkiness. And frustration. I bought a birthday present for madcaow, but it wasn’t until we got it home that we realised you had to assemble it yourself… And thus, our friday night was made. Felt rav tbh. I think we did ok, for a first attempt. (No bloggers were harmed in the making of this series).

The production line had it all – disgruntled and embattled workers, harsh employment conditions and even some bloodshed. I am surprised there wasn’t calls for a union to be formed (must have been the ready supply of wine), but to our astonishment the final product somewhat resembled that which appeared on the box. It was a short moment of great pride. And then we found this:

Yes. It is true. Thank you for raising the bar, little brown bird’s dreams. I bow down to your felty goodness. (In our defense, she is from Singapore, which is closer to Japan than here). I feel there may be more inspired felty treats to come…