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Ha… That got your fucking attention… I know all about this search engine shit… Now for the rest of the story… The second video from the psfk “Good Ideas in Advertising” Salon is now up. This is the one with me moderating the “Young Geezer” panel… Dominico Vitale (Founder, PI&C), Gill Linton (Founder, The Joneses), and Alain Sylvain (Managing Director, RedScout) Good shit, get your arse over there.
Paris is next!
You have to laugh at the news today that Larry Ellison, CEO of Oracle, has joined the ranks of douchenozzle chief executives who are making the supreme sacrifice in these hard financial times, by announcing that in 2010 he will be drawing a base salary of one fucking dollar. The key word here is “salary.” ‘cos last year, Larry “The Shogun of Redwood Shores, gave himself a pay rise of 38%, making him the third richest fucktard in America. His total take home was $84.6 million PLUS he exercised $544 million in stock options for a total twelve month income of $628 fucking million. So, the question is, why do these fuckers think this one dollar gimmick is going to fool any one? Right now, according to Forbes Larry’s net worth is $27 billion. And he’s still responsible for some of the worst advertising on the face of the fucking planet.
You’re just jealous!
According to the BBC, French consumer groups are investigating reports of iPhones that explode or crack spontaneously. This has also been happening in the UK, Holland and Switzerland. Is this some fucking dastardly plot for GodJobs to obtain a limitless supply of livers? As usual, Apple is playing it cool and has been accused of trying to hush-up cases of iPhones and iPods turning into toasters then bursting into flames in the US and the UK. They’ve offered a few punters the price of a replacement phone (Probably a fucking coupon for an Apple Store)… Not very much when you’ve turned your bloody ear into a toasted bagel. Seems like the Lithium Ion batteries made by child laborers in Myanmar are the problem. No wonder the Airline Pilots Association has asked for them to be banned on all planes in the future. Well, ‘till the iPlane comes out!
You... Your liver is mine, fucktard!
The big news out of the UK is that one of the longest running, truly fucking shitty TV programs of all time, “Big Brother,” is about to be axed. This was the one based on getting a number of brain dead people, who would have been rejected for the Jerry Springer show, to live together in a house, while being videoed 24/7… Yes, even when making love, farting and having a dump. For some reason, this show was huge for fucking years. Here’s the best bit, a statement from the director of Channel 4, the station that aired it… He said: "Big Brother is still profitable for Channel 4 despite its reduced popularity and there could have been the option to renew it on more favorable terms. That's what a purely commercial broadcaster would have done, but Channel 4 has a public remit to champion new forms of creativity. That remit to push the boundaries has been an essential part of the weird chemistry behind Big Brother's success, but it's now what is telling us that the program has reached a natural end point on Channel 4 and it's time to move on." “Champion new forms of creativity!” Do these fucktards know how fucking dumb they sound? Obviously not. Can’t wait to see what they replace it with!
Channel 4 program guide!
WPP announced their first half figures today, and they are a fucking disaster. Profits are down a whopping 47% and the company stated that growth was unlikely in 2010. WPP had planned for a 4 per cent drop in like-for-like revenues in the first half but on Wednesday reported revenues down 8.3 per cent to £4.29bn, a steeper decline than analysts had expected. As usual, the PR bullshit flowed. “The impact of the recession on the group’s profitability in the first half was severe,” WPP said in a statement, with cuts to staff and other costs “insufficient as revenues fell faster than budgeted”. The last bit is Dwarf code to the serfs that lots and lots of fucking layoffs are on the horizon. Check out this video on the Financial Times Web site, where Tim Bradshaw describes the Poisoned Dwarf as being in a “contrite mood.” I’ll bet he fucking is. Probably doesn’t know where his next $95 million bonus is coming from.
Lord, give me the strength to lay off more people!
No doubt you’ve been reading about how Wikipedia is preparing a program to combat the leading cause of premature celebrity Wikideath by requiring "experienced volunteer editors" to sign off on changes to certain articles. Yeah, it must be a shock if you’re fucking Keith Richards to keep reading about your death, then you look in the mirror and realize you probably are. Under the new system, new users would be required to have their article alterations vetted before they become viewable to the public. The focus will be on pages of living, high-profile people and corporations. On the other hand, under the new policy of moderating articles of living people, fledgling Wikifiddlers can still change your article to say you are dead. They just have to fucking kill you first.
Dead... Who's fucking dead?
I’ve written many times in the past about how fucked up is the way most clients choose an agency. This bit in Agency Spy about how one of the world’s worst agencies, Donner, was selected by “Choice Hotels” – I never fucking heard of “Choice Hotels!” to do its “Creative Promotion,” while Leo Burnett was chosen to handle “Creative Advertising.” Just what the fuck is the difference? Anyway, here’s the spokesnozzle’s PR release from “Choice.” "Doner and Leo Burnett were chosen after a robust competitive agency review process among the country's top-tier agencies. The search process included a comprehensive Request for Proposal, in-person presentations, cross-functional leadership reviews and the input of Choice Hotels franchisee representatives. For the review, Choice employed the services of Joanne Davis Consulting, New York, to assist in the process." So for months, the chumps at Choice have been putting agencies through the fucking wringer to come up with two agencies to do what sounds like the same fucking job to me. And as I always say, if the marketing director at the client end was doing his/her fucking job, they wouldn’t need a search consultant to pick an agency. But since when did a marketing director do their fucking job?
When I grow up I'm going to be an agency search consultant!
psfk has the first of two videos up showing the “Good ideas in advertising Salon.” That I hosted a couple of panels for at the SoHo House… Uber trendy, uber expensive, but a nice place, nevertheless. Check out the first video, and look for the second one sometime tomorrow. As usual, everything psfk does is well run, classy and certainly worth listening to.
The "Geezer" panel!
Rage du jour, Facebook expects to increase its staff by 50 per cent this year. CEO Mark Zuckernozzle said in an interview with Bloomberg that while most firms are axing workers to make do, Facebook's revenues are on the rise and capital investments are still flowing in. (As usual, no mention of the fucking amounts involved.) Facebook currently has about 1,000 employees worldwide. Meantime, over at MySpace, the Wizoned of Oz is chewing the fucking carpet after announcing in June that it would lay off nearly 30 per cent of its US-based workforce. MySpace said at the time that its staffing was "bloated" as well as "too big considering the realities of today's marketplace." Ha, fucking ha... No diamonds for Wendy this week. Facebook currently claims to have more than 250 million users, Zuckernozzle apparently thinks that's peanuts compared with what the website can eventually pull in. The full of shit boy wonder actually told Bloomberg that he aims to eventually have 1 billion users on the website. That's 15 per cent of the world's population. What a wanker!
Message to Zuckernozzle!
Seems like everyone is in a bit of state about the news of CP+B losing the VW account. According to AdAge, it's 'cos they want to triple sales in a month, or some shit like that. As you know, I'm not a paid up member of the "Sun shines out of CP+B's arse" club. But this is the usual client... We are now ready for the big time, so we need a mainstream agency, bullshit. Clients do it all the time. It means they now think they need "solid" advertising, rather than off the wall shit. It also means they want car advertising like all the other car advertising. These people are douchnozzles. They deserve everything that's going to happen to them. My bet... Hopefully it goes to Goodby, the one big non-dumb agency that would do a good job for them. My other bet, CP+B gets Peter Arnell's "Pea-Pod" account. A marriage made in hell.
I think Alex and I would be a dream team!
