Stealing With Pride…

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Interwebs be blowing up with this little bit of scandal right now, yo. 

Seems MWEB’s ad agency has been caught with their hands in the creative cookie-jar. What’s it all about? Well, this is MWEB’s most recent ad (which was featured on the creative showcase site 10and5)

And here’s one that was done earlier for Numericable by Leo Burnett Paris.

Yeah.

So as the community on 10and5 rightly pointed out, the similarities between the two are quite interesting. Seriously though, we all know about the not-so-fine line between inspiration and plagiarism. See an idea, like an idea and then use it to build your own damned idea. Cut-and-paste “creativity” doesn’t work. And you will get caught out. Whoever the “creatives” are on this job should be dragged out into public for all to see. Advertising has enough damned problems without this kind of crap. The M&C Saatchi Abel ECD has publicly confirmed that this is not from within their bullpen. The question is: who did it then? The answer is: we may never know, as everyone rushes to cover their asses on this one. MWEB by the looks of things. According to 10and5, MWEB came up with this idea after considering “various references”. Yeah. As far as I can see, they just considered one….and very closely at that.

It’s a sad day for advertising all round.

VW: The Bark Side…

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VW’s back with a follow-up to their amazingly successful “Darth Vader” Super Bowl commercial. For those of you who missed that, here it is…

That’s 48 million views worth of commercial. And I’m not a fan of TVCs but that was simply awesome. Anyway, as I said before, VW is looking to capitalise on that success with the follow-up. It’s a teaser for the 2012 Game Dayy commercial and here it is…

Yeah. If that doesn’t make you smile, you’re dead inside. And at the time of writing, it had clocked 50 000 views in 9 hours. Can’t wait for the actual commercial. And I can’t believe I just said that. By the way, the link at the end of the vid takes you to the VW site where you will soon be able to create your very own Star Wars crawl. Nifty, no?

BMW And The Race For The Next Level…

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As a Saffer, I’m always happy to be able to share work that’s right out of my home country…even if I’m not a fan of the brand. BMW SA had to find a new way to launch the new 1 Series. iLogic was tasked with coming up with a unique way to engage the market. This is what went down…

On the face of it, it’s not the slickest execution but it is again a signal of what can be done. Personally, I would have been more impressed with a NFS style driver skinned for this execution (it can be done) but it’s still pretty cool, especially the social media link. And it looks like the players had fun. I would have tried to maybe add a vid-capture of the race so it could be uploaded to the BMW page with the contestants tagged in it but hey, deadlines and budgets, no? Big up to iLogic for taking the leap on this.

We’ve seen something similar to this in Turkey around the middle of last year (click here to see that execution) but I’m really looking forward to seeing how this idea evolves…

The World’s Smartest Thief…

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This is a great little piece of guerilla viral work. I gotta admit it had me fooled when I first watched it. Check it out…

I should have caught the hint when I saw the word “SMART” but it slipped by me. Re-reading the title of the video, it makes sense now: SMART thief. Yeah. I see what you guys did there. Nicely done, LG. And while the clip has had its negative comments it’s still one of the best virals I’ve seen.  But then maybe I don’t get out much. What do you think (about the video, not my social life)?

adidas and The Do-Over…

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Brand extensions are great. A little added value here and there never hurts, right? Of course not. But it’s when the brand extension is actually the incarnation of the brand personality that you hit the bullseye. adidas Originals does this time and again…and here’s their latest bullseye: the Do-Over.

adidas Originals should be the case-study for any brand that really wants to own a space in  the market and in the hearts and minds of its consumers. Every piece of work is a master-class in brand-building. Do your homework.