middledigit.net | jonathan hopkins

Chris Anderson blocks email from PR people and lists their email addresses online. There’s someone from Bite on there too, which is nice. Could this be the first signs of a new trend?

After Paint, Balls, Play-Doh and the super cool RecYou comes this - a new spot for the Walkman phone. Liking a lot of stuff Sony is doing these days comms wise. Hmmm . . . . and I bought a Sony LCD the other day. Go here for the full site and behind the scenes stuff - a given for Sony ads these days.

[Via Creative Review Blog]

Well it’s not that bad really is it? But, I do think this is worth reading. Found via the good people at neoco, it might be old (really not sure) but definitely still makes you think. Was 1.0 the creation of it, 2.0 the realisation and quick-fix of it and 3.0 will be the creation of something completely different? I don’t know. But I do know that the internet isn’t all that sh*t right now and in the future (say, inside 5 years), think it’s gonna do stuff we haven’t even thought of.

A great article by Danny Bradbury published on the Guardian yesterday - “The growing number of websites that mix and match low-quality articles produced by amateurs in order to generate traffic is causing concern”. PR, SEO and online advertising are mixing quicker than ever before and we’re having to get even more technically literate to understand what that means for each of our industries. This is right where I’m at right now. And it’s complicated!

A bit of a rugby theme today. . . blesstheboot.com - Great idea, slightly ropey looking but executed pretty quickly. Will certainly be doing the rounds today and has already got some good hits. It should have been 02, or a sports brand, or in fact any brand that wanted to hijack the buzz ahead of the match tomorrow. No obvious brand behind it but a quick WhoIs search reveals it to be a Jamie Vickery in London. Anyone know him?

UPDATE: if it’s Adidas then I didn’t even notice first time round - only when looking closely.

Amidst all the rugby fever and wax statues of JW appearing in Trafalgar square, Bite client Blinkx has created a special rugby wall which pulls in the latest commentary, pre-match interviews and random user generated rugby content. Looks great and I think that we’ll be seeing a lot more visually-led interfaces like this about town in the future.

PS - show your support on Facebook (another Bite client) today by changing your profile picture to the one below. Just grab it and upload it.

Wow. A bit of a radio silence there. Sorry about that. I blame the perfect storm of being hugely busy at work, being away at the weekends and having a lot of other stuff to do and on my mind.

So, as by means of a bit of a catch up - here’s some stuff I’ve been doing and thinking.

1. Bite won the Facebook pitch. I’m on the team and am delighted to be working with the guys at Facebook. Especially when you read stuff like this. PR Week said it was “arguably the most sought-after retainer of the year” and that “Tech PR insiders agree that this was one of the most competitive pitches in recent memory”. Enough said. Very chuffed. Hugely excited.

2. We bought a car, our first (nearly) new one. One a bit like this. After polling my mates and colleagues before buying it, I already know that some people hate it. I liked it and then I drove it - just plain fun and reminded me of my 1972 VW Beetle that’s still waiting for me in a garage back home.

3. I met with Lloyd and talked about the Social Media Cafe he’s currently planning. Nice cup of tea and a pleasure to have a chat about something so completely logical.

4. I’ve been watching a lot of TED talks. Can’t get enough of people talking about stuff they are so incredibly passionate about. Here’s a directory of them all.

5. I’ve discovered MarsEdit via Chris Green. Looks like it’s going to be very, very useful indeed to write this blog (need all the help I can get right now as I’m struggling a bit to find my inner-blog-strength).

6. I’ve still been enjoying the constant feed of amusing cat photos from Esaba. This is where I found my Facebook profile pic that seems to get a lot of comment. There’s a little widget you can add to iGoogle that generates a new pic with every refresh. (see example below)

7. I’ve saved another 100 links or so to del.icio.us since my last post. All manner of stuff in there. I just can’t get enough of del.icio.us and am finding it increasingly hard to see how people who spend a lot of time on the web can manage without it. If I ever have to use a PC/Mac that isn’t one of mine I feel very, very wrong.

8. I’ve been drafting a monster post about “being digital”. One day I look at it and think it’s shite and another I can’t stop writing it. Hmmmmm, we’ll see.

9. I went to my Grandma’s funeral. Nothing more to be said on that other than this.

10. Sam at Glide told me about journa-list.com - a really useful site that allows you to track what different national and BBC journos are writing about and track their output as feeds. Much time saved. Nice simple tool that needs to be expanded upon.

It’s all getting a bit cosy isn’t it? The predictable consolidation is in full swing. Via Jaiku blog.

So, this was just posted on Viralmonitor by FH Digital - Today marks the start of National ID Fraud Prevention Week. To support the campaign FH Digital has created a spoof 1940s infomercial to drive home the importance of the issue and the need to take better care over your personal identity. We hope you enjoy it!

Sorry guys (I hate being horrible) but this is a load of utter shite. I reckon it breaks all the golden rules of viral video - the main one being it’s dull and over two and a half minutes long! The only way it could be a success is it’s so bad other people like me feel the need to rant about it and tell other people about it. So it could be a reverse hit. Maybe.

I’m all for the message behind it but I find it really painful that stuff like this is still a) getting presented and b) getting signed off.

PS I Googled FH Digital and the most likely result came back as this which links to a video on a site with no other links or choice of navigation (which is really rather annoying).

UPDATE - on reading this live, I feel the need to point out that FH Digital is a digital wing of a PR agency and that I am a digital consultant at Bite, also a PR agency. Just in case.

This has always been an absolute favourite of mine. I just remembered it YET again whilst thinking of some ideas for something exciting. Ben Dawkins is your man.