Hemi Shooutout Online through Pilote Media

The 2008 NHRA US Nationals have been taking place in Indianapolis this week. In amongst the racing in the Superstock division has been an event within an event - the MOPAR HEMI Challenge, otherwise known as the Hemi Shootout.

In association with Nash Performance, Pilote Media have provided fans of these cars with unprecedented news, results and images from the event via a new site: hemishootout.net

As well as covering this week's US Nationals, the site is updated with official results for the whole Hemi Challenge season.

Social Network Sponsorship for Virgin Mobile

Virgin Mobile has announced they will sponsor Bebo’s latest online drama, The Secret World of Sam King. Using the new funding model of brand integration developed by Bebo, Virgin Mobile will be cleverly referenced in the show. An additional dimension to the sponsorship will see Virgin Mobile take the show on location to the V Festival.

The Secret World of Sam King, a first between a social network and music company, launches on Wednesday 6th August and revolves around junior ’facilities’ employee, Sam King, who from his base at Universal Music secretly founds his own start-up label in the post room.

The Secret World Of Sam King will upload 3-5 minute episodes daily on Bebo, a format made successful by stable mates on the social network KateModern and Sofia’s Diary. For a sneak preview, go to http://www.bebo.com/samking.

James Kydd, Managing Director of Marketing at Virgin Mobile commented: "This sponsorship deal is a great tie-in for us as a brand. Virgin Mobile is constantly looking for ways to engage with its customer market, and we are confident that such an innovative sponsorship opportunity will create real impact with Bebo users"

Mark Charkin, VP Sales Bebo added: "We are very excited to have Virgin Mobile on board for Sam King. Their interest in aligning with our newest entertainment property is a fantastic opportunity for us to demonstrate our ongoing success in the arena of social media, and in particular our proven funding models"

Extreme Brief: Holy Crap! Truck,

"Holy Crap!" indeed.

The Nike 6.0 Extreme Sports Group have developed an action-sports urban assault vehicle -- actually a converted 1959 amphibious tank-like truck to create buzz for extreme sport consumers.

The brief for the project was, in fact, "Holy Crap!" -- defined by the client as creating a presence impossible to ignore and sure to create a camera-phone viral response, said Andrea Collette, the shop's communications director.

Nat Kidder and Dan Phillips developed the basic concept, working with cd D.J. O'Neil and a team under design director Peter Judd. The vehicle was chosen from among 20 Hub ideas.

The team needed to convert an actual urban-assault vehicle to achieve heightened realism.

Quick completion of the project meant very quickly assembling what Collette called "an unorthodox team including an architect, strategic planners, industrial and graphics designers and a copywriter." The assault vehicle was completed in just two weeks.

Vehicle features include a skate ramp, wakeboard tower, surf racks, skateboard rails and BMX racks -- as well as creature comforts such as a barbeque, sleep-in camper shell, a waterproof CD player, radio and remote control iPod. She declined to disclose Nike's spending on the assignment.

From AdWeek

Vend a Sim.

I'm always looking for ways to stop the mobile networks imposing their indefensible roaming charges on me. The simplest way was always to carry a second phone that was 'unlocked' and buy a local 'pay as you go' sim-card, then text the new number to anyone who needed to find you.

The hard part about this plan was finding a local mobile store that would sell you a sim-card without local identification or some tedious sign-up process.

Now in the UK at least, travellers can get themselves a sim card from the network of their choice from a vending machine. This photo was taken in Heathrow's Terminal 4, just outside the arrivals gate. It might not last for long. The current paranoia about terrorism might not sit well with the ability to just appear on the mobile grid and disappear again, but in the mean time, it's a great service for travellers.

Text message ads. Cutting edge after 10 years.

In 1999, I was involved in a small company advocating the power of SMS text messaging as an advertising mechanism. Almost 10 years later, the data is starting to prove us right, but mobile advertising is still a little too 'out there' for most marketers.

A survey in the US by the Direct Marketing Association (DMA) suggests that although text messaging is popular among young adults, the 160-character format has yet to become a mass influencer.

For those who do send messages by this media, the response rates are higher that traditional advertising. 70% of respondents to the DMA's "Mobile Marketing: Consumer Perspectives" study who had acted on mobile ads said that text messages for a product or service had prompted their actions. That was more than three times as many as responded to a mobile Web offer or coupon.

So, when will mobile advertising will become a common campaign tactic. For most marketers and advertisers, mobile is still only getting experimental budget at most. In one survey, 33% of 'mad-men' surveyed said "no way!" to mobile marketing while 35% said they might dabble in the coming 12 months.

Sometimes it just gos to show, even when you think you are early in a market, you might not realise just how far behind everyone else is.

TopUP TV is Top Down Thinking

Television is being shaken up. No longer is the British consumer stuck with 4 and a bit channels - now they can choose from multiple providers and multiple platforms. One of the offers available to consumers with selected 'Freeview' boxes is TopUp TV.

Both the packaging and the website of TopUp TV promises programming from MTV, LIVING, UKTV Gold, Paramount Comedy and Hallmark Channel. What they don't tell you, is that you pay to get one program per day per channel and you don't get to decide which one.

In a world where 'on demand' is on the rise, here is a service that charges the consumer for a force-fed sample of media content. What's more, the media content is often tired re-runs of programming that was originally 'free to air'.

This week, while trialling the service, the box decided that I could not record my preferred freeview channel because one of the TopUp Tv channels was downloading something. The screen provided me with a rather unhelpful error, that wouldn't tell me which program was being downloaded, or give me any option to stop it. When I asked customer services about it later, they advised to to deactivate the whole channel. The offending program? Fawlty Towers!!!

This week, programs that were offered included Coupling (original air date 2000), Fawlty Towers (original air date 1975), Sex and the City (original air date 1998). The shiny new Two and a Half Men, offered on the new Warner Channel 'failed to download'...

TopUp TV were invited to comment and said only "Top Up TV Anytime now has a large and growing base of loyal customers who are enjoying the flexibility of having great programmes available on their DTR to watch at a time to suit them."

For this media consumer, it misses the mark by miles.

o2 iPhones Out of Stock - or are they?

Walking past the o2 shop in Richmond today I saw a large white easel with a professionally printed sign on a thick poster-board.

The sign, in branded font said "iPhone 3g. Sorry we are currently out of stock. Ask in store for more details or visit....."

One imagines that if they KNEW they were going to be out of stock, to the point where they had special street signs created, why didn't they just order more stock?

Is this a case of trying to create a buzz, but thinking about it a bit too hard? Or is this a case of trying to manage a situation that really did take them by surprise?

The website suggests the sales forcaster got it wrong and under-ordered. But they can manage to create special signs and turn them around!