This lively RSA Animate, adapted from Dan Pink's talk at the RSA, illustrates the hidden truths behind what really motivates us at home and in the workplace.

www.theRSA.org

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Something of a viral sensation in the past fortnight, these posters for social media services were created by Brazilian ad agency Moma Propaganda as part of the 'Everything Ages Fast' campaign for Maximidia Seminars.

They could make a packet selling high-quality prints of these...

 

 

Moma Propaganda's vintage internet campaign for Maximidi

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For years, the mobile phone has been touted as the potential jewel in the crown of interactive advertising. Now, thanks to the creation of smartphones, driven largely by the launch of Apple's iPhone and the Google Android-based G1, users are gravitating to mobile media more than ever. But it remains to be seen whether advertisers and agencies are aware of the latest location-based platforms, or whether they will provide the scale, functionality, and reach advertisers crave.

As we all know users are now accessing the Internet regularly from their mobile devices. In an attempt to capitalise on this increase, Vodafone, Alcatel-Lucent, and Navteq have all unveiled technologies that can help personalise ads by targeting users based on their real-time location.

Vodafone have announced that they intend to conduct large scale trials of a range of location-based products later this year.

Alcatel-Lucent and Placecast also announced the availability of their own location-based ad platform which will utilize the same tracking technology as Vodafone's system. Finally, Nokia's Navteq are launching a similar location-based platform for Nokia's Navigator application, which makes use of GPS location data to serve points of interest into mapping content, allowing users to "click to navigate" or "click for coupon."

Location-awareness makes for a more powerful and engaging form of advertising placing the relevant and easily accessible advert in the palm of ones hand. Agency interest is, of course, a positive sign for the practice, but meaningless unless it evolves into advertiser spend.

Location-based technology is still far ahead of advertiser demand. We keep seeing new efforts (Bluetooth placed within Adshels in shopping centers for example) related to location-based advertising, which are very encouraging. But we don't yet hear about companies that would want to advertise putting big budgets behind campaigns involving location on mobile phones just yet. I sense it's going to take a few years to build that kind of audience. When it becomes easy to buy, I think it will really begin to take off…

Part of the reasoning behind Vodas initial trials is to go out and see what people want. The initial trials will last around three to four months, but it’s estimated that it could take up to a year or 18 months before they start to see advertisers come on board.

Vodafone believe that location data will play quite such an integral role in the future of mobile advertising, but said it will become yet another tool for mobile marketers. They also however, recognise the appeal for location-centric advertisers, such as retail outlets.

Vodafone's trials will commence this summer, spearheaded by the release of its Power Search application across a range of Vodafone handsets.

An iPhone version has been available since January.

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So Bing, Microsoft’s new search engine, oops, sorry, discovery engine, has launched in the US. Chances are you won’t be able to miss JWT’s $100m multimedia ad campaign to promote it (if you live in the UK that is).

The slogan is: The Sound of Found.

The 'discovery' engine promises to help overcome search overload by being 'simple, organised and consistent'. Results include price comparison, images and reviews, as well as Microsoft's successful 'cashback' initiative which compensates users for any products they buy via a Bing search. A short video here shows Bing, which will completely replace Microsoft Live Search, and aims to make a serious dent in Google 65% share of the search market.

Geeks throughout the UK have been beta-testing it since it was soft-launched and continue to, even though its already live. It’s fair to say opinion is mixed. Read a round up here from Tech Crunch: http://tinyurl.com/klq324 and here’s a comparison between Bing and Google: http://tinyurl.com/ku2bnm

Speaking of Google, the search giant has been hard at work creating Google Wave (as Greg B has recently written about in his latest sohotrightnow online digital blog), it is an open-sourced personal communication and collaboration tool which would merge e-mail, instant messaging, online forums, and wikis into a grand messaging service. It is due to launch later this year, but you can see why it’s causing so much excitement in a detailed demonstration here ...

My money is on the mighty Microsoft stealing some market share from Google, if only from users who are tired of combing through pages of results, many of which aren't relevant to their initial query. But all three launches indicate a refinement of existing interfaces, making them more intuitive and user-friendly. And that can only be a good thing for both users and advertisers.

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In their recent edition, Rolling Stone Magazine has issued a thank you letter to the record label executives. Hopefully they’ll read it and get the bigger picture. It is a very wise and concise note that brings to light the changing nature in which individuals discover and spread music. Hats off to Rolling Stone for trying to get the RIAA and the music big wigs to open their eyes.

…seems like they sold out just like this guy.

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