By BRAD REES Is football breakable? That’s the question writer Janan Ganesh eloquently answered in a recent thinkpiece for the Financial Times. On the surface football is in rude health. Mr Ganesh gives the example of how obtainable a European ‘soccer’ game now is in the USA, ‘even Atlanta, down in gridiron country, has become … Read More
Social audiences are influenced by authentic posts that make them feel an affinity with the author. Mediacells can reveal that social media folk respond less to celebrity endorsements and more to meaningful recommendations made by trusted commentators who make them feel special. We analysed the latest adidas influencer campaign and awarded a lesser-known volleyball player … Read More
SECTOR: Entertainment CLIENT: Hearst, Esquire WOW: Power of the human word DATE: November 2017 Progressive US magazine Mother Jones recently reported that Artificial Intelligence (AI) experts are predicting we will have ‘full human-level AI’ by 2045. Artists? Surgeons? Writers? There’s an app, well, a robot for all that in less than 30 years. The New … Read More
There are no two words in the English language more harmful than ‘good job’, said Terence Fletcher, the rhythm-dictating fascist drumteach in 2014 Hollywood blockbusting outlier, Whiplash. It’s alright being good at something but being the best at something is a huge ask for the individual. Not so for countries, according to David McCandless and … Read More
A mugger accosts you in the street ranting, ‘YOUR CASH OR YOUR PHONE?’ what do you give up? If you hand over your cash, there’s no recompense, you’ve lost your dosh. If you hand over your phone, chances are it has a lock on it and you can cancel it and get a replacement. There’s … Read More
By Brad Rees As the Atlético Madrid team bus rocks up to the San Siro stadium on Saturday, the Blaupunckt stereo system will be blasting out ‘Thunderstruck’ by Ozzie MetalGods, AC/DC. It’s an Atléti tradition. Torres and chums will be chanting, ‘Thunder, thunder, thunder, thunder, I was caught in the middle of a railroad track.’ … Read More
Love it or hate it, MTV’s licence-to-ill DocuSoap has wiped the floor with all previous traditional ratings records and amassed a vibrant, engaged social audience in the process. An army of digital natives gorge on content, not just for the 42 minutes per episode but 24/7 – as new and old habits collide and somehow … Read More
Start by understanding what makes them tick at work, says Deloitte We’ve all had that job that never makes it to the CV or LinkedIn halls of fame. Mine was working for Alternative Corporate Entertainment PLC or ‘ACE’, where I was tasked to sell ‘Novelty Entertainment Acts’ (NEAs) to global business monoliths from the boss’s … Read More
By Brad Rees Last week I realised the true value of being a follower when I discovered an amazing story by Hillsborough survivor, Adrian Tempany, after it was promoted in a tweet by sportswriter David Conn. It was 5,000 words long, which meant a lot of iPhone thumbscrolls on a Sunday afternoon when I should have been helping … Read More
Tim Cook will have woken to the news that Facebook has tripled its advertising revenues. The news has stunned Wall Street in much the same way that Apple’s revenue-drop news, 24 hours previously, had shocked the media world. The surprise came despite an apparent expectation management exercise, masterminded by mister Cook in January. Apple soothsayers … Read More
It’s 1977. The Goblin Teasmade advert is on television screens, Punk is hitting the UK streets and Clifton Country Primary (CCP) are engaged in the dying embers of a grudge soccer match against arch pre-teen rivals, Mayfield. It’s nil-nil. CCP have just brought on a substitute, Steven Roundtree. He’s new to the team and it … Read More
Google’s Al might have stuffed the Go champ but youthful instagrammers are sticking it to the machine. Google’s Al beat the top player of the ancient and complex game, Go, at the DeepMind Challenge, recently. It didn’t so much beat the South Korean champion, Lee Sedol, as wipe the board with him 4 straight wins … Read More
Last week’s launch of a print-only newspaper excited journalists – but is it sustainable in a digitised consumer world? When I started my newspaper career in the late nineties ‘digital’ was called ‘the bloody internet’. “Forget about the bloody internet,” my ink-stained tabloid boss would argue, before resting his case on some surreal, qualitative Hollywood … Read More