Summary – constantly.

Reasons – to stay connected when not physically present.

Benefits – learn and feed my appallingly low attention span.

Tips – be anti-social every so often.

71% awesome and 29% poor. The curation seemed muddled in places and the rooms didn’t always provide the depth required.

Wanted to dive into the fabulous huge canyon canvasses and the gridlines provided the structure that my brain requires to look at things that overwhelming.

I liked the idea of the ipad art but felt it almost cheapened his work.  They seemed like finished articles rather than sketchbooks and the screen size and medium made them seem disposable, almost like stock images in some cases.

One of the rooms was indulgent and full of what seemed to be almost sell out commissions (sermon on the mount).

Lovely random early work and the first part of the video is beautiful. The last part with the dancers made me weep for 15 minutes of my life I will never get back…

From a creative perspective, I LOVED the way that in many cases,  the journey was as interesting as the finished piece. The sketchbooks were so beautiful and I wished I could sit there flicking through them all…..

….would happily go again.

2. I got some daffodils for the office as I thought you looked depressed.

3. I can hear you when you’re on your own, talking to people.

4. Who owns the lame bike?

5. Does anyone actually come to see you here for meetings?

These are not from personal experience. Almost at all.

One of my clients – Hitwise – has taken a look at search volumes for the Toy Retailers Association (TRA) predictions for the top 12 must-have toys this Christmas.

The TRA didn’t rank the top 12 toys in any particular order, but using the top 10,000 search terms driving traffic to the Experian Hitwise Toys and Hobbies category in October this year, we can see the most popular toys by search clicks:

Old faves were missed off the list – such as Lego, Playmobil and Barbie and as Hitwise noted:

Barbie, Playmobil and Scalextric were all more popular than any of the top 12 toys listed above. Barbie in particular received four times as many searches as the LeapPad Explorer.

We’re planning on getting the LeapPad for our 5 year old although given the amount of time my daughter spends “borrowing” my iPad, I am not sure if this will be seen as an acceptable alternative! With less than 50 days left, better get a wriggle on with the shopping anyway.

For me, it says it all.

Cheers Steve, your legacy will live on and continue to enable others to change the world.

Image courtesy of cienpie

1. When buying a gadget/appliance, you forgo a huge discount on a grey market import to have the peace of mind that John Lewis provides
2. You do research before buying white goods /  contemplate joining Which?
3. You have a National Trust membership
4. You use it
5. You buy an extended warranty
6. You celebrate a morning to yourself/ the kids being out by listening to Radio 4 and/or reading the Sunday papers
7. You say (or even think) “aahhh, peace and quiet” at any point in your day
8. You get an early night, despite the kids being out, as you don’t want to risk not having a full 12 hours sleep
9. You can’t sleep past 7am anyway
10. You buy a Christmas present before the end of September

This year’s Ads Worth Spreading is searching to find the 10 most compelling campaigns of 2011, driven by this belief: that the smartest, strongest ads don’t just sell a product or brand, but express an idea.

TED’s mission is ideas worth spreading. The dream behind the Ads Worth Spreading initiative is to find companies that want to communicate ideas to their consumers in the same way that TED wants to communicate with its audience.

Revealing the way a company thinks tells consumers what that company is and what it stands for. In last year’s contest, one of our final selections, Chrysler’s “Born of Fire” campaign, spoke to people because it communicated an incredible idea — steel is born of fire, and cities that go through hard times aren’t dead forever.

“In our brave new interconnected world, the rules of marketing are changing fast,” says Anderson. “Ambush advertising is broken. We think there’s a better way, based on sharing powerful ideas. Most companies are teeming with amazing ideas that the rest of the world never gets to see. By letting some of those ideas out into the world in an authentic way, companies have a shot at transforming the way they are perceived. We’re looking forward to another fantastic round of entries from forward-thinking companies and people.”

via TED Blog | Announcing Ads Worth Spreading, year 2.

Worldwide social network ad revenues will reach $5.54 billion this year, eMarketer estimates, with just under half that amount, $2.74 billion, coming from the US market.

Revenue growth is solidly in the double digits in the US, but even more rapid growth elsewhere will mean spending outside the country will account for a slightly greater share each year. By 2013, non-US revenues will make up 51.9% of the total, which will hit nearly $10 billion worldwide. In the US, social networks will make $4.81 billion from ads that year.

The bulk of these dollars, in the US and around the world, will go to Facebook, while a much smaller share will go to Twitter and other social networks. eMarketer’s first forecast of ad revenues for LinkedIn predicts the site will account for 3% of worldwide social network ad revenues this year, with $140.8 million. The site has more than tripled its ad dollars in two years, though growth is tapering off.

via Social Network Ad Revenues to Reach $10 Billion Worldwide in 2013 – eMarketer.

- They don’t see this as a “Facebook killer” and said several times during the meeting, “you’ll still need Facebook, and you’ll still need Twitter”

- They don’t see it as as social network, rather a social enhancement to the whole web. One day everyone will need a G+ account because it’s practically impossible to use the internet without using Google owned sites.

- It’ll be nice and open for competitions for brands, UNLESS they are trying to use them to gain +1s on their content, in order to affect search results. You will be able to use inclusion in Circles as an incentive for contests.

- The +1 Button is going to be huge. By owning a brand page and using +1 Buttons on your other owned sites, you create a link between them, demonstrating that they are official, and improving search rankings.

- +1 Buttons will appear on all ads in the Google Display Network. +1ing them will count towards the final landing URL. Users will be served more relevant ads than ever, based on their friends’ +1s and ad clicks.

- Circles will be great for segmentation. Brands will be able to segment their users into different circles and push out different messages to each.

- G+ will be a testing ground for ideas – trying them on a small circle of fans – say 100 – and seeing how that goes before pushing an idea to the entire consumer base.

- Hangouts are the main distinction from Facebook. The ability to host hangouts with fans, and consumers, and then publish them to YouTube for the whole world to see is likely to become much more normal. Only 10-15 may be able to participate at once, but thousands can watch a “stadium” hangout.

- People are already using Hangouts innovatively, from Dolly Parton chatting to fans, to hosting focus groups, to creating a remote baby-sitting tool.

- Another thing that may be useful for brands is the Android App and Instant Upload – imagine being at a brand event and being able to put the pics up, for everyone who couldn’t make it, in seconds.

- The Android app and Instant Upload will make brand events more instantly shareable to the web. Imagine being at a brand event and being able to put the pics up, for everyone who couldn’t make it, in seconds, without having to go through any complicated upload sequences.

via What Google+ will mean for brands | The Wall Blog.