Cunard break 127years of tradition

As of 1 December 2011 Queen Mary 2, and the other ships of the Cunard fleet, had changed their registry from Southampton to Hamilton, Bermuda in order to host weddings on board thus ending 127 years of Cunard British registry. British law says that weddings cannot take place onboard a British ship. This is why ships in the Cunard fleet are now being registered to Bermuda instead. This allows passengers to get married on board and also have their honeymoon, saving on cost. However, they could have also registered in Bermuda so Cunard are not taxed so much. This like many other British companies have registered in another country to avoid being taxed so much.

Best of 2011

Popular Science have just written an article about the best inventions and products that have come along this year.

Products like the iTwin which connects two computers via USB, the Zenith Towers planned for Busan, South Korea and the Sony Personal 3-D viewer.

There are so many interesting new products and concepts. Check it out at http://www.popsci.com/bown/2011

Man City sponsored by United?

As a huge football fan, and a supporter of Leeds United, I've recently found it hilarious to find out that Manchester City are sponsored by a company that in English means 'United'

Manchester City are sponsored by Etihad, the giant Abu Dhabi airline company. Etihad translated into English effectively means United. This intern means that City are sponsored by United and their stadium name translates as the United Stadium which could be seen as them being sponsored by their huge rivals Manchester United.

I just found it interesting as I am huge football fan and I found it quite ironic. If you want to find out more, check out the link http://menmedia.co.uk/manchestereveningnews/news/s/1426178_manchester-city-stadium-does-the-arabic-word-etihad-really-mean-united-in-english

Surprising that Google get any work done

I have no idea how google manage to get any work done in an office with slides, fire poles, games rooms and aquarium!

Check out a BBC report on it by clicking the link http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/7290322.stm

The Winklevoss Twins Take a Shot at Mark Zuckerburg

Again the Wonderful Pistachios adverts are confronting common trends. Like an earlier post of mine when they used the angry birds to advertise their pistachios they are now using the Winklevoss twins. The Winklevoss twins claim they came up with the idea for Facebook and in 2004 filed a law suit against Mark Zuckerburg (The founder of the social network site Facebook). This idea of Zuckerburg stealing the idea is played on in the new Wonderful Pistachios advert.

Check out the advert at this link http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bUkR0MYLYZg

Sony – Doubling Sights

Sony are the first to come up with binoculars that are able to double as a 3-D camcorder. It captures in 3D and 2D Full HD video with high magnification of up to 10x optical zoom. It is being sold at around $1400.

3D is becoming more and more popular on cinema screens and now Sony have made it readily available for the average Joe to watch their bird watching back in 3D. 

This product seems ridiculous to me, if someone wanted to film in 3D there are much easier and cheaper ways to do it. Sony's very own 'HDRTD10ESDI Handycam' is around $500 cheaper.

Anyway, if you wish to check the product out here's the link...

http://store.sony.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/ProductDisplay?catalogId=10551&storeId=10151&langId=-1&partNumber=DEV3#additionalImage1"

Angry Birds are Everywhere!

There is meant to be an angry birds film...
http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsbeat/15385699

There are angry birds toys...
http://shop.angrybirds.com/

There is going to be an angry birds animated series...
http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2376066,00.asp

All of these things came from a game application. A simple game that has taken the world by storm. Advertisers have taken advantage of this trend in such adverts as the T-mobile "Angry Birds Live" advert (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jzIBZQkj6SY) and the Wonderful Pistachios "Get Cracking" advert (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ArJBk7NOYzo).

Art & Copy Review and Would a Product Exists Without Advertising?

After watching Art & Copy I felt I had a better insight into the world and business I would like to come apart of. To me the movie is revealing, exciting and informative. The documentary shows off some of the biggest names in the advertising world, such as Wieden and Kennedy, Hal Riney and George Louis. I shows how concepts were conceived and how they were developed into the greatest adverts.

I watched this film with my girlfriend who didn't quite have the same opinion of the film. She is currently studding business at MMU. She thought the film was very self righteous and that it was a bunch of advertisers advertising themselves in a documentary about advertising, suggesting that they were the best and that advertising was the best business in the world. I find it interesting to see her point of view on the whole subject of advertising and she raised the question that there could be no advertising without a business/product in the first place. I agreed that if there was no business or product then there would be no advertising. However, without advertising I do not think the business or the product would be anything.

It is interesting to see another person view on the subject that isn't in advertising and I it'd be interesting to see what other people think.

For All Us Wannabe Advertisers

A film came out in 2009 called Art & Copy.

Art & Copy is a film documentary directed by Doug Pray about the advertising industry in the U.S. The film follows the careers of people from "advertising's creative revolution of the 1960s", including Hal Riney, George Lois, Mary Wells Lawrence, Dan Wieden, and Lee Clow. The documentary covers advertising campaigns such as "Just Do It", "I Love New York", "Where's the Beef?", "I Want My MTV", "Got Milk?", and "Think Different".

Check out the trailer at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hLfvmiB4edI&feature=player_embedded#!

Check out a review at http://www.ovguide.com/art-copy-9202a8c04000641f8000000010088736

What Will They Think of Next?

A computer has been developed that can recognise the emotional state of the person communicating with it, and could then be taught to respond accordingly. It has been developed by a collaboration between computer scientists at the Universidad Carlos III de Madrid (UC3M) and the Universidad de Granada. They created the system to recognise negative emotions such as anger, boredom and doubt.

Just thought it was pretty cool.

Check it out at http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2011-11/21/computer-that-reads-emotion

Form Before Function

Researching my latest project I came across some very unconventional but very cool designs for everything from watches, coffee kits and baths to sofas, bottles and USB sticks.

The website shows concept designs, sketches and final products.

These are some of my favourite unconventional but really cool products from the website.

ORA Watch Concept

http://www.vizeer.com/ora-watch-concept-a-watch-design-which-shown-the-mechanism-and-the-unconventional-display/

Milk packaging

http://www.vizeer.com/milk-packaging-an-unique-milk-package-which-adapted-the-shape-of-milk-letter/

Check out the site at www.vizeer.com

Coca Cola Bringing Back the Retro

In a time where money is scarce and we cannot afford the luxuries in life the masses have begun to go for the vintage items. A lot of fashion company’s have started bringing out their own 'vintage' range and now the product world is catching on, including soft drink giant Coca Cola.

Recently on my trip to Cyprus having asked for a coke I was presented with this bottle.

The shape and the text of it would suggest it had been produced in the late 19^th century apart from the tell tail give away of the 'use by 22/05/2012' stamped on the bottle neck.

However after looking on the coca cola website there is no mention of this bottle design but it is interesting to see that bottles of this shape and style are still being produced.

After looking on the coca cola website and researching bottle designs I was interested to find out about their new bottle design which they call “Our greenest bottle yet”. These bottles they are now making that they call a PlantBottle are made from 22.5% plant materials which are renewable.

To find out more click this link http://www.coca-cola.co.uk/environment/plantbottle/introduction-to-plantbottle-packaging.html