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10 things we didn't know before the 26th week of 2007

1. The prime ministerial Jaguar is called Pegasus.
2. MPs cannot resign. To step down, Tony Blair had to accept the post of steward and bailiff of the Chiltern Hundreds.
3. Gordon Brown is the first post-war university-educated prime minister not to have gone to Oxford.
4. There is no kneeling or kissing of hands when the Queen offers the position of prime minister.
5. A flotilla of rubber ducks that spilt into the sea from a container ship in 1992 may soon be sighted in British waters. They may continue circling the world for 100 years.
6. Peanuts can be made into diamonds.
7. Sporrans used to be made out of otter fur.
8. Beetles commit rape.
9. Egyptian pharaoh Hatshepsut is believed to have worn men's clothes and a false beard.
10. Domestic cats can trace their descent to the Middle East.

(Source: BBC)

The geography of lost childhood

We've been having a lot of conversations with one of our clients recently about the loss of childhood: the paradox where kids today are forced to grow up too quickly on the one hand (comsumerism, sexualisation and all that), and barely allowed out of the house on the other, for fear that something non-specifically awful will happen to them.

For whatever reason, kids are no longer allowed to be kids in the way they once were. Which has to be a concern.

Now I'm completely aware that this is probably a very middle class POV. And that 'childhood', in the way we now know it, is a pretty recent invention. I may even be looking at things through rose tinted specs (although my life was quite clearly different to Josh's).

But I don't care. Parents need to chill (me included - life out there isn't THAT bad). And kids need the opportunity to see there's more to life than a parasitic relationship with a Playstation (and, yes, I have read Steven Johnson's book, and broadly agree that some 'bad' things can be good for you - but just get out and get some fresh air as well will you).

All of which may make it sound as if I've switched allegiance from the Guardian to the Daily Mail. I haven't. But, it's a nice segue way into this article that appeared recently in everyone's favourite bastion of Middle England conservatism (thank's to Lee and his regular dose of Delicious links, for serving this up).

Relatively free of the usual rabid Mail-isms, it has at its heart a very simple thought (and a great map): how does the right to roam of an 8 year old today compare with 3 previous generations of the same family at the same age.

Rightly or wrongly, literally or only in our heads, it does show how much the world has changed. And traditionalist that I am, with a bit of a liking for the Great Outdoors, I think that's sad.

I'm back back back

Pitch madness is over (for awhile). Now let's see if I can remember how to do this blogging thing.

10 things we didn't know before the 25th week of 2007

1. The Amazon is the longest river in the world, not the Nile.
2. The QE2 had the unglamourous name "Job number 736" while being built in a shipyard on the Clyde.
3. Europe has a vodka belt comprising Poland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Finland, Denmark and Sweden, although the drink is also made in countries such as Britain, France, Italy and Spain.
4. The average cash withdrawal from an ATM is £100.
5. Bernard Manning worked as an armed guard watching over senior Nazis locked up in Berlin’s Spandau prison, when aged 16 after the war.
6. Sugar from fruit could be converted into a low-carbon fuel for cars, with far more energy than ethanol.
7. EastEnders actress Susan Tully, who played Michelle Fowler, was in the Islington restaurant Granita when Tony Blair and Gordon Brown famously discussed the future Labour leadership contest, on 31 May 1994 (as you would know if you watch Andrew Marr's History of Modern Britain on Wednesday evening).
8. There are 1,200 people employed at Glastonbury just to pick up and sort the rubbish.
9. There were 6.3 million 999 calls made in the last year, which is almost double the number of calls received 10 years ago.
10. A white tie given to Gordon Brown as a gift from the Daily Telegraph to wear for his Mansion House speech ended up in a charity shop in Notting Hill.

(Source: BBC)

Pitch meltdown madness - closed for blogging

3 in 10 days. Including a reprise of my recent tropical trip.

On the back of 1 recent win I'm not allowed to talk about yet. And the other stuff that's going down.

Life in melt down. Brain like mush. And that's it really.

No time for the luxury that is blogging.

But stick around. In the immortal words of Arnie...I'll be back.

10 things we didn't know before the 24th week of 2007

1. Lewis Hamilton is named after US sprinter Carl Lewis.
2. Bolivian President Evo Morales sacrifices llamas for good luck.
3. Drinking aftershave (among other things) has been blamed for half of all deaths of Russian men of working age.
4. Pickpockets watch for those who react to signs warning of their presence, as many people will pat their wallet on reading the notice.
5. 18% of all new homes are built on residential land, up from 11% a decade ago.
6. As recently as the early 1980s, mortgages were rationed.
7. Only two judges have been fired since 1701's Act of Settlement gave the Lord Chancellor alone that power. The first was in in 1830, for stealing court funds; the second was in 1983, for smuggling whiskey and cigarettes into Britain on a private yacht.
8. Prince Philip came to be venerated as an island god because villagers in Vanuatu have for centuries believed that a pale-skinned son of a mountain spirit had ventured across the seas to look for a powerful woman to marry. The Duke of Edinburgh has been the focus of this legend since the 1960s.
9. Jail and prison are not the same thing in the United States - it depends on the size and governing body of the facility. Paris Hilton, for instance, is in jail, not prison.
10. Blood can turn a dark greenish-black - like a Vulcan's - if taking a certain type of migraine medication.

(Source: BBC)

A little bit of charity

Interesting little side bar in the Observer Magazine last Sunday, looking at Britain's top earning charities (according to the Charity Commission).

Skewed in places by the national lottery. But what most surprised me most was 1) that it disproved the supposed preference Brits have for looking after animals rather than kids and 2) how few of them I had heard of, or if I was aware of the name, knew what they actually did.

1. Arts Council England (£584,158,000)
2. British Council (£517,493,411)
3. Nuffield Hospitals (£507,750,000)
4. Cancer Research UK (£380,813,000)
5. The National Trust (£306,266,000)
6. Wellcome Trust (£295,018,000)
7. Oxfam (£293,100,000)
8. Charities Aid Foundation (£254,864,000)
9. Anchor Trust (£238,087,000)
10. British Red Cross (£233,100,000)
11. CITB- ConstructionSkills (£230,835,000)
12. NCH, The Children's Charity (£219,456,000)
13. Mencap (£164,039,000)
14. Save The Children (£161,187,054)
15. Barnardo's (£155,977,000)
16. British Heart Foundation (£155,208,000)

So is your money going to the right place?

Experience IS the product

Good article on product design over at Core 77, setting out why we shouldn't confuse the 'thing' with the experience it gives you, and that good design always starts with this experience.

Lessons for all our disciplines there then.

And as it concludes...

"When you start with the idea of making a thing, you're artificially limiting what you can deliver. The reason (the best examples of) forward-thinking product design succeed is explicitly because they don't design products. Products are realised only as necessary artifacts to address customer needs. What (they) all realise is that the experience is the product we deliver, and the only thing that our customers care about".

Second bite of the cherry

Last year we pitched for the Oxiclean family of cleaning products, which was licensed in the UK at the time by a small household cleaning company called Adoco.

We won. Only to be told a week later that UK sales and marketing for Oxi were being taken back in house by its US owners, Church & Dwight (the company behind Arm & Hammer toothpaste).

Disappointed, life went on.

Then, a couple of months ago, C&D got in contact (on the advice of Adoco - which was nice of them), asking if we would like another go. We had to pitch again. But we won again.

And the moral?

Don't know really. Maybe something like 'if you do a good pitch and lose out, don't worry because good will come of it eventually'.

10 commandments of Al Gore

This month Q asks the green messiah what his rules for life are...

1. Face facts
2. War is hell
3. Beware awards ceremonies (one for all us ad people!)
4. Rock out (he does apparently)
5. Think globally
6. Accept your fate
7. Take action
8. The future is digital
9. Clean up your act
10. We are the world