Old Spice - I'm back

A few things.

1: Notice the lack of product in the ad. Has he become so iconic that he doesn't need a pack shot?

2: It says "This video is unlisted. Only those with the link can see it."

Old spice, what are you up to? I also noticed the embed code was different to the usual. Hmmm. 

Working in regional agencies

It's our final week at Leith for Chris and I. Ending not only a great Edinburgh adventure, but the partnership of CR and AP.

It's been two years (almost to the day) since we first moved up here. And I wouldn't have changed it for the world.

As I've found Scotland or agencies outside of London can offer young teams so much more. 

Why?

Because you get thrown in the deep end. 

In London you'll usually get eased into life. Feeding on scraps. Or working with two or three teams that are more senior than you, which means their ideas will more often than not get chosen over yours.

In our six month stint in London, we did a few press ads and a piece of DM. In six weeks up here, we'd done probably twice that. And since then, we've worked on numerous TV, radio, online and DM projects. Not to mention the odd pitch or two.

My skill set has increased. Purely with creative departments being more dependent on you knowing the software. No longer to do I fumble around CS3 and I've even learnt how to code (slowly). I'm not scared of writing 1,000 words. Or even having 10 or more briefs on my desk.

We've got to work on big clients. STV (Scotland's ITV), Historic Scotland, IRN-BRU, ScotRail and First Group to name a few. And had decent budgets to work with too.

We've been nominated for awards, had plenty of Fridays in the pub and even met a few celebs. It all happens. You don't have to be in London to get all that.

So when you have your sights set on London, be it now or when you graduate, see what's closer to home. You never know what great agencies are on your doorstep. Or in our case, the other end of the country. Even if it's just short term. It could have a great long-term effect on your career.

I've learnt so much up here. I've grown up. And then some. But I feel the time is right to start my new adventure in ad land, which starts on Monday... in London.

FaceTop

I can trawl through the new Apple App Store for hours. What I love about it is that there are all sorts of tricks on my Mac that I'd never even considered. Take this bizarre app for instance. Why bother checking your Facebook online, when it can be your transparent auto-updating desktop background? It'll even let you chat on it. Oh yeah, it's clever stuff.

I half think why, but then I think, why not?! It gives you one reason to keep that desktop tidy and makes that Facebook addiction a tad bit closer.

Relax, do nothing for 2 minutes

A very simple idea. Just have a break, but not a kitkat.

Click here to see if you can last a whole 2 minutes of doing nothing. I struggled.

YouTube's Nonprofit Program

One thing I noticed today is that YouTube have a Nonprofit Program. If you look carefully under this video, you'll notice that there's a "donate to this organisation" button.  

I like this idea. So I did a bit more digging and found that it's not just your usual "save this and that" or "the fight against doing something bad" that are using it. Companies like the Anaheim Ballet are taking advantage of this donation box too.

You can find out more about YouTube's donation scheme here.

Banksy's Identity on Ebay

Somebody is selling the real name of Banksy on Ebay. Apparently If you win this auction they "will mail you a piece of paper revealing the true identity of Banksy" on it.

How have they found out who they mysterious man is? Well, they've "uncovered his identity by matching up the prices of his sold pieces to corresponding tax records."

What's more is that currently someone is willing to pay $999,999 for a "piece of paper [that] will say his name, nothing more."

But for that hefty sum they give you "100% assurance that it is most certainly the full name of the street artist known as "Banksy"."

Right...

CR.AP

There have been some developments over the job front since the start of the year.

You may have seen our big push at the end of last year with our site takeover, which worked perfectly. Apart from one thing. Chris and I wanted different things. He wanted to stay up here in Scotland. And I wanted to head back to London.

Having exhausted all the possible opportunities up here, which for a team is currently non-existent, we've reluctantly decided that we're going our separate ways.

After teaming up at uni over four years ago, doing three years of work in agencies AND living together for two years, this wasn't the easiest of decisions to make. But, we both feel we're in strong positions to move onwards and (hopefully) upwards after the work we've done and experience we've gained.

As of writing this post, Chris has got some work in Edinburgh as a designer/art director at a digital agency. And I'm currently looking at opportunities in London. I have a couple of interviews lined up as a copywriter/digital creative, but I'm keeping my options open.

My heart lies in digital and being creative, but I want to see what's out there before committing to anything. So feel free to contact me if you've an interesting position available.

As for the name of the blog, it'll eventually swap over to something else, but fear not. The AP of (formally) CR.AP will still be pumping out more posts of weird and wonderful things on a near daily basis.

Having spent the last week getting a new portfolio together, as well as building a new site. I now feel I'm in a position to share it with the world. You'll find my work at andymarkpeel.com

Hopefully you'll like what you see.
Cheers.

Bieber.ly was short lived

Apparently Justin Bieber's lawyers don't like a little bit of harmless fun. 

Bieber.ly arrived on the scene on Thursday. And, by Saturday evening, it was dead and buried. Maybe because it was going to be bigger than Bieber himself (I wish).

Nice one to the five guys that came up with it. Please do more of these kind of things.

Justin Bieber gets his own URL shortener

The Justin Bieber phenomenon continues. He's now got his very own URL shortener. I'm sure Bieber.ly will soon sweep the world was his infectious mop top of mini links. And, I reckon Google might get tired of ranking anything other than Bieber and Gaga soon.

I wonder if it does real time stats?

And, I've found the creators. Can't decide if I should say well done or not.

Using Quora to find a job

This morning, I finally joined the masses on Quora. I won't go into the ins-and-outs (because you'll probably be aware of them already), but I did notice one nice thing about the site. 

It's a great place to find a job. 

Now I'm thinking you'll have to get in early, because I can soon see this becoming a Yahoo Questions type thing that'll all get very similar. But as the two shots I've taken show, both have some very good answers.

You never know, you could find a great job... just by asking. 

P.S. I still need one. Thanks.
P.P.S. This popped up shortly after I posted this.