back to the future at MIT

Oh, the wealth of gizmos that geeks at MIT have bestowed on the world: radar, Technicolor, stair-climbing wheelchairs, even a battery powered by a virus. See displays of new and once-new technologies created at MIT since the school was instituted (days before the Civil War broke out) in their just-opened exhibition “MIT 150.” You don't have to be in Cambridge to visit. The exhibition’s website lets you browse artifacts like Spacewar!, the first video game created in 1961 on a DEC computer. And Lantern slides, an ancestor of PowerPoint, in which black and white transparencies are inserted into glass “sandwiches.” I suspect it was good news for our forefathers that lantern slides were heavy and had to be toted in wooden boxes—must have kept presentations mercifully short. More on the show from Daniel Grant in today's WSJ.

kid builds company out of erector set

Don't you just love how the Wall Street Journal has shrugged off its green-eyeshade image and embraced the world north of Maiden Lane? Today's front page features a story on the (remember?) Brannock foot-measurer which is being knocked off in (surprise) China. There's a quote from someone with a job I didn't know existed--shoe historian. And an interesting tale of how the company began: Charles Brannock was the son of a shoe salesman who began developing the contraption while still a student at Syracuse University. He applied for a patent with a prototype made out of erector-set pieces. Business took off during World War II when the government contracted a version that measured both feet at once, which sped up the process of distributing footwear to soldiers. Seems like great fodder for erector-set's agency. See what you learn reading stuff besides trades?

david ogilvy on the future of advertising

There's been a lot of speculation lately about the ad agency of the future. Ironically, I've been reading a new book about an ad man from the past and I'm struck by the prescience of David Ogilvy. He famously insisted on the superiority of advertising that provides measurable results. Ogilvy, Benson and Mather (as it was then called) was the first ad agency to integrate direct marketing (the ancestor of digital) into traditional campaigns. His preference was informed, no doubt, by his experience as a door to door salesman. He began his career hawking stoves, of all things. Not exactly an impulse buy. (Especially to canny Scots in the depths of a Depression. He learned to go around to the back door, to sell the cook first because if she didn't buy in, there was no hope of making a sale to her employer.)

Here's a few Ogilvy mantras that ring as true today as they did in the typewriter era. (Ogilvy never actually used a typewriter, he wrote longhand using only freshly sharpened pencils. For other untold tales about D.O. from the POV of a man who worked with him for years, pick up Kenneth Roman's excellent--and first-- biography King of Madison Avenue.)



The public is more interested in personalities than corporations.

This never changes. The only time someone wants to talk to a corporation, is when they're trying to wangle a refund from it. It may be the age of "conversational marketing" but consumers won't engage with a monolith company unless they're given a reason to do so. (See Alan Wolk's now-famous post on this topic.)

It has been found that the less an advertisement looks like an advertisement, the more people will stop and look at it.

Hence the rise of embedded marketing, iphone apps, branded entertainment and widgets.

You aren't advertising to a standing army; you are advertising to a moving parade.

Of course, the parade moves a lot faster now, and to many more places. Still, a brand message must move nimbly with it.

Every advertisement must contribute to the complex symbol which is the brand image.

A brand message has to live in myriad environments these days, but no matter where it goes, it must carry the same DNA and core values.

Our business is infested with idiots who try to impress by using pretentious jargon.

In his day it was "suboptimize." In our day it's "folksonomy" and "glocalisation" and other words meant to make consultants appear worthy of exorbitant day rates.

Advertising isn't an art form, it's a medium of information.

Ogilvy alienated some colleagues by speaking out against over-the-top TV production extravaganzas and awards. He was interested only in creating messaging that produced results for the client. Here's a pep talk he gave (virtually) to one of his direct response departments. Just substitute the word "digital" for "direct" and it makes for an informative webinar.

where to find what you lost in the 60s

Sadly, another casualty of the recession is Alphaville, home of the best collection of vintage toys and collectibles this side of 1963. How many trips down memory lane I took there while waiting for showtime across the street at Film Forum. Now, alas, it's going out of business which is good news for you. The smart looking book bag you always wanted? The neat-o Skipper stickers your sister swiped to wallpaper the dollhouse? That issue of Jack and Jill you lost at Girl Scout camp? Those and other artifacts of childhood can be had at half-price. No online orders. (True to the era, the only web presence at checkout is Jack.) But you can let your fingers do the walking. 212 675-6850. Doors close next Friday. Right after Gunsmoke.

Nope, this isn't a pay for post. It's a post for love, kids.

RIP Marty Forscher, Patron Saint of Photographers

Readers who remember F-stops and finders and diodes will mourn with me Marty Forscher's passing. For over 40 years, he ran Professional Camera Repair Service in Midtown, founded in 1946 just down the street from LIFE magazine. Any photographer I worked with in my early ad days used him. Used? No. More like, he was their confessor. Generally regarded as the most sought after camera doc in the country, he was beloved by Richard Avedon, Diane Arbus, Joel Meyerowitz, Annie Leibovitz and myriad others whose work he made possible. Even a strictly edited NY Times obit writer was allowed to wax eloquent:

To the supplicants who thronged his counter, and the others who placed frantic calls from obscure corners of the world at obscure hours of the night, Mr. Forscher was equal parts detective, diagnostician, conjurer and psychotherapist. Many photographers referred to him as the Savior. The more concision-minded simply called him God.

What I didn't know: Marty was also an inventor. He invented the Pro-Back, a Polaroid attachment for a 35-mm camera that gave photographers an instant proof print, allowing them finally (in 1982) to test a shot without having to develop the roll of film.

He also contributed to the 60s civil rights movement, begging cameras discarded by magazine staff, fixing them and sending them South where students used them to document images published around the world. When cameras were dashed to the ground or drenched by police fire hoses, Marty repaired them and sent them back.

where does digital culture come from?

From teleytpe machines, rotary phones and computers the size of your living room. Anything goes. Excavated from the treasure troves of Faris Yakob, Chief Tech Strategist geek at McCann NY.

breakfasts of champion art directors

These sketches were tissue roughs for Post ceral boxes, created back when art directors could draw, though it wasn't called drawing then (illustrators did that) it was "comping", and required unlimited exposure to toxic markers and other items now stocked only in The Museum of Forgotten Art Supplies. 

Guess "Digits" didn't make it out of focus group testing. Cannibals being a limited niche market and all. From the treasure troves of Dan Goodsell who displays more from his impressive collection here.

friday flashback: 1958 Kodak industrial

No one knows the exact origin of this marvelous 1958 documentary "How Film is Made." According to Dutch photographer Marco Boeringa who helped bring it into this century, it may have been an instructional for new Kodak employees and was probably used as a promotional to the general public as well. (Perhaps Don Draper viewed it in preparation for that Kodak pitch.) Unfortunately, the English soundtrack on the original 16mm was lost when it was dubbed in Dutch, probably in the early 60s. But if this hadn't happened, we'd have missed amusing subtitles such as "An invisible but extremely important characteristic of your film is it's purity and cleanliness." 




found on Twitter via @polaroidgirl and @holgajen

need to spiff up your wardrobe for job interviews?

Head to Palm Beach where Bernie Madoff's clients are forced to sell their designer duds on consignment. According to wowowow,  business at the region’s upscale consignment stores is booming like never before. Check out photos of fire-sale items here.  With the savings, you can afford to make an offer on that Starbucks month-old Gulfstream to tote your stash home.

friday flashback: when beauty reigned in the subways

From 1941 to 1977, little girls rattling underground on their way to school or to Grandma's uptown, dreamed of being Miss Subways. The contest was sponsored by an ad agency set up for the purpose, called (what else) New York Subways Advertising. Applicants had to be aged 14 to 30, New York City residents and subway riders themselves. They sent their photos and bios to John Powers, a top modeling agent. The lucky winner had her face, along with a blurb about her life and ambitions, plastered in every car of the IND, IRT and BMT for a month. 

Interestingly, the posters reflected the rise and fall of women in the workplace. When civilian women were critical to the work force during WW2, December 1942's Miss Subways "aims to be a doctor as good as her dad" but by June 1950, her "fondest hope is a trip to Bermuda." Then the 60s came along and Miss Subways (pictured) is described as "young, beautiful, and expert with a rifle." 

Ellen Sturm, Miss Subways in 1959, owns Ellen's Stardust Diner where many of the posters are preserved and displayed. (It's where I found this one.) Would that these vintage cards still hung in trains to provide respite from ads hawking cures for bunions or hemorrhoids.

Are you, by chance, a former Miss Subways? If so, Fiona Gardner wants to picture you in her forthcoming book.

friday flashback--Tom Hanks, creative director, 1986

My 19-year old goes back to college next week and in searching for bonding activities of mutual enjoyment, I netflixed Nothing in Common, an advertising movie I missed somehow. (Oh, right. It came out the year I birthed my first child, a year in which the only movies I saw were reruns at 2 in the morning while breastfeeding.)

It was a great choice, a fun, funny, shareable film. Early Tom Hanks. Bess Armstrong. Sela Ward. "I can't believe it!" I gasped when Jackie Gleason's name flashed on screen. My daughter gasped, too. Someone her age likes Jackie Gleason? Nah. Opening credits were scrolling over first scene which takes place on a plane and announcement is made to extinguish all smoking materials. "You could smoke on a plane?" she said, incredulous.

Which had me noticing all kinds of things that have gone the way of smoking sections and DOS:

marker sets in 87,987 graduating colors
shoulder pads
storyboard pads with frames that looked like mini TV screens
Flashdance-type cutoff sweatshirt sleeves--for guys
epaulets
purple lipstick
mechanical snow makers on set
long gloves worn with wrist-bling on top
designer briefcases
portable phones with pull-out antennas
wall phones
secretaries

Of course, some things never change:

pencils stuck in acoustic ceiling tiles
presentation jitters (Don't bother me now, I'm in pre-game.)
cubicles
theatrics during new business pitches
clueless clients
impossibility of juggling work and family
bosses who get it--and bosses who don't
window office envy
toy collections in creative offices
on set--"client areas" to keep clients as far away from director as possible (But why can't we watch the monitors over there.)
nepotism

friday flashback: this 1979 ad could run today

For Prius.  It was art directed and illustrated by Helmut Krone, legendary art director and Real Life Mad Man at Doyle Dane Bernbach (NY) who was one of the greatest designers ever to wield an exacto. He knew how to use image to define corporate personality long before "brand" was used as a verb--an etymological development Ad Contrarian blames for our industry being in such a muddle. (Read the book.)

international checkout queens, 1965

Starring in vintage industrial from The Super Market Institute in conjunction with that famous producer of blockbusters-- Reader's Digest! Featuring push button cash registers! Giant Hair! Clerks who speak English! Bag boys in ties!  And debut of artist making comeback at a Whole Foods near you: The Bamboo-Handled Plaid Shopping Bag.



as seen on Malls of America

domain you won't find on getty or corbis

Next time you need a retro image that doesn't cry stock, try MirrorWorld which posts vintage snapshots from all over the planet. Its creator's vision:

The singular brilliance of photography is its capacity for allowing hacks & amateurs to create the accidental, offhand masterpiece. Your grandma has no great unread novels or perfect lost symphonies written by her & still tucked away in a drawer in some upstairs closet - but the odds are she does have a photo or two snapped by Uncle Lou in 1939 with a $2 Brownie that wouldn't be out of place on the walls of MOMA. Hopefully somebody will give me a million-dollar grant to go door-to-door looking for these someday. In the meantime when I get bored I snoop about on ebay, the library of congress, etc, & post the cream of what I find on Mirror World.

Will somebody please give this guy a Guggenheim?

[via ComingAnarchy]