Stories We’ve Enjoyed This Week

8th December 2019

  1. From WARC. ‘Digital platforms are growing ever-more influential and 2020 will see marketers increasingly tasked with building their brands within ecosystems over which they have little or no control… the major story for next year being the growing reliance of advertisers on ‘walled gardens’, the digital platforms that combine paid advertising and payment tech or e-commerce fulfilment.’
  2. ‘Beauty drama’ dominated Youtube’s trending page in 2019.YouTube released its top trending list (which is different from most viewed videos) for this year. A strong theme was beauty creators and the drama between them.
  3. This looks both fun and interesting. ‘If you’re a fan of books by people like Gary V and Simon Sinek, you should probably stop reading now. Delusions of Brandeur is an antidote to the insanity that now pervades the marketing industry. A collection of articles, satirical posts and assorted miscellany, it is a no-holds-barred commentary on modern marketing, advertising and business.’
  4. 52 things I learned in 2019, courtesy of Tom Whitwell, one of the smart people at (friend of The Filter) Fluxx.
  5. Big news from the Influencer world this week as ‘Mother of Daughters’ blogger Clemmie Hooper deletes her Instagram after a backlash over trolling friends…. and her husband. 
  6. ‘As music streaming apps struggle to differentiate, Apple is making concert video a more central part of its strategy, with a Billie Eilish show at its HQ’s Steve Jobs Theater. The Apple Music Awards concert streamed live and then on-demand to Apple Music’s 60 million subscribers.
  7. Pantone Color Institute unveils ‘Classic Blue’ as the colour of 2020. Thechosen colour, explains the company, highlights “our desire for a dependable and stable foundation on which to build as we cross thethreshold into a new era….”
  8. Cassetteboy on Boris Johnson. Nice re-jig of MC Hammer’s, You Can’t Touch This.
  9. A holiday advert from exercise bike company Peloton has been widely mocked on social media as being “sexist”, “out of touch”, and even “dystopian”….and this is a smart piece of connected opportunism from Aviation Gin – the Peloton wife is back…in a gin ad. 
  10. A Circle Thief is a lovely little animation by Natsumi Comoto, of a robber of circular objects and the chalk-wielding commuter who attempts to stop him (short video).