Participants who wanted to enter were asked to film themselves on 24 July 2010 and in particular, respond to three questions: “who do you love?”, “what is in your pocket/handbag/purse?” and “what do you fear?” The resultant footage would be edited by The Scott Brothers (of Alien fame) and produced by Kevin Macdonald.

In one of the most successful crowdsourcing exercises of its time, over 80,000 people from 140 countries submitted responses and 4,500 hours were selected to be edited into a 94 minute film, which was premiered at Cannes earlier this year.

The result, which was aired on BBC2 last night is an utterly compelling insight into modern life and I would recommend that everyone takes the time to watch it.

Aside from being impressed at the quality of some of the submissions (the role of consumer as content producer is a conversation for another day) it also got me to thinking about how we articulate what it is like working for companies and whether this style of approach would be worth considering as both an employee engagement exercise and as recruitment material. Food for thought…

Facebook vs the Internet
There were numerous themes being discussed and debated at yesterday’s IAB Engage conference, but for me one of the most interesting was an off the cuff conversation around Facebook. The question being debated was whether Facebook was trying to become the Internet.

Think about it – the Internet, whilst effectively controlled by the companies that maintain the infrastructure (carbon fibre pipes, connections etc.) is an open source mechanism; anyone can use it in a (reasonably) unregulated manner free from traditional constraints. Whilst this has often caused issues for governments, businesses and advertisers, as they try to find some way to regulate how it is used, it has also presented some great opportunities, as normal people have collaborated to come up with innovative and life-chaning new products, services and concepts. Facebook, on the other hand, is a closed ecosystem, meaning that one company has complete control on how it is used, managed and what is done with the information that it gleans.

Whilst the ramifications of this continue to be mulled over by far more intelligent people than me, my thought was simple. When presenting any media plan, should we treat Facebook as a channel in its own right? In other words, should FB activity be on every media plan, distinctly separate from press, out of home, digital etc.? It makes sense – 20% of the worlds population is using it, any activity on FB gives us direct access to a mobile audience (over 50% of smartphone usage in the UK is on Facebook) and we can be incredibly specific in our targeting. Hodes is using Facebook in increasingly inventive ways (see our latest work for Gazprom) and have some successful examples that we can showcase.

I suppose the other way of looking at the same question is, given its size and scale, why haven’t we been treating it as a separate channel?

The LinkedIn vs. Facebook discussion has been a hot topic for a while, and one that will continue for months (and probably years) to come. What’s made this even more interesting is that this week saw the launch of the Facebook Social Jobs Partnerships.  A joint venture between Facebook and the US Dept. of Labor, “The partnership will explore and develop systems for delivering job postings virally through Facebook at no charge.” Some speculate that this will eventually lead to “Facebook destroying Linkedin”. Even if true my personal opinion is that we are a long way from that… In the meantime LinkedIn is maintaining its cool, with co-founder Reid Hoffman stating that ‘Facebook isn’t competition’ at the San Francisco Web 2.0 summit.

Involved in presentations? Then chances are you probably already have a list of data sources that you ‘borrow’ from. Mary Meeker is one of Silicon Valley’s foremost Venture Capitalists and championed very early on companies such as Microsoft, Google and eBay. Her presentations have become legendary and a veritable source of data for anybody working in the digital world. Her latest can be found here . Well worth a read and well worth ‘borrowing’ from.

China (and Asia) cannot be ignored any longer. At some point you will probably be involved in a project that will involve working with clients/partners in this region, as I have been in the last few weeks working on ABB. This site  is a great resource for anything related to digital in Asia in general. Ogilvy has also created a handy guide on the equivalent sites of Facebook, Foursquare or even Google in China, which can be found here.

Finally, I thought I would feature Hypem. A site which is creating quite a buzz. It takes music posted on blogs around the world and indexes it in a nice readable format, for everybody to rate and vote for – as well as to listen to. A great way to discover new music…

Google+ a socially suitable successor to Facebook?
Ever since Facebook started to gain traction within the collective global consciousness, Google has tried to jump in on the action. Its first foray, a service called ‘Buzz’ was deemed a disaster and served to reinforce the growing belief that the team at Google didn’t really ‘get’ social media. Last week, however, Google launched its newest venture, a social network called Google+. And the feeling is that this time, Google has done something right.

Google+ is a social network. As with many social networks, it requires membership to get the most out of it. Unlike many social networks, you can still participate if you are not a member.

There are a whole host of services on offer – users can capitalise on many of Google’s existing products and services in a manner that facilitates social engagement. For example, increasingly you will start seeing the +1 symbol on Google search results pages. This is Google’s equivalent to ‘liking’ something. Google+ users have unlimited storage on Picasa, which is a piece of image editing software that allows users to store, share and more importantly edit images. It also has face recognition, but I’ll come to that later.

You will probably hear a lot about ‘circles’, which is Google’s way of allowing users to associate an individual with a particular group. For example, one circle may be ‘family’, one may be ‘work colleagues’. Depending on how granular you want to get, you may also have a circle called ‘drinking buddies’, or ‘people I met at Tom and Marie’s wedding’. It is possible to get as granular as you want and also, allow one person to be attributed to lots of different circles. Its pretty intuitive and more importantly, you can specify very clearly what group is allowed access to what information.

It’s all very clever stuff and as I spend more time over the coming weeks, you’ll probably hear more. For now, it is worth noting simply that Google has launched a credible competitor to Facebook. With Facebook starting to lose numbers, it is worth paying attention. There are however, a couple of things to bear in mind.

There is a fear that Google+ allows Google to be even more intrusive in our lives. Google wants to be all things to all people, and, no, this is nothing to laugh at. Google continues to build the largest computing infrastructure on the planet, but still manages to generate large amounts of liquidity. At the end of March 2011, it had more than $36B in cash. Google is extremely capital efficient.

The other concern is about how Google use the information that a Social Networking product will provide. Google’s one and only goal is to sell advertising. The path to this goal requires ‘radiation pressure’: Google wants to make sure we don’t escape its ads. It wants to insert itself into all aspects of our lives, to find out as much as it can about as many aspects, activities and relationships as possible. And Social Networking is about as pervasive as it gets.

Do I think that this will stop people from taking up its new offering? Yes and no. Yes, because Facebook is falling out of favour with many and people are starting to look for a credible alternative (which Google+ provides); no because Google is already a behemoth with a staggering amount of information. We tend not to like it when organisations or people have too much power. On top of this, I’m expecting Governments around the world to wake up to this and to start talking about monopolisation, data integrity and security.

Social Networking and Recruitment
Social networks are powerful recruiting and job seeking tools. The $120 billion corporate recruiting industry is being transformed (and upset) by LinkedIn because the system is such a powerful tool for recruiters to find passive candidates.  People in the LinkedIn network maintain their profile actively, giving recruiters a real-time, highly accurate database from which to search and contact candidates.

And the growth of LinkedIn has dramatically impacted many of the big players in this market. Executive recruitment firms like Heidrick and Struggles, Korn Ferry, and Spencer Stuart are losing the value of their proprietary executive networks. Mid-sized recruiting companies are seeing big companies develop more and more expertise in the use of social networking internally. And large job boards like Monster.com, The Ladders, and others are seeing job seekers (and recruiters) move their money and energy toward LinkedIn.

That’s not to say that LinkedIn is the only professional networking tool out there. Nor is it to say that the more innovative agencies, like MDH, are doomed to fail. It is simply outlining that the speed and voracity of social recruitment has caught a lot of people off their guard.

Monster finally joins the game; LinkedIn responds
Last week Monster threw down the gauntlet with the launch of BeKnown, a new Facebook application that aimed to become the professional social network for Facebook users, and a vital new tool for recruiters, human resources, and talent acquisition teams.

Monster wasn’t the only recruiting provider to use Facebook – for example, a product called ‘Branch Out’ has been around for a while and recently been gaining traction – however, it is certainly the biggest.

The use of Facebook, however, was perceived as a real coup. Whilst LinkedIn has an estimated 100 million users and is growing at a rate of nearly 3 million per month, there is an entire world of Facebook users who do not use LinkedIn (yet).  Facebook, with more than 750 million users, taps into a broader audience who uses the network for different purposes.

Now, and here is where we come to the interesting bit; any social networking product or service requires a critical mass before it become effective. Monster had hoped to circumvent this by using LinkedIn’s API to allow individuals to upload their LinkedIn contacts to BeKnown. LinkedIn, recognising the threat that this posed, simply shut down its API.

It’s a clever move, despite being criticised by many in the industry. With a single keystroke, LinkedIn has forced Monster to actually go through the difficult process of creating its own network, which takes time and effort and will act as a barrier to take up by many individuals. It has prompted a huge debate about data ownership and also gives LinkedIn time to consider a response.

Expect a LinkedIn Facebook app to arrive imminently…

Pleasure Hunt My Magnum
Since the heady days of Magnum’s shocking introduction to the heavily traditional world of ice cream, their campaigns have continued to push boundaries. Literally.

The world’s biggest PacMan
A Ronseal site. What more can I say?

“I’m sure you’re going to say you have already seen all this years ago and I’m so behind the times but I was so impressed I wanted to share it with you regardless. I’ve been exploring all the digital recruitment stuff from the Swedish armed forces and its amazing. I remember we featured some social stuff they have done in that GSK prezi so I expect your aware of the work. They all make use of amazing SFX too.

Reminds me that recruitment marketing can still be amazing.”

Enjoy!

A

An industry oldie (by virtue of being around more than a year), Glassdoor is one of the most popular P2P review sites on the web. Users can anonymously comment on the organisations they work for (or have worked for) giving advice to senior management about how things should be improved – a useful pulse survey for firms and researchers alike. They can also post their salaries and questions that were raised during interviews. Whilst this does raise a challenge for recruiters, levelling the playing field in terms of salary negotiations and making it difficult to get under the skin of the people they are interviewing who have had plenty of time to pre-prepare responses to questions they are likely to be asked, my view is that this should ultimately be a good thing. I’m curious as to what will happen to Glassdoor – will it become just another job board, or is it a hot prospect for a takeover. My suspicions say the latter, as the content it owns is far too valuable. Time, as they say, will tell.

A new contender on the block, the Job Crowd sounds curiously similar to an award winning TV comedy. However, the content and features it contains are no joke. Targeted at graduates and early stage workers, there are plenty of articulate and useful reviews about a range of jobs and industries, with added features like ‘Similar Reviews’ (akin to Amazon’s ‘People who liked this also liked’ feature) and a surprisingly large following. The business model is nice too, as every review added generates a donation to the Shaw Trust, a leading employment charity.

The brain child of a couple of entrepreneurs from Loughborough University, Rate My Placement has been firmly establishing itself as THE favourite contender for Graduate advice. Its business model has it working closely with employers, careers advisors and university placement officers, generating input from students that will hopefully provide real-life insight into what students and graduates can expect from working in a company. With competition forcing employers to start the engagement process earlier and earlier in the student lifecycle, it is easy to see why this site continues to do so well. It’s  first-hand knowledge and experience of the student placement and internship process, aligned with a dedication to relevant, up-to-date, student generated content that has allowed RMP to identify and fill a growing gap in the market and understand the needs of our users and clients. Another hot prospect for takeover.

Talking of early stage recruitment, I thought to take a look at an early stage P2P site that allow students to rate teachers and schools. Rate My Teacher is an intriguing prospect although  I’m curious how long such content will be allowed to be posted without accusations of libel and slander (reading today’s news about Google being successfully sued for the way that its search algorithm can place negative words next to an individual’s name is a stark reminder). However, the site does have plenty of content and uses Facebook ‘Likes’ to extend its reach across multiple channels. As a parent who is seriously considering about investing in education, it is reassuring to see that some teachers can still generate a hugely positive response.

Finally, I saw this site and had to post it as a great example of opportunistic capitalism. Faced with a throwaway society, where having the latest toy and gadget affords children playground status and a consumer cycle where ‘latest’ can now be expressed in months and weeks, rather than seasons, it is no wonder that an exchange marketplace has risen, phoenix-like from the ashes of a discarded toy mountain. Stork Brokers is a trading exchange for parents who want to get some vestige of value from barely used toys. It’s similar to eBay with more targeting and a much better moniker.

A

Adobe Museum of Digital Media. A cool and interesting idea where a museum dedicated to Digital Media is developed entirely online. You have to play around with it, as it’s a bit odd. If anything though, it will remain etched in my mind for moment of epiphany by an ‘architect’ from Goodby Silverstein & Partners (the ad agency behind the idea) when he and the team find out that “this was the precise moment when we realised that doing something virtual wasn’t that easy…”

Some of you may remember the TED winner JR from a few mails ago. He’s back and with a vengeance for his newest project, Inside Out. In his words, “INSIDE OUT is a large-scale participatory art project that transforms messages of personal identity into pieces of artistic work. Everyone is challenged to use black and white photographic portraits to discover, reveal and share the untold stories and images of people around the world. These digitally uploaded images will be made into posters and sent back to the project’s co-creators for them to exhibit in their own communities.” Quite.

Can’t remember if I featured this in previous mails or not, but this is a nice idea from a Japanese band, that has just been voted a finalist in this year’s SXSW: an interactive music video that gets customised every time you view it depending on your personal data and social networking status. You sign up using Facebook, Twitter and a webcam but for those of you who don’t have (or want to) connect via Facebook, you can see the non-connected version here.

As described by Russ, totally pointless but cool site for a Friday.

And lastly, a fun mashup that allows you to search the Creative Commons images on Flickr according to colour.

Enjoy!

A

Getinspired
Struggling for design inspiration? Trying to come up with an engaging but slightly differentiated resolution to a sticky problem? Then Pattern Tap is worth a try. It is a resource of design ideas and executions, nicely categorised into quick access categories. Looking for some ideas about how to display lists? Then click the ‘List’ tab and hey presto, 418 different ideas. Struggling with iconography? Then look at the 200 different types of thumbnails. Simple, intuitive and effective.

GetaGravatar
The term ‘gravatar’ is a neologism that stands for a ‘globally recognised avatar’. Apparently. Anyway, the notion behind this is that, given the explosion of social media requiring soundbyte interaction, making sure that everyone can identify the person behind the comment is an important. Being consistent with this representation of who you are is “SUPER important”, so the logic is that you should create a image of yourself that is associated with every comment or insight you post. I think that this is also called branding…

Getajob
This site is a children’s book, designed to answer the question “what are the strangest jobs in the world”, delivered as a flash site. There are a couple of games to keep you entertained – I particularly like the Sewer Cleaner game. Some content can be translated, but much of the content is in Polish. I’ve no idea why I like it, but I do.

Getsupportfromyourcommunity
We have seen an explosion in the number of community-based support sites recently: Feedbackers.biz and StartUpLift offer low cost support for new to market ideas; Veel provides crowdsourced design support and sites like Sparked make it easy for altruistic consumers to support an organization or cause by enlisting both individuals and groups of company employees to contribute their expertise to a non-profit organisation.  It’s a nice idea and I’d love to see this sort of approach used in either internal or recruitment comms. We just need to think about the ‘what’ and the ‘how’…

Shiftperspective
Tilt shifting is where real-photos are manipulated to look like model photographs. Tilt-shift maker allows you to make your own.  It works better with landscapes.

So this week I’ve been thinking about the notion of preconception and challenging the status quo. We tell our clients that the Recruitment landscape is shifting, but are we heeding the very advice we are dishing out? In this week’s merry bunch of examples, we draw inspiration from children, from those who are hard of hearing and from those who are forcing us to rethink the way we work. So as you come to think about New Year and the list of things you’ll be looking to change, you could do worse than drawing inspiration from the example below.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year

Andy

Can children draw the internet?
In a world where the balance between what can be imagined and what can be achieved is precariously thin, it is often those who can approach the mundane from a different viewpoint who come up with an idea that truly stands out from the crowd. Such people are often derided as being childlike and over-playful, but in this intriguing experiment, we are all encouraged to relish  our childishness, as it is in this mode that we are uninhibited by preconceptions and more likely to come up with a great idea. The test is simple: senior level creatives and children are asked to draw the internet. The output is fascinating and displays a level of insight coupled with imagination that would stand us proud.

Hearing with your hands
I’ve had to live with people who are hard of hearing all my life, adjusting the manner in which I speak to my family to make the conversation easier to understand and be involved in. The problem is that deafness and partial deafness isn’t exactly easy to spot and for some reason, people are often reticent to admit that they can’t hear. Sometimes, just to understand what being deaf is like, I try to live life without sound. Think about it – how much of your perception of the environment is dominated by what you hear? Try watching a TV programme from start to end with mute switched on and see what impact it has on the way you perceive the programme. Anyway, in this link, the cast of Glee listen to John Lennon’s ‘Imagine’ as sung by a deaf choir. Sounds strange, but is heart-rendingly moving.

Why work doesn’t happen at work
One of the things that really irritates me is the number of times someone interrupts what I’m doing by asking an inane question that they could quite easily had answered for themselves. Or the long meeting involving all and sundry which could have been done and dusted in a much shorter timeframe between a couple of people. In this engaging and entertaining 15 minute presentation, Jason Fried, the brains behind the hugely successful collaborative work tool Basecamp, discusses how our workplace could actually be counter-productive, providing some suggestions as to how to resolve this. My favourite is No Talk Thursday.

The story of the Nativity & The Digital Nativity
I thought I’d finish with something appropriate to Christmas Eve. For those of us who have ever got involved in acting, a huge challenge is how to provide an interpretation of the playwright’s work that is differentiated and entertaining. Over the past few weeks I have been looking at differing representations of the Nativity and it never fails to amaze me how many different ways there are to articulate what is, when you think about it, quite a straightforward sequence of events. These two videos, which both provide a modern view on the Nativity, have been trending recently and it’s easy to see why: one is tongue in cheek, the other slightly more serious. Both are worth watching.

The best modern careers sites go beyond simply promoting jobs: they provide content that help a candidate gain a deep insight into the culture of the firm that they are looking for. They do this with a range of tricks and tools: 3d panoramics, games, blogs, microblogs, tests, challenges, videos. And the better ones, the ones that win awards, make the experience of accessing that content part of the brand journey.

As a result, I’ve been looking for examples of interactivity, where the user gets more out of a site experience the more they explore. These four examples show how interactive media can help create an immersive experience that crosses a range of differing senses: touch, sound and sight. Can’t do taste or smell yet, but I can’t believe that it’s too far off… maybe we could do that for Nandos?

Enjoy

False
A portfolio site for a Japanese developer, what a better way to showcase your wares that by encouraging a user to interact with it. Some of the pages can make you feel slightly nauseous, but what a fun site! (If you get stuck, select the MENU> icon on the LHS…)

Snowboarding – an interactive experience
We’ve talked before about the use of 3D panoramic in video and I love this example. Drag your mouse around inside the video and watch the video pan out from a range of perspectives. Genius!

Mashup Breakdown
One from our very own DJ Dix. It’s a fun visual way of representing music. You can select different tracks by clicking on the dropdown underneath the page title. Just turn the volume down a bit…

Life in a day: One World. 24 Hours. 6 Billion Perspectives.
A while back, the digerati were asked to help create a feature film that would act as an interactive time capsule that provided a portrait of the world on a particular day (July 24). Individuals were asked to create short videos of some aspect of what they were doing on July 24. User-generated content on a scale that has never before been attempted. In particular they were asked to answer 3 questions and show what they had in their pocket. The three questions were: what do you fear most in your life today? What do you love? What makes you laugh?

The film will premiere at the Sundance Film Festival on January 2011. With Kevin MacDonald as director and Ridley Scott as producer, its going to be something unique and special. Have a look at some of the videos and see what you think…