Stephen Ross Scott.com™

Many years ago Telstra really thought they were 'all that' (and a bag of xxxl potato chips). They believed Sensis, their woeful search engine, (now in 2011 powered by Google. Ah sweet irony.) was what Australian's wanted. Sensis was better, faster, and that Android was to just be ignored.

They then put all their eggs in the iOs/Apple basket, and as usual, another not so smart move by the monopolistic giant. 

The (then) CEO quipped;

 Google Schmoogle

&

We’re outgrowing Google in Australia. We’re doing more, we’re growing faster and we have more capability, because we’re more relevant.

Taxi for Telstra CEO please... 

So nice to finally see Telstra has rebranded, removed (some of) the arrogance, grown up, wised up, and told the latest CEO to shut up. Finally realising that if you want to get anywhere in this world that listening and collaboration, along with offering customer choice, is the only way forward... Someone at least has now empolyed a brain cell, and the often vastly customer devoid Telstra flagship Australian store, is now partially overtaken as the world's first Android store, called 'AndroidLand' in right here in Melbourne; 

2012 is going to be a little bit greener.

(thx Paul)

I rarely ever talk about my work here on this site, but we've undertaken some major work recently that I think is worth sharing.

It's been three years since we took a redesign at RMIT, and in this case, we've only taken a refresh rather than a full redesign so far. Simply put, most web sites these days are incredibly hard work to change. As businesses realise the importance of digital media, every step becomes more careful, more planned, more throrough and more and more stakeholders are involved. 

Talking with colleagues in the education and other sectors at several social media conferences recently, it's became clear that finally (finally!) over the last few years business have realised how crictical your brand and digital presence is across your site, partners sites, social and mobile. 

So with that in mind it was rewarding we could finaly make some of those changes recently. And with a successful site refresh done in recent weeks, a very successful mobile site for our Open Day today (see below), and an amazingly successful Open Day offline and online campiagn I'm very proud of all of the work we have done in the organisation. Only possible thanks to some very hard work, lots of debate and a large amount of people who have worked with us on all these projects and helped make them a reality. 

Now the really hard work begins : )

Look at your brand, now back to Taco Bell, now back to your brand.. now back to..Taco Bell. Sadly, not everything can be inventive as Old Spice, but we are sure as hell getting some great brands like Old Spice and recently Taco Bell and Toyota engaging in new, fresh, and just plain kick ass, non corporate bullshit ways. And, they are benefiting from it all greatly. I'm on a horse.

Okay enough of that ad, I promise, but see how ingrained it has become?

So the above video is for Taco bell, doing a retro 70's stylee, Saturday morning, badly drawn and acted cartoon angle. Just the stuff I grew up on and lusted to watch more of, and internet audiences love to share. Clichéd to say viral, but a well known label, and fitting.

This video is the second in a series. #1 got half a million views with very little effort. The scripts are very on the money and unashamedly go after a hip, adult swim and very stoner audience, especially with their tongue in cheek 'munchies' take.

Add in the 1st episode, a fun retro web site (scroll to the right, and keep scrolling), some nice facebook and twitter accounts for the superheroes, and all done in very subtle Taco Bell branding throughout.

One huge problem about all these great ads recently. The brand awareness, like the internet is global, and yet the Toyota, Old Spice and Taco Bell are all for USA products. Well, they are least building awareness and desire for the products should they come to Australia. (Come back Taco Bell, I love you!)

We really do need some superheroes to sort this regionalism out. To the El Camino!

Singer Ke$ha (she must be cool cos y'know she has a dollar sign in her name) or label Sony could not have foreseen the massive reaction that this song has sparked across the web and beyond.

A little history; the single is released with it's own official video (not all that good). The super catchy pop beats, and Ke$sha's lack of ugly helped this become a huge worldwide hit. The end right? On to the next single? Nooo, before you can say 'web community - engage!' They kinda did, and off they went with mash-ups galore, and one of the best and first, was the below, rather excellent Star Wars Version:

A great interpretation, and for most of us we thought that was it, but then the amazing happened... I'm watching the Simpsons a few weeks ago and the very traditional opening sequence and theme gets replaced with this phenomenal version (The time and money alone spent here, as well as legal issues between fox and Sony are worth thinking about); 

Well thats gotta be it right? And I would have banked that was it, no more heights to achieve, but this thing has wings, and also not to be outdone by George Lucas fans, the 'trekkies' get their own also excellent mash-up; (Thnx Sam C for sharing)

Now whats the big fuss about all this? Just some videos, right? T Wrong, the fact that gets me on watching all these is that after all the wails and moans about Digital Rights Management (DRM), lawsuits galore for using copyrighted tunes, and bitter complaints from the media industry about us the customer, all of a sudden it's quite okay for everyone including a major animation studio to get thier mash up on?

This is a huge change, and without a doubt (as many a web head would have told you for years) is doing Ke$ha no harm. In fact she'll soon be adding several more dollar signs to her name as this gets more and more exposure. Nearly a million views on each version I've shown above alone, never mind the worldwide viewer-ship of the Simpsons TV & DVD sales.  

Yet sadly this is still an exception, and I encounter content everyday that is still locked down, restricted, region locked, and hobbled by legal nonsense. Many YouTube Music videos for example still wont allow basic embedding and sharing. (Do you want exposure? Why even have your product online if it can't be shared?)

When customers can make videos for $0.00 to record labels, ask for nothing in return, and promote your product for you? It truly is time to wake up if you manage a brand, and start losing some control to gain more, and let customers play with your product before your time is up.