Media Week

Neil Hughes from 56 Up

This week saw the latest instalment of The Up Series.  Originally commissioned by Granada television in 1965, Up is a documentary series that has followed the lives of 14 people from the age of 7, returning to each of them every seven years to see how they and their lives have changed (or not).

Would the format survive with the seven year gap since the last episode, during which the arrival of social media could have made the series redundant? The fact is, it was more powerful than ever and Monday’s 56 Up was about as powerful a piece of television as you’re likely to see this year.

Intimate detail became epic stories on the screen; as a viewer you recognised that not only were the 14 telling you their story, they were helping you to understand yours in a way that only great television can.

This was not the curated ‘authentic’ self of social media nor the self-actualised optimism of ‘Life in a Day’ but the really real deal. With all its mundane glory, earned the hard-but-only-possible way, in the really real-time of 56 years.

A ratings hit? Not quite, but with an 8.1 TVRs versus Scott and Bailey’s 10.0 it certainly held its own, and at the same time set Twitter and Zeebox on fire in a way that signals next week’s episode  (2/3)could grow.

It’s all too easy to think that we live in the era of risk taking, progress and change but can anyone honestly imagine a publisher or broadcaster committing to a project that could take over a hundred years to complete? Well I think I can. C4 has felt the absence of Big Brother and perhaps a look back at the pioneers of 1964 would be a source of inspiration for a channel famed for its daring.

The AGM, sometimes referred to as the “annual geriatrics’ moan” or more commonly “annual general meeting”, is suddenly becoming something of a place to be -an event where scalped big earning chief executives are paraded in front of angry shareholders as penance for years of over-indulgent remuneration amidst falling profits.

It never used to be the case; AGMs used to be a boreathon, where dividend, auditors and executive pay would be silently approved by corporate shareholders who could never be bothered to show up.

And, invariably, they always did approve everything.

The only highlight would be listening to a shrieking single-shareholding prune that had travelled down to London from the outer reaches of Arbroath with the sole agenda of taking issue with say the chief executive of DMGT over the financial wastefulness of the company’s expensive paper stock of its annual report.
The chief executive would never have the gumption or humour to respond to the shrieking woman with something along the lines of “This is the AGM for DMGT, the AGM for PMT is a week Tuesday.”
The AGM  is simply too staid for that, but as Trinity Mirror and Aviva lose their chiefs amidst shareholder unrest, isn’t it about time the AGM joined the modern world and dispended with its soporific mix of corporate platitudes, crap sandwiches and Styrofoam cups in favour of social media and X-Factor style re-appointment of directors.
Why not let the FTSE bigwigs take to the stage, microphone in hand, and in say 10 minutes sing for their suppers (re-appointments) in front of the judging panel: the company shareholders.
The bigwigs could take it turns, taking the mic and kicking off with “the reason I should be re-elected is.”… then cite their high and low points this past 12 months and perhaps at a critical juncture – like when they talk of the day the company’s share price rose  a record 12%- wiping away a crocodile tear or two.

Once they had finished their auditions, the shareholder panel could vote, saying “Yes, We’ve seen the figures and the company has performed OK in the past 12 months, but on today’s performance you have not convinced us you want it enough.

“Moreover, your audition ran for 12 minutes, two more minutes then allowed, and you being a finance director and a numbers man and all that, we don’t think that is good enough. So thanks, but no thanks.”

If not X-Factor style auditions, then live tweets must be introduced, as the AGM is the one chance in the year investors get the chance to question company bosses, so surely it is futile not to make use of the technology whereby investors who don’t want to schlep down to London or wherever can get their voice across.
For too long, at AGMs,  full-time directors and non-executive directors have been silent silhouettes, letting the chief executive and chairman take the plaudits or poo-throwing, depending on the success of the company.
Now is the time to revolutionise the AGM and make it an event that all shareholders will want to attend.

In the last few years you may have noticed how the global recession has impacted upon our collective psyche.  Whilst the nineties and noughties witnessed a throw-away society and mass consumerism recently a new consciousness has emerged – a ‘make-do-and-mend’ mentality and a return to frugality, dubbed ‘austerity chic’.  These phenomena have heralded a new popularity of old skills like sewing on buttons, darning socks and growing your own vegetables.

Media and celebrities have caught onto the trend through programmes like Kirstie Allsopp’s ‘Handmade Britain’ and ‘Homemade Home’ which extol the virtues of domesticity and show viewers how to make items such as decoupage tea lights and clay-baked gift tags.  The Duchess of Cambridge is a key exponent of this trend, recycling her hats and outfits and even swapping them with her mum. Read More »

Listening to the radio this morning, I heard U2’s “It’s a beautiful day” and it kind of summed up my week.  Unlike last week’s earworm the Rolling Stones “I can’t get no satisfaction” which was far more relevant (and for once I don’t mean Mrs M).  It got me thinking in a far too Wogan-esque vein, that we should have soundtracks for our days, and more specifically we should have soundtracks for our job roles.  Read More »

Yesterday evening I was walking down a lane near my house and a man was coming towards me staring down into his mobile phone. I thought, “He will see me, he will see me.” Then I thought, “He won’t see me, he won’t see me.” I stopped and he didn’t. A quick “sorry” and he walked off resuming his downward gazing. Smart phones don’t make smart people it seems.

This got me thinking, which is always a worry. Around two in five adults in this country have a smartphone (Ipsos Technology Tracker) and the figure continues to grow; last year the devices started to outsell PCs (IDC). Three in five teenagers admit they are “highly addicted” to using smartphones, compared with 37% for adults (Ofcom). We cannot ignore the mobile generation, even if they do ignore other people on the pavement.

Internet access through mobile phones will eventually be the default setting for everyone. Mobile will be the one-stop shop for social interactions, finding, buying, selling, playing, watching and reading, and who knows even the odd phone call. Smart devices are not just about communication, they are our identity. They will even select music for you based on your pulse rate or location (not sure I want ‘I’m forever blowing bubbles’ when I’m in the bath).

We, as human beings and consumers, are changing with this technology. We don’t store information, we access it. We used to know a lot about a little, but now we know a little about a lot. That doesn’t necessarily make us smart though.

Read More »

I’m a sucker for a good quotation. The best can make a point far more eloquently and concisely than I ever could, which is why I use them in my presentations all the time. Sometimes it may be historical figures – for example Henry Ford’s “a man who stops advertising to save money is like a man who stops a clock to save time” or Samuel Johnson’s famous quote about advertising overload (written in 1759).

Other times, it may be celebrity classics (Arnold Schwarzenegger – “I think gay marriage should be between a man and a woman”) or homespun words of wisdom (“A computer might beat you at chess, but you can always beat it at kick boxing”) Read More »

Anyone else catch “Ad Men” on Sky Atlantic?  Great to see our own legends of the small, and large screen, talking about how Ad Land developed, being influenced by the US industry, the creativity of the 70s through to the excesses of the 80s.  Favourite moment was Ridley Scott telling the story of when someone suggested as he was so great at making ads, he might consider making films.

And it was a great excuse to include many of our favourite ads pack into an hour.  From the BA “Face” ad to the Guinness Surfer, so many of the ads, did that very special thing of giving me a #Tingle.  You know that special feeling you get when something moves you and literally makes your hair stand up on end? Read More »

Mirror, mirror on the wall who is the fairest of them all?
Step forward one Mark Hollinshead, current managing director of Trinity Mirror’s nationals’ division and Media Week’s tip as replacement for Sly Bailey.

Hollinshead, aesthetically speaking, does not possess the credentials of Bailey: he is a short back and sides man, unlike the snow-white mop hair of Bailey which made her so instantly recognisable, nor perhaps does he possess her charisma. Read More »

“That’s part of your problem: you haven’t seen enough movies. All of life’s riddles are answered in the movies.” Davis (Steve Martin, Grand Canyon, 1991)

Moneyball - a movie about data

Inspired by Sue Unerman’s cinematic references in her last blog I’ve another movie for your attention.

I’m not Brad Pitt, but neither am I Jonah Hill, at least I’m not as smart as he is in the baseball-based movie Moneyball.  It tells the story of Oakland Athletics’ 2002 season. A season where they changed the rules of baseball forever. It’s one of those movies about sport that isn’t about sport. It’s a movie about conviction, destiny, redemption, resistance and duty. It’s also a movie about data. Read More »

One of the things that has appealed to advertisers about the internet since the first dotcom boom has been its global scope. It allows them to communicate with markets around the world as easily as they previously could their domestic audiences. And as we see TV, radio and mobile all using the internet as the medium to reach a worldwide audience, the importance of the internet as a global medium will only grow. But as an advertiser, how do you assess reach across continents?

In a world of increasingly fragmented audiences and segmented media habits, census information becomes key for planning communication, as it is able to identify traffic across geographical regions at an individual unique browser level. Equally important is that advertisers have a universally recognised set of principles to work with, underpinned by local verification that these principles have been met. That means advertisers, agencies and media owners can be confident that they are basing their commercial decisions on sound data that meets an internationally recognised benchmark of transparency. Read More »