Burger King in Family Guy Google Hook-Up

Fast Food giant Burger King could score a real hit with their latest venture into the online world.



According to the New York Times, everyone's second favourite burger chain is launching a tie-in with Seth MacFarlane and Google which promises to be something of an online first.

'Seth MacFarlane's Cavalcade of Cartoon Comedy', dubbed 'Too Big For Your TV', will air exclusively on the Google AdSense network from September, as was announced in June. A Clockwork Orange-esque preview is available now at sethcomedy.com.

Burger King have, in a very savvy manner, managed to piggy back what could be a real phenomenon by including a 'lead-in' featuring a MacFarlane-animated version of the sinister Burger King character. These, it would seem, are in addition to pre-roll advertising prior to the Cavalcade clip. BK have also built a dedicated You Tube channel.

It's all a far cry from Burger King's previous attempt at harnessing the power of online and social media, when P Diddy's ham-fisted attempt (he's not entirely to blame - it was clearly someone else's idea) at encouraging people to interact made the cringeworthy effort below which became ripe for parody. Interestingly the Diddy connection has not ended there.




As for the MacFarlane venture,Tim Street pointed out that this could be an excellent and very targeted pioneer for a way (depending on which sites are chosen) of launching TV shows online, which is true.

What Burger King and Google haven't taken into account, and which as a Family Guy fan I think they would do well to note, is that MacFarlane is not exactly unopinionated. There are numerous references to various outfits who have incurred his ire in Family Guy, including Twentieth Century Fox and the FCC. His new 'paymasters' would do well to note any subversiveness that could potentially undermine a beautiful partnership.

Hello? God? Sorry, I'm just eating a toffee apple

Red Arrows Join London 2012 Olympic Handover Celebrations

The Mall, August 24th 2008.

A picture tells a thousand words. The Red Arrows are officially a
national treasure. Spectacular.

To those of you watching at home...

...there's a rumour doing the rounds here that Brian Barwick and his moustache have been shown the swanky glass door at the FA's Soho Square headquarters.

You'll also notice from my picture that there are a hell of a lot of empty seats, cunningly positioned on the same side of the stadium as the cameras. PR at its best, surprisingly for the shambolic Football Association.

And if you are watching at home, you won't be getting wet. It's that fine rain that soaks you through.

Wembley again. Raining again.

My second visit to Wembley in the month of August and it's bloody raining again. James Olley, of the Evening Standard fame, is bemoaning the lack of lasagne at recent England matches. And England are losing.

Reverse Bel-Air from xkcd

I'm very new to the term webcomic, let alone the phenomenon itself. Following on from my Garfield minus Garfield appraisal here, suffice to say that xkcd, 'A Webcomic if romance, sarcasm, math(s) and language', has excelled itself with this strip. I'd file this under romance and sarcasm. Easy on the math(s).

Garfield Minus Garfield. Pure Genius.

I haven't had much time over the last few days to keep up with my growing library of links. Thunderfrogs, a site I was put on to by The Guardian Guide, has absolutely made my day by bringing Garfield Minus Garfield to my attention.



This site is an absolute stroke of genius. I'm no art critic but I like things that have little logic and are slightly anarchic. I remember seeing that maverick Actor/Director/Artist/Model Vincent Gallo had followed up an exhibition of pictures of him and his girlfriend, after they subsequently broke up, with an exhibition of the same photos with her face scratched out and replaced with a stick man face.

Such is the brilliance of Garfield Minus Garfield Webcomic creator Dan Walsh, he has been lauded by Garfield creator Jim Davis and inspired a book since its debut in February 2008. Give it a look.

Berocca Blog Campaign Draws Mixed Reception

A few weeks ago, I wrote about the reaction to a campaign by Coca Cola to target bloggers in Brazil to promote a new drink.

I mused at the time that what was actually a pretty innovatove strategy using early adopters and influencers had been lost because it was done by Coca Cola, and that those bloggers not chosen had instinctively taken against the idea. I was slightly correct.

In the UK, Berocca has been promoting itself to the blogging community in a similar manner. Berocca's Blogger Relief Pack was available to the first 50 entrants to the form on their site. i-level launched the campaign on their own blog, and it soon had a healthy amount of debate in the blogosphere.


The Beam Team and Sandrine Plasseraud were enthusiastic, even more so when their packs arrived (there's a full shot of the contents here - I love the stress button).

Simon Collister, however, was less impressed at his failure to be among the chosen 50, and became suspicious after his protests when he suddenly joined the lucky few. BlogTillYouDrop had a similarly cautious assessment.

Again, the message seems to be that those who are included and feel as though they have 'discovered' something will embrace it. I've come across things that proved ultimately to be pretty useless, but while I thought nobody else knew about them I was particularly effusive.

Conversely the feeling of exclusion from the 'select few' is never going to make a blogger receptive or welcoming to an idea. I'm sure there is a middle ground to be struck but, and this is especially applicable to the likes of Coca Cola, you'll never be far away from bitter accusations of bribery.

I wasn't quick enough off the mark with this at all, which is a shame because I have actually used Berocca in the past and am a big believer in its 'pick-me-up' qualities. I would have loved a stress button too, although there is far too much crap on my desk as it is. I am, however, open to bribes...

Russell Brand and Britney Spears in MTV VMA Promo

I'm a big fan of Russell Brand, and I also, for no particular reason other than I feel quite sorry for her, would like to see Britney Spears back on her feet. So the MTV VMA 2008 Promo featuring the pair of them is not only a good thing per se, it is also pretty damn funny.

Here's the first part:



and the second:



Also, if I'm stealing their ads, I should point out that the MTV Video Music Awards 2008 take place on September 7th.

And thank The Inquisitr.

Audrey the Wizard - Football Stickers return in November

I posted a little while ago about how Amy Winehouse had gone up in my estimations when she was pictured carrying a Euro 2008 sticker album for her husband. There have been developments on the sticker front.

A colleague, keen to recreate the playground swapsies in the workplace, emailed one of the 'Wizards' at Merlin, who make the official Premier League sticker collection, to find out when we can expect the launch given that the big kick-off for 2008-2009 is but a few days away.

He got a reply this morning, too, from the same 'Wizard' email address. They're scheduled for later this year. Probably November apparently. They seem very relaxed about it, the wizards. And this particular wizard signed off as Audrey. Which is my gran's name, so I'm not dissing it. It's just a bit of the sort of name you might expect a wizard in Monty Python to have. Because it would be funny, because it's not a wizard's name.




I'm hopeful the stickers will be out before November and before we go off the idea. I reckon we'll get a few people interested, and there's the chance of emailing the whole group with any special 'needs' before lunch break, when a meeting will be convened in the corner of the playground. I'm thinking of plotting my own progress on this site. A bit like this, but better. Although not as in depth as this. And surrounded by interesting stuff about football but not stickers.

You get the idea.

Palahniuk's Choke Movie - Have Radiohead done the Soundtrack?

I'm not going to lie to you, this post is largely an excuse to bring the upcoming movie Choke, based on the Chuck Palahniuk novel, to your attention.

Palahniuk's Choke, the trailer for which is below, is directed by Clark Gregg and, apart from generating interest from fans of the novel, is also getting buzz from a potential contribution to the film's soundtrack.



Fight Club author Palahniuk, in an interview with BBC 6Music, claimed that Radiohead had written much of the ambient music for the film. Radiohead themselves are admitting only allowing the use of the track Reckoner from their recent album In Rainbows.

Palahniuk, who gained musical credibility when the Pixies' Where is My Mind was used in the last scene of Fight Club, told the Shaun Keaveny Breakfast Show:

“Clark Gregg, who directed the movie version of Choke which comes out in November, he knew that I’d written Choke while listening to [Radiohead’s 1993 debut album] Pablo Honey, with Creep, over and over and over.

“So Clark got Radiohead to contribute a song; to write a song for the very end of the movie, the final credits.

“Apparently Radiohead liked the movie so much, they’ve written the score, most of the ambient music throughout it. So it’s ‘Choke – with the music of Radiohead’“

When confronted with the denial from Radiohead's management, Palahniuk told the BBC that:

“It’s the incidental music and I also thought it was the closing credits, sort of like the equivalent of the Pixies song in Fight Club - and Clarke really wanted to end the movie on a downbeat, kinda like The Graduate, where they’re finally together and on the bus and the future’s not entirely bright at that point. I know Clark was looking for a very downbeat, mellow sort of song.”

He also added that he had heard the music, "and it is terrific, I really love everything about the movie, it is as good as Fight Club, and the romance is much more predominant."

I'm really looking forward to this film. I loved the book and I loved Fight Club. I'm also quite fond of Radiohead, so fingers crossed...

"Spain is not a racist nation - quite the opposite."

Really? More here.

Does Luis Aragones coach the Spanish Basketball Team?

Ah, the good old Spaniards being lovely and racist. How else would you pose for a picture ahead of the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing than by all making the slitty-eyed gesture?

Where Lewis Hamilton, Thierry Henry, Shaun Wright-Phillips and Ashley Cole have gone before, so the whole Chinese nation follows. At least this was a silent gesture.



Bearing all that in mind, there's a brilliant quote here.

"Spain is not a racist nation - quite the opposite."

Fantasy Football Below the Premier League? Surely Not!

Earlier today I received a message from a friend with this link. I couldn't believe my eyes. Fantasy Football beyond the Premier League? The stuff of fantasy!

Well actually, it's not. Even the Daily Telegraph's version isn't all it promises to be. Why? Because people don't generally know as much as they claim to about divisions below the Premier League. Think about it. Why else would Chris Kamara be considered a foremost authority on anything?

Even the people who have made it can't have put much thought into it. Yes, the values placed on players in the Premier League versions are a bit arbitrary, but they're in the ballpark. Don't even try and convince me that James Scowcroft could be worth £3.6 million. Surely you should just reduce the overall budget to, say, £15million and make him worth £500,000. And that's being generous.

Also, half the fun for me of playing a Premier League Fantasy Football game is that I have no real affiliation to any particular side (except Bolton as for a long time my local team, but that's a moot point as I don't even live there anymore). This means that I can watch, say, a Portsmouth game as I did last season and get excited when John Utaka or Sulley Muntari get near the goal. It adds a bit of spice.

The version we play at work is the classic Fantasy League Professional, involving an auction and everything. It's really competitive and involves some good office banter. There's loads more interest when you can be angry at a certain player for scoring when you know your colleague has him and it will take him past you. There is for me, anyway.

Of course, the mere mention of Fantasy Football puts me in mind of the unsurpassable show, for which I am in mouring every time I see David Baddiel or Frank Skinner doing anything at all. I don't know if they're still available, but their Times Online Podcasts from the 2006 FIFA World Cup are an absolute pleasure. I listened to them all again a year on and they were still hilarious. Get involved.

Headline of the Year

I am fully aware that it is puerile, but please take a moment to read this headline from the Guardian.

I read a piece in the Guardian Guide recently about how The Day Today could not be made today as the news, and the media in general, is too bizarre already.

Barack Rolling

Inevitably and quite brilliantly, the battle for the Whitehouse, which is being fought increasingly over the online community, has overlapped with one of the major internet phenomena of the year.



Rickrolling, the practice of diverting unsuspecting searchers to view Rick Astley's Never Gonna Give You Up on You Tube, has developed into 'Barack Rolling', which uses the excellent video embedded here of Obama apparently doing his own version of Never Gonna Give You Up.

Some people clearly have far too much time on their hands.

A nod to The Inquistr for this one

Snappy Dresser

While trudging through the pouring rain in central London this evening
I stumbled across this hidden gem.

Outside the Lacoste boutique a little way behind Oxford Street is this
fiersome chap. Obviously meant to tie in with the famous Lacoste
crocodile symbol, it takes window dressing to the next level.
Literally as it's outside.

I can't believe nobody has made off with him yet. I'll be checking
back in on him to see if he's seasonal or here to stay.

The Twin Towers

Excessive Celebrations

Carlos Tevez started sprinting towards the goal after Glen Johnson and
his questionable haircut had contrived to sky his crucial penalty into
the sodden Wembley evening.

Such was the general apathy among the players that Tevez looked back
and saw nobody else had bothered, so instead indulged in a quick game
of tig with Patrice Evra.

Nobody even turned their shirts backwards.

Penalties...

Half Time at Wembley

No goals but a hot dog and a nice cookie. Result.

Down Wembley Way

After bombing down the motorway from Manchester in varying weather
conditions I made it to Wembley just in time for kick off in the
Community Shield between Manchester United and Portsmouth.

Sure enough the sun came out for kick off. Let's hope it's a good
game...

Always a bridesmaid...

I'm 'away' up north (or back home, depending on how you look at it)
for a wedding yesterday so have been out of the loop for as long as it
has taken me to tap into some legitimate wifi.

News of the World to enter Blogosphere

After finally having realised a newspaper website can be more than a replication of its paper version, the News of the World is to step into the murky world of Blogging!

According to The Guardian, the Sunday version of The Sun will relaunch its site to coincide with the start of the new Premier League football season.

As part of its coverage of the flagship competition, the News of the World will introduce a blog for each Premier League club. According to Gary Thompson, the site's Associate Editor, quoted on MediaGuardian.co.uk, the blog section will be open for contributors to file at any time.

Editors have been chosen already from fanzines and fan sites, and Thompson emphasised their culpability for issues like libel, a problem over which the News of the World and The Sun have had to stump up thousands in recent weeks to various injured parties.

Opening up the site as more of a forum for football fans would certainly solve the issue of the site appearing largely static week-on-week. It remians to be seen whether they might move towards user generated content for their more celebrity-focussed audience.

The site is currently in beta, but is said to be set to focus more on video content. The current representation has the video to accompany a tearful confession from a Cheeky Girl (I don't care which one) over he recent miscarriage.

Puffer Sphere - New Advertising Medium used by Coldplay

A few days ago I came across the above curiosity in our reception. As
it looked quite nifty, I took a snap of it and vowed to find out more
and share it with the Blogosphere.

Apparently, it's called a Puffer Sphere and is a piece of new
interactive projection technology. Apparently Coldplay have been using
them in their recent stage shows.

The technology can diffuse 95% of an image onto a sphere and is
usually over 60% brighter than the example here. It can also be made
fully interactive by using infared sensors to track the user's
movements.

Rock bands seem particularly handy at harnessing impressive looking
new technology to make a spectacular show.

While Coldplay's shows may not quite be on a par with the likes of U2
or Pink Floyd, if they continue to be at the cutting edge, and making
music to the standard of their recent album Viva La Vida or Death And
All His Friends, I may even begin to recognise them as a proper rock
band.

Mingers on University Challenge

I don't normally watch University Challenge as it depresses me. I
consider myself quite good at quizzes but it wipes the floor with me.

I may have further than I suspected to go intellectually, however, as
I spent the entirety of this week's episode tittering at the fact that
one of the Queens' College Cambridge team was called Mingers.

One of the other team was called Silhi as well but this was far less
blatant. Pictorial evidence is included.

Snail

'nuff said

A Clean Slate - John Salako Style

Former Crystal Palace winger John Salako has never struck me as a natural journalist in all his time with the good people at Sky Sports.

This morning, however, he verged on Garth Crooks levels of ineptitude in his preview of League Two on Sky Sports News.

It wasn't that he tipped Rochdale, last season's losing play-off finalists, as the team to beat, despite the fact that they have stayed in the same division since football tables began.

Nope, it was that he began his piece with a romantic vision of the start of a new football season. Everyone starts on a level footing, said John. A clean slate, he mused. Not quite, John. Ask Luton Town.

Which is why I feel no sort of sorrow for Salako over the sort of abuse dished out in the clip below. Asking for it, he is.

Joey Barton Interview

With his release from the clink coinciding with a fresh FA charge relating to his attack on Ousmane Dabo, Joey Barton just can't seem to stay away from trouble.

For those that have an interest in one of the more darkly colourful characters of the Premier League, the interview he gave to Gabby Logan of the BBC's Inside Sport programme at the end of last year is unmissable. You should be able to see it here.

One suspects that, having served his time literally, the hefty ban he is now likely to face will be another test, as will the public's reaction to someone who, to most people, does not seem to have a single redeeming feature.

The plight of the likes of Paul Gascoigne, bereft without the major love of his life, football, and spiralling down the George Best route to oblivion, is one thing. For Barton, even football does not seem to be any sort of salvation. Comparisons that are being made to Eric Cantona seem accurate in one area only. Both Barton and Cantona are one-offs.

The Carphone Warehouse - A Brief History of Communication

I've just seen the above ad on Channel 4. I have to admit I was quite taken aback by the fact that it is for The Carphone Warehouse.

If you look at The Carphone Warehouse's own history of communications, it's hardly ground-breaking stuff. They have done a lot with sponsorship of major television properties, from X Factor to Big Brother, although the latter ended with the Jade Goody/ Shilpa Shetty debacle.

The new ad, A Brief History of Communication, is a charming stop motion animation by Kristofer Strom, A Swedish artist who, as far as I can work out, also uses the name Ljubilden & Piloten for his music.

Strom also did this ad for the rather cool Pacemaker DJ System (see below - although this appears to have a voiceover by Stephen Hawking rather than Zoe Wannamaker), but it is Minilogue, which has had over 2.5million views on You Tube, which has been the driving inspiration behind The Carphone Warehouse hiring Strom.



It's interesting to note two tactics used by the Carphone Warehouse. One is posting the ad onto You Tube themselves yesterday so that people can find out more from one of the most obvious sources. This allows buzz to be generated, although it's likely that they are also moderating any negative comments. Lloyds TSB did something similar when they launched some of their 'For The Journey' ads. Drench, the water brand, saw viral success for their Brains advert, which sent Snap's Rhythm is a Dancer soaring in the charts
. Comments under the 'A Brief History of Communication video on You Tube are already asking about the music.

The second tactic is that employed by Weezer for their Pork and Beans video. It seems a simple concept and a bit of a no-brainer. How do you guarantee viral success? Piggy-back a successful viral. Weezer used a range of famous internet characters to create a video that has had over 11 million views.

The Carphone Warehouse using Kristofer Strom means a lot of Strom fans will view the ad and it will be discussed in the right sort of creative forums. Minilogue is an award-winning piece and could easily become the same for The Carphone Warehouse.

And I managed to get all the way through the piece without mentioning my major problem with The Carphone Warehouse, namely that they don't sell carphones and aren't warehouses.

Web Without Sense

My new obsession of checking out as many of the links from sites I like as possible took me to a couple of excellent new discoveries this week.

The first, It's Nice That, is a design-based site to showcase creative talent. I was put onto it by the blog of the genius that is Graham Linehan (called, excellently 'Why, That's Delightful!'), one of the men behind Father Ted, the IT Crowd and countless other cameos including a part in a memorable scene in I'm Alan Partridge.



Good design, the ethos behind Will Hudson and Jez Burrows' It's Nice That, is something I appreciate but, and I'm the same with wine, know nowhere near as much about as I would like to. Unlike with wine, I suspect I may be able to use the internet as a means to expand my knowledge and appreciation of good design.

Anyway, in that spirit It's Nice That put me on to Web Without Sense, a site that I believe would fall into the 'simple but effective' bracket. And which will probably be used as the basis for some pretty geeky t-shirts.

Cristiano Ronaldo - the video game!

You know when a transfer has probably been dragging on for a little bit too long when someone has time to make a video game based entirely on the will-he, won't-he, who cares anyway farrago.

Ronaldo2Real is a new game from Mousebreaker and begins with the 'hero', one Cristiano Ronaldo, sitting with his bad leg up in a hospital room. I'm pretty sure that a sun lounger would have been better, although I haven't got onto the later levels to see if this is actually involved. I suspect it might be.

Anyway the general idea is to get Ronaldo to Real Madrid. Of course, if you get good at this game, which involves avoiding the 'Red Baron' Sir Alex Ferguson, you could effectively find yourself at the centre of a 'tapping up' storm.

The situation regarding 'tapping up' is quite bizarre. To my recollection, prior to the spectacular infringements by Chelsea and Ashley Cole, the only person to be properly charged was David O'Leary regarding his pursuit of James Beattie when at Aston Villa. Crazily he never ended up signing the striker, who moved to Everton instead, largely because the alleged 'tapping up' was simply acknowledging in an interview that he would consider signing him.

Now Rafa Benitez is telling all and sundry that he wants Gareth Barry and Robbie Keane and pretty much succeeding in his pursuit of both, although it would be hilarious if Barry were to sign for Arsenal. I suspect that Gareth Barry's destination could have a large bearing on the title race. Either Liverpool or Arsenal would be greatly enhanced by the Villa midfielder.

Ferguson at one stage was accused on hypocrisy by Tottenham, of all people, when it appeared he had undermined his own disgusted stance against Real Madrid by discussing his attempts to bring Dimitar Berbatov to Old Trafford. It turns out that, while everyone knew he was talking about Berbatoiv, he had never actually used his name. The interview in question had been fleshed out by a Scandinavian website. And Fergie thinks the BBC is bad.

Now it is Spurs, and more particularly their chairman Daniel Levy, being accused by Spanish club Sevilla of hypocrisy. Sevilla, after all, saw their manager Juande Ramos linked with a move to White Hart Lane for months following his public meeting with Spurs officials last August. Much like Ashley Cole, the inevitable followed a few months later.

All of which makes it all the more unlikely that, five years from now, Manchester United fans will be reminiscing about the quaint stories linking their long-serving star Cristiano Ronaldo with Real Madrid years ago and how people were so taken in they even made a game about it.

Carling iPint iPhone application

On the subject of fairly pointless but extremely boastworthy
applications for the iPhone, the Carling iPint has been the single
most overused tool on my iPhone.

I'm not the only one either as, along with the obligatory Facebook
application, now greatly improved, the iPint is consistently near the
top of the download chart.

It's a great piece of viral marketing and both the simple game and the
simulated pint showcase the accelerometer technology perfectly.

Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery and there are already a
number of simulate iPhone apps featuring different tipples. There is a
more advanced iBeer app but, as this is a paid-for app, it's difficult
to see why anyone would choose this over the free version, unless they
had a particular aversion to Carling.

iPhone Dark Knight Application

It's less than a month since the application-hungry iPhone 3G hit the
streets and it is already spawning some excellent marketing tools.

A major franchise like the Batman movies should always be accompanied
by multimedia buzz using all the latest technological innovations
available.

Sure enough, Christopher Nolan's The Dark Knight uses the iPhone
applications store to disseminate a completely pointless but highly
amusing means of adding Joker-themed graffiti to your photos.

While the effort below hardly puts one in mind of the late Heath
Ledger's excellent perfomance, this application is good fun and adds
more value than many other free iPhone apps. Here's to many more in a
similar vein.