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Advertising Week: The Olympic Games of Networking (Outside the Cube blog)

Last week was the fifth annual Advertising Week in New York. From Monday, September 22, through Friday, September 26, the city was packed to the brim with advertising execs and creative types alike, attending content rich seminars by day and schmoozing to some great entertainment by night.

But you didn’t have to be an agency "big-wig" (or even involved in the industry) to attend and make the most of this past week. As long as you had a MetroCard and an interest in advertising, you could easily have been rubbing elbows with ad directors and executives from some of the biggest names and top publications in the industry.

Not only was it a great opportunity to meet and mingle, but there was also a lot to take away. No matter what sector of the business you’re in, advertising most likely plays a crucial role in your company’s everyday and, in certain cases, overall existence.

I had a general idea about advertising with regard to the some of the lingo and its importance to the media industry as a whole. But attending these events offered a huge opportunity to run into people I would never have had the chance to speak to without a standing appointment. And to hear from them first-hand about their experiences in a relaxed setting was interesting, but more importantly, it was incredibly informative.

In the midst of these sponsored events with food and drink galore, I was able to take something away – and not just something, but a good bit of useful information.
Advertising as a whole is a meld of creative and business; it is the meeting ground for visual ideas and the creative word to blend together, affecting business end-users in every industry across the globe.

While Ad Week may have ended last Friday, we here at ABM end with a bang on October 1, when we celebrate Creative Excellence in Business Advertising during our 13th Annual CEBA Awards ceremony.

This is truly where the best of the best in b-to-b advertising are showcased, and I’m anxious to see how the top players made out.

Posted by Wally Koval

Top Reasons to Attend the 2008 CEBA Awards on Wednesday, October 1

• Join in the accolades of the Grand CEBA winner and their receipt of the $25,000 prize.
• Celebrate and network with the industry’s best and brightest, our 2008 finalists and winners.
• Honor the 2008 CEBA Creative Hall of Fame inductees: DDB Worldwide, The Martin Agency, Gordon Bowen, founder/CCO of mcgarrybowen, and Tom Stein, president/CEO/founding partner of Stein Rogan + Partners.
• Find out who will take home the highly-recognized and coveted CEBA Awards.
• Listen to exciting presentations by our hosts: John Colasanti, CEO of Carmichael Lynch, and Nina DiSesa, chairman of McCann-Erickson New York.
• Mingle with representatives from the industry’s superstars: BBDO, Carmichael Lynch, GE, IBM, McCann-Erickson, Ogilvy and more.
• Say hello to David Bell, chairman emeritus of the Interpublic Group and 2006 CEBA Hall of Fame winner.
• Experience the view at Jazz at Lincoln Center.

Posted by Kate Patton

What’s All the Twitter About?

Earthquake! The breaking news of the earthquake in L.A. this summer is yet another adage to online, social-networking, “kinda/sorta,” thing-a-ma-bob, micro-blogging Web site “Twitter’s” list of accomplishments and honorable mentions.

Boasting a Twitter subscriber as the initial “reporter,” word on the quake spread on the network just as quickly as the quake sprung. The ability to expediently break occurring news, events and emergencies quickly across a large and directly-connected network is Twitter’s claim to fame. The free software provides a network as large and specific as your liking, and you can instantly send (up to 140 character) messages through instant messaging, wireless phone and e-mail. The network can also be accessed via sites like Facebook, MySpace, and FriendFeed.

Subscribers of the 2006 San Francisco-based startup overwhelmingly agree that one thing’s for certain – just one encounter with Twitter and you’ll either hate it or love it. Both haters and lovers of Twitter agree that the constant 24/7 messaging can lead to extreme annoyance from abusers of the connectivity, who seem to value quantity over quality of messages. There’s significant difference in a message boasting, “I’m hungry” versus “wildfires are spreading.”

Obviously, Twitter cons can include the constant, and quickly massive, mindless chatter, or “Twitter” rather, that can ensue and easily annoy the most patient and cyber-social users.

In his blog posting on rexblog.com, Rex Hammock, founder/CEO of custom media firm Hammock Inc. and a Twitter user, says, “Twitter is something you’ll never understand, so stop trying” and “ the amazing thing about Twitter is this: everyone uses it differently.”

Whatever the source of tweets, Twitter has established its presence and doesn’t seem to be slowing anytime soon. In fact, recent headlines affirm the enormity of the network, reporting that Twitter is “outgrowing itself” with the volume of ever-increasing users and messaging outpacing its infrastructure. 

My only question: So, would users be called Twits?

Posted by Samantha Sims