When it was easy it was still overwhelming. Even with the old media empires and a few standard shapes and sizes of what were then known as "ads", it was a near impossible task to produce something you could be proud of. It was still rare. There was TV, radio and print. I started my career in the apocalypse of this time. The end times. We knew it was happening, but we didn't know what was happening.

This isn't a good-old-days piece. F that. I was there. They weren't so much better than now. Like everything there are plusses and minuses of every situation. But realistically, to appreciate the plusses of today, it helps to understand where we’ve come from.

In partnership with BBDO and Tim Kring and RSA Films, AT&T gets into the product-demonstration, er, branded-content business, with Daybreak. A new series featuring five online episodes, a microsite, an app and the HTC One X. The series was directed by John Cassar who also directs "24."

There are loads of things to drive you around the web in case you aren't content with merely watching the episodes. Like the main site, Day Break, and a super techy microsite called Jack Boxers which sounds more like something I wear than an app designed to do whatever it's supposed to do.

Everybody's talking about Fiat's OMG THEY DIDN'T photobomb. They parked in front of the Volkswagen offices, and waited till the Google Street View peeps rode by. And then KAPOW. Take that, Volkswagen. There's a Fiat 500 in front of your office on Google street view. For like a year!
In yo face! This is not a Beetle!

Adgrunt AndrejX spotted these two jaw-droppingly similar twin-ads, and with a little help from Robblink the übercollector, we now have two quicktimes movies to show you.

What's faster than a racing bullet? A BMW or a VolksWagen?
Adgrunt AndrejX spotted these two jaw-droppingly similar twin-ads, and with a little help from Robblink the ¸bercollector, we now have two quicktimes movies to show you.

What's faster than a racing bullet? A BMW or a VolksWagen?

More sex and politicians in Sweden! The land of midnight fun never stops giving in the department of ridiculous sexist scandals in a b-cup.

Just the other day, the company called Panlegis, which sells the shady practice of establishing LTD's in the UK cheaper than it is to establish a limited company in Sweden, was reported to RO (Reklamombudsmannen) för sexist advertising as their holiday ad included a topless santa in a tub with the pun-bastard line "Company for christmas?". Sadly, it's not the terrible pun that's a bannable offense, it's the half-naked santa-girl sitting in a tub, which has nothing to do with the service they are selling. There are so many things wrong with this ad, the pun, the layout, the colors, the image - and who on earth wears hose and heels, but nothing else, in a tub?

Panlegis responded today by reporting Hillevi Larsson right back to RO, says politikerbloggen, and it was because of this image (in full) which is her portrait available on socialdemokraternas site. Yes, there's actual skin showing in that shot, an entire neck and a hint of cleavage. The dress is also quite snug. And she's wearing heels! Call the cops! This woman must be stopped, clearly.

Lets just take a moment to laugh at that for a second. Go ahead. I'll wait. Oh, you're done already?

Say what you want about George Parker, but when he's right he's so on the money dead presidents envy him.

He recently posted about the plethora of "ad*" site and domain names in our ad obsessed corner of the blogosphere as he had confused adfreak with adrants. Oops. See: Oooops... Too many "Ad's".... He concludes

The only one allowed to keep theirs is Dabitch at AdRag, 'cos she's been doing it for longer than all of us combined!

This be true. So, to start a new trend, we're switching over to our other URL we've had since 1999. The commercial-archive.com. Diehard adgrunts know that I've long been irked by Norton Internet Security and the way it errounously blocks all of Adland, as I have to help people with it who think that the site is broken, making me Symantecs unpaid and very disgruntled tech support. Well, Norton isn't the only adblocker to do this, Adblock list FiltersetG does the same thing, and if you ask how to get around that in their forums you get the unhelpful advice "If you want to look at a page with advertising-related content, turn off Adblock".

Mmmmokay. Thing is, a lot of people with this stuff installed aren't even aware of it - or they don't realise that the stuff they installed is at fault when they suddenly can't see Adland. I know, it's weird.
In the arms race of adblockers versus banners ads security will only get tighter even when it's dumb, so it's time to switch domains to avoid getting our site blocked. What does this mean to you, dear adland reader? Will you have to rearrange your bookmarks and change your RSS readers feedlinks for the news, the films and the whole enchilada? No you don't have to do a darn thing, the only thing that changes is that poor sods surfing with adblockers on will actually see the site instead of a linkless mess, and won't have to email me in a panic screaming "Your site doesn't work in [insert their favorite browsers here]".
It was never the browsers fault folks, it was the Norton Internet Security, FiltersetG and who knows how many other adblocking software things that messed our site up. So these days ad-rag.com automagically redirects to commercial-archive.com, which we used to do the other way around!

Dramatic enough headline for ya? Good, because I want your attention on this matter. I've never been a fan of Norton Internet Snakeoil, Symantec's crap better known as NIS, as it's rather expensive and to me, utterly useless. The bad part of NIS is that it removes any and all URL's based on word and letter combinations within the URL rather than actual content of website. "Ad" is one of those letter combinations, killing innocent sites like this one. The even worse part is that some clear advertising content URL's are whitelisted by default, perhaps because these companies paid Norton off.

In plain English, NIS kills this website. Then the people who are using NIS email me, helpfully letting me know that "your website is broken, mate, it's like all white or sumthin', no links work." Well, it's not my fault, it's your Norton. This past week I've helped 17 (!!) people sort out their Norton issues, Symantec should fucking pay me. A lot.

One of the people who had trouble was fellow advertising gossip blogger George Parker with the sharp pen. Even his blog, located at "adscam.typead.com" has plenty of items blocked by default by Norton Internet Security, and George thinks he has a pretty good idea as to why Norton behaves this way. He insists that there is a Peter Norton/Charles Saatchi conspiracy theory! He might be right! (read more for it)

When you load the page Zooppa.com it asks you in the upper right hand corner "who are you"? The question is, who is zooppa? It's yet another place riding on the user-generated hype where people can create ads that meet a brief and if their ad is picked, they win cash prizes. Oh joy. The about page of this "first Italian American startup" reads

"It is committed to the vision of real people and real companies conducting business in a creative and rewarding viral context.

Is the headlong rush towards creating an iPhone app really right for your client? David Rowan, Editor of technology bible Wired, hosts a "for and against" debate on the value of the iPhone app as a marketing tool. How can your client make money from an app? Is app success measurable? Would your marketing spend be better used elsewhere?

Moderator:

David Rowan, Editor – Wired

Panellists:

Scott Seaborn, Head of Mobile Technologies – Ogilvy Group UK; Co-Chairman – UK Mobile Marketing Association
James Easterbrook, Client Services Director – My Agency
Jorge Calleja, Creative Director – Wieden+Kennedy Amsterdam
Chris Carmichael, Manager, BA.com & Mobile Innovation – British Airways

The French campaign group SOS Racisme brought a case against L'Oréal already back in 2000 saying they excluded non-white women from promoting its shampoo, and the ruling is just in: Guilty. The Garnier division of the beauty empire, along with a recruitment agency it employed, were fined €30,000 each after they recruited women on the basis of race. A senior figure at the agency given a three-month suspended prison sentence.