Team Green got started and quickly subdued us,
with their front man, their go-guy, Mr George LOLcat Sued Us.
His wireframes made me want something to eat,
since they looked like a pizza (extra cheese, extra meat).
But the Biotherm visuals were nothing but class
(except when George photoshopped himself with his hand on the…
um…
centre of the website)

Innappropriate photoshopped images aside,
Green had started off well, now they gathered their stride.

A photo of Cernz (when he turned 61)
kicked off the Tourism Media fun.
He’s truly a man who has plenty to say
so for this “project prestigious”, he put on display
(with, i might add, not a hint of pomposity)
an informative graph, charting syn-of-the-gosity.

Cernz mapped out the journey this project had travelled.
Yes, it all held together, it never unravelled.
It’s impressive to see all the parts of a team
when they synergise, leaving no trace of a seam.
Gwyneth would have been proud, and Cernz could have said more,
but the figity window was now a sleek, sliding door.

Next up, a preso from young Jamie Musk
who’s task was to carve out a workable husk
we could populate with any Aussie campaign.
The client was stoked, so we popped the champagne.

Then Dan told us something that everyone knows
– a surf on the web’s like a drink from a hose.
But he has the answer — the Evernote App –
which helps you sift out all the gold from the crap.
The text recognition seemed really quite smart,
as it helps you catch news at the point of impart.
Don’t want to take notes? You can whip out your Moto,
and capture it all just by taking a photo.

Rounding it out was Sir Jeff de la Gouj,
(who’s calves have been labelled “incredibly huge”).
He showed us a website referred to as Twine
where, if you show me your links, I guess i’ll show you mine.

The curtain was dropping, and Team Green were spent,
only one task remained in their Thursday event.
To hand out the coveted RGB hat:
on whose head, we mused, would the helmet be sat?
It wasn’t a shock when they unveiled the winner:
Fabulous – Well-deserved. Champion. Grinner.

PS. The last thing I want is to cause you to stammer,

but suss out this sweet mini-match report on yammer.

These two photos of Mike say it all really.
Mike spoke about two things he’s really passionate about. Those being comics and the digital world and what happens when the two collide. Below Superhero Mike testing out his skills of flight from the Harbor Bridge.

Mikes links here. Check them out again…now.

Emile took us through MacDonald’s social/environmental/health efforts in France as expressed through the below site. He also told us there is “no water when you pee”.

Is it him?

Moshi Monsters Once a monster is adopted within the game, it’s up to the user to nurture it and be responsible for its wellbeing, creating what the site’s founder, Michael Acton Smith, hopes is an emotional connection between pet and user, reinforced as the monster develops throughout the game.

Club Penguin Has 12 million users worldwide, each with his or her own virtual penguin ready to chat, make buddies, decorate their igloos and participate in fun online games. Free to use but a monthly $16.00 gives access to more features.

Bebo Bad (for the under 12’s) Why? 75% of kids ‘disturbed’ by pics online. 50% of kids will give out personal info such as name and address – beware the social predators and cyber bullies – — www.cyberbully411.org

Take a Breather

Theeeeen…Ellie loves image searches so she took us through her detailed process looking for that perfect imaaaaage.

In Ellies words:

Image searches can turn up some pretty random stuff sometimes (some stuff which isn’t always the best to see), but for most generic searches using site’s like gettyimages or jupiter you are overall pretty safe.

Search for ‘diversified’.

Google images: http://media.ebaumsworld.com/picture/tdb89/Diversity-3.png Gettyimages or jupiter: http://www.jupiterimages.com/searchResultsji.aspx

Before starting know what the brief asks’ of you. Eg: I’m searching for an image using the key word ‘diversified’. Diversity for my brief covers: manufacturing, retail and roof & beverages.

A guide to image searching:
Step 1: http://www.jupiterimages.com or http://www.gettyimages.com (and yes there are many others)
Step 2: Search ‘diversity’ with RF selected.
——-
Think hmmmm that isn’t right? How can a cereal bowl work for a financial institution like CBA?
——-
Step 3: Let’s try searching within the results so far for ‘business’
——-
Ok now things are looking better. hmmmm 16,773 images to choose from. The next hour is going to be AWESOME!!! Maybe we could refine the search even further?
——-
Step 4: Let’s try searching further within the results for ‘corporate’
——-
GREAT! Only 847 images to pick from now. I must be getting closer to the perfect image…
I have gone through 15 pages of images and none adhere to brand or answer my brief. Pooo
——-
REPEAT steps 1 to 4 using new key words like ‘retail’ + ‘shopping trolley’ + row and try using thesaurus.com to help narrow down the search. 3 days later I have gone through over 30,000 + images and I’m only half way through…

and this is the photo it came up with:

Which brings us to Heath.

Heath won the 3×3 Helmet. For Rarely Gone B49. Heath’s a hard working lad.
Belinda seems just a little concerned, tho’ See the past helmet heros here.

Heath – Papa Smurf

Tourism Oz,
Steep curve learn well.
Red dot CMS.

Lauren – Smurfette

Refreshing liquid,
Break free of desklunch,
SMS banner.

Sam – Sassette Smurf

Lightbulb changing,
Creativity has a lot of syllables,
Seek big idea.

Sarah – Handy Smurf

Learn to love timesheets,
My work is interesting damn you,
You brush teeth now.

VB – Snappy Smurf

Coolhunter, Coolhunter,
Coolhunter, Coolhunter, Coolhunter,
Coolhunter, Coolhunter.

Alister – Poet Smurf

Star Wars storyteller,
Beware of the convoluted prequel,
Polish golden dookie.

Sooo I may not have stuck to the pure Haiku structure. Next time it’ll be limericks.

RGB award,
Bertie of the Mathew
Really Good Ballskills.

Pitch in three minutes,
Christmas Google MapsMashup thingy,
Team Blue win everything.

Till next time…
Pabs.

After an unprecedented, never to be repeated one week hiatus for the 3×3 juggernaut, Team Black returned to the stage. You could see by the look in their eyes: this team was psyched.

They began in dramatic fashion.

Stalking around the chalk outline of Credibility was Detective Luke Sandral. His chilling investigation into the pitfalls of Copy Errors served as a stern warning to all aspiring copywriters of how important it is to write right.

Right? Right.

Then “Pepper” Romi (PR) issued a PR on PR, seeking to sell us all on the idea of selling ourselves (try saying that 3 times fast). Though her content was compelling, it clearly had no affect on me, and the fact that I just registered mikeisawesome_andisalwaysright_sotellyourfriends.com as the URL for my soon to be released blog is a total a coincidence.

But I digress.

Now, apparently there’s more to Australian IDOL than just identifying good-looking pop singers. As Kathleen “I’ll take the” Hyland explained, IDOL also generates an impressive income by driving high volume mobile phone usage of impressionable teens and 31 year old married guys (er… so I’ve heard).

Kathleen whizzed us through a simple, powerful preso on the current IDOL Content/Carrier relationships, and to be honest, she’s got my vote* and I’d be very surprised if she was in the bottom three this week.*charges apply at a rate of 55c per timesheet allocation segment

I’ve also decided to hire “Can I borrow your” Penn Lee as my own personal websurfer, after his wonderful examples of digital+real experiences. Each execution captured the atmosphere of the real environment it was promoting…

• Like scrolling waaaaaaaay up a page about a huge skyscraper.
• Or ordering food by dragging and dropping dinner selections onto a virtual plate in front of you.
• Or being the front-man for an emo band while… oh wait. That was a dream I had… okaaaaaay….

Honorable Henrique Marassi knew the clock was against him, so he went for quality over quantity.

He focused on the new “tall” site for The Volkswagen Box (because as the site, and some of the guys that hang around the ground floor of my apartment block agree, “being High is much more fun”), and he had the crowd on the edge of their bonquettes, with each click revealing a cool, new idea.

Although it was a tall order (ha, “tall”… classic) to follow Rique, Panadeine Paul Jeffress did so in style.

He wrapped up Team Black’s variety show with a concept-drenched, painkiller-fueled vision of the future, in which he foretold that clients and agencies would one day be the same thing (we could call them “clagencies”).

It was truly inspired, and I, for one, was impressed… especially since the only thing Codeine Forte ever gave me was a hankering for Space-Food Sticks, and a 10-minute period where I thought I was a Flash Loading bar. Long story.

Overall, a very strong effort from Team Black.

If I was in Team Red, I’d be nervous about matching them next week.

Oh wait, I am in Team Red.

Whatever.

See you next week. And remember:

If 3’s a crowd, then 3x3’s a party.

As Kermit the frog famously sung, it’s just not that easy being green, a theme which under-pinned Team Green‘s presentation this week.

With two members abandoning ship and another two missing in action it was down to just four.
Expectations were high, Team Red had been themed, Team White had been chumped, so understandably, the boys were a little concerned. As their hero Kermit wisely advised, “people tend to pass you over ’cause you’re not standing out like flashy sparkles in the water-or stars in the sky”.

With a little encouragement from Mike it was time.

Taking a little of inspiration from Tony Robbins to unleash the power within, George motivated us all about Managed Network Services and how we can challenge the brief to deliver our clients a great result. All you need to do is hallucinate about small Indian men smoking pipes and asses (the donkey-kind) – no wonder that no-one had come up with the answer beforehand: genius work.

Next Jamie made his 3×3 debut mobilizing Telstra Be Involved. There were challenges and a lot of testing but in the end the guys delivered a slick solution to get everyone involved in Telstra’s sponsorships while they are on the move. Well done

Question: What do Jeeps, Jets, Jacuzzis and…..Jeff have in common?
Answer: A summer shared with Coke.
Don’t be fooled by those sunny skies, summer hasn’t officially started…… but it will next week. Coke Summer kicks off next week and Jeff showed us the new promotional site, “Share the Summer” – great prizes, video and a spinning Coke bottle with the ability to hypnotize, it was looking ready to go.
All you need to do is buy a coke, find the GPS tracker and be prepared to be ambushed by an army of ninjas with a handicam.
……..Shame about the birds.

Next, unleashing his inner homeboy Matt B gave a fly presentation on the world of Street Art, and can advertising roll.
In a world where Banksy is god, its all about letting the gang do what they want with your brand. Props to Disney who let New York graffiti artists loose with Mickey Mouse. Not so, Sony PSP who tried to stencil their way to cred.
Word.

Once was not enough for Jamie who came back for a second helping. A journey into the world of dairy according to Sour Sally, Honda – where every problem is a playground and the infinite world of Orange showcased some awesome examples of illustration and site navigation techniques to get us a little more interested in what brands want us to see.

After such a great effort, it was becoming clear that “green is all there is to be” and it was time to present the RGB award.

The RGB award this week (Really Great Beginning) went to our new agency concierge Maria. Two weeks in and she is doing a fab job of helping us out, feeding us and keeping our visitors happy. Nice one.

Then time for the 6 min pitch, this week teams needed to imagine what their digital day would be like in 3 years time. There were 42 DPI WOW swords, real life LOL cats, life blogs, how to catch a crook on the commute home and a general consensus that we will all work for Google.
But in a demonstration of triumph over adversity (& for the 2nd week in a row) Team Green stole the show with a realistic view of a digital day coupled with some priceless sound effects & moves from Jeff & Matt.

So in a final word from Team Green’s hero – Kermit:
“It could make you wonder why, but why wonder why?
Wonder, I am green and it’ll do fine, it’s beautiful!
And I think it’s what I want to be”

Boys, Miss Piggy would have been proud.

Rach.

as seen by Mike…

Team White kicked off their highly anticipated, much talked about 3×3 bonanza with a brand new PPT Template, and an impressive Milk-Carton based metaphor.

- Full Strength -

Miles “RE:” Joyce began proceedings with a highly informative, in-joke riddled summary of the Executive Board away days. Laying out the renewed vision for White, our fearless, peerless and (temporarily) beerless leader reminded us why we’re so highly regarded within the industry, and what it’s going to take to keep us out in front. He also completely abused the all-staff email system to win a bet with Groges.

- Lo-Fat -

Sandy “where the hell did I” Park presented some highly falsified figures from the latest Staff Survey, which quite frankly freaked everybody the hell out. While we were busy working out how to respond to the prospect of no longer getting our b’day off (“is it ok to gasp? I really feel like gasping…”), everyone’s favourite Chump pulled back the curtain, revealing the real results of the staff survey. These results revealed many things. But mainly, they revealed that when Sandy’s not escorting questionable employment choices from the building, he’s pretty handy with statistics.

- Homogenised -

Savoury Galvo tucked us in and read an inspiring Dr Seuss bedtime story – reminding us of the things we’ve done, the places we’ll go, and how, if we work really, really hard, we too can take a 2 year long golf playing sabbatical.

- Anything but Soy -

Matthew-biquitous Grogan prophesied the future of the digital medium using the latest… um.. was it a plug in? Anyway, it was impressive and apparently there are more details of Ubiquity on our blog somewhere. Armed with the ability to email-this, find-this, ebay-this, buy-this and translate-this, Groges demonstrated how easy it was for him to go salsa-dancing with Sandy, and also that the difference between Anger Management and People Management is about three Asahi’s.

- Added Punch -

Wrapping it up was Katie, who unlike Sandy (Chump), made the smart choice of retaining creative control over her own slides. The result was Simplicity in both name and nature, and served as a reminder that clients are like our mum’s, consumers are like our wives, and Pos_ers will be Prosecuted.

Finally, The RGB Award.

Dan took the honours this week (Ridiculously Gargantuan Bum), after keeping the faith on the Tourism Australia Media RFQ, and powering through the last few days juggling a new baby (er.. not literally) and his usual client service responsibilities.

It should also be noted that Belinda narrowly missed out on her first RGB, after a remarkable turnaround in timesheet performance.

So we have done a full rotation of 3×3 and whilst we need to have a full wrap up of the whole shebang thus far, we thought it would be good to start with regular a “match report”. These will be done weekly (preferably the next day). But hey this is the first one so give me a break.

First up it’s Team Red. It’s always a quality production from the illustrious and ever pre-pared Team Red, and this week was no exception. Team red were team red, or team red wore red. They looked great, in a primary kinda way. Team Red of course couldn’t let it stop there. They had… wait for it… a theme.

Music, sweet, sweet music.

In the digital world.

So anyway Team Red plugs their guitars in and they’re away.

Did each team member had their own theme song? and keeping the whole thing kicking along was MC Mikey B.

Part One. The local acts.

First act up on stage was Belinda P to the tuneful strains of “Highway to Hell”… Hell/Bel geddit? “No stop signs, speed limit, Nobody’s gonna slow me down…” Well that’s not completely true… that’s why we need things like Whereis Navigator. Belinda took us through this super sharp work just finished for Telstra. A nifty design and usability exercise in making the complex wonderfully simple and fluid. Yet to be released but look out for it on Telstra A-GPS enabled mobile devices soon.

“He got monkey finger, he shoot coca-cola” makes absolutely no sense. It is however one of the lyrics to The Beatles “Come Together” which was Eliana M’s theme song whilst she took us through the magical journey that is phase two of the Webolution project for CBA. If this project was an album it would have gone triple Platinum… It’s that good. Months of dedication has produced work that brings the CBA business site into the future.

I hope that someone gets my message (in a bottle) you might be saying as you are filling in a “send to friend form” in a campaign minisite you want to send to 100 of your closest mates. But how am I going to remember 100 email addresses. That’s where David C steps in and taps you shoulder as points to our wonderful new send feature that grabs all your addresses from all the major email sites and you’re good to go. You turn around to thank him and but he’s gone. Just like the magic in this great new feature.

Then we were halfway through the show already…

Part Two. The International acts.

Heavy K, The K Dawg, The Kmeister, Krazy Kev and his Krew... the one the only Kev (he’s like Madonna, no need for a surname). Now this was a trippy experience, some would call it a new sensation even. Kev did a three part opus on web optimisation. I cried all over my notes, I can’t read the words anymore. There are no words on this thing. It was brilliant.

Next on stage was Emile R to rock the house, and that he did all Idol sty-lee. No seriously, Emile gave a snapshot of the musical behemoth that is the Idol franchise and how it lives and breathes online in more countries than the united nations.

Then for the finale… it seems like it’s only just started

Rach M is on the stage pumping up the Jam on some of the finest online music (as in live) /social destinations from the slick music.vodafone to the sticking it to the man Tennents Mutal to the interconnected cross-eyedness of the converse festivals… The crowd calls for an encore, but Team Red can’t. They’re spent.

Oh boy.

The RGB Award

To wrap things up for Team Red it’s Fi-Fi O presenting the RGB award (which for this week is the ”RedDot Gifted Brainiac” Award) for all-round upstanding topness which is awarded to… to… Donovan (Duncan, really but you know it goes with the theme). Donovan wins for is superhuman pitch winning techness which reduces him to tears whilst delivering a three hour acceptance speech. He then vows to buy us all a beer. I’d love to have a beer with Donovan.

Part Three. The Three Minute Pitch.

To take this puppy all the way to Mexico (the last bit) was the three minute pitch. This weeks pitch was for each team to tell us who there three dream clients would be. The only catch being there can’t be any conflicts of interest with our current clients. Apparently two teams couldn’t grasp this concept leading to there immediate disqualification.
In the end there was only going to be one winner any way and this week it was perpetual underdogs… Team Green. A great selection of clients and an entertaining presentation.

Judges feedback to follow.

Phhhhhhhhhheeeeeeeeeewww. That’s it. I think this match report is longer than the actual presentation was… next weeks may/will be a little shorter.
Hopefully we will have a scoreboard up by then with the teams standings as well.

Till next week.

PS: Sorry for the shocker photos, Fabian was hogging the camera doing some “work”

Pabs.