Went to a toy store yesterday and I saw a bunch of Avatar (James Cameron) toy. (p.s. – Amcorp Mall’s toy shop)
Realized that those toy integrated with AR.

It’s around 70$SGD / RM170 each piece.

http://www.amazon.com/James-Camerons-Avatar-Thanator-Creature/dp/B002LE8KRS/ref=pd_sim_t_2

On the box it says something like:
Use your webcam and control the creature bla bla bla. It’s known as the iTag.

The app can be downloaded at:

http://www.avataritag.com/

Some article on the web:

http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/mattels_new_web-enabled_avatar_toys_will_offer_augmented_reality.php

The video demo:

lol. It’s so fascinating that this piece of technology refuse to die yet.

“I always experiment and I always push. That is what client wants and it is what I am being paid to do. But if I ignore the brief then anything I do becomes worthless to them. Or if I design something that is too abstract and self-inflated then it becomes meaningless no matter how beautiful it is. It has to communicate and it has to be interesting and stimulating – in that order.”

Sherlock Holmes end credits sequence

Such an inspiring interview.

In no absolute order, I would like to share with you few of my favorite blogs and portals that feature news and insights on the advertising scenes from Asia, Australia or even North America. I’m pretty sure there are much better ones out there but if you got one to share, drop me a note on the comments below. Hope you’ll find things here useful.

Creativity Online
You’ll actually benefit more from being a member in this site, where you can have access to most of the “legendary” campaigns ever made. But still, for non-subscriber, you can still enjoy the cakes while it’s hot (around 15 days after the article is posted). Covers from prints to videos.

Coloribus
Claimed as the world’s biggest ad archive on the internet, one of the best feature on the site would the listings for award winners across the globe. What I liked about the TVC section of the site that it allows you to either view the spot online or download it into your hard drive.

Advertolog
I guess it’s on the same network as Coloribus. Huge library.

Campaign Brief
This site is pretty direct and concise which acts almost like a CNN for the advertising industry in Australia. You get juicy updates on what is happening around on the hottest people on the game. They did have a site dedicated to news on advertising in Asia!.

Media
This portal has almost everything you need from insights to job opportunity in advertising. The bulk of the content are still targeted at the Asia region. You can view videos, look at opinions/discussions and even get a heads up on the events that is about to happen. The blog features day-to-day interesting news.

Adverblog
The name says it all. Advertising Blog. One of the favorite among surfers. Though most of the content are based on Digital campaigns/Interactive websites. You can find a lot of inspirations on this blog itself.

Creative Review
A must to visit for any creative individual. Covers a lot of grounds in jobs, news and happenings. One of my favorite since the layout is exceptionally good.

Marketing Interactive
If you are looking towards insights on Asia creatives, you can go to this site that covers not only news on digital campaigns, but also news on agencies around the region.

Ad Goodness
A blog that collects good and interesting ads ranging from prints to videos.

B And T
A portal dedicated to Media news in Australia. You can actually skimp through the summary of news, categorized by the labels on top.

Marketing Alternatif
A blog in French, but the content remained very interesting. Covers most of the international campaigns.

Photoshop Disaster
Slightly off-topic, but remained one of my favorite. This is because it gives me inspiration towards what not to do.

Public Ad Campaign
This site promotes local advertising news around the States, cities like NYC or Toronto. You can get some insights on the happenings around the town, which most of the time are OOH type of ads.

Personal Insights

A+M Bootleg
An advertising and marketing blog that gives you news on happenings in Malaysia advertising campaigns.

The Pitch

A more rough and raw unedited journal of advertising scene in Singapore/Malaysia.

Room 116
A small little blog that takes the insight of Brian Chiao. Interesting links shared over time on good things that happened in advertising.

Copyranter
A blog from a veteran copywriter’s point of view.

5 Blogs Before Lunch
One of the ace in advertising blogs, a Webby awards winner for 2009. Need I to explain more? But you would normally get more coverage and news on the advertising in the United States though.

http://574clips.com/

I personally felt this is a great effort and campaign to touch people’s heart that is really into sneakers. What they do is to individually film 480 Videos (of 20 seconds) and 480 Polaroid pictures on a limited edition of the NB shoes.

And user/people that is interested on that would have to ‘claim’ the shoe once they bought it on the store, kind like a ‘multiplayer online game’ but in a larger and “real-life” scale, a warmer approach rather than the usual ‘keyboard’ and ‘mouse’ interaction.

They believed it’s possible to edit and shot all of the videos manually, and, it’s almost half of a thousand clips to be exact. I strongly felt that the site could be better than the current one because the idea and content itself is really great but probably on a first sight, it might render some people uninterested to explore it. Love the idea and effort on the clips. Felt very personal. Read the interview.

Inside Steve’s Brain

I have been reading a lot in the past few month, particularly at those books like the one on top. Partially motivational and also practical, it’s really even a miracle for me to pick up a book and spend some time in understanding it. It’s definitely a great book for those whole is lost in what they are doing or wondering if they are doing good enough compared to the rest. The cliche about this part is that tuckloong is reading the translated chinese version of it in the recent month! That’s really funny considering I have been looking for this book for a long time and finally bought it in Taiwan. I hope you would really enjoy it much as a I do, would definitely do more book recommendation in the future.