calamarc's collective of cool thoughts + media

I should introduce this, and i will. But it’s more telling to jump right in. and I don’t know who I’m writing this to yet.

I’m talking about Sampson, our royal, King Charles Spaniel. he’ll be 10 on july 25. He’s almost there, to the young end of the breed’s expectancy of 10-12 great, loyal, rewarding years.

Today, Sammy is in the throes of good, ol’ fashioned heart failure. his appetite has dropped to an astonishing level. he would eat cookies, at least, but these hot days are taking the taste for anything out of him. that’s when i have to look at him, get in his eyes and ask him. are you good? do we need to stop this? 

Years of dialogue like this, we have a deep bond. And I do think I know him. And the spunk is not out of him yet. He has wonderful moments, playful, energetic, excited moments in him yet, and those are the peaks of living, what we do it all for.

So where is that threshold? How do you know when to end it?

they let a whale into the gulf today. and that’s a good thibg.

here’s a facebook privacy app. compelling case for the cautious.

http://host-d.oddcast.com/php/application_UI/doorId=452/clientId=62

Oddcast’s new AR feature, built right into a web-ad. very promising, as usual, from Oddcast’s mad scientist media lab.

TGIF’s lucky fan “Woody” has been challenged to get 500K fans to FB page, to get free burgers for everyone. that’s a lot of meat.

users click on the ad, punch in their phone # (don’t have to, same experience if you click “no phone” — i tried it both ways to be sure, for the benefit of the friends i knew i would share the ad with, but i used my google voice number, so any follow up calls are already screened out!

Woody answers phone in video onscreen and talks to you directly. well, almost. probably depends on your connection whether or not his voice in phone is in sync w him onscreen, but it wasn’t far off for me, and i adjusted quickly to hearing his voice in my phone, and watching him speak right to me. the video editing was superb in that they masked the necessary cuts in the video simply, but effectively, without calling too much attention to the device. and it feels near normal. normal until the phone beeps to prompt your answers.

for me, the phone piece was still a bit off to be effective, and in my call, Woody was having a hard time hearing anything i said, which made the experience a bit choppy, to say the least. and giving up your phone number to an AD is still a bit too personal. but i applaud the ambition, and the effort — a ton. i am eager, as always, to see what else the creative folks at Oddcast will create for me to play with. and lucky for the brands cool enough to try an Oddcast AD, i’m not the only one who feels this way — by this morning, there were close to 1 MM fans on the page, so people must be clicking through. not bad for the state of the art!

Marc