I think they’re pretty cool – and the are releasing them under an open licence for anyone to use on their blog, website, Facebook page…wherever you have a voice. So let’s do just that – spread the word, pick the one that works for you below and use it….

Or try clicking on this link:

Worth a read.

Death by paper « Absolutely Zo?.

- They’ve gone with the “We’re not perfect, but we know it and we’re working on it” approach, which has some merit. Think Avis’ “We Try Harder” campaign. In this case, Cell C have gotten the tonality right – its authentic, clear and not arrogant. Perfectly suited to target today’s cynical consumer, and well placed in the social media environment.
KICK – If I were Mr Reichelt I’d walk over to my ad agency, pick up the sledgehammer they used on this campaign and ram it into the desk of the nearest person with a ponytail. The whole thing smacks of an agency well aware of the power of social media, and oblivious to the nuance one needs to operate in that space with any integrity. The blundered into the space like a teenage virgin on his first fumble south. First there is http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aCsv8QLaw0Qa clip of comedian Trevor Noah posted on YouTube, in which he disses Cell C. As Marc Forrest points out, they were posted by a user who joined YouTube on the day the clip was posted, and who had a grand total of just one video to their name. Already smelling a bit funny, this one – zero integrity, no usage of social media influencers who would have given the campaign some credibility right off the bat, little understanding of how viral works. Then just four days later an ad ran in the Sunday Times: a letter from the Cell C CEO to Noah saying he’d seen the clip and was apologising for his experiences with the brand. Four days? The Sunday Times website includes their booking and material deadlines
Sunday Times: Main Body
Deadlines: Complete Material – 12 noon Wed prior
Bookings – 4pm Tues prior

So on Tuesday, the space had to have been booked….a full day before the video appeared on YouTube. The material would had to have been at the newspaper on the same day the video appeared. Granted, newspapers often flex these deadlines depending on the size of the chequebook waved under their noses, so they could have found space for a big customer like Cell C at the last minute. And I could have believed that they had, until the final chapter unfolded.
Then – ROFL and LOL – Cell C have a press conference the following week, announcing that Trevor Noah is their new CEO (“Chief Experience Officer”) and, oh yes, Cell C have a new corporate identity.
I’m sorry? Either you want us to believe that the chain of events was authentic (video gets posted on YouTube then, within a week, celeb critic is co-opted to Cell C to help them improve) in which case you are underestimating your audience hugely. Or you want us all to go “hahaha we were all caught out, good on ya’ Cell C” in which case, um, you are underestimating your audience hugely. Either way……you get the picture?
It all smacks of an ad agency trying too hard, believing that they’re going to integrate social media into the campaign and then proceeding to do so with zero tact and nuance. There’s nothing more embarrassing than watching someone set out to create a viral campaign, and then getting it wrong.
Compare this bull in a china shop approach to the beautiful simplicity of the recent Old Spice campaign which just got it absolutely right from the word go. Old Spice may have set out to do all the cool social media angles they ended up doing, but if they did they kept it to themselves and made it seem as if they were reacting rather than proacting. It’s an art that requires a level of sophistication that I don’t think Cell C’s agency employed in this case.
PAT – On the other hand, they’re at least trying. Cell C has made the effort, they’re sitting up and taking notice of this social media thing and figuring out how they can make it work for them. That’s more than a lot of South African companies

KICK – However…the execution has collapsed right where it shouldn’t: at the company’s primary consumer interface – their website. A few hours after their press conference, here’s a screengrab of their site:
Still the old logo….not much of a Corporate rollout. At least they have cool looking social media buttons done the side, though.

And their news page?

The most recent article is over a month old…despite the fact that, today, they’ve had the biggest brand revamp in their company’s history.
Some commentators are calling it a #brandfail. I wouldn’t go so far. Cell C are being bold, they’re trying, they’re playing in the right sandbox with all the right toys. They have their tonality right, their new logo is pretty cool:

Some would say, though, that they are trying too hard. And it shows. I think I agree.

This time round I am so blown away by the Parlotones’ new CD I have to have my say.

Stardust Galaxy is the third big release by a band that is destined to make Dave Matthews-sized waves internationally. And what a release it is.
Radiocontrolled Robot was a mishmash of styles, some good tunes (and one or two forgettable ones) and an attempt at putting their stake in the ground as rock contenders. The follow up A world next door to yours moved things up a gear with a bit more of a unified sound and a fistful of radio-friendly songs. But, as good as it was, it still had a streak of ordinariness about it as if the band hadn’t yet found their mojo. But if those two albums can be likened to firstly dipping a toe in the water and then wading in chest high, Stardust Galaxy sees the band taking the plunge and swimming the English Channel. It’s that good.

The catchy radio friendliness is there – Push me to the Floor being the first single, perfectly palatable, interesting and one of those songs you’re unlikely to tire from hearing over and over. Not sure what radio stations will begin playing next but if it’s not Remember When… then someone is making a giant mistake. It’s the kind of anthemic rock tune that bands gouge their eyes out to write. Without any hint of 70s glam rock cheese. Think Journey without Steve Perry’s tight trouser whine.

There’s something subliminal on the album that makes it work. On the one hand it could be the product of playing together live so much – it results in a tightness and unified sound that can’t be replicated in the studio. Then there’s the contribution of Theo Crous’ production and Neal Snyman’s mixing (Neal is one of those underrated engineers who has quietly mixed some of my favourite albums – Wendy Oldfield’s Holy Water, Arno Carstens’ Another Universe, a couple of Nude Girls albums, Karen Zoid’s Media and Postmodern World, and Sons of Trout’s Ticks on George). Their influence is felt throughout the CD. It’s tight and polished and gives you a deep sense that there’s something magical in the way the chemistry has come together.

But back to the songs. The title track of the CD is another of those rare moments – combining Kahn’s sound with that of the reigning queen of SA pop, Freshlyground’s Zolani Mahola. It’s a great combo. Both have unique and distinctive voices. Both are on top of their game. And they’re dynamite together. In a kind of way that Peter Gabriel and Kate Bush were on Don’t give up. Fly to the Moon is one of those yearning-for-something-better-but-unattainable songs that Kahn does so well and Welcome to the Weekend manages to be both angry and sweet at the same time. In a sinister way (you can blame Andy Lund for that, I guess – he does backing vocals on the track).

I first saw the Parlotones live at Oppikoppi in 2006. But my abiding memory was watching them on stage at South by Southwest in Austin, Texas earlier this year. They were good. But they sort of got lost in the great orgy of live music that characterises this showcase festival. I wanted to leap in front of the crowd and kak them out for not realising that they were watching the beginning of something special, that their albums to date have been good but just wait, there’s more on the way. i had a conversation with a bigwig music journo who wanted to come to the gig but arrived late, I should have told him the same thing. Because with Stardust Galaxy being launched I could email him one line – “I told you so”. In fact I might just do that anyway.

They’re a great band, destined for great things. And as someone who has been lucky enough to work with them peripherally I can attest to the fact that no-one deserves it more. A bunch of great guys, hard working, uncomplaining and who leave their egos firmly at the door when they have a job to do. Bring on Wembley, they can handle it.

Courtesy of the Sunday Pepper – a Ugandan newspaper.

If that happened in any other city the Democratic Alliance would have come out guns blazing, smoking the airwaves demanding judicial inquiries while making snide references to expensive motor cars, all coated with piety and sugary self-righteousness. But not this time round. Because this time the “bungle” was the DA’s. It happened on their watch. So instead of demanding that heads roll, we have to hear the Mayor Dan Plato come out and say “If it were not for the financial downturn we would not be in this position.” What complete and utter bungling bollocks. One of the things Neilson said in the interview this morning is that someone forgot to include the price of the busses in the project plan. Huh? How is that anything to do with the financial downturn? How is that anything other than complete dereliction of duty? With a small dose of stupidity sprinkled over the top. And why, when the chamber of highly paid councilors were reviewing the plan, did no-one stick their hand up and say “Um, guys, there aren’t any busses on here. I thought this was a bus system.” Then there was some VAT left off the budget. No-one spotted that either. And then virtually every single line item on the budget, according to Neilson, was underestimated. When Aden asked the perfectly sensible question: “Why did Council not pick this up?” Neilson did the verbal equivalent of coyly kicking his shoes through the dust and shrugging his shoulders. “We trusted the experts” he said.

Here’s the wake-up call Mr Neilson: We trust you not to trust the experts. We trust you to question them, interrogate them, fight for every line item in every budget. We trust you to ask if you don’t know something. We trust you to pick up mistakes. And above all else we trust you to come clean when something has gone wrong, and to do so before it is too late.

But here’s the most interesting thing about the story (and forgive me if I don’t get the timeline 100% right, I was driving at the time). The way I understand it is that the initial budget of R1.3 billion was approved in August last year. Shortly thereafter it became evident that things weren’t going according to plan. Investigations began. The budget was increased. But it was all pretty quiet and kept under wraps. It was then clear that even the increased budget wasn’t going to be enough. But we knew nothing about all that. Until today when the story broke that the budget had slowly ballooned to more than three times the original estimate. So why was it kept quiet? The answer is fairly self evident – 22 April 2009. Let me jog your memory – that was the day the country voted. In the course of that election, the DA won the highly contested Province, largely on a ticket of “What we have done for Cape Town we can do for the Province”. At that stage most people thought that the DA was doing an okay job in the Mother City, What would have completely scuppered their careful campaign would have been the news that what they were doing for the City was driving it deeper into debt through incompetence and bad planning. So they did what most politicians would do…they kept it quiet. And even now, after the story has broken, there is no word from Helen Zille who was Mayor of Cape Town when the plan was approved. She’s gone strangely quiet and sent her minions out to do the damage control. Accountability M’am? You were Mayor, after all.

The DA’s handling of this has been shameful and they have lost the moral high ground. Next time they encounter corruption or incompetence in another Province or in the National Parliament they are going to have to sit meekly by instead of leaping to their feet and demanding that someone gets sacked. I look forward to the day they try. And meanwhile I’ll weep for the loss of a credible opposition.

A while back I created this audio mashup containing tiny clips from ten songs for a friend’s birthday quiz…Give it a listen and see how many songs you can identify in the mix.
(if it’s any consolation no team on the Quiz night got more than 4/10…) Post your responses (Artist and Song Title) in the comments below, I’ll put the correct answers up in a day or two. No prizes. Just the joyful glow of a job well done. Like Carlos Parreira.

[audio:http://tonylankester.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/10/mash2-final.mp3]