To ensure that our critical ad serving and tracking infrastructure we can meet this demand, we have taken the decision to take non-critical services (such as our dashboards) offline temporarily while they go through peak demand.

Ads will continue to show during this period, and all actions that occur during this period will be counted.

This was caused by a regression in a javascript tracking library which is used by some of our ads. Although all text and image links continued to function throughout this time, some rich media ads in medium rectangle units (300×250 MPUs) were unable to track actions on some browsers during this period.

This issue has been resolved and actions are now being tracked as normal.

Based on the idea that Des Lynam has set up a special training academy to put would-be fans through their paces and prepare them for the mental stress of the impending football championship, it’s actually a pretty amusing celebration of quintessential English football fandom. Look out for cameos from Brian Blessed, Stuart Pearce, Ian Wright and loads more.

Beer Fairies Support Group – Canadian Club has launched its latest campaign about beer fairies, aka drunken, smelly, beer guzzling Australians, continuing the brand’s assault on beer drinkers in an attempt to convert the world to spirits… ‘No fairy gets left behind. Unless you’re asleep in the toilets and your beer fairy mates are dying for a kebab. Then you’re on your own!’

Elastoplast – Velocity Concrete Drop-off – With 2 bank holiday weekends approaching, shops are stocking up on gardening supplies, tins of paint, and power drills in preparation for all the DIY disasters waiting to happen… What better time for CMW and Elastoplast to team up with Ex-England ruby international Lewis Moody and create some ‘Xtreme DIY’ virals to show the amazingness of Elastoplast plasters.

Who ‘got his wolf on’ at Snowbombing’s Eristoff Forest? – Follow the adventures of a Snowboming virgin as he hits the slopes, dances with the Wolves (and Mr Motivator) and has the ultimate experience at the Party in the ERISTOFF Forest…

Red Bull BC One All Stars – Finally, watch the BC One All Stars bust out some seriously awesome breakdancing moves all over Rio de Janeiro, the city where this year’s Red Bull BC One World Final will take place.

We’re pleased to announce that we’re running a Digital Shoreditch #KittenCamp Special

NEXT #KITTENCAMP LONDON date: Mon 28th May, in a special East London venue to tie-in with Digital Shoreditch

Expect the usual *viral shenanigans*, further *meme-battling* and free beer courtesy of VAN Bring your friends, and your East London swagger.

To get (free) tickets, check the following Eventbrite for London

http://kittencampdigitalshoreditch.eventbrite.com/

Get involved: suggestions for the best memes you’ve seen recently to #KittenCamp

@ViralAdNetwork

@rubber_republic

In case you missed the last #KittenCamp, here’s what went down.

Kaythxbai

Are LOLCats and Internet Memes Art? It’s no secret that we love our memes here at VAN and LOLCats are among our favorites, but should they be considered as more than just a fad of the new internet generation and actually regarded as an art form in their own right?

Although the term LOLcat is fairly recent, the idea of photographing our little feline friends and adding amusing captions isn’t a new one, examples go back as far as the 1870’s with images like this from photographer Harry Pointer. It may sound odd but memes like Trollface, Business Cat and Socially Awkward Penguin have evolved into widely recognised vehicles of self expression and communication that anyone can use to convey thoughts and trends; the core principle of any art form. The Idea Channel examines the place of memes in modern day culture, taking a closer look at whether or not these internet creations could truly be considered as art

The Dark Knight Rises – It’s probably one of the most eagerly anticipated films of the year, Christopher Nolan’s final installment of the awesome Batman trilogy, The Dark Knight Rises. With the release date drawing ever closer, fan-based parodies are springing up all over the net, from funny spoof clips like Bane Speaks to this brilliant little stop motion animation from Paranickfilmz – Batman + Lego = genius!

Sweet Brown: No time for bronchitis – When the news crew interviewed this Oklahoma City resident they probably had no idea they were about to strike internet viral gold.

Her enthusiastic rendition of her escape from a burning apartment building earlier this month has made her into a YouTube sensation with over 3 million views and a host of parody remixes including this hilarious Autotune remix.

Lawyer Dog Vs Business Cat – Look out Business Cat, there’s a new corporate pet in town! The cat Vs dog rivalry continues this month as Lawyer Dog storms onto the internet scene, with his sharp power dress suit and snappy one liners, challenging business cat to win the nations hearts.

Business cat does not look impressed!

Hot Problems - Oh dear, you would think the world would have learnt a lesson from Samantha Brick and Rebecca Black, sadly not! With 5 million views in just over a week and the tag line ‘Life is hard when you’re a hot girl,’ these teenagers have shot to internet stardom, but the public backlash and host of negative reaction videos and parodies may be about to teach them that not all fame is good fame.

Henri2, Pawde Deux – You might remember Henri, the depressed French cat. Well the existential little moggy is back in this awesome follow up video, still wallowing in ennui and lamenting the lack of meaning to his existence. This time he’s learnt some new life lessons, ‘we cannot escape our selves. And sometimes the cat door… is closed’. Though life being a cat!

Finally, most awesome way to eat a Pizza EVER!

If you see anything you love online tweet us @ViralAdNetwork and we’ll give you a shout out if we share it!

There’s no real story or science behind the show, from what I can gather the main aim is just to crush, explode and destroy as many household items as possible – simples! I’m not usually a massive fan of stupid Jack Ass style antics but there is something mesmerizingly beautiful about watching the clips at a super slow motion 2500 frames per second that leaves me crying out for more, (and also kind of makes me want to own a slow motion camera – clever bit of viral advertising for the Phantom Flex!)

A dramatic surprise on a quiet square – With nearly 27 million views in less than 2 weeks this video is set to become one of the most shared ads of the year so far. Made by Belgium agency Duval Quillaume Modem to launch the new TV channel TNT, it’s set in a “little town in Belgium” in a “square where nothing really happens,” that is, until someone placed a giant red button and invited people to press it to add drama.

So what happens when you push the button? Well, as promised lots of drama ensues… ambulance sirens blare, semi clad ladies on motorbikes speed past as men brawl in the street and police shoot masked robbers from across the square while baffled passers by watch in shock – all the magic ingredients for an instant viral hit!

OMG, Lickable lifts! – I’m sure I wasn’t the only kid to watch Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and come away with a head filled full of ideas about living in an edible world. I used to imagine what the flowers on my wallpaper might taste like and fantasize about being able to eat the furniture. Of course I’ve long since put such childish notions behind me, that was until I saw the latest campaign for McVities Jaffa Cakes… edible wallpaper!!

The installation was part of an innovation competition hosted by London based communications firm Engine, who invited agencies to take over a lift for 2 weeks and customise it in their own unique way. It was the PR agency Mischief who came up with the idea of tasty wallpaper, commissioning a team of food technicians and artists to create the Jaffa Cake flavoured slickers.

I’m not sure I would personally be too keen to lick the walls of a lift that had had the tongues of half the office on it already but apparently they had a special lift assistant whose job it was to supervise the licking activity and replace used stickers to prevent licking cross over – amazing!

Girls going wild in red light district – Famed for its red light district, Amsterdam attracts thousands of visitors every year, curios about the spectacle of prostitution.

This awesome awareness campaign created by Duval Guillaume Modem and produced by Monodot in support of Stop the Traffik highlights the exploitation of the sex trafficking industry. The silence from passers by at the end says it all really, it’s an interesting campaign and well worth a watch.

Change the tune poster – Now, before anyone gets too excited, this is not available to buy #SadFace. It was built as a research and design project at Agency Republic to help improve democracy when it comes to choosing the daily office soundtrack. It’s an awesome little accessory for anyone who works in a team of people with ‘questionable music tastes’, please let someone release one on the market soon, we need one here in the VAN office!!

]]> http://www.viraladnetwork.net/blog/2012/fun-stuffs-from-t%e2%80%99interweb/feed/ 0 http://www.viraladnetwork.net/blog/2012/viral-seeding-van-brisbane/ http://www.viraladnetwork.net/blog/2012/viral-seeding-van-brisbane/#comments Sun, 22 Apr 2012 13:13:55 +0000 chris http://www.viraladnetwork.net/blog/?p=5549 VAN is steadily spreading its wings across the world.  In the past month we’ve been travelling around Canada (visiting Vancouver and the glorious East Van), the US (New York, Austin and San Francisco), and most recently we’ve been hot footing across Australia – in a bid to get a head start on the tan front . . .

Of course, beyond observing (and engaging with) the local social media scene, ice cream van spotting has become a wee bit of a past time.  On a blisteringly hot Saturday afternoon in Brisbane I spotted a contender for *ice cream van* of the year – an awesome retro van named the *Cone Queen*, handing out nicely chilled retro ice creams to passers-by.

Anyone for an Australian Ice Cream Crawl???  I reckon the *Cone Queen* could do us proud as our Van of choice . . .

Let Your Body Drive – Produced by our sister company Rubber Republic to promote the launch of the new Peugeot 208, the video features some seriously smooth dance moves from YouTube sensation Nonstop, aka Marquese Scott.

According to Peugeot, the new model ‘has been designed to be perfectly in tune with the driver’s body: more intuitive, more sensation, more stimulation.’ Set against the urban geometry of an underground car park, Nonestop manipulates his body perfectly in tune with the upbeat rhythm of music by Rudimental featuring John Newman. It’s designed to leave the viewer unsure whether the video has been altered or played in slow motion, but believe it or not the clip was shot in one continuous take with no edits or special effects.

Levi Roots Reggae Reggae Sauce – Aardman Animations and JWT London are putting some music back into your food with this fun little ad featuring a clay model of Levi Roots, who shot into the limelight back in 2007 when he successfully pitched on the TV show Dragon’s Den. Singing along to his now trade mark line ‘tastes so nice a had to name it twice’, never have sausages and chicken drumsticks looked so happy, dancing merrily as they bask in the warmth of the BBQ grill!

Most insane blob ever into paddling pool – We’re seeding this one for the awesome charity Give More who are raising awareness of charitable causes with crazy stunts like launching someone 50ft into the air to land in a paddling pool. Don’t try this at home folks!

Leo - On a more serious note, in a modern world where people are increasingly obsessed with their looks, the disfigurement charity Changing Faces has released an advertising campaign to raise awareness of the unconscious prejudices of society and help promote tolerance. Created by DDB, the ad shows ‘Leo,’ a facially disfigured man watching a woman from a car outside her house. He walks through the rain and taps on her door… what happens next is probably not what most people were expecting, but it highlights the preconceived ideas that society can form about people who look different.

For a period of roughly 30 minutes this (periodically) affected all of our services – although users in western Europe will have been most affected.

We have been informed that this attack has been sufficiently contained, and we do not currently foresee more issues during the day.

BBC Comedy dude Will Saunders kicked things off with some exclusive new material including the lol-some Horse iPad sketch from Dawson Bros Funtime sketch show. We saw some really funny other stuff that is SO exclusive it hasn’t even been launched yet – watch out for them on BBC Comedy soon!

We also really enjoyed Paul McCrudden from AMV BBDO talking about their campaign for Snickers – ‘You’re not you when you’re hungry’, which involved hi-jacking the Twitter accounts of celebs with a barrage of out-of-character tweets: Rio Ferdinand suddenly tweeting about how much he loved knitting, and Katie ‘Jordan’ Price confidently stating her view on the Chinese economy, brilliant!

Jon Burkhart took the stage to tell us about what went down at the previous Urgent Genius, featuring all sorts of things that were urgent or genius or both, including their parody of the Guardian Three Little Pigs ad. And here’s the original in case you’d missed it.

A tense meme battle commenced between Meme Master Meow and April’s LOLPuppy guest James Mitchell from BBH Labs. Here are the highlights:

Russian talent competition girls covering Bomfunk MCs ‘Freestyler’

Click here to view the embedded video.

Dollar Shave Club

Click here to view the embedded video.

The Real Mitt Romney

Click here to view the embedded video.

And the rest:

Underwater Treadmill Cat

Guinness St Paddy’s day

Lionel Richie Hello collage

Pentagon shopping centre

Embedded

Horse_ebooks as read by James

Thus concludes the memes for this month.

You can see what Gus Ferguson thought of it in his lovely review

For more #KittenCamp news you can like us on Facebook, and follow the Kitten Tumblr. Join the #KittenCamp mailing list for all the latest memey news by dropping Ellie an email at ellie.robinson@teamrubber.com