Tales from the Spam Filter: Dirty, Sexy, Money

Spam makes so much more sense when it's rerouted to the proper recipient.

(Please to be Clickking ths photograsphy for her pleasures.)

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Friday Ad Haiku: Filchbook

You know you're on to something when Facebook wunderkind Mark Zuckerburg pilfers what makes your utility great. Twitter, as if it needed the validation, was obviously the primary inspiration for Facebook's face lift - namely the addition of a real-time friend stream and a reworking of the status window.

(Click pic=big pic)

Personally, I'm not impressed. Using Facebook is the social network equivalent of unhooking a bra on prom night: full of good stuff, but way more complicated than it should be. A parade of sketchy apps and pokes and super pokes and ultra-craptomic pokes. Sure, I still use it frequently, but it's more in spite of all the moving parts, not because of them. Unfortunately, every step Facebook takes to be more like Twitter gets it that much further from what makes it unique.

Social behemoth.
Useless apps. Still, how else would
I stalk old classmates?


Previously in the Friday 5-7-5: Responding to a-hole blog comments

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Friday Ad Haiku: Responding to a-holish blog comments

So we had a conversation internally today about the best way to respond to lulz and trolls who leave nasty, incendiary, and otherwise jerk-offish comments on blogs. I remembered a post our homegirl Angela Natividad (of AdRants fame) wrote on her personal site, talking about how the Air Force public affairs department handles stuff like that.

The answer: A flowchart.

(If you're a patriot, you'll click to make it bigger)

Totally simple. Totally logical. Totally brilliant.

A surprisingly user-friendly tool for we social media shills (and I say that with much love, respect, mad proppers and what have you) tasked with convincing clients to put themselves out there in the cold, scary woods of blogdom. I endorse pilfering the flowchart for fun and profit.



Proprietary?
Schmaprietary. You can't
patent common sense.


Previously in the Friday 5-7-5: Blog Pimpin'

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Friday Ad Haiku: Stock Photos

We all know stock photography is life saver when it comes to quick turnarounds on print projects, comps for clients and saving huge costs on budgets. But either their search engines need a little work or photographers are really stretching the tags they use for each picture. Here are some gems we've stumbled across for various projects.

Okay, now this guy came up under a search for "lawyer," but really he looks like something out of The Neverending Story or Star Trek.

(These I found with Google.) Either way, unless your firm specializes in cases involving giant flying dogs or is on retainer for the Klingons, this image probably isn't going to help you.


These gems we found under "teacher" and "customer service representative," respectively.

Customer service rep is a world unto itself, because after looking at a dozen images, I started wondering, exactly what is the service industry you're working in? There are some "old" professions out there.

And ironically, while teacher and customer service yield images of sultry models, one of the first images for "sexy" was the first picture below, and the very first image for "woman" yielded a picture of team Japan after the World Crew Championships, and I'm pretty sure that's not even the women's team.












So in honor of the stock photos that save our hides and the many stock photo misfires that completely baffle us, your Friday Haiku:

Stock Photography

"Comp on deadline.
No budget for design. Find
pic of teacher. Thanks."

I searched stock photos
To save our hides. No teachers
But how 'bout a skank?

Previously in the Friday 5-7-5: Offending Customers

-Captain Awesome, Copywriter

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