Shaving my sabbatical moustache

Aircel dinghy advertisment saves lives

August 24, 2009 By Matthew Gain 2 Comments

Aircell dinghy advertising stunt

UPDATE

Drew in the comment box below has alerted me to the fact that I have linked this advertisement to Aircell, The US broadband provider, rather than Aircel, the Indian mobile provider. I have updated the post below.

ORIGINAL POST WITH EDITS

Aircell, an American airline broadband provider, Aircel, an Indian mobile company, has created quite a storm of late with a clever advertising and PR stunt in Mumbai India.

Working with Indian outdoor agency Primesite, Aircel booked an outdoor media billboard in Mumbai at a spot notorious for flooding. The advertisement featured a dingy attached by rope to the sign accompanied by the Aircel logo and the copy ‘In case of emergency cut rope’.

Once installed the clever people involved in the campaign sat back and waited until the rains started falling. Sure enough in the middle of the monsoon season the site flooded and flooded quickly. So quickly in fact that people were stranded at the location and the only way to get themselves to safety was to cut the rope on the bill board and paddle to safety in the Aircel boat.

A nice story isn’t it. You can view a photo essay of the stunt on this dedicated spot of the Aircel website. Like me you may notice that a few of the gentlemen saved were wearing Aircel t-shirts, and that the people don’t look that stranded, but I am willing to give them the benefit of the doubt.

I am not entirely sure how this ties back to broadband in the air, but it has me and This stunt has me and many others blogging about them, has built brand awareness through the media coverage it generated and no doubt would have been a hell of a lot of fun to be involved in. For those reasons I reckon it is a clever campaign.

My suggestion on extending it – auction off the boat on eBay and donate the funds to monsoon victims.

Hat tip to Lexy Klain for bringing this to my awareness.

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Filed Under: Advertising/Marketing, PR, Professional Posts Tagged With: Aircel, Dinghy, Mumbai, PR Stunt, Primesite

Proof that Australians are harder workers than Brits

August 22, 2009 By Matthew Gain 2 Comments

Global Working Hours

Having worked overseas, one of the questions I often get asked is where do you work harder, in The UK or Australia? The opinion if it is a Brit asking is that Aussie’s are lazing on the beach most of the time and if it is an Aussie asking, they are convinced that those lazy Brits are too busy making tea to be doing real work.

Being the diplomatic bloke that I am, I typically respond that I have met Brits and Aussies that work stupidly long hours and that likewise there are plenty on both continents that seem to do very little work at all.

Now thanks to The Organisation for Economic Co-operation I have the answer.

Even though there is only an hour in it I will be sure to give it to those lazy Brits. Though the new question now, is how the Koreans found the time to respond to this survey?

via Steve Clayton – one of those Lazy Brits…

Filed Under: Interesting stuff, Professional Posts Tagged With: Australia, Blogsherpa, England, Europe, Global Working Hours, UK, Working Hours

Energy Australia ad

August 18, 2009 By Matthew Gain Leave a Comment

Energy Australia ad

This ad didn’t make me go to the Energy Australia Website, but it did make me laugh.

Seen at Kings Cross train station in Sydney.

Filed Under: Advertising/Marketing, Professional Posts

Oh yeas – Beached Whale series coming to ABC TV

August 17, 2009 By Matthew Gain 1 Comment

Just heard via Julian Cole on Twitter that Beached Whale, the hugely popular Youtube video featuring a beached Kiwi accented whale and a friendly seagull is to be made into an 11 part series with new characters. It will be shown first online and then aired on ABC1 and ABC2.

Read the full details about the Beached Whale series on the ABC blog.

If you’re not familiar with the video watch it below. If you are familiar with it – watch it again anyways – you know you want to.

Choice bro.

Filed Under: Entertainment, Professional Posts, Web stuff Tagged With: abc tv, beached whale

Filed Under: PR, Professional Posts, Web stuff Tagged With: 4th Annual PR and New Media Summit, Frocomm, New Media, PR Skills, social media

Ken Robinson says schools kill creativity

August 10, 2009 By Matthew Gain Leave a Comment

The video above is not short, it is 20 minutes, it also not that new either, having been delivered in 2006, but it is well worth watching. The speaker, Sir Ken Robinson is a leading thinker on realising the potential of creativity and the importance of innovation. The talk is incredibly funny verging on a comedy routine at times. The premise is that the current schooling system that trains children for the working world is an inadequate tool for preparing children to face the unknown challenges and opportunities that will happen into the future.

I liked the presentation and particularly related to the example he gives on why people are often discouraged from studying arts subjects like music. One of my favourite subjects at school was drama, but I was discouraged from continuing it beyond year 7 as it was unlikely I would ever find work as an actor. I’m not an actor today – even if I had pursued the subject it is highly unlikely I would have wanted to be an actor. But having a job that calls on me to present to and influence people constantly I often wonder how the skills I would have gained from further study in this area would have benefited.

Anyways enough about me – watch the video, it is entertaining. Hat tip Steve Clayton.

Filed Under: Art and culture, Professional Posts Tagged With: Creativity, Education, Sir Ken Robinson

Shaving my sabbatical moustache

August 2, 2009 By Matthew Gain 5 Comments

Pre and post moustache shave

One of my things is that whenever I am on holiday I grow a moustache. Today I shaved off my latest and most successful ‘tache – pre and post shots above. The ‘tache was four months in the making – not having shaved it since I left work on the 3 April this year. Like the all the other ‘taches there was some ceremony in the cutting off. I always take a photo, use a new razor blade and ensure Elizabeth is close by to kiss my shaven lip when it is done.

I used to grow the ‘tache for a bit of fun, but over time it has grown to mean more than a silly laugh. It acts as a physical reminder that I am not currently working. It reminds me to make the most of the time I have off and to do something that will sustain or enrich my life, because I will be back at work soon enough and won’t have the luxury of completely free time.

The trip Elizabeth and I recently concluded was the second travelling sabbatical I have taken during my professional career (the first being the trip I took with Elizabeth on our way to London that involved six months travel in South America) and I would be very surprised if it is the last.

But for now I am ready to return to the workforce. I feel refreshed, enthusiastic about the work I will be doing and have a head full of the type of ideas that simply don’t come in a hour long brainstorm (at least not to me). It is for these reasons that I encourage anybody that feels they are not sure where to take their career next, feel exhausted and jaded with work or have lost the work life balance battle to take some time off and go travelling. My career has not at all suffered from my time off.

So that is that. Tomorrow I will wake with an alarm, shower and iron a shirt and commute to the office. I want to thank all the loyal readers who have left comments and sent me kind messages about the stories and photos we have shared during our travels. The content on here will shift back to more of my professional thoughts and opinions now. For those who prefer the pretty pictures I still plan to post regularly, but I won’t be offended if you drop me from your RSS readers or unsubscribe from the email alerts.

Like my moustache, I will be curtailing my travelling desires for now, but the good thing is they will always come back.

Filed Under: Personal Posts, Travelling Tagged With: moustache, sabbatical