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BBCify via Kelly

“BBCify mashes up TV and radio listings from the BBC with Spotify to create playlists of shows.

As well as new playlists for each broadcast, BBCify also creates magic playlists; a single playlist that gets updated every day with the latest tracks. Add a magic playlist to your phone, set it to sync offline and each morning you’ll awake to great playlists lovingly crafted by the awesome BBC people.”

Kelly swears by The Huey (of Fun Loving Criminal’s fame) Show… this will give you a playlist with Velvet Underground, James Blake and Al Green. Score.

Life in a Day via Tony

Another video that we’ve been waiting a long time to see, Ridley Scott’s ‘Life in a Day’ project.

“On July 24, 2010, thousands of people around the world uploaded videos of their lives to YouTube to take part in Life in a Day, a historic cinematic experiment to create a documentary film about a single day on earth.”

This film will attempt to navigate the cliff edge between being heartfelt and being cheesy – from this trailer we’re not so sure that it’s going to do it successfully but it’s still a great idea.

Cinemagraphs via Rob

Ok, so we’re not the only ones shouting about these this week. We love the re-cycling of a simple technology (ie GIFs) to make something new and great. This one seems to be the most popular in the office, but check out the full collection at From Me To You’s Tumblr.

Royal Wedding Cereal

The obligatory Royal Wedding entry. Purely for the genius copy on each pack…”Put a monarch in your morning!”

‘Special Kate’s’ and ‘Wills’ Royal O’s’ gets our vote for best Royal Wedding merchandise.

Suwappu!

We love designer toys, but once you have one, it sits on your desk and does very little – maybe you’ll get another one to keep it company, but then the two of them just sit there. Dentsu have come up with a concept that will change this. Suwappu is a range of toys that you can interact with using augmented reality. Finally, a decent excuse to actually play with our toys again.

Coachella

Last weekend, Coachella threw down the gauntlet for festival coverage. Using YouTube’s new live streaming service, viewers from all over the world could watch one of three channels showing a selection of the artists playing the festival without heading to the desert. Can Bestival’s 3D coverage top it?

Wiley – Numbers in Action

When he’s not off advertising jam on Youtube, offering hundreds of free downloads via Twitter or talking to fans and making beats live on U Stream, Wiley more traditionally makes music for record label release.

We love his smart new video for ‘Numbers In Action’, the lead single from the forthcoming Big Dada album ’100% Publishing’ which sees multiple Wileys walk, jump and dance in time with the music. It’s the best video he’s done and hints at a return to his more traditional, less pop-synth-heavy production.

Suspected

Pervasive games are all the rage at the moment from Secret Wars’ water pistol assassination game to Go Game’s interactive treasure hunts. This weekend, Fire Hazard are teaming up with The London International Festival of Science Fiction and Fantastic Film (wow, they need to come up with a shorter name) to create a huge real-world game on the Southbank.

“Guided by the Citizen Education Officer’s voice in your ear (and perhaps the odd message from the resistance), you’ll evade agents, crack codes, pass on secret messages, spot clues and demonstrate superhuman powers of reasoning to win the challenge and become one of the RECOGNISED.

Geeky fun!

Beastie Boys ”Make Some Noise” (Fight For Your Right Revisited)

In January, we heard that the Beastie’s film, starring (amongst others) Seth Rogan, Elijah Wood and Will Ferrell, would be showing at Sundance and we have been desperate to see it ever since. Today, the film leaked online, so you can watch the trailer below and watch the rest on Audio Perv. Enjoy!

A few weeks ago, D&AD held one of their Sharp’ner events on What Makes A Great Idea? (apologies for the cliched lightbulb pic) and the answer was a resounding shoulder shrug and a muttered “I dunno but it kinda looks like one of these ideas…” Feeling deeply unsatisfied with this answer we asked five members of the Outside Line team, all from different disciplines, what they thought made a great idea…

David Hamilton, Development

I always thought ideas are like greatness. Some ideas are just great (internet porn), some ideas achieve greatness (Facebook) and some ideas have greatness thrust upon them (Twitter).

Ideas often depend on your point of view and great ideas come from being able to see something in a way no one else has, or even seeing a use in something that other people have dismissed as ridiculous.

For instance, washing fruit and vegetables in your washing machine sounds dumb, right? But check this out, a washing machine manufacturer in China went round to a guy’s house to fix his washing machine and when they got there they found it was clogged up with lettuce and other veg and they were like “wtf man?” (or something to that effect). He replied ”yeah I wash my food in here”. Instead of laughing at him as they probably should, they went back to their R&D team and they designed a washing machine that cleans food as well as clothes. That may not have been the greatest idea but that kind of thinking can result in winning ideas.

Dan Rutherford, Creative Planning

For any idea to be successful it needs to offer a fun, entertaining or useful experience for consumers. If it doesn’t, then don’t bother.

It’s not just about delivering the brand message in a certain way, it’s about creating something that adds to the consumers day.  In my opinion, brands that offer a continual flow of experiences for consumers are the ones that create better connections with existing and new fans of the brand.  The energy that’s created by fans who interact with your idea is what makes the idea great.

Gemma Bardsley, Social Media

Great ideas come from insights into culture; knowledge of the way people behave and using this information to create a relevant ‘solution’. The solution and ‘idea’ may not have been a problem anyone knew needed to be fixed. Way before Facebook existed we were all happy with the way we interacted with people, the creation of Facebook wasn’t essential to our day-to-day life. However, insight into human behaviour suggested that there was another way to facilitate communication, which harnessed the web’s ability to connect people and our inherent desire to share information. This led to the creation of the biggest social networking tool.

In the way that luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunities; a great idea is what happens when cultural insight meets inspiration.

The below video is a great example of cultural insights resulting in a great idea; providing a city with 20,000 bikes so they can move from a to b and kickstart their own economy.

Kelly Wisker, Accounts

“I wish I’d thought of that first”… if people say that about your idea… you’re onto a winner.

A great idea is something that fills a void that people never even knew existed – a new product that you didn’t need, but now you can’t live without it… an app that solves a problem or makes your life easier… a tool that brings you together with friends or reunites you with family.

Ben Stapleton, Video

A great idea is something you shouldn’t have to think about, it should come to you.

Whether it’s the perfect sandwich filling or a great idea for a video, it’s something you should want to put into action straight away, regardless of any hurdles.

It’s often so easy to get bogged down by obstacles and the thought that “someone else has probably already done it”. This can be the death of an idea before it’s even begun, it’s important that once you have an idea that you have confidence in it and block out your inner naysayer.

“Creative digital agency Outside Line has completed a restructuring deal in which its senior management team has acquired investor Ingenious Media Active Capital’s shareholding and appointed Steve Leach as Chairman of the board.

The agency, which has orchestrated award-winning campaigns for a raft of major brands including Beck’s, British Gas and Arla Foods, sees former European Entrepreneur of the Year Leach join as non-executive director following a fresh seven-figure investment in the firm. Currently celebrating its tenth year as an independent, Outside Line’s executive team plans to use the new funding to expand its operations in the UK and abroad.

“Ingenious have been a fantastic partner to us over the last 4 years and we are now really excited to be entering into a new phase of the Outside Line story with a chairman as widely known and respected as Steve. He’s a true pioneer of the digital industry and taken with our track record for blending creativity and technological expertise, we expect his strategic vision and experience to have a major impact upon the company’s future development,” said agency Directors Ant Cauchi & Lloyd Salmons

With a staff of 60 based at its London office, Outside Line works with household name brands across a variety of sectors to deliver creative and impactful digital campaigns. Representing a diverse portfolio that ranges from Disney to Lurpak with a blend of dedicated websites, smart phone apps, social media campaigns and viral content, the agency has won a raft of industry awards under the management of directors Ant Cauchi and Lloyd Salmons, the partnership behind the multi award-winning Now Play It service.

Leach, who is the only individual to have simultaneously held the Scottish, UK and European Entrepreneur of the Year titles, founded digital marketing agency bigmouthmedia from an Edinburgh basement and grew it into the country’s biggest search marketing brand prior to a merger with LBi in 2010. Appointed as chairman to bring a wealth of commercial and strategic experience to the firm, he was attracted to the Outside Line proposition by the company’s potential for rapid growth.

“Over the years I’ve encountered a lot of agencies, but Outside Line was one of the few whose blend of raw creativity, technical excellence and sheer entrepreneurial spirit really stood out from the crowd. With their established reputation and proven approach to make brands stand out online there’s tremendous scope for expansion in both the UK and overseas markets, and I’m looking forward to advising a team I’ve every confidence will make that happen,” said Leach.”

For more information contact admin@outsideline.com

Pica Pic

This website is actually the reason this blog is a little late, I was stuck on Donkey Kong Jnr. Great site of digitalised versions of hand held electronic games.

Beats Per Mile

Gemma, one of our Social Media Managers, is running the Marathon this month. Being a self-proclaimed, digital geek she was eager to explore what she could do with all the data collected on each of her runs (using Runkeeper Elite) and the result is Beats Per Mile, a site that creates a visualition on a map as she runs. The site will also pull in instagram photos and tweets as she goes around.

http://coffeeandpie.net/beatspermile/

Hackney Hear

Looks like this app (iPhone and Android) will launch in January 2012. With quite a few Outside Liners living in nearby Hackney, we’re pretty excited about this app which uses your location to trigger audio lips tailored to your journey.

Ashley Boo Facebook

I feel a little bad mentioning this one as you will most likely never get to experience it since Facebook seems to have taken it down. Of course, as with all missed opportunities, this one was amazing and you should be sad that you missed it.

A facebook takeover meets the hunter shoots a bear interactive YouTube clip. Ashley Boo looked exactly like a Facebook profile except it comes to life. Allowing  you to issue commands to Ashley and her friends via the Facebook status bar…  really nice. We hope they find a way to comprimise with Facebook to get it reinstated.

120 Hours

“120 Hours (of digital display) centres around an exhibition that is an experiential celebration of the digital creative industry and its work. At this one-off, exclusive event we will walk you through the best digital ads from online and mobile.”

Held at IAB’s Covent Garden office.