Advertising Age - January 9, 2012

THE WORK

Edited by Ann-Christine Diaz, adiaz@creativity-online.com

Creativity-Online.com has all the features of AdCritic.com, plus creative profiles, videos that go behind the work and regularly updated news. Submit your choices for best ads to Ann-Christine Diaz, Editor, Creativity, 711 Third Ave., New York, NY10017 or e-mail adiaz@creativity-online.com.

CREATIVITY’S TOP FIVE OF THE WEEK

From anti-drug efforts to lighter animal-loving fare, here are our favorites of the moment

NuuoNubot

Japanese agency Nuuo develops a robotic avatar concept with the video-chat doll Nubot, a robot that utilizes smartphone technology to allow staff at the agency’s Tokyo and Fukuoka offices to interact with one another on a more personal level—and then some.

TideReusable
ShoppingBag
DirecTV–StrayAnimalsandDogCollars

Grey New York shows the fallout of having regular cable and not DirecTV—such as becoming an animal hoarder and having a grandchild who wears a dog collar—in a hilarious new series of spots directed by MJZ’s Tom Kuntz.

In answer to the United Arab Emirate’ shockingly high plastic bag waste, P&G’s Tide and its Dubai agency, Leo Burnett, created a reusable shopping bag that doubles as a grocery list. The UAE consumes more than 20 billion plastic bags annually, and its Minister for Environment has ordered that it become plastic-bag free by 2013. Tide’s Smart Bag resembles a notepad on which you write your list, then wash it off. It was distributed, with a marker and a box of Tide, to customers from Tide’s database, as well as fashion editors, influential bloggers and environmental organization leaders. After a positive response, Tide is planning to make the bags available regionally.

AndesFriendRecovery

Robotic avatars have become quite the rage. Before the holidays, Wieden & Kennedy Amsterdam resurrected its virtual holiday dinner that brought friends and family together for a sit-down meal, even though they were separated by thousands of miles. More recently, Del Campo Nazca Saatchi & Saatchi created a clever invention that allowed beer drinkers to join their buddies via Friend Recovery, a robotic avatar that lets you be a part of the night out, even though you’re sitting at home with your girlfriend.

IsraeliAnti-DrugAuthorityFacebook
Timeline

McCann Digital Israel makes sobering use of a split-screen Facebook Timeline to demonstrate how a young man’s life unfolds under two circumstances—living on drugs vs. living sober—in this campaign for the Israel Anti-Drug Authority.