Viral Marketing Practice

I think the proper way to play with viral marketing is via a blog, the yahoo 360.

I am making it more interesting to increasing the view. ^_^

Here is the blog URL:
http://360.yahoo.com/lancer_andrew

Graffitti Art - Is It Art or Is It Design?

Before discussing about the above issue, let's talk about how people define the term "graffitti" first.

Graffitti, according to wikipedia.com, is a art form created by scratching sharp objects or spraying paint into a surface.

Up to now, graffitti still be considerred as crime art because the graffittists make their works into public walls without permissions from authourities, or private walls without aggreements from the owners; then, letting to vandalism.

Moreover, it's quite hard for the graffittists to create their artworks legally due to some reasons:

• They need a large space to paint --> it's impossile for city's scenarios.
• They need to build thier own walls --> it costs lot of money.
• Most of graffittists are poor or unemployed or low-educated --> thier use of words is not properly.

So, it's time to go straight to the main issue here, Graffitti Art - Is It Art or Is It Design?

Well, for some reasons graffitti is art because:

• Not much people accept the viusal of graffitti.
• Mostly graffitti express the artist's personalization by drawing thier 'tag' (nickname) into the walls.
• Graffitti has a long-term development from the ancient Greek period till now.

However, graffitti is now becoming design because:

• The marketers use graffitti to approach the youth as a taget group.
• Graffitti is applied as a style to decoration, such as, fonts, notebook covers, wallpapers, etc.
• People use graffitti to communicate their concepts to audiences over advertising.
• Graffitti is not only on the walls, but also appear on a variety of media, like internet images, TV, printAds, etc.

To conclude, depending on which purpose of using graffitii, it could be art or design.

If a person makes a graffitti for his own personalities. That's art.
But if a person creates a graffitti to communicate an idea over many types of media. That's design.

So, what do you think?

5 examples of viral marketing

while sneaking around the web, i have found some interesting examples of viral marketing.
just want to share with you these.

(source: clickz.com)

Value Viral

• What it is: People share quality experiences with others.
• How it works: Joe tries product X and finds it to be very good. He then tells Jane to try it.
• Product examples: Hotmail, PalmPilots, Harry Potter books
• Web site examples: Amazon, Yahoo
• How to "make it viral": You can't. The products alone must be good enough to foster user chatter. "Tell a Friend" technologies do not make a product viral; they merely allow users to tell others about good products.

Guile Viral

• What it is: People try to "sell" to others in exchange for incentives.
• How it works: Joe tries to convince Jane to try product X because Joe may receive a reward if Jane tries it.
• Product examples: countless promotions, beenz, Amway, Tupperware
• Web site examples: Quixtar, MyPoints
• How to "make it viral": You can't. Users must feel that the reward is worth it and that the products are good enough to risk the possible displeasure of others. Simply adding a reward when the products are not of sufficient quality might result in user backlash against being "sold."

Vital Viral

• What it is: People want to share experiences with others, which requires certain products.
• How it works: Joe wants to share experience Y with Jane, and Jane needs product X to do so.
• Product examples: ICQ, RealPlayer, Macromedia Flash, Adobe Acrobat
• Web site examples: eBay, AOL
• How to "make it viral": You can't. Users must feel that the experience and the product are worth it to make a change for themselves, let alone to convince others to do likewise. Simply creating a user-to-user standard without making it worthwhile and enjoyable might only serve to inhibit adoption.

Spiral Viral

• What it is: People want to share funny, dirty, and/or interesting experiences with others.
• How it works: Joe wants to share experience Y with Jane because Joe thinks that Jane will also find it funny, dirty, and/or interesting.
• Product examples: numerous jokes, Superfriends video clip, Hampster Dance, Frog Blender
• Web site examples: Mahir Cagri's Home Page, JenniCam
• How to "make it viral": You can't. Success stories in this category were rarely intended to be "viral," rather, they were intended to be funny, dirty, and/or interesting. (The Superfriends email was originally sent to only seven people.) Also, this category is not well suited to push products.

Vile Viral

• What it is: People warn others of negative experiences.
• How it works: Joe tries product X and finds it very bad. He then tells Jane to avoid it.
• Product examples: Many failed dot-coms, Apple Newton, Olestra, "Plan B" book, Crystal Pepsi
• Web site examples: Real.com (for the RealJukebox fiasco)
• How to "make it viral": You can -- very easily. Simply create products that are of poor quality, are not designed with the user in mind, or are perceived by the user to be marketed in an underhanded manner.

My usual process of creating a WORDTYPE logo

Handmade:

• Draw the company's name on the paper.
• Try to write the name in different styles as much as possible.
• Using S.C.A.M.B.E.R technique to refine the shape of the logo.
• Scan and sketch on computer

Digital:

• Using Illustrator, type the company's name
• Change the font style till feeling satisfied with the font.
• Modify the type to create a new look for the logo.

Application of Logo Lession- Logo for the Publik Co.

Based on what i have learned about logo creation this week. I have made a logo for the company which was established by an ex-RMIT PR.

The logo is mainly based on typography, and has a special point within the logo. --> Wordtype Logo.

Art Nouveau - The Deepest Inspiration to Me

The Art Nouveau (c.1880 to 1910) were applied on the wide range of everyday life, from design, architecture, art, furniture, ect. It was a revolution because untill this time art was not allow to look at everyday objects.

Supporting by the industrializaion, Art-Nouveau things were mass produced. Therefore, the Art Nouveau became popular to most of people; and the price of Art-Nouveau was cheap, except pieces designed by famous artists or designers.

Art Nouveau had a deep influence on a variety of art and design movements then.
For example:
De Stijl, a Dutch design movement in the 1920s, and the German Bauhaus school in the 1920s and 1930s.

I love these curve lines, stylish flowers, leaves, seed, wood in Nouveau Art. I have created a new pattern based on this.

Art nouveau (c.1880 to 1910) vs Psychedelic Art (1960s)

(source: bbc.com; fontcraft.com)

Art nouveau (c.1880 to 1910)
--> Stop looking backward in history for ideas, but take inspiration from natural world.



Psychedelic Art (1960s)
--> Combine previous art styles together, including Victorian and Edwardian, the 1920s and art nouveau; presenting for post-modernism period.



Styles:

• Art nouveau:
  --> sinuous, elongated, curvy lines
  --> the whiplash line
  --> vertical lines and height
  --> stylised flowers, leaves, roots, buds and seedpods
  --> the female form - in a pre-Raphaelite pose with long, flowing hair
  --> exotic woods, marquetry, iridescent glass, silver and semi-precious stones

• Psychedelic Art:
  --> plastic and PVC
  --> disposable, throwaway
  --> multi-purpose furniture
  --> low-level
  --> revivalist
  --> fun, witty

Art Nouveau in Design:

Pattern

Fonts:

Psychedelic Art in Design:

Pattern:

Font:

RMIT Website Mock-ups - Applied User Experience Design

Based on what I have been taught about User Experience Design for web. I have created a new RMIT Website.

The Homepage:

The Subpage:

The description for the design:

Preferred screen size: 1024*768 OR 800*600 à both is okay
Navigation: Global navigation: using TABs à easy for visual trackingLocal navigation: on the left-side
Information presenting:Similar contents are put into modules
Font consistent: Arial for ALL
The big image at the centre of the Home page à should be in Flash à will show how advanced RMIT Vietnam is.
Warranty: having the same appearance on cross-platforms, safari, IE, Firefox.

Flickr

This is a test post from , a fancy photo sharing thing.

TRADE OFF - I am trading off my money to get the experience

I was really imperssed by the term TRADE OFF that Don has told us!
We should trade off our money just for now to get real experience with a real client.

I have done this then! My friend's father has a company with 2 TOTO showrooms and he'd like to make brand stretagies to rainforce the indentity to the target customer's mind.

I have a freedom in creating all the designs and making the marketing strategy by myself; and he will take care the budget at appx US$1500.

The duration for this project is around 6 weeks (started from 4th March 2007)

Thanks to the "Creative Advertising" book, it has helped me much in sparking the ideas out. (^_^)

An Example of Design Creativity

The pakaging design is from 2POP company at http://www.2pop.com/

The design has followed the creative rule: combine things into 1 whole thing.

Spatial Experience

It's my own experience and I don't know if this feeling happens to the others as well!

A day as a normal day, I came back to my house from school; then I accidentally recognize that the scence was really strange to me, like i have never been there, my house. But this feeling just lasted for seconds, and the old feeling came back then.

I likes this feeling, so I tried to create it again and again. Trying to have a new spatial feeling of an familiar place; sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't.

I have thought about this feeling and try to explain it in a verbal way:
When you see a place over and over again, you eyes automatically has a habit of scanning things in a certain way.
For example, coming in your room, you would see you table first, then your windows, then your cabinet, then your bed, etc. --> so, table -> windows -> cabinet -> bed.
But for an un-concious moment, your brain has a chance to look in a random way, so you will look at your windows first, instead of your table --> your brain will lost its habit --> the brain will look things in a new way, till it realize the place is the familiar one to you --> the brain will come back to its habit again!

I would say the moment your brain freely to look things in a new way is really short and rarely, so try to remember this feeling, and force your brain to look at this new way again; if sucess, you would experience the new spatial feeling of the familiar place!!!

What do you think?

Multimedia - I am in the crossroad, which way to choose

Multimedia is the mother term for all kinds of media.
The childs are Graphic Design, Sound Design, Video Design, Web Design, Animation, and 3-D.
Each of them has its own passion to me!!!

Graphic design, I love the way you expressing the abstract idea in a visual maner. I love to play with texts, layouts, and put things together.

Sound design, it's interesting too! We can understand most of the world without seeing! Sometime, I imagined to be blind, and then listened to the surrounding world.

Video, I think it is a more complex form of graphic. Video reflects the realities and fantasy as well. Human is animal; animals are dynamic things, and that's why animals are more intersted in dynamic things rather than static things.

For example:
A hunter pretended to die at front of the bloody bear. Why he did so? Because the bear don't like the static, none-moving objects. The bear wouldn't care the hunter anymore and he lived!

Moreover, dynamic is an innate chracteristic of animal!
So, video, or animation in general might be the most interseting form for us to watch!

Web design, I don't have much interest on it! But I can do it if I have to!

Animation and 3-D, they are so COOL, I must say! This is the place for us to expand all of our dreams about the world. We can create any thing we can imagine virturally and visually!

The following is the rank for my abilities and skill for each form of multi-media for NOW:
1st --> Graphic Design
2nd --> Flash, animation
3th --> Web
4th --> Video
5th --> Sound
..
I don't know about 3-D.

So which way to choose now, i have no idea, i just do things i am keen on. Let's see how multi-media will drive me to where!