think native

You’ve got to love the Monty Python boys, apart from being madder than a box of frogs and funny as hell, they’re also pretty savvy guys.

In a rather amusing video, they’ve announced that pretty much the full library of Monty Python skits will be posted to a dedicated YouTube channel, in high quality video. So you’ll be able to watch Monsieur Creosote eating that last wafer thin mint, or the rapid demise of the killer rabbit via holy handgrenade as many times as you like, gratis.

And by offering such a smorgasbord of free content, the team hope to generate more sales of their DVDs. They, like many other content owners have realised that you can’t beat ‘em, so you might as well join ‘em, taking advantage of free distribution and brand building to generate sales.

Read Chris Anderson’s theory on Freeconomics here

Not since the Cola wars of the 80s do I remember such blatant and aggressive competitive ad campaigns coming out from two bitter rivals. Isn’t it fun to watch them pull ponytails and scratch each other’s eyes out?

Of course it all began here:

Then lately it’s Microsoft’s slightly desperate sounding rebuttal:

The latest smackdown move from Apple feels a little petty, but it’s still pretty funny:

 Your move, Gatesy.

Here’s a nice idea, alternative movie posters listing the brands that have been placed into each film.

View them at ANTREPO04

I’d like to see the Casino Royale poster, but maybe they couldn’t fit all the different brands in.

The Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain playing the theme from Shaft!

And the very talented Newton Faulkner’s one-man performance of Bohemian Rhapsody.

Being sold in as a way of discovering music you forgot you have (a compelling proposition when you’ve got a few weeks worth of continuous music on your harddrive), the new Genius function in iTunes 8 uses the listening behaviour of all (opted-in) iTunes listeners over time to create an recommendation engine integrated into the media player itself. This engine draws songs from your library that ‘go well together’ with a 1-click playlist set up. The new iPods will allow you to do this on the go too.

Pretty sweet, looking forward to trying it out, though I suspect it’ll get better with time rather than being great from the start.

Here’s a nicely done piece of content (*studiously avoids the word ‘viral’*) to promote caterer.com, a jobs website. Not sure what the ins and outs are legally when nicking Gordon Ramsay’s ‘brand’ (they could argue it’s a parody I guess), but hey it’s still funny!

 Genius.

This is a cool idea - flickr won’t let me grab an image to post so you’ll just have to trust me that it’s worth clicking on Thanks to Mal for drawing my attention to it.

Michael Hughes - Souvenirs

Could this be sleeveface for the masses?

As per my previous post, I’ll be DJing with my good mate Dan Cat (Catz) at Aquarium right next to Old Street tube station. Headliners will be ANdre Crom from Berlin and Mistress De Funk from Radio 1. Should be a great laugh, the last one was brilliant

Can’t wait to play at Catz Musik @ Aquarium this Friday night, if you’re in the neighbourhood maybe see you there