Sour Alba

Stewart Kirkpatrick on journalism, Scotland, the net

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From journalist to content marketeer

February 28th, 2008 · 1 Comment

I am very proud to be a journalist and, coincidentally, have long admired the late great Bill Hicks. I especially enjoyed his assessment of those trod “the other side” of the media line:

By the way, if anyone here is in advertising or marketing, kill yourself. Thank you, thank you. Just a little thought. I’m just trying to plant seeds. Maybe one day they’ll take root. I don’t know. You try. You do what you can. Kill yourselves. Seriously though, if you are, do. No really, there’s no rationalisation for what you do, and you are Satan’s little helpers, OK? Kill yourselves, seriously. You’re the ruiner of all things good. Seriously, no, this is not a joke. “There’s gonna be a joke coming…” There’s no fucking joke coming, you are Satan’s spawn, filling the world with bile and garbage, you are fucked and you are fucking us, kill yourselves, it’s the only way to save your fucking soul. Kill yourself, kill yourself, kill yourself now. Now, back to the show.

So part of me is bewildered to find that I have set up a “content marketing” agency called w00tonomy. Yup, I now work in marketing, though I still consider myself a journalist. A journalist who is hibernating until the current great winnowing is past and the good times come back.

In the meantime, sorry Bill.

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Tags: Journalism · media · newmedia

Design agency’s self-destructive subliminal message

November 19th, 2007 · No Comments

I was checking out the del.icio.us bookmarks of an Edinburgh design agency called Whitespace. There was a link to a most drollsome site which gives vent to designers’ frustrations with clients in general by offering Make My Logo Bigger Cream - complete with a natty video of the miracle product. The site is well done and very amusing but the thing that’s exercising my imagination is this: when Whitespace linked to this were they aware of the following imagery in the video?

Whitespace crossout

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Tags: newmedia