Curated by Stuart Fogarty stuart@admaticallycom for AFAO'Meara Advertising, Streamabout The Video Agency and Admatic Ireland.
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Not a lot of people know about Californian Stephen Bishop, but those in the know, know 'Careless'. It was his first Album from 1976 and 'Save it for a Rainy Day' and 'On and On' were fairly big hits at the time. But it is a classic. 'Never Letting go', 'Madge', and 'Little Italy' are great tracks and it all comes in a traditional singer/songwriter vibe - he wrote all the tracks. Clapton features here (he notes Bishop as being a fan) as does Art Garfunkel, Andrew Gold and Chaka Khan - but it's a star lineup of session musicians of the time. Great songs and the Album went gold at the time. Bishop then spent his time developing movie appearances and soundtracks with his most recent Album in 2014 (a live album). But this is a star. Easy listening but with real melody and moving lyrics. Not for everyone, but if you like that James Taylor style, you'll love this. A very worthy addition to any collection. Smooth and Meaningful. Really.
Apple announces further expansion today in Cork, Ireland (South West). Tim Cook was there in person this morning. They've been in Ireland for 30 years and announced a further 1,000 jobs by 2017 on the back of the 5,000 Irish direct employees already. And that's up by 25% this year alone. It's estimated that Apple's Irish operations support about 18,000 jobs directly and indirectly. Fairly vast. It makes Apple, one of Ireland's biggest employers/investors.
Superbowl airtime on CBS is nearly sold out. At 5 million usd for 30 seconds, that's a bonanza for CBS. And it shows just how important the Superbowl is in American Psyche. Nevermind the audience numbers, the brand association is extremely positive allowing the kudos of being part of the party. Of course too, it allows a whole creative opportunity online to get engagement for the "best Superbowl Ad" and commentary. But it's not cheap....
Following Facebook's Q3 Earnings call that showed Video views up to 8 Billion a day (from 4 Billion in April), Snapchat isn't far behind. According to The Financial Times, Snapchat reports 6 Billion video views a day. That's pretty impressive especially in their young, affluent demographic and up x 3 since May. They have circa 100 million daily active users on Snapchat and frankly, recent remodelling of the App has made it look pretty good. Sky News and sports on snapchat deserve worthy mention in the Discover piece - it's all pretty smart. They will generate about 100 million usd in revenue this year too. Streamabout have placed video on Snapchat too as part of a Bank recruitment drive and it showed good results. Online video is growing (+38% expected this year in the US) and these numbers confirm the explosion. Something we know very well.
