Weekly wrapup: Nikon's unflattering 'selfie' video, flying doctors FTW, more

FTW or fail

Each week we select one campaign or piece of work that we agree is 'FTW' (for the win) and one that...isn't.

FTW: The FTW distinction this week goes to Australia's Royal Flying Doctor Service, with Havas Worldwide and Red Agency, for this clever fundraising campaign that asks people to 'buy' a slice of airspace, after which the organisation will keep the donor engaged with weekly updates about the life-saving flights that pass through that patch of sky.

In this case it's not fancy production values that win our admiration, but the solid connection between the idea and the organisation's valuable work. The RFDS flies more than 26 million kilometres a year, delivering medical care to people in remote locations or delivering people from remote locations to medical care. 

Fail: This week's crashing failure is 'A new way to selfie', a video perpetrated by Nikon Malaysia (below). There's nothing wrong with providing a tutorial on a specific product feature. But the execution here is so laughable—the horrendous sound quality, the scorn-worthy acting, the questionable grammar and unique pronunciation of the lead actress—that the result is "content marketing at its worst," as one of our editors put it.

By the way, the video below is an edited version the brand released after pulling the first video. That's right, as hard as it may be to believe, what you are seeing is new and improved. Judith Yeoh on Says has the scoop on the changes, and on Facebook, "mrbrown" has thankfully preserved for history some of the worst/best bits from the original version.

Top stories

The most-read items on CampaignAsia.com for the week of 18 through 24 October.

• Gerard Baker on evolving Dow Jones into a 'digital native'—fast
• David Tang takes on regional role at DDB
• Content marketing: Changing the rules of the game for marketers
• NUS Business School opts for Bates Chi & Partners as branding agency
• Behavioural economics, Japanese culture and brands
• All I really needed to know in adland I learned from my mum
• Does Emirates understand sports sponsorship more than any other brand?
• 7-Eleven vehemently denies rollout of a new logo and store design
• The Gate Worldwide attracts two ex-Bates Shanghai heads
• Beauty-brand Boots enters Singapore with Guardian

Distractions

1. Our UK colleagues had their Campaign Big Awards Wednesday evening (HK time) and the keynote speaker was Sir John Hegarty. We enjoyed this Tweet sharing Hegarty's best soundbyte, and a pictorial response.

@Campaignmag Show John this. #campaignbigawards #bigdata pic.twitter.com/7mkc06TOYf

— daniel bonner (@3onner) October 23, 2013

2. 'Best' Vines compilation, from VineReactor. Most of these are inexplicable. But also inexplicably compelling. At the very least they prove that six seconds is enough to tell a story. Now what are brands going to do about it?

3. Unfortunate ad placement in Malaysia. We're not laughing about the news story, which is obviously horrifying. We're sure the advertiser is not laughing either.

4. Fast cars and football from Audi and DDB Barcelona.

Have a great weekend everyone. Thanks for reading Campaign Asia-Pacific.