About

Good morning advertising. We've fielded a few emails from concerned readers that the commenting system has been unresponsive. In one case, a person commented, but the remark never showed up. Sometimes this is a browser (Firefox, Chrome, Safari, Internet Explorer) issue and others it's ours. Still other times, our commenting system (Disqus) is to blame. We're pretty sure this one is resolved because there were some doozies yesterday and Tuesday. Nonetheless, in our never-ending attempt to make you happy, please help us do so by notifying us if you have issues. Or if you just don't like us. We're gluttons for punishment. And soup. Mmm.

Contact: agencyspy at mediabistro dot com

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We can be reached via any of these methods:

Twitter: @agencyspy
IM: AgencySpy
Email: AgencySpy at mediabistro.com
Phone: 212.547.7935

Discretion guaranteed!

We're chickens sans heads over here. Patience is a virtue.

Over the last year we've received some tips that would make any of our fellow ad-writers salivate. A few we've chased down and published (Doner, TBWA et al) but others have slipped into the gmail abyss.

These stories live on, sort of, as little ghosts in our email archive. Like the one about a major player at Lowe who may be moving on soon, or the hugely famous film director who was allegedly fired for comments he made publicly. We have sources in just about every agency, but frequently a story is sparked from nothing more than an anonymous tip, which we then chase down — confirm, dig up, weigh out and publish. Sometimes, not always. Some stories just die or become blind items.

In these troubling times many of you have grown increasingly wary of the risks involved in sharing these stories. We understand this, and just wanted to thank you for helping us reveal what little we can about this business. We do our best to get people talking, but it's really you who gets it all going.

So it is with this in mind that we cordially request you keep sending us the stories that make your agency go-round. Each day means brings more dirt to shovel, and we're committed to keeping you in the know. Thanks for your help, your persistence and your consistent support.

And thanks for keeping us honest with your comments.

Email: agencyspy at gmail dot com
Twitter/IM: agencyspy
Phone: 212.547.7935

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The week is under way and we're attending as much as we possibly can, focusing on what we think will be interesting enough to keep us awake. This is in no way the full list, but it's enough to get us started on the whirlwind week of reporting and then scouring for WiFi. So far, Boingo wins. And now, the schedule.

Kiran and I haven't fully figured this thing out, but here's what we know for sure:

Monday:
1. Toward a bill of rights for online advertisers
2. Adv. Week leadership conf.
3. Google: Experiments in digital creativity
4. Opening Gala

Tuesday:
1. IAB MIXX Conference & Expo 2009
2. MediaPost Online All Stars
3. YouTube Battle of the Ad Bands
4. IAB Mixx Awards Gala
5. Social Media Society Launch Party

Wednesday:
1. Adv. Week Climate Change Symposium
2. Social Media Social Change
3. Business Week global CEO panel
4. Social networking 2.0
5. The New Age of Advertising (Attendance TBD)

Thursday:
1. EA: It's Your Move. Get In the Game.
2. The Big Ad Gig
3. Just For Laughs: Great Online Advertising

Tell us what you think is worth attending (or not) in the comments!

Note: Kiran and I will be splitting up the events, so be sure to send all emails this week to both of us. agencyspy at gmail dot com and ladspastik at gmail dot com.

From Mediabistro: Today's Top Media News

Do you work in an agency that blocks certain Web sites like, say, AgencySpy? Some of you have indicated that yes, you do. Well there's an old school solution to this new school problem that works around this pesky issue: our daily e-mail. Tons of you already use this simple resource, and for those of you who don't here's how it works:

1. Click here to sign up (all you do is enter your desired e-mail

2. Wait til about 4:45 each day when we'll send an e-mail containing all the day's news.

3. Laugh at your IT team's futile attempts to keep us apart — this love of ours cannot be thwarted

4. Stay current on the breaking news, anecdotes, ads and other goodness from the comfort of your cubicle/private jet without allaying suspicion from peers/peons

This is also a great option if your smart phone's Web service sucks.

Bonjour AgencySpy readers, this is Kiran Aditham, your newest writer. Incase you slept on our initial announcement about my arrival (and shame on you for that), I figured I'd just say hi once again.

If you need to reach me with news, tips, sweet nothings or vitriol, and for some reason ignored the masthead, my email is kaditham78@gmail.com, IM is Pvnkfreud and Twitter ID is @Pvnkfreud.

I wish you all a happy Friday, a good weekend and for those off to Cannes, bon voyage!

A few of you have called the tip line to let us know you're having trouble with a couple things. Our tech team is on it, but in the meantime, here's what's going on.

Comments
Question: "how come sometimes your comments link includes the number of comments, and sometimes it just says '(view comments)'? much prefer the number, so i can see if stuff has been added since my last visit."

Answer: There's no definitive answer to this question, but I do have some quick thoughts.

— If you use Firefox, you should always see the number of comments versus "(view comments)". If you don't, click refresh and that should take care of it.

— Internet Explorer and Safari tend to display "(view comments)" only.

Anonymous Tips
Question: "sometimes when I try to send an anonymous tip, it says i entered the code wrong. wtf?"

Answer: First off, we added the code thing because we were getting spammed up the whazoo, and that was annoying. Literally, thousands of e-mails pimping all sorts of unsavory wares were coming in. Yet again, there a few solutions to the code problem.

— We promise not to identify you in a story. I know it's scary to e-mail us, but if you have something to share, e-mail us if the tips box isn't working. agencyspy at mediabistro dot com.

— Set up a fake e-mail account on gmail. It takes a few seconds.

— Call the anon tips line at 212-547-7935.

— Try the anon tips box in a different browser. Again, FireFox seems to be best optimized for us.

— If you are viewing stories by clicking on categories (you'll know if you're doing this because the URL will read like this (ie for Op Eds) mediabistro.com/agencyspy/opeds/. This view returns "(view comments)" rather than the number of comments.

Our tech team is working out the bugs, so keep sharing your secrets. You're safe with us. When was the last time we outed a source? Exactly.

More: "How to Tip More Anonymouser"

"Inside your agency. Deep inside." was the big winner of the tagline contest, which lasted way too long. Until we can find a better place to put it, the right side of the page will have to do. See image for clarity.

More: "Finishing This Darn Tagline"

I was talking to a friend last night about the biz and despite the jack and cokes that were flowing through me I think we made some rational statements about the future, specifically how screwed up it is that communication in general has become so siloed none of us can tell we're standing within feet of one another. And that we all have the same mission: get butts in seats, sell something, deliver a message, create an emotional bond et al. I've never taken an advertising lesson so if this sounds redundant, it's supposed to — this stuff is important. But more than that it's blatantly obvious but I'm going to say it anyway.

So recently someone asked me what is the future of advertising and I said convergence. He said, well what does that mean and I said it's convergence, dude, delivering a message through pretty much every platform and not calling it advertising or PR but just admitting that it's communication and nothing else. It's not PR + Advertising + Journalism + Research, it's all of those things with none of the bad memories in one big supergenius robot called Voltron. The sum of many parts.

Note: Advertising, as a name for this industry, is a meaningless moniker created back in the day to differentiate the business from the next closest thing — which was probably journalism. It will probably be called advertising forever but come on, it's real name is communication and by definition it is "an ongoing, dynamic process between an infinite number of variables with no beginning, middle or end." — Ken Ksobiech. Bottom line — the message has to be unified under one unit consisting of linear but integrated media.

And today "advertising" is no longer valuable except that people go, "oh, you're in advertising...that shit doesn't work on me but I love those Burger King ads." Or whatever.

Anyway back to the future: it's undoubtedly a mixture of everything that's out there but more like the 1980s hit cartoon Voltron which was this big badass robot that would "form" only when shit got really bad. Voltron is composed of 5 really cool transformer-like robots which are piloted by people we were supposed to like and want to be like. Today communication is really the same thing, except it's probably less like a hero and more like a pain in the ass that the majority of America and the world at large would like to see dead.

So what's the answer? Well lots of you know this already but I think it's time to stop over-thinking this stuff and just focus on the end game — selling shit. The agency model doesn't work and Coke just announced their plans to not pay you if your work doesn't drive sales. Eh hem, Crispin (Burger King's sales are down).

David Ogilvy did something similar back in the day when he changed O&M from a commission system to a fee-based system. Everyone was pissed at him but he did it to legitimize the business — take it out of the "sales" realm and make it more like law or dentistry.

But now we need another upgrade and if the kids at Gawker get paid more for higher traffic stories, why the hell shouldn't you? The perception of value-add (aka when there's not an uptick in sales but your account guy tells the client, "well we got your name out there") is what's destroying this business and it basically perpetuates the bad work we keep seeing day after day.

So if you've got the balls step it up and start promising ROI. You'll be ahead of the pack if it works and furthermore it will cause you to face your failures in a more real way — ie you don't get paid. But look if I go out to eat and the food sucks, I'm not paying (well, in theory — I don't have a discerning pallet and try not to be a dick most of the time).

More: "LATimes: GM's Woes Could Harm "Transformers 2" Revs. Right."