MostContagious2012.pdf - Contagious Magazine

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screen grabs /
creating, sharing,
watching
Amateur Dramatics /
Phones and tablets are also a platform on which videos
can be created too, and brands are empowering people
with the tools to become directors and distributors.
Ever the smart marketer, Red Bull tapped into the long
standing extreme sports tradition of videoing tricks with
its Flow app, which let fans shoot, edit and share content
direct from their mobile. LEGO’s Superheroes Movie
Maker app, through Pereira & O’Dell, San Francisco, lets
children direct stop motion shorts using their phone and
favourite brick-based creations. Contagious 31.
redbullflow.com
dcuniversesuperheroes.lego.com
Ones to Watch / Social Video
Just as Instagram threatened the dominance of Facebook
with a superior mobile interface and social sharing function
for images, so YouTube is watching with interest the
explosive rise of a new breed of video sites that do the
same. GIFs had a brief flicker of popularity among brands
early in the year, with VW, GE and even Burberry launching
campaigns in the format, but it was ‘Instagram for video’
apps including SocialCam, Viddy, Klip and Threadlife
that really came to prominence in 2012, through building
in seamless social sharing.
User numbers are difficult to pin down, but SocialCam
claimed 16 million downloads in July (from a massive 54
million peak), and Viddy 26 million users in May, according
to The Wall Street Journal. At last count Red Bull,
GE, Sierra Mist were among the brands experimenting on
the platforms. However, YouTube needn’t worry just yet: no
one truly cracked social video this year.
socialcam.com / www.viddy.com
www.klip.com / www.threadlife.com
And Finally… /
What round up of this year’s content couldn’t name-check
South Korean rapper PSY’s Gangnam Style (c’mon, you
know the one…) with its monstrous 830 million plus views?
Born of the country’s industrialised pop music-making
machine – K-Pop’s notorious ‘cultural technology’ programme
– PSY deeply subverts its picture perfect boy and
girl band output with his age (too old), look (too fat) and
off-brand message (Gangnam residents are vapid and vulgar).
But WHY the views, you ask? Perhaps it’s the global
zeitgeist of lampooning the rich in a time of austerity. Or
the cultural jolt of seeing a wry Asian piss-take of bombastic
American music video clichés. Or maybe just the sheer
bloody ridiculousness of it. More likely, like most virals, it’s a
confluence of factors so mind-bogglingly complicated we’ll
never properly fathom it.
www.youtube.com/user/officialpsy
MOVEMENTs purpose sErVicE data technology design social biz sharing amplified screens augmented retail personalise new loyalty payment sbpf
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