Under the Influence

Went to this last night. (shrugs shoulders)

Don't think I was quite pissed enough to get it if I'm honest. Despite a brilliant, charming and refreshingly honest talk about agency life by illustrator Si Scott, the rest quickly (really sadly) descended into Powerpointing planning wank and some fucking dismal number-crunching. Granted, number-wanking has it's place in the industry, but not on a night that's meant to influence and inspire creatives. The best bit was the video of some web application that let a fat moron scan baseball cards into his webcam, which then let him play Pong with a render of his character by pressing ONE KEY on his computer. "This is happening right now!" we were told excitedly. Wow. I'm sure Stephen Hawking'd love it.

A genuine well done to the guys at Iris for making the effort though. A bit more emphasis on creativity and creatives, rather than the clienty "Facebook has torn a hole in space-time" hysteria-bollocks and you'll be on to a bloody winner. Oh, and the veune looked great, by the way.

In fairness, I must just say please don't let my negativity put anyone off (I'm always bloody negative - don't try it home, kids). Apart from some crap speaking (in my view) Under the Influence, is a very, very good thing. The more people get involved, the better it'll be.

(Who got booted off The Apprentice, anyway?)