Here’s a map of he DNS root servers globally. I didn’t realise that in 2002, an attack disabled 9 of the then 13 root name servers. And then in February 2007, 30,000 zombie PCs, traced to South Korea, battered the servers: affecting six, two badly. If all the servers were to be taken out, things would grind to a halt: after 1 hour, 2% of the web would stop, rising another 2% for each hour leaving nothing in less than two days. These facts are from an article in Esquire October 2007. Some more factoids from the article:

There are more than 4 million CCTV cameras in the UK with the average Londoner being captured on film 300 times a day

Today, an American child is 6 times more likley to play on a computer console than ride a bike

An ICM poll in June 2007 reported that half of 25-34 year olds claimed they would not be able to carry on without email

Over half of Korean 15-25 year olds believe themselves to be addicted to the internet

More people visit Korean-made online virtual worlds than visit Korea itself

Can Gmail become your social brain? Interesting comments against the Google big brother and the desire fort a “social journal” to be created. Not being too much of a geek some of the hints on the more powerful features of Gmail are pretty useful.

And now for something completely different: Marc Jacobs has a VIP Club. Nice smells, but perhaps they could say what I might get for the trouble of requesting a membership thingy from a stockist when I buy a fragrance?

A third of American men don’t wash their hands & 12% of women don’t either. Ewww. That’s disgusting. And that’s how germs are spread. Just ask the NHS! Quote from the Guardian:

Guys need to step up to the sink

It’s not that hard is it? I found the image on Flickr and the photographer’s commentary questions how stupid people are to need instructions. Clearly very if the numbers above are true. Worryingly, the numbers have gone up since last year. Remember that next time you shake hands with someone: one in three chaps is likely to have touched their bits without washing. I feel ill. Another argument for email, conference/video calls and virtual environments Vs physical meetings? Reduce costs and reduce germs.

An art invasion across Cumbria with a Google map mash up

Get matching collar and cuffs (source: popbitch)

And Dan Aykroyd is an avid UFO spotter. As well as creating the best movie ever. I should clarify that I mean the Blues Brothers, not Coneheads.

Jake: How often does the train go past?

Elwood: So often you won’t even notice.

MSN take a look at how the web is evolving including personal daemons.

Which is a new term to me as a quick Google suggests it came from a Phillip Pullman novel. But they exist in other forms including the one in the article.

Having taken the test on the Golden Compass movie link above, it appears my Daemon is Olyandra: a moth. As I am “spontaneous, relaxed, modest, solitary and dependable.” She is female as human and Daemon pairs should be different genders. Perhaps I should read more on what it might do?

In any case, hope they come up with another name in web world. Maybe “Dobby’s” in relation to the long suffering house elf in Harry Potter?

A while since the last ones but found this coaster in a delightfully mad shop in The Lanes, Brighton called Pussy.

Being at a creative agency is exciting. But perhaps creativity and Star Wars doesn’t quite have a place in the gentleman’s lavatory, aka the traps. Thoughts?

(FYI, Yoda is saying “May the Force be with you”)

Just when we thought that social media was on the rise and using detachable and user generated content was getting traction (witness this week’s NMA with HP & Burger King sloshing vast revenues into digital because it works better for them), I get this email from Ocado (upmarket grocery home delivery service in partnership with Waitrose - upmarket supermarket) telling me to watch their new TV ad tonight at 9.30 on ITV. Why? Here’s the intro copy from the email:

We feel it’s our duty to tell as many time-starved supermarket shoppers about our service as possible. So from today we’re launching our first ever TV ad!

Here’s some thoughts & these come from my own perspective as I have been an Ocado customer:

1. Time-starved. That’s not the only reason people buy from Ocado (hate supermarkets, Waitrose are not as omni-present as Tesco/Sainsbury so it’s also convenience as well as time let alone the can’t be arsed to push a heavy trolley around then stick it in the boot and then out again & I want the nicer food from Waitrose). But it’s a biggie as the audience is typically professionals who we can broad-brush advertising stylee into cash-rich, time-poor. I am the latter, not the former.

2. But if they’re time starved, clearly they will not be able to make appointment to view advertising schedules either? Let alone spend the time to go to the supermarket? Making appointment to view TV viewing is rare these days. Sky + has transformed the TV viewing in our house (and millions of others) to the extent where I have lost track of the actual day, time and channel programmes are on and rely on the TV planner. The only appointment to view TV is probably football, Lost and 24. Everything else is recorded and played back on our time.

3. On our time. Which sucks because we work hard, get home late and want to enjoy. Which means the fast forward button on x30 when the ads come on as I want to watch the programming content, not the ads. We have even taken to starting watching shows like 24 10 mins in so we can forward the ads and the programme still finishes within the hour once you catch up with the final section.

4. Which means I won’t a) read the email on the day as I’m busy at work, b) watch ITV at c. 9.30 and c) won’t stop the fast forward because there’s an Ocado truck. So I miss it all and don’t get to see the gospel according to Ocado spread.

5. Ocado has grown mainly by word of mouth, in store POS and some funky radio ads in local areas where they serve. The quirky vans also act as a mobile advertising medium which draws the attention. And surely you could get a better return from a whacking media spend on TV by targeting your time starved audience in the environment they actively use to help them with their time-starved lives: the internet? (The ad on the Ocado site is embedded using Google Video so there may be hope yet.)

6. So why turn to TV when the audience they want isn’t there - or at least isn’t paying attention in the breaks? And why would I tune in for an ad by a grocery delivery service? No matter how good they are? It just feels very wrong. And they’re not the only ones, I saw an ad in the Times the other day (or was it today?) that the new M&S TV ad was airing tonight too! At least they may have some models in lingerie which might cause me to reduce the forward speed from x30 to x2 for a bit but didn’t this phenomenon go out with the Nescafe couples ads? Or is it a reflection of the degenerate programming content?

I still don’t know what was on ITV at 9.30 and don’t have the compunction to find out. Besides, I was watching England beat Russia 3-0 on the BBC while catching up on some work and personal email stuff. OK, I wasn’t really. But I could have been.

The MTV VMA awards are on again. But as I’m now the wrong side of 30 I find I have more in common musically with the oldies than the kidz. As an example, we went to see The Police in concert (with Spam the Monkey) and they were amazing and the last time they played live in the UK was in 1983. But they had Maximo Park as a support act who apparently are kool wid da kidz. I found it a cacophony of noise from a bunch of chaps with a lead singer in a bowler hat. So I am truly getting old and I now see myself in that parent role tutting and being utterly bemused when Top of the Pops came on. Anyway, I digress.

MTV have tried a few things in the wonderful, crazy mixed up mashed up world of digital of late which you have to give them credit for even though their video user generated content site was a bit, well, empty. And now they’re giving Twitter a go. While the updates from the show clearly don’t turn me on as I’m not core demographic, it’s interesting to see a relatively big brand trying out these new formats.

But how do people find out about this? I discovered it from two sources: 1) the seemingly omnipresent Armano on Twitter (who keeps trying to get Twitter-oke going with limited success) and 2) from the irregular update email from Twitter themselves (which I’m sure David read before me as my email backlog has grown exponentially with pitch work dominating me & then sent a tweet/twat into the ether to inform his groupies that maybe the MTV VMA thingy might make Twitter more credible for brands). If these didn’t exist, would I ever know? And would the event be over before people found out about it?

So, I click through from the Twitter site to the MTV site. And there’s a link to see Britney’s first live performance since the hair/rehab thing. Clearly I want to see if she a) has hair and b) well, that’s it really. But I’m barred!

I can’t access the video on the US site because of “copyright”. Hello MTV! It’s a global world out there. And if you get me from a global site like Twitter, don’t deny me access to the rich content because I’m not from the US! But my appetite for the hair question is unsated so I go to MTV UK site and there it is.

She has hair but it looks fake. And she lip synched. And looked bored. And she kind of wiggled rather than danced. And the people in the crowd who are presumably the stars of today looked utterly bemused by it. But importantly, my guess is it’s the same damn video as on the US site so I am very confused by copyright getting in the way of a good brand experience. Duh?

The point being, if you start the conversation with people, make sure you can finish it, wherever they are in the world.

Spam rocks at The Police concert, Twickenham, London.

Previously on Spam the Monkey: episodes 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5

In flight entertainment going a step too far? Virgin America have recently trialled an in flight IM service allowing you to badger the hell out of other passengers, probably the “hotty” 3 rows in front of you. Frankly I’d find this annoying as fuck as we say here in Blighty. But the general service seems to have gone down a storm in the US. It seems that Virgin cool has transferred pretty well and spreading the gospel to the jetrosexuals stateside. I like the fact you get ice cream served during movies. (Image source)

And with the recent hullabaloo (I surprised myself writing that word too) about Heathrow and the general backlash against flying, those folks at Iconoculture have come up with It Sucks to Fly, a repository for all things negative about the chores of flying.

Get writing and you could be the next JK Rowling in this Times competition (closes Nov 17).

A new film and some interesting, intriguing content at 1-18-08

The story of the men (and the madness) who made ads that changed our lives.

Dirt cheap texts as opposed to dirty texts which would be a different link altogether.

Get some Hoff on Twitter.

What a pitch does to you.