On the most romantic day of the year, we're happy to share something that gets us excited: Interactive visual experiences under moonlight. Chicago's Millennium Park is home to Anish Kapoor's Cloud Gate sculpture, which is colloquially known as The Bean. It's a polished steel masterpiece that has become one of the most-photographed Chicago landmarks, and its surface is incredibly reflective, meaning that the surrounding landscape is part of the magic of the art piece. No two photos are the same. With that in mind, the Luftwerk artistic collective have created a unique video / light installation that takes these factors into account to create a breathtaking, immersive experiential installation that will have people snapping photos that will make everyone and their grandparents yearning to go to Chicago. It's also a great place to spend part of an incredibly romantic evening. Check out Luminous Field There's also a video interview with the artists from Luftwerk.

10am One Things Kia and celebrities are a dreamy combo Lazer tag reinvented for the smartphone generation Should they claim? Creative Inspiration Facebook Places used for AIDS awareness Sunscreen billboard activates when the sun comes out Chevy helps curate content with banner ad Friskies cat playhouse McDonalds plants the seeds for an outdoor ad OK Go creates music with a Chevy Sonic Trend Spotting Diane von Furstenberg's streaming live at fashion week with Viddy Amazon is plans to open a physical store Learn a new language with Verbling Toyota lets you become a sportscar Red Hot Chili Peppers' interactive music video Japanese App helps you control your dreams

Celebrities have long been used to sell cars, and recruiting influencers to help spread marketing messages is a tactic almost as old as advertising itself. Kia took both of these a step further by recruiting celebrities to appear in their recent Super Bowl commercial based on the reach of their social graph and then contractually obligating these celebrities to share a link to the spot with their followers. Rockers Motley Crue, supermodel Adriana Lima and Mixed Martial Artist Chuck "The Iceman" Liddell all appeared in the spot, and all were chosen based on their appeal and social reach to Kia's target of Gen-X males. While it will certainly give marketers something to think about, it might also effect the way celebrities market themselves and their relationship with brands. Instead of just basing success on their talents and looks, they'll have to demonstrate their popularity with verifiable fan, follower and Klout numbers. Watch the spot: http://youtu.be/lHZbXvts0LE Read more: http://adage.com/article/digital/kia-taps-celebs-bowl-spot-based-social-graphs/232518/ For an archive of the 10am links, visit our Delicious account at http://www.delicious.com/Radar10AM. Radar http://www.twitter.com/RadarDDB.

NERF's Lazer Tag system is reinventing itself this year for the smartphone generation. The Hasbro product will soon be incorporating their plastic guns with AR shooter elements that allow users to insert their iPhone or iPod touch into the view finder. With the Lazer Tag app installed, users will be provided with an increasingly sophisticated gaming experience that includes updated visual elements, gear, and even a leaderboard to track their power level and overall status as they 'shoot' their friends. According to Engadget, the new Lazer Tag system will be available this summer on August 1st. The app will be free, and the plastic guns will be sold for $40 each (or $70 for two). This announcement is yet another example of how AR gaming tools are continuing to be incorporated into day-to-day tools, games, and lifestyle-based product offerings. For the targeted market in this case (teenagers and young adults), this serves as an especially strong fit as they are already one of the strongest groups of smartphone users. Learn more

Did you get your fix of high-budget, overproduced ads featuring has-been celebrities on Sunday? So did we. Now let's have a look at what can be done on the cheap with a little creativity for a client in an industry that, on a surface level, might seem a bit stale. The UK's Spencers solicitors has assembled a simple Hot-or-Not style interactive site called Should They Claim?, where site visitors are encouraged to spot the fakes while watching a series of videos sourced from YouTube and CCTV. It's a great example of how an insight, a simple execution, and a resourceful re-purposing of widely-available content can be packaged up effectively to create a campaign that's more than the sum of its parts. So ask yourself: Should They Claim?

I recently attended Dx3 Canada on behalf of Tribal DDB Toronto. As Canada's first major tradeshow serving digital marketers, digital advertisers, and digital retailers, I couldn't wait to get my hands on some of the latest technology and give them a test run. For the second installation of our two-part series, we'll be discussing the fun new trends in mobile location and payments. You can check out the first part of the series about the effective use of social media. Here are the highlights of the mobile marketing trends: Location Based Marketing It's no secret I'm a huge fan of all things mobile marketing, so I sat in the keeners row for Asif Khan's (LBMA) discussion on location-based services (LBS) and location-based marketing (LBM). There are so many exciting opportunities in this space and not nearly enough brands (or agencies) capitalizing on it. Granted, there are many things that need to change in Canada to really get the most of location-based tech (like wireless in more public spaces, lower mobile data fees, shorter mobile contract periods, etc.) but LBM offers exciting opportunities to reach consumers in valuable, highly targeted ways. What's not to get excited about? The following are some great ideas on how to use LBS for your next integrated marketing campaign: Rewarding Advert Consumers Idea: Reward users for watching commercials Example: CW Rewards worked with Shazam to specially program the songs in their television ads within the Shazam mobile application. When the CW ad begins, it prompts viewers to get their Shazam application ready on their smartphone. Scanning the song from the commercial would then trigger cool things to happen, like offering points, discounts, and social sharing. Services: Beyond Shazam, Get Glue is a service also moving into this space In-Store Concierge Idea: Wi-Fi enabled smartphone applications that work within a retailer's indoor location Example: Consumers connect to a retailer's Wi-Fi and are greeted with welcome message. The technology then tracks shopper's location through the store (within three feet), offering push notifications about discounts in their vicinity. It also adds value by allowing consumers to check store inventory, scan to buy, and compare products. Services: Beemedia, iSiGN Media, Shopcatch The Connected Consumer Finally, Darrell MacMullin of PayPal offered interesting insights on the mobile wallet. Paypal is already seeing eight million users and $10-million a day in payment volume. With a projected 50 billion connected devices by 2020, its no secret that mobile is influencing commerce in a big way. "Couch commerce", a term to describe people who buy and consume online content from their phone or tablet while watching TV, is a growing trend in the space. Further, MacMullin said, "the mall is now in your pocket and art of selling is gone." It's a powerful sound bite, but a debatable one nonetheless. In my opinion, the new 'art of selling' is data-based: targeting the right information (and advertising) to the right people based on user behaviours and rich individual data offered only by mobile devices. The following are some more highlights from this session: - Canadians getting "smarter" as more than half 18-24 year-olds have smart phones - Most smart phone usage is not talking on the phone - Most people use mobile for researching products before buying - Most people are doing mobile shopping from home in the morning before work/school and at night before bed No matter how promising the data, the two main reasons why people are not using mobile for commerce are cited as privacy issues and poor browsing experience. This again demonstrates that the industry is still very much evolving. We need to invest in these technologies to refine user experiences and educate users if we want to generate mass adoption. Overall, the case studies from real, Canadian companies were a definite benefit coming out of the conference. It was clear that Canada has a lot of room to grow, especially in the mobile space, but we need the proper infrastructure in place to do so. Wireless needs to become accessible across public spaces (and in our subway systems), and telecoms need to offer lower mobile data fees and shorter mobile contract periods before we can see a real impact of this emerging tech. But as the need to offer more-for-less amplifies, it is inevitable that more and more companies will invest in these digital solutions. Luckily, Tribal DDB has the knowledge, fluidity and capabilities to steer our clients in the best directions, helping them lead the pack and help shape the industry as we know it. Will your company help pave the way, or will it be left behind? Want More? Check out some of the companies who exhibited at DX3: - Cotton candy at the Payfirma booth - Bnotions wrestling ring, creating a website in two days - Ortery's 360 digital imaging for product animations - iSiGN Media's location based mobile marketing solutions

Looking back on the week's highlights in the online and social realm, from a creative standpoint. 10am One Thing Posts Super Bowl storytelling Flying people in New York Bear 71 Creative Inspiration Times Square's heart beats for Valentines Day Heineken serenades lovers Grannies are standing by Moving made easy LED Cathedral Stuffed animal sleep over Roomba Art Merry Paycheck Best Tweeshes Trend Spotting Scrolling for information about fracking Android Mannequin's in Retail NFC to be built into Nintendo's WiiPad Obama's Google+ Hangout Two iPhone screens become one

Social media is undeniably a hot topic in marketing. Yet, with all of the interest and activity, there are amazingly few standout examples to draw on and learn from. This is because social media gets tangled up in the technology when its essence is in human behavior. It has so quickly become a part of our society because it has recognized the fact that people love to share. Through the centuries, anywhere people gathered, they shared ideas, opinions, and beliefs. Now the Internet and social media allow us to share more, more often, to more people, and at faster speeds than ever before. All of this and more are explored in a new DDB Yellow Paper called We Love to Share: Social Media Means Business. It covers how social media mirrors (mostly) normal human behavior and how trust and influence are both primal and primary factors in social media marketing success. The paper features five interesting cases that demonstrate the theory through practical application. And it provides a framework on how to implement social media marketing. These efforts require creativity and innovation. And this means experimentation. We hope that this paper will provide tangible guidance but at the end of the day, social media marketing demands that you be bold and take some chances. Download the Yellow Paper here.

What do you get when you combine almost 3,500 digital marketers, a handful of digital thought leaders and a wrestling ring full of Red Bull-fuelled developers? Dx3 Canada, Canada's first major tradeshow serving digital marketers, advertisers, and retailers. I was lucky enough to attend on behalf of Tribal DDB Toronto to get my hands on some of the latest gadgets in digital marketing, and pick the brains of industry leaders. There was so much amazing content to digest, so we've broken up the highlights into a two-part series; this post about the effective use of social media and Part Two about the fun new trends in mobile location based marketing and advertising, as well as mobile payments. Here are our takeaways about the effective use of social media: Selling Social To The C-Suite Duncan Fulton, CMO of Forzani Group (Canadian Tire, client) took a conscientious look at how Canada's 'C-suites' are facing a generational, cultural and budgetary divide. Fulton discussed the pressure to deliver more with less while offering insights on effectively selling social media to the corner office. He discussed one of the major roadblocks to selling social media to the C-suite: control of the message. In traditional top-down communications, corporations were allowed to control the message and what people could say. Enter social media and the personification of the brand, and the previous method of doing business is no longer a feasible solution. The solution, Fulton explained, is that C-suites need to let go of control. Key Learnings: - Turn bad press into an opportunity to engage. Critics will likely appreciate the engagement and turn into evangelists - You can't engage in social media discussion with a customer service script - If something's not naturally social in real life, it's not social online Finally, don't forget the value of brand equity. Fulton offered a digestible example: When asking whether your company should engage people online, he asks, if you were sitting at a Tim Hortons beside people loudly talking negatively about your company, would you not speak up and engage? The Digital Landscape Tribal DDB Canada's own Social Media Director Ed Lee filled the room for his session on Maximizing Twitter. He explained that "digital" is neither a media nor a channel; rather, it is the new infrastructure and social media is the geography upon it. Twitter is the road that gets us from one community to the next and aids us in transporting ideas across the information highway. Utilizing some best practices from real world examples, Lee outlined the following key learnings: - The best conversationalists are the best listeners - Be human and be yourself. Transparency is key. - Followers aren't everything, but they are a good place to start - Tie your messaging back to your business objectives - Know your place and know your audience - Twitter is what you want it to be - The only thing that doesn't belong on Twitter is spam, otherwise there are no hard and fast rules Social media requires planning, contingencies, process and objectives. Just as communications teams put crisis plans in place for all sorts of potential disasters, a great social media strategy will consider these situations as well. Know what your goals are and be prepared before issues happen. As Lee says, perfect planning prevents piss poor performance. Be sure to check out Part Two of the series on Dx3 Canada where we will be discussing mobile trends in location and payments.