Spying on lovers having a coffee is one thing. Changing the music, lighting and even their table height is another. At Kauko (Finnish for remote) you can do all of this from the safety of the web, illustrating how design affects us all.

I always dig web-real-life connections. No doubt it is fun for web users to play soft pranks on people in the cafe. I just wonder how pleasant it is to be a patron there.

Check out the Kauko website (during opening hours in Helsinki). The cafe is part of a wider campaign to celebrate Helsinki as the World’s Design Capital in 2012 and was conceived and built by Perfect Fools and GP UdstillningsDesign. via

Over the past year or so I’m sure you’ve seen dozen of social media related infographic. Most of them are pretty interesting and certainly very nicely done. But probably none of those is as beautiful and, I would say, intense, as this project by Colin Pinegar. Colin “audited” his Facebook friends and visually mapped out his relationships. He asked himself questions ranging from personal (do I know this person’s phone number?) to generic (can I recognize this person by their name alone?) and assigned each of his cyber-friends a score ranging from 1-25 (those that scored less than 1 were de-friended). Each score was then plotted on a color spectrum. He then made a wax bust of himself for each person in the color that corresponded to their score, purple being assigned the the most intimate friends with whom he interacts in person.

via Fast.Co

Pinterest is the hottest thing in social content curation right now and has been billed as one of the top web properties in 2012, even though it still remains invite only. If you want an invite, leave a comment at the end of the article with your email and we’ll invite as many as we can!

So what is Pinterest? It’s a visual curation site where you can create boards for the things that interest you. And those boards, probably say more about what you’re really interested in than any other site. For business, recent research has shown that Pinterest is driving more traffic than Google+, YouTube and LinkedIn combined! For the more visual brands out there, it’s another network to make sure they are a part of but there are clear traffic driving benefits. Brands like GAP, Whole Foods, Threadless and even General Electric are leading the way so far. It’s the greatest indication yet that the social graph is morphing in to the interest graph. A picture is worth a thousand words, right? Check out the infographic below for more and let us know what you think. Have you tried it out yet? You can follow me on Pinterest here.

One of the great things about H&M creating special collections with high-end fashion brands is that the advertising of such co-labs is usually as beautiful as the collection itself. The latest commercial has been directed by Sofia Coppola. The video is set in Marocco and presents a 1 minute story featuring Marni at H&M collection and a fascinating Brian Ferry’s Avalon song.

Check in out, the photography is beautiful.

Possibly one of the sweetest and nicest promo pieces for Valentine’s Day I’ve ever seen. And possibly a sign that the creative “war” between Field Notes and Moleskine has officially begun. After a lot of recent great videos by Moleskine, FN fights back with a lovely little artwork. The video has been created to promote the Red Blooded notebook which has been recently added to the Field Notes standard product line. The notebook that becomes a love letter: a further proof that life, love and commerce can intersect nicely. Well… maybe the description that they added on the site is a bit too much but, still, it’s a very inspiring and beautiful work.

As someone commented on Vimeo, this is an annoying great work. What happens to your brain when you get an email, an sms, a phone call, a Facebook message and two tweets all within about 5 seconds of one another? This creative re-interpretation of such event will show you. I warn you, watching and listening to this video will freak you out. Yes, it’s a pretty annoying one. But hopefully it will also make you think about how crazy our “always on” lives have become.

Kudos to Chris Crutchfield for the “scary” idea and lovely execution.

When property prices slumped in the United Arab Emirates, moving & storage company ‘The Box’ wanted to stand out with their TV ad. They wanted to demonstrate how easy and worry-free it is to move with them. Their idea: moving with us is as easy as switching channels on your remote.

Unfortunately their website is a bit too straight-forward for my taste, but maybe the rush of new customers will lead to bigger investment into online as well. Great to see some good work from the Arab world. Please keep submitting from all corners of the earth.

Agency: Leo Burnett Dubai

Wieden+Kennedy Amsterdam is helping to ignite romance this Valentine’s Day with the launch of a fun new Facebook application called ‘The Serenade’. Based on the brand’s second global film ‘The Date’, the new app enables Heineken consumers to send humorous personalized songs to potential partners, inviting them on a date. Available in twenty languages, ‘The Serenade’ is designed to put love in the air and smiles on faces around the world. Millions of adult consumers across the globe will be able to participate and create their own Serenade songs

via Heineken’s Facebook page

WWF and supermarket chain Loblaw wanted to raise awareness among Canadians for National Sweater Day on Feb.9th. On this day you are to turn down the heat and put on a sweater. In support of this day, The Granny Call Centre was set up– where you can sign up to get a call from a real Granny, reminding you to put on some knitwear.

So be a dear and sign up at www.SweaterDay.ca – Live Grannies are standing by to call you!

Lovely idea and great performances by the multi cultural group of elder ladies. Plus, that charming website gives me a warm and cuddly feeling already.

This past Christmas, Norway’s DNB bank wanted to leverage their sponsorship of the famous Norwegian Broadcasting Boys Choir. Their agency ended up recommending a very unusual media choice: their telebanking menu.

The Choir sang every word of the automatic telebank menu and thereby let (hopefully) everyone rejoice while checking their account balance. Merry Paycheck everyone!

Agency: TRY/Apt

In Argentina, AXE runs an interesting online campaign featuring The Cleaner. This guy makes sure no evidence is left behind after that very wild night. The campaign is completely video based, and starts with a 3-minute long adventure.

When visiting the website, you will get to know The Cleaner in two different episodes. And although my Spanish is pretty bad, I get the picture easily, and so will you. The cool thing is that due to lenght, size and quality of the video’s, it feels like a little movie you’re part of. The campaign is set up to promote different AXE showergels, among which the new Instinct range.

Via: illegal advertising

Very interesting interactive campaign by BMW in South Africa. For the launch of the new 1 series car, they’ve attracted and engaged consumers with a racing game projected on buildings and scaffoldings. The fun thing is that consumers had the chance to join the game by connecting their iPad to a dedicated Facebook app.

It’s not the first time that we see advergame interfaces projected on outdoor surfaces or megascreens (see this Blue Bloods billboard or this McD campaign) but I believe this BMW idea is one of the first examples of a Facebook Connect OOH advergame.

I also appreciate that they shared the results. The ROI might not have been super good, but I recon the idea is pretty sweet. What do you think?

The agency is iLogic.