SPARK: Ads only visible to women, Barbie's augmented reality wardrobe at fashion week and Facebook timeline for brands launches

ADVERT ON OXFORD STREET LONDON DISPLAYS ONLY FOR WOMEN

An interactive hoarding at a London bus stop aims to show a 40-second advertisement only to women and girls. The screen showing the short video campaign, by children's charity Plan UK, is located at a bus stop opposite Selfridges on Oxford Street. A camera will measure facial features of the person standing at the screen to decide whether it is a man or a woman. It guesses right 90% of the time.

INSIDE FOXCONN: YOU WILL THINK DIFFERENTLY ABOUT APPLE PRODUCTS

On 23rd Februrary, millions of U.S. television viewers will get their first glimpse inside Apple’s magic factory: the two Foxconn plants in Shenzhen and Chengdu, China, where Apple makes a variety of best-selling gadgets, including the iPad. It will also be an opportunity to assess whether Apple is treating its factory workers properly. ABC Nightline anchor Bill Weir, who spoke to Mashable about the special, said that after spending a few days on the factory floors, he now “thinks different about Apple  products.” “We expected to find some real horror stories, and didn’t. That said, what is acceptable on a Chinese assembly line is soul-crushing by American standards,” said Weir.

BARBIE'S AUGMENTED REALITY DREAM CLOSET

Iconic toy brand Barbie launched its new marketing campaign — ‘What Happens When You Play With Barbie?’ — as part of its 50-years celebration of the the style icon’s role in the lives of girls worldwide. During this year’s Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week in New York, Barbie installed the ultimate Dream Closet complete with 24-foot tall, jewel encrusted doors leading into a two-story, 9,000 square-foot set. The pop-up closet, only open on the weekends, also features augmented reality technology “mirrors” that allow users to try on Barbie’s glamorous outfits such as her 50th Anniversary Barbie gown that channels the famous designs of Oscar de la Renta.

CHIRPIFY TURNS TWITTER INTO PAYMENT AND COMMERCE PLATFORM

Twitter has become a high-powered news, information and interest network but it hasn’t really flexed its potential as a commerce platform. But a new Portland, Ore., startup called Chirpify is looking to leverage the exploding Twitter network to create a tool for brands, organizations and users to sell items, take donations and accept payments, all without forcing people to leave Twitter. Chirpify, formerly known as Sell Simply, is today unveiling its Twitter commerce platform, an all-in-one tool that tapsPayPal and allows users to monetize their tweets.

SOCIAL SHOPPING: LITTLE BLACK BAG

While retail outlets are finding increasing success in taking the shopping experience online, the search goes on for a compelling social shopping experience, allowing users to interact with one another as well as their favourite brands. Based on the Japanese concept of ‘fukubukuro’ — or ‘lucky bag sale’ — Little Black Bag gets shoppers to first pick a mystery goody bag of top-name fashion and beauty products. Then consumers have a week to search the site’s marketplace to try and swap their items and build their perfect set. After all trading has finished, the bag is then sent out to the shopper. Little Black Bag says that the experience puts the fun and excitement back into retail therapy and offers the site’s users the chance to discover some new products they may not have otherwise tried. As an incentive, the company will also offer regular prizes worth 4-to-5 times the value of the bags. Little Black Bag has already secured brands such as Z Spoke by Zac Posen, BCBGeneration, Betsey Johnson and Kenneth Jay Lane.

GRAB SOME GOODBY

Goodby, Silverstein & Partners endured painful layoffs in recent weeks, letting at least 100 people go after losing Sprint and parting ways with Hewlett-Packard. Now, a former Goodby employee who left in 2010 has launched a website, GrabSomeGoodby.com, in an effort to get some of those laid-off staffers hired by other agencies. GrabSomeGoodby.com is a tribute to the talented folks at Goodby, Silverstein & Partners who were affected by the latest layoffs," the site reads. "It was created to act as a directory of those people who are now available to do work for you. ...Help turn this situation into a positive thing. Getting some Goodby at your agency is a great thing." A brilliant idea.

BBH LAUNCHES SOCIAL GAMING BUSINESS WITH CHUPA CHUPS

BBH is jumping into online gaming, creating a venture that connects its Chupa Chups client with game developers to help the brand leverage the interactivity and stickiness of social networks. The first game from Chuck Studios — in soft-launch phase on Facebook -- plays up the brand's positioning as a fun, irreverent candy. Called "Chupa Chucker," the brand mascot shoots "brain spam" with lollipops. It's not new for ad agencies to create online games, but the costs of producing quality games are high and the titles must be managed and optimized to remain successful. The Chuck Studios business model aims to make social-game publishing profitable for all parties. It does not employ game developers directly but rather provides its developer partners with seed funding and use of the Chupa Chups' IP. Meanwhile, the game developers can access the brand's global online fan base and marketing support. A portion of the game's revenue must go to the social platform, while Chuck Studios and the developers split the remainder.

EXCELLENT ADVENTURES IN EDUCATION

It seems like education is waking up to one fact: they are talking to very young people! Seems simple enough, but more often than not their comms seems more aimed at their parents. I bet you this gutsy ad will do more for Western Australia’s Institute For Technology than most of their career fairs and glossy brochures. Because this makes you seriously want to be in media and technology. Perth comedy stars Henry and Aaron starred together with local venues and talent in this ‘perfect for YouTube’ clip.

HOW THE US ARMY HAS BECOME A SOCIAL MEDIA LEADER

Over the past several years, the US Army has developed an exemplary program in exploiting numerous social media methods, and done so without a lot of flash, expense, or personnel. They have an engaged audience, numerous followers, and maintained a multi-pronged campaign into all of the major social media networks, including recent beach-heads in Pinterest and Google+. All this, and with a five-person team based in the Pentagon and without spending much in the way of budget too. They are a worthy case study for organizations that are trying to make their own assaults on social media and haven't been as effective.

KOMBISPEL: THE SCRATCH LOTTERY

Kombispel, a lottery company in Sweden, promoted their scratch lotto cards during the winter by placing direct marketing cards on the windscreens of cars before heavy snow storms. When drivers scratched the ice and snow off their windscreens they found the message, “It should be fun to scrape”. In Swedish: “Det ska vara kul att skrapa”. A great simple tactical execution.

BURBERRY TO DEBUT NEW COLLECTION ON TWITTER VIA ANIMATED GIFS

Burberry is taking its Tweetwalk to the next level. After the success of last season’s Tweetwalk — an event that caused both “#Burberry” and “Christopher Bailey” to trend worldwide on the platform — the British fashion house is once again sharing images of every look with the brand’s followers on Twitter before the models hit the catwalk — only this time some of those images will arrive in the form of animated GIFs.

AUTISM SPEAKS: KINECT POWERED DIGITAL BILLBOARD

Autism Speaks has created a Kinect powered digital billboard featuring a life size girl who avoids eye contact no matter how hard you try. The Kinect in this instance is used to track the head movements of the people looking into the digital billboard and continually position the child’s head and movements to avoid eye contact. This is just one example of how the Kinect is being used by advertisers and technology experts to create interactive and personalised experiences, keep an eye open for more!

FACEBOOK TIMELINE FOR BRANDS LAUNCHES THIS MONTH

Facebook will bring its Timeline profile pages to brands this month in the U.S., according to executives briefed on the company's plans. The new pages for brands will start in beta with a handful of partners and then be released to more marketers in stages, according to the sources. Timeline has significant implications for Facebook fan-page management and Page layout including potential changes to tabs and apps. Facebook is expected to go into detail about the new pages at its first-ever fMC event, a day-long conference in New York on Feb. 29 specifically for marketers.