SPARK: The latest digital trends and unique thinking

HOW MCDONALDS IS MAKING A COMEBACK ONLINE

For years, critics have been taking on McDonald’s, questioning its practices in an increasingly health-conscious time. The most famous assault on the company’s reputation was probably Morgan Spurlock’s “Super Size Me,” the 2004 Oscar-nominated documentary that suggested a month of eating only McDonald’s meals might hasten your death. But that has hardly been the only grenade lobbed in the company’s direction. In the last year alone, nuns in Philadelphia, Seventh-day Adventists in California, doctors in Chicago and activists in Boston have warred with McDonald’s over its menu, its marketing, its mission or all of the above. Now McDonald’s is fighting back, quietly launching a major counteroffensive of its own. And it isn’t simply trying to keep its current customers happy; it’s also hoping to convince McDonald’s skeptics that they’re wrong.

HELLO KITTY GETS ITS OWN AIRLINE

A Taiwanese airline has used the iconic Japanase cartoon character Hello Kitty to decorate their planes and staff uniforms. EVA air are flying three planes across its routes and the service will be decked out with motifs of the playful cat – from check-in to food-service.

RADIO KLASSISK: AND THEN THERE WAS MUSIC

In April, passengers on the Copenhagen métro were greeted with a flashmob of a different sort. The ‘mob in question was composed of the Copenhagen Philharmonic who crowded into a car and spontaneously began to play, in support of Radio Klassisk.

FACEBOOK ANNOUNCES ITS OWN APP STORE

In a move that should surprise no one but make many developers happy, Facebook today announced a marketplace for finding apps called the App Center. "The App Center will become the new, central place to find great apps like Draw Something, Pinterest, Spotify, Battle Pirates, Viddy, and Bubble Witch Saga," writes Facebook engineer Aaron Brady on the company’s developer blog. The Center will also include a mobile version, which Brady says is designed to increase the number of mobile apps that use the social network.

SWEDISH ARMED FORCES: WHO CARES?

Do you really care about other people? Would you give up your freedom to help others? Tough questions to answers. And, honestly, questions that don’t get asked very often. This campaign by DDB Stockholm for the Swedish Armed Forces didn’t play around with words. It wanted those questions to be answered with facts. Would you enter a room not knowing when you might get out? Who cares? is a controversial, almost creepy, ambient interactive project that challenged the Swedish to prove if they are ready to help people in need. See the project in action. Would you have entered that room?

IKEA: SURPRISE CHEMICAL TOILET

Usually public toilets, and chemical toilets in particular, never reserve nice surprises. You get in, and you try to get out as soon as possible. But the story of this chemical toilet installed in Milan during the recent Design Week is different. It’s an IKEA toilet or, better, it’s a gateway to the IKEA world. Check out this fantastic ambient marketing idea to promote IKEA’s bathrooms line.

SIDEWALK PAVEMENT STONES OFFER BLUETOOTH AND WIFI

We’ve already seen sidewalks used to capture the energy of pedestrians’ footsteps so it doesn’t seem all that far-fetched to see them emitting power as well. Sure enough, iPavement is a sidewalk pavement stone that serves as a wifi hotspot with Bluetooth connectivity. Made of calcium carbonate, each iPavement stone weighs 25kg and measures 40x40x7 cm. Available in either a classic smooth or a corrugated finish, the stones are the brain child of Spanish Via Inteligente which will start to manufacture them this summer. Offering 802.11 b/g wifi and Bluetooth 2.1, the stones each offer broadcast coverage of between 350 and 580 square meters, depending on their surroundings.

GAP, H&M, SEPHORA AND OTHERS UNWRAP NEW SOCIAL GIFTING SERVICE IN THE U.S.

More than 25 major retailers, including the Gap, H&M, Sephora and Brooklyn Industries, are working with a Swedish company named Wrapp to roll-out a social gifting service starting this week. The intention of the service is to drive consumers into stores, much like Groupon, but rather than enticing them with coupons, the bait is presumably even better: Free gift cards.

THE 9 MOST CREATIVE USES OF PINTEREST

Marketers have flocked to Pinterest, but aside from a few retailers and media companies, few have attracted huge followings. So, instead of focusing on who’s biggest, here is some inspiration from the users who have made the most of the platform creatively.

LURPAK: FOOD BEATS

If you have a penchant for blasting out some tunes from your laptop whilst whipping up a tasty treat in the kitchen, you might like this neat little Web app.

FoodBeats is the handiwork of Lurpak’s social agency, which has teamed up with Last.FM to develop an online music tool that generates and streams recipe-based playlists based around what you’re cooking. FoodBeats taps Last.fm’s scrobbling technology to give users recommendations to fit with what they’re mustering up in the kitchen, and not only serves (pardon the pun) to help discover new music, but also takes the hassle out of deciding what to listen to by doing the donkey-work on your behalf.

NIKE AUCTION SITE: BID WITH KILOMETRES NOT CASH

Nike is rewarding its loyal customers by allowing them to use their earned Nike+ kilometre points as currency. The project, called ‘Nike Auction: Make your Sweat Count’, is part of the global #makeitcount campaign and was created by JWT Mexico. The site allows people to use Nike Plus accumulated kilometres to bid for exclusive products. The bidder that offers the most kilometres, wins the auction.

STRIDE GUM: WORLDS LONGEST BANNER AD

Stride Gum claims to be ridiculously long lasting gum, so naturally, they created a ridiculously long lasting banner ad to match, and it was so good, it’s just picked up a webby award for it!

The banner ad challenged users to click-and-hold the target area for as long as possible in order to win $500, meanwhile throwing in all sorts of distractions and random movements to try and throw you off course. And as intended, the World’s Longest Banner Ad had a ridiculously long record of 46 minutes and 27 seconds.

LYNX ANARCHY: THE FIRST INVISIBLE AD

In Sydney, to launch the new Lynx Anarchy product they created polarized LCD screens, which were placed in the windows of oneterraced house in Darlinghurst. Passersby could only see the intriguing bright white light emanating from each of the windows until they were handed a pair of polarized pink (for the girls) or blue (for the boys) sunglasses. Once on, the bright white screens unveiled the activity that was really going on in the house. Nice stunt idea.

THE IMPOSSIBLE TEXTING AND DRIVING TEST

More and more traffic accidents are due to texting. If we want to reduce the 1.2 million traffic victims worldwide each year, we have to act. How do you convince youngsters not to text while driving? Prove them it is a very bad idea: oblige them to text while driving! The Belgian organization Responsible Young Drivers (RYD) took learner drivers out on a road test and told the students that in order to pass they had to text on their mobile phone while driving.

RAYBAN: BRIGHT LIGHT APP

#RayBanBrightLight is a funny mobile app that will help you finding the sunny spots in your city, the places where you can enjoy the sun without the visual noise of the buildings. No more shade on your way! This app helps people to get the most out of the sun and their sunglasses.