The Toronto branch of Halifax-based Extreme Group and Toronto-based Lollipop have been tirelessly working on this unique branding and interactive campaign for a new Toronto business venture. The edgy campaign received final blessings and was about to launch when nature decided to rear its ugly head in Haiti.

So, instead of the massive launch this campaign was about to receive, a highly subdued roll-out took place. I’m being deliberately vague here because I don’t want to spoil your first interaction with this campaign. Go ahead and click on the image below to visit HaitianPure.com (Edit – March 1 2010: website has changed to PureBlackSunshine.com). Turn your volume up, set your browser to ‘Full Screen’, then follow the website prompts and you’ll know what I’m talking about.

While I can understand the potential risk of backlash, I can’t help but wonder if the campaign (and the client) would have benefited from the publicity that would have resulted from any potential controversy. In the end, I think the client and the agency correctly decided to err on the side of safety.

Despite the quiet launch, the campaign’s viral potential will make up for the lost attention. Extreme made sure to furnish the interactive with the necessary tools to squeeze as much social juice out of the site as possible. You can add it to your Facebook or MySpace profile. You can also Digg it and Tweet it (but for some reason, you can’t Stumble it).

Regardless of the outcome, this campaign is surely heading for some award nominations (at least a Davey Award!).

Similar to the Atlantic ICE awards, the Dubai Lynx awards ceremony features a competition among the best ads and campaigns created by agencies in the MENA region. FP7-Doha is based in Qatar, a small GCC country where Newfoundland’s College of The North Atlantic has an operating campus.

You may remember FP7 Doha by their famed Medal of Honour ads that earned them 2 golden awards at the 2008 Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival.

With offices spanning the Middle East and North Africa, FP7 Doha committed the advertising industry’s 3 cardinal sins of…

1. Submitting fake ads to an awards show for products that don’t exist or for clients who didn’t hire them!
2. Submitting ads with plagiarized creative
3. Submitting ads that were not approved by clients and not used in client campaigns

Arabian Business magazine reported a statement yesterday from Fortune Promoseven announcing that the company is conducting an internal investigation:

“We are continuing our internal investigations and we are taking strong punitive action against anyone who was in contempt of our reputation and our standards,”

Below is one example of the withdrawn winners. This ad won a Golden Lynx in the Print category. The problem is that this model of washing machine isn’t even sold in the Middle East.

Samsung Washing Machine Ad

For those who don’t know, the Ice Awards is an awards show that celebrates creative advertising and marketing made in Atlantic Canada (‘ICE’ stands for Innovation, Creativity, and Enterprise). To see the winning ads, you can visit the ICE website or click on the TV below.

Halifax-based agencies Extreme and Colour, and Newfoundland-based Target took home the majority of awards.

One thing I noticed while mingling with the local advertising crowd is their common use of Twitter. Now, while I pride myself for having above-average knowledge of social marketing and interaction tools, I must confess that I never really adopted the micro messaging site, or really understood why people use it. For Arabic users, a similar site called WatWet.com offers the same service.

In comes the ‘In Plain English’ series from the folks at CommonCraft.com, a service by a young couple based in Seattle who specialize in ‘explanations’. They produce short fun tutorial and training clips to explain, in plain English, whatever you want them to explain. An excellent substitute to boring corporate training videos that make you want to take a toothpick to your eyes for all the bad 80′s style cinematography you just had to endure.

So, if you are like me and you just don’t get what eveyrone is ‘Twittering’ about, here is Twitter – In Plain English.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ddO9idmax0o