Tech

Facebook started as a way for Harvard students to check each other out. It grew to be the most ubiquitous social media platform of the early 21st century.

When Ogilvy took on the IBM account, the brand was taking a scattershot approach of selling its many products and services through several agencies.

This thing called the “World Wide Web” was no longer the playground of technogeeks. With the introduction of online services like Prodigy and America Online, suddenly everyone from schoolchildren doing homework to young moms seeking colic remedies were logging on to their (mostly) desktop computers.

Quality content must be useful, entertaining, and/or beautiful. At least that’s what Bob Greenberg of Robert Greenberg & Associates (R/GA) once said. And with the creation of the game changing Nike+, R/GA achieved all of these things, particularly the first two.

Burger King released Subservient Chicken as a launch for their new chicken sandwich, taking the tagline “Chicken Your Way” to an all too literal place.

From 2001-2002, Clive Owen teamed up with BMW to take action packed chase scenes to a whole new level of bad-assary. The Hire, a series of 8 short films designed to subtly highlight the auto brand’s features, was perhaps the earliest successful example of a brand producing video content specifically for internet release.

One of the 20th century’s most significant works of literature, George Orwell’s 1984 has always been more than a literary marvel—it was a cryptic prediction, too. So, when Apple Computer chose to channel the novel as inspiration in Macintosh’s 1984 Super Bowl launch, the ad became an instant success.

Turns out Dunkin’ Donuts wasn’t the original fuel for the USA. “America runs on Bulova time” was the line accompanying the first ever (legal and continental) TV commercial. Airing on WNBT on July 1, 1941, the 10-second spot for Bulova Watch Company was simply a graphic and voiceover designed by Biow Company.

The first radio commercial ever was broadcast on WEAF New York. Direct selling was prohibited, so radio host H.M. Blackwell created his own “indirect direct” method.