Five things on Friday #344

Things of note for the week ending Sunday April 2nd, 2023

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INTRO

Good morning, and in case I don’t see ya, good afternoon, good evening, and good night.

Welcome to #344 of Five things Friday. Thank you to all of you (literally none of you) that wrote back to tell me I got the number wrong on the last edition. I clocked it after I hit send and then changed the web version but couldn’t amend the email. So if you’re here and wondering what happened to issue #343 well, you’ve already had it – it arrived last week. OK? OK.

What else can I tell you?

It’s been London Games Week this week so a VERY BUSY WEEK INDEED (probably why I’m writing this on Sunday afternoon) and also a VERY ENJOYABLE WEEK AS WELL. More on that and more, below.

Speaking of below, shall we jump right into The Things?

LET’S GOOOOOO!


1. OK BUT JUST LOOK AT THESE MANTISES

Mantis Macro Photography

I mean COME ON.

My Modern Met writes:

Macro photographer Pang Way captures the delicate dance-like movements of a variety of mantis species. From an up-close point of view, he depicts the insects as they balance on their long legs with wings splayed in a fan-like fashion. We’re able to admire all of their incredible characteristics, from the brilliant coloring to the delicate webbing over their wings. It offers a new appreciation for these elegant creatures that live throughout the world.

Uh huh. And they’re WONDERFUL.

Mantis Macro Photography

2. MAD WOMEN

From Channel 4:

“Timed to coincide with the 100th anniversary of WACL, (Women in Advertising and Communications, Leadership) Mad Women (1×60 mins)  will, for the first time, explore the role women have played in advertising across the past century.

From the creation of Shake n Vac with its unforgettable jingle and the Levi’s launderette ad with Nick Kamen to the Flake girl in the bath and the bikini-clad women falling over men because of the Lynx effect; this film meets the pioneering women behind some of the UK’s most iconic ads.

Starting in London’s late 70s – in a world evocative of Mad Men – we meet those who broke into the industry and started to break down the stereotypes that had been in place for decades. We’ll discover the ground-breaking adverts they engineered and the battles they had to endure to get them onto our screens.

In a world now unrecognisable from the heady days of Mad Men, we’ll also meet some of the most senior women working in the industry today to find out what’s left in the world of taboo breaking. Is it the role of adverts to reflect trends or to create them and what can we expect next from the current generation of Mad Women?”

In.


3. THIS WEEK IN GAMING

tl;dr: WASD was great.

As I write this to you it’s Sunday April 2nd around 12:55ish. Yesterday and Thursday (with an amazing wedding in Nottingham in-between) I attended the superb WASD Video Games Expo in London.

Thursday was a work day and I didn’t get to play that many games but I DID have the enormous pleasure of giving an updated and super fresh update of the metaverse talk at the excellent London Dev Conference (that was being held in the same building).

After that I did managed a very quick go on the new Cult of the Lamb DLC, ‘Relics of the Old Faith’ – which is more Cult of the Lamb + some new skills and levels. Given Cult is immensely playable, is of course very welcome. And I also managed a handful of rounds on Street Fighter 6 – continuing to be my most anticipated game for 2023 (yes – really). The absolute highlight was scoring a PERFECT! round against my sworn Street Fighter rival (aka Diva ECD, Stuart O’Neill. DONE YA!).

Seeing the team on the ground meeting our friends and clients at Maze Theory, Bandai Namco, Gearbox (hello Have a Nice Death!), Ninja or Die, Super Rare Games, Activision, and more… well, it was just lovely. Follow that by an excellent Diva hosted/sponsored after first day show party, well… it was awesome.

We went back as a fam on the Saturday and the games we tried and enjoyed include:

We didn’t play any VR unfortunately but I heard v good things about Peaky Blinders (Meta Quest 2) and The Last Worker (PSVR2) more on the latter shortly…

Other gaming-related news/links of note:

  • The truth about “gaming disorder”.
    Last week there was a whole bunch of scaremongering press about ‘hundreds’ of children being treated for gaming disorders. Headlines everywhere. Ex head of comms for Ukie, George Osborn (not that one) breaks it down.

  • E3: cancelled.
    Sad to see but inevitable, really. Post COVID, post Geoff Keighley (moving in on the turf with Summer Games Fest), E3 never really had – or gave itself – a chance to recover. And let’s be honest, if you’re a developer or publisher who has spent the past three years doing controlled streams of your games announcements, why would you go back to a world where you’re breaking the backs of your devs to get a playable/buggy vertical slice of your game ready for an in-person event? That’s not to say that games events are over (obviously not with the success of WASD above and GamesCom last year (265k attendees!), it’s just perhaps the role of these events has changed, irrevocably. And there are those that have recognised this and changed with it and there are those that haven’t. E3 feels like the latter. GI.biz has more.

  • This, from Heineken, is a great ad. People that play are everyone. People that play are everywhere. The fact this is out NOW and just ‘oh, here’s a covid ad’ makes it just that little bit more special, y’know?

  • Fortnite now shows you how many people are playing on each island.
    This is good/useful data! Basically, with the roll out of UEFN (see last FTOF), this is an important way for Fortnite Creators to see how well their creations are doing – especially up against Epic’s own islands such as BR Solos, Duos etc. Yes, Epic is sharing its own numbers too. Hooray!

  • The Murder of Sonic the Hedgehog was a REAL April Fool. Amazing.

  • Xbox has stopped its £1/$1 Game Pass trial offer which is a shame (I used it a lot in presentations about democratised access to games) but that doesn’t make the service any less compelling – as I’m sure many of you already know.

I’ve run out of space to speak meaningfully about the BAFTAS but I will say ROLLERDROME picking up Best British Game was a high point for me – it’s such a great game. You can watch the full replay of the BAFTAs over on Twitch right now.

What am I playing?

  • Still plodding through Marvel Suns (made it to Act 3 – wooo!). The game loop is really nice.

  • I picked up Dead Cells after seeing the Castlevania DLC drop (Castlevania was a huge part of my early video game years on NES and SNES). A great little game that.

  • Related, I also picked up a Razer Kishi in the Amazon spring sale – and it has become an instant luggage companion. Dead Cells is great on it AND best of all? It’s compatible with Game Pass. Yessssssss.

  • C-Smash VRS on PSVR2 is excellent.

  • And last night, after seeing a bunch of folk play it at WASD, I got home and immediately purchased The Last Worker. It’s really nice. Really nice. I’m pretty sure it’s on every/most platforms so go check it out.


4. THE MEH-TAVERSE

Because I am tired. Here are some more links about or relating to dead-trend-walking from 2022: ‘the metaverse’

I mean broadly, I really like this idea as a concept. Digital/animated character enters the real world via VR headset to experience real life – and the indulgence taste of a Magnum Ice-Cream. Strong Ah-Ha vibes. I get it. THAT SAID, I think the end line ‘not available in the metaverse’ is advertising for advertisers. A trap that could’ve been stepped over so easily. But they couldn’t resist. In doing so, it feels like the ad is about how clever they are vs how incredible it is to taste a Magnum in real life.

But hey, that’s just me.

  • Apparently the metaverse is not dead (note: it would’ve had to have been alive at some point for that to be true), it’s just going to ‘take a while’ – don’t take that from me though, take it from Meta’s head of global affairs, Nick Clegg.

  • Oh and thank you to the (now seven different) people that have sent me this link: ‘The Future is a Dead Mall’ which basically spends just shy of two hours pulling apart the myth of Decentraland and The Metaverse.


5. ENDING WITH A MEME FOR THE TIMES

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BONUS SECTION

THIS IS THE BONUS SECTION. BONUS LINKS THAT BUMP US OVER FIVE THINGS BUT DUE TO TIMING AND SELF-IMPOSED WRITING RESTRICTIONS ARE LIMITED TO PITHY COMMENTARY ONLY.

ENJOY.


YOU ARE REACHING THE END OF THE NEWSLETTER. MIND THE GAP.

I hope you’ve had a restful weekend and are gearing up for a nice Easter. I’m in Bristol at Diva HQ next week and two four day weeks to cram ten days of work into… so unlikely we’ll see a new edition of FTOF this side of it all.

I tell you what, let’s regroup after Easter and share stories. Deal? Deal.

Much love gang, thanks for reading.

Hit reply and tell me what’s up.

Whatley out x

Five things on Friday #343

Things of note for the week ending Friday March 24th, 2023

INTRO

Two editions in January. Two editions in March. If I keep this up, we may get into some kind of regular pattern for this thing y’know? Amazing.

(No promises though babe)

It’s been an interesting couple of weeks. The San Francisco Game Developers Conference (GDC) has been in full swing and I’m fascinated by the news and announcements that have been flowing out – more of that later in Thing 3. And I’ve also had a bunch of stuff go out all at the same time that was made all at different times over the past few months (Adweek commentary, podcast stuff, a speaker announcement) – and they’re linked in their proper places in this week’s edition.

Thank you, by the way, for the nice notes and comments from the last edition in regards to the words I wrote about taking on my first CSO role. You’ve all been super lovely and, well, I’m pleased. I wrote it to offer insight and to help 🙂

In a similar vein, the week after next I’ve got my first hire starting at Diva (WEEEEEEEE!!!). So here’s a little Twitter thread about that process – and ultimately why feedback is so important.

Finally, for the newbies – and strangely there are quite a few of you this week (hello!), this newsletter is a mixture of culture, news, advertising, video games, and just occasional random things I enjoy. Sometimes there are typos – but they’re there to test you. So if you spot one, let me know!

Right then.

Shall we?


1. SEE YOU AT WASD?

‘WASD’, Noun. Event.
/W.A.S.D./Wazz-da/Was-duh/Woz-dee/

Later this month see the return of London-based consumer and trade games show, WASD. We were there last year (I hosted a terrific panel of industry veterans talking about the future of the industry and played some fantastic games – see Thing 3, in, FTOF #328). This year, it’s back and bigger than ever – this time moving from Tobacco Dock to the Truman Brewery – and hosting so many more devs and publishers and their games. From Street Fighter 6 to VR2 and every indie inbetween, there will be a LOT to see.

Also, if you’re going to pop along to the London Developer Conference on March 30th (running in parallel and on the ground floor to WASD), I’ll be giving a talk about how devs can ready themselves for working with brands – in a refreshed update to the talk ‘Metaverse, what metaverse?’ – this new version be less provocative and more constructive. Promise. Ish. …we’ll see. 😁

Anyway, I’ll be there Thursday in a work capacity and Saturday as a punter with the fam. Hopefully see you there?

Tickets are available now.

PS. Work in the industry and don’t have a ticket to the industry after show party? Get in touch.


2. LAUGHTER & THE MAGUS

This week on Twitter someone shared the lede from the this 1993 excellent long read profile of the incredible Ricky Jay.

You should click through and read the opener (and then see if you stick around for the whole thing – it’s a great read). I’ve known and read loads of stuff about Ricky Jay before. The man is a master. Magic was a thing I used to do for a while (not like ‘I know a couple of card tricks’ magic, more… I was a magician’s assistant one summer in my teens and I did a couple of kids’ parties) and, well, when my friends and I used to trade tricks the ambition was never shock, or surprise – it was always laughter. If you could bring about laughter in another magician, then the job was done.

I’ve seen Ricky Jay do a lot of stuff. On YouTube videos on TV shows – and I’ve read about him a ton. The point is, after finding the article above and from the same Twitter thread, I found and watched this incredible film of a trick I’d not seen Ricky do before. I laughed. I laughed and laughed and laughed.

In awe.


3. THIS WEEK IN GAMING

Hopefully not that much this week given all the WASD stuff above but let’s see how we go…

There’s only one major thing to talk about this week and it’s this:

GDC 2023 | Epic Games - Unreal Engine

Epic’s ‘State of Unreal’ presentation at GDC 2023. If you are so inclined, you can go ahead and watch the full one hour twelve minute presentation over on YouTube right now – and honestly, if you have the time, I really recommend you do. The technology on display is truly game-changing. Literally.

This v short clip for Hellblade II for example, is just one clip of just how amazing the new standards of this tech truly this.

I can’t wait for Hellblade II. But also: Metahumans are insane.

So yeah, there’s that.

Then there’s the update to Fortnite. With Unreal Editor for Fortnite (UEFN) and Creator Economy 2.0. I’ve been saying to anyone that will listen that ‘You should keep an eye on what Epic are building’ – because frankly, Roblox stole their breakfast lunch and dinner and, well, GDC was a proper flex.

FORTNITE ANNOUNCEMENTS

  • 500M players.

  • Islands built using Fortnite’s creator tools take up 40% of the playtime on the platform.

  • A new creator portal enabling IP ownership for development on platform.

  • UEFN means you can make a ton of new games, and *while you are building them* your friends on your team can drop in – from any platform that runs Fortnite – and run around. WHILE YOU ARE BUILDING IT.

  • From this week, 40% of Fortnite’s net revenue (billions of dollars every year) is going to be open and shared with the people developing and publishing games on the Fortnite platform.

  • And so much more…

In short: Fortnite is getting bigger. Better. And for Unreal Engine, it is an incredible Trojan Horse.

But that’s not what I want to talk about (!) – what I want to talk about is, Epic’s CEO, Tim Sweeney’s closing remarks about Epic’s future vision.

Aka, what Epic is calling: ‘The open metaverse of the future’ (it’s a ten minute talk, and this link should take you right to it).

And I really like it.

In the talk, Sweeney ‘Metaverse inspired games’ such as Roblox, Fortnite, Minecraft, etc – collectively cover an identifiable audience of 600m active users – on a trajectory that will be in its billions by the end of the decade.

Tim says:

‘We can set aside the crazy hype cycle around NFTs and VR goggles… …and the core of it is something that every gamer understands: it’s you, and your friends, getting together online and going around as a group – on voice chat, having a fun time in social entertainment experiences. Some of these experiences are serious games like battle royale, some of them are going to a concert and dancing or chatting with friends and just having a good time’

Social entertainment experiences, something I’ve been calling metaversal activities sounds exactly like what so many other badly made platforms (Horizon Worlds, Sandbox, Decentraland) and terrible brand executions (like, I don’t know – just close your eyes and throw a dart) have been trying to do over the past 12 mths or so but doing it without any real idea of audience size or segmentation, creative nous, or understanding of what it is they’re trying to do and therefore achieving little to nothing aside from a few trade PR headlines.

But with the tools and platforms Epic is publishing I can genuinely see the path towards what they are calling the ‘open metaverse of the future’. And, in attempt to tick the ‘interoperable’ part of the metaverse definition, Epic also believes it should all be open and connected – ‘turning today’s game engines into tomorrow’s metaverse browser engines’.

Like I said: I really like it. It talks about social entertainment experiences and does so from the point of view of the player.

I do think the ‘m’ word is unhelpful (the definition is loose, at best) but generally, when people like Epic stand up and talk about this, it’s useful to sit up and listen.

A metaverse of games – connected via a backbone of Unreal tools and services – feels like something that will happen.

And I’m interested.

This is a very good follow up piece (with additional commentary and interview notes).

Other gaming-themed links of note:

And finally, towards the end of last year (November to be exact) I was asked on to be a guest on a new audio series from Kaspersky, called ‘Insight Story’.

Episode 1 was, of course, ‘What should you be doing about the metaverse?’

Apple links also available.

A good conversation that lays out what is and what isn’t worth worrying about if you’re a brand or an SME thinking about getting involved with ‘the metaverse’. I’m also quite happy that five months ago I was talking about the activities outlined by Epic above (in a similar context).

Would love to know what you think.

What am I playing?

  • Diablo IV beta (phenomenal).

  • Back into Destiny 2 (which is great – beat the raid! Earned a raid jacket!)

  • Finally had enough tokens to get Knull in Marvel Snap and now I can’t put it down again.

  • I’ve got Tchia downloaded and ready to go but haven’t had a chance to try it yet.

What are you playing?


4. ‘PROPER WHOPPERS’

Sharing this again because it’s just so good.

We used to do these for Kronenbourg 1664 at Ogilvy, years ago (and it might’ve got us in trouble once too) and so I know the effort that goes into these things.

The ‘Proper Whopper’ line was on the cover the Metro the day before and so less than 24hrs later, to have the ad space bought, the brief in, copy approved, and then lined up and published…? That is some herculean effort.

Well done to all involved.

Ps. For the non-Brits reading this. Our ex-Prime Minister is a proven pathological liar. And has been pulled over the coals for misleading parliament (about his lies when he was partying his way through covid lockdowns – fun!)


5. NYC CABBIE AND HIS AMAZING PHOTOS

Ryan Weideman nyc cab driver street photography

Ryan Weideman is an NYC cab driver that has spent the last 30 years taking photos of his passengers.

This is his story. And there are many photos.


BONUS SECTION

THIS IS THE BONUS SECTION. BONUS LINKS THAT BUMP US OVER FIVE THINGS AND THIS WEEK CONSIDERABLY SHORTER GIVEN HOW MANY OF YOU COMPLAINED ABOUT BROKEN TAB

ENJOY.


YOU ARE REACHING THE END OF THE NEWSLETTER. MIND THE GAP.

This week I’m signing off with a photo.

My good friend and old Ogilvy pal Larry was in town this week – extremely short notice and so, because the bugger lives in Amsterdam, I dropped everything and high-tailed it into Soho to see him.

We drank Guinness, traded stories, and took photos of each other because that’s what you do when you’re in your 40s reminiscing. Anyway, Lazzle Bazzle Pazzle (that’s his real name), took a photo of me that I quite liked and, because I’m never going to reboot my instagram, you can have it as well.

So here’s me, at 9pm on Wednesday night. Literally, happy as Larry.

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Until next time,

Whatley out x

Five things on Friday #342

Things of note for the week ending Friday March 17th, 2023

INTRO

Hello friend. It’s been a while.

How the hell are you? Been up to much? Me? Yeah, I’m alright. Head down, cracking on – last quarter of the FY kind of madness. You know how it is. Plus, for those of you reading this in the UK, any idea when Spring is coming? Enquiring minds want to know. Thanks.

Where we we? Ah yes, that’s right. Welcome. Welcome to #342 of Five things on Friday – a semi-occasional/weekly newsletter of no real description other than ‘it covers stuff that James Whatley finds interesting’ – people seem to like it. Yourself included. So thank you for that.

I must confess, I think I’ve sat down to write this newsletter on three separate occasions this month (he says, changing the date on the header – again), which goes to show how non-stop it’s been of late. Be that as it may, the THINGS that have been wibbling away in the inbox since… January? are all still pretty fresh.

So let’s stop the waffle and get right on that, shall we?

LET’S.


1. A YEAR IN THE JOB

It’s crazy to me that just over a year ago I arrived into Bristol to start my new job as Chief Strategy Officer for the gaming native integrated creative agency known as Diva (see Thing 1, #324).

And yet here we are, one year later…

Madness.

The reason I’m telling you is from the moment I accepted the job – my first ever position as CSO – I got super introspective. I wanted to make sure I had done the prep work for the responsibility. It’s a big deal! I asked a few people for advice. And tried not to overthink it too much (narrator: he failed).

However, one thing I definitely did do at the time was try to capture how I was feeling about it. Like, what does a CSO say think and do in 2022? I never got around to editing it down to publishable length (although I did pitch it to some very patient editors).

A year on, and a new pal said I should revisit it and maybe publish it as is/was. So I booted up the old Google Doc, copied and pasted it over into Linkedin, and hit publish.

So here it is ‘LEADERS ARE WHAT YOU MAKE THEM’.

I’d love to know what you think.

x

PS. Thanks for the nudge, EML.


2. IT’S THE PHONES, STUPID

This, via the John Burn-Murdoch at the FT, is compelling reading.

“Something is going very wrong for teenagers. Between 1994 and 2010, the share of British teens who do not consider themselves likeable fell slightly from 6 per cent to 4 per cent; since 2010 it has more than doubled. The share who think of themselves as a failure, who worry a lot and who are dissatisfied with their lives also kicked up sharply. The same trends are visible across the Atlantic.

The number of US high school students who say their life often feels meaningless has rocketed in the past 12 years. And it’s not just the anglosphere. In France, rates of depression among 15- to 24-year-olds have quadrupled in the past decade. Wherever you look, youth mental health is collapsing, and the inflection point is ominously consistent: 2010 give or take a year or two — when smartphones went from luxury to ubiquity.”

It’s the phones, stupid.

The full article – along with more charts and analysis – is available here, Smartphones and social media are destroying children’s mental health.

Important reading.

And if you recognise the name, John Burn-Murdoch was the data scientist who led the work around the FT’s best in class covid-19 reporting.

Related reading:


3. THIS WEEK IN GAMING

Last time we spoke, we were getting very excited about the imminent arrival of PlayStation VR2. Well, since we last spoke, VR2 has arrived! And while I may have done a mini-review thread over on Twitter, I can safely say it is a considerable improvement over the original.

The highlight is, of course, Horizon Call of the Mountain.

It’s insanely good. As any first party launch title should be. But, truth be told I’ve not had that much time to play it (work/life being what it is at the moment). But the games I have played have been superb.

  • No Man’s Sky (free VR2 update), is outstanding.

  • Zombieland Headshot Fever Reloaded is super fun (disclosure: we made the trailer).

  • Tentacular – cute as hell and it just works.

And while these games are excellent (and there’s more – I’ve not even booted up the likes of Rez, Tetris, or Gran Turismo 7 – and the other games announced for the ‘launch window’ also look great (The Last Worker is top of that list)), to my mind I think it’s still missing a few things. A few more updates would be good – speaking for my kids specifically, they’re missing VR painting games (like Tilt Brush) and the connection and carry over from older PSVR1 games – such as Minecraft.

(Seriously, Minecraft on VR2 would be amazing)

Beat Saber is expected to arrive soon but not here yet, Half-Life Alyx is highly rumoured (but nothing solid) and then maybe possibly a 3D interface for when you turn it on might be quite fun…

Point is: it’s great. Is it perfect? No. Will it get better? Definitely. One notable thing that does stand out mind is that VR2 is the first VR headset I think ever, that I’ve been comfortable wearing for a lengthy amount of time. Spending a few hours climbing around in Horizon or exploring in NMS is breeeeeezy. And quietly surprising with it.

OK, so what else can I tell you?

First off, I don’t know how many of you this is relevant for but in light of Google Stadia going bye bye back in January (BARELY A DENT WAS MADETH), the AAA games streaming options are now Xbox Cloud Gaming – via Game Pass Ultimate or GeForce Now (GFN), from Nvidia.

The former is handy if you want to go all in on the Xbox ecosystem (and want to play anywhere) but the latter, I’ve only really dabble with here and there. We’re not a gaming PC house so getting access to Steam stuff is… difficult. To get around this in the short term we’ve basically been using an Apple Magic Keybord, an Nvidia Shield, and an Xbox controller to play via GFN.

A bit of a faff.

But the kids liked it and it was a chance to experiment with some different games. HOWEVER. A couple of weeks ago I spotted, purely by chance really, that Nvidia had gone and released the GFN streaming app for my TV (the 2020 LG CX).

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It’s nothing short of revelatory. App-based instant games streaming. We’ve got an old PS4 controller bluetoothed to the TV and we’re off to the races.

Downsides: you’ve got to buy the games via Steam first (this is where Game Pass has the advantage).

Upsides: all those PC games you’ve missed? Right here, right now. Can’t afford a AAA console or a (ridiculously priced) gaming PC? Sorted.

Among everything else going on in games at the moment, this continual lowering of the barrier to entry to AAA gaming is the one that’s most exciting to me.

A few of gaming articles of note:

Finally… what am I playing?

  • Midnight Suns (Xbox). I can’t put this down.

  • Destiny 2: Lightfall (PS5). I’ve sworn to my fireteam I will be raid ready by the weekend 😬

  • Wario Ware on the GBA via the Switch. Why? Here’s why.

  • Pedestrian (PS5) – really quite charming.

  • And eventually… all the VR2 games mentioned above.

What are you playing?


4. THAT’S NO MOON!

This is kind of mental.

Reddit user ibreakphotos had a hunch that maybe Samsung might be doing something extra with its “space zoom” moon photos and, after digging a bit deeper and running a few tests, has declared that they are basically all fake.

“Many of us have witnessed the breathtaking moon photos taken with the latest zoom lenses, starting with the S20 Ultra. Nevertheless, I’ve always had doubts about their authenticity, as they appear almost too perfect. While these images are not necessarily outright fabrications, neither are they entirely genuine…”

tldr; ibreakphotes downloaded a high-res image of the moon, downsized it 170×170, applied a blur, then put the image on a monitor before turning the lights off and taking a photo from the other side of the room.

This is what happened:

Now look, there’s probably some VERY SMART AI/ML stuff going on in the background here but it’s not just scaling up, it’s seemingly adding detail as well.

Nuts.

Read the full thesis over on Reddit.


5. THE MATERNITY PLEDGE

Here’s a thing. It’s not often one of your best mates says something like ‘Yeah, so the wife has launched a new venture that I think is really bloody brilliant and you should look at it’

But when your best mate DOES say that, you should pay attention.

That’s why I’m sharing this with you today.

The Maternity Pledge is a free to join workplace pledge that supports employees who are pregnant, on maternity leave and returning to work. It also includes perinatal mental health support packs for employees when they confirm their pregnancy at work. 

Retention of working mothers remains a big issue – 60% change jobs after maternity leave. The pledge puts five simple pillars in place that start from pregnancy right through until the return to work. It comes with a handbook and tools to help implement the pillars really easily and a digital badge to indicate to current employees and new talent that you are supportive of working mothers. It’s great for smaller businesses who need some help with their maternity policy, and equally good for larger companies who may already be meeting the pillars of the pledge as the badge provides visual recognition of what they’re doing well.

The pledge also focuses on wellbeing. You can purchase perinatal mental health support packs for your staff. These expert-led unique packs focus on the emotional transition to motherhood. They’re inclusive (mother being an inclusive term as per 2019 UK law), can be given to expectant mothers or fathers, and include a free subscription to The Maternity Pledge members club which runs during maternity leave and includes coaching and guidance on returning to the workplace.

If you’d like to know more or join the pledge you can register at https://www.maternitypledge.com/join-the-pledge or email susannah at maternitypledge dot com for a chat.

So do that, yeah?


BONUS SECTION

THIS IS THE BONUS SECTION. A SECTION THAT THIS WEEK I MAKE NO APOLOGIES FOR BECAUSE HONESTLY I THINK IT MIGHT BE LONGER THAN THE REST OF THE SODDING NEWSLETTER. SORRY NOT SORRY.

ENJOY.


YOU ARE REACHING THE END OF THE NEWSLETTER. MIND THE GAP.

OK so hot damn, I thought this one would be a lengthy edition. If I lost you in the bonuses there for a bit, I’m sorry (I’m not sorry).

As is the norm at this stage of proceedings, I tend to say thank you. Maybe recommend a thing or two (new Mando is quite good; I’m slowly catching up with TLOU).

I’ve got some Destiny to play and a Raid to get ready for.

Until next time.

Whatley out x

PS. Hit that reply button – tell me your favourite thing this week 🙂

PPS. Here, have some potatoes.

Five things on Friday #341

Things of note for the week ending Saturday January 28th, 2023.

INTRO

Two editions in two weeks? Ambassador, you are spoiling us. What can I say? Sometimes the words come and sometimes they don’t. I’ve learned to recognise and embrace the former and make my peace with the latter.

No matter what, the words will come when they’re ready.

It’s funny, even writing that now – we had to submit something a few months ago, the words wouldn’t come. I knew they would, eventually, when they were ready but they didn’t for a long time. I had to have faith. Faith in myself, faith in my ability.

Faith in the words.

And sure enough they came. All 1200 of them. In one go. No edits. Madness.

Reading back over last week’s edition, it feels reflective – looking back a fair bit – at old links, older stories. The symptom of diving back into the unused link logs since October. The good news is that’s done now – so this edition is FRESH.

At least, I’m aiming for it to be.

So let’s find out if I’ve done it, yeah?

LET’S.

Usa Network Jump GIF by Temptation Island

1. DEALING WITH LAYOFFS, IN TECH, GAMING, JOURNALISM AND MORE

Since Meta’s 11,000, Google’s 12,000, Twitter laying off 4,000, and Microsoft’s 10,000… and that’s before the swathes of journalists were laid off from everywhere from Adweek to the Washington Post this week, there are a lot of people looking for work right now.

Hard to dismiss this is a ‘post-covid rebalancing’ when so many livelihoods have been impacted (plus: it patently isn’t just that).

The point is: it’s rough out there.

Source: layoffs.fyi

Having personally been through redundancy a few times (on all sides of the table) it is a horrible experience.

From a purely gaming-based perspective, there is at least some light at the end of the tunnel. Over on Linkedin, the incredible Amir Satvat has pulled together some fantastic resources for those looking for new employment (including this superb community vacancies spreadsheet – featuring 13k vacancies!).

If you find this helpful or useful at all, don’t thank me, thank Satvat.

If you’ve been hit by any of the layoffs and need some help, with connections, CV help, just a friendly chat – whatever – then do please get in touch.

Xx


2. CALL OF THE VOID: SEVEN YEARS ON

The lovely Holly (hi Holly) shared this during the week and it is a fascinating read.

Written by a self-professed analyser of plane crashes, it looks at every inch of detail we know and pulls together a compelling argument for what truly happened to the still missing flight MH370.


3. THIS WEEK IN GAMING

This week: LOTS TO TALK ABOUT.

  1. Xbox dropped Hi-Fi Rush out of nowhere (certified banger – oh and, as it turns out, one of the devs worked on Viewtiful Joe – what a game!)

  2. Dead Space arrived to rave reviews (not my cup of tea – I don’t like scary games, OK?!)

  3. Goldeneye re-released on Nintendo and Xbox (1997 nostalgia hit)

  4. The PlayStation DualSense Edge (aka ‘the Pro controller’) landed on doormats for all pre-orderers (hello).

  5. Aaaand vampire-teamup-killathon, REDFALL, looks all kinds of ace (10min gameplay video).

OK, so what else?

So look, I need to confess. Let’s just get this out of the way right now:

I am very excited about PS VR2

PS VR2 Release Date, Price, Design & Specs - Tech Advisor

Yes it is a lot of money but a), I really want to play it (I’ve been saving for it and the other half may have offered to go halves with me for Christmas) and b) I can kind of (?) justify it because this is both in the interest of my job and my hobby/passion – and that’s that. If you’re unaware when this thing comes out, on tech specs alone, it should easily be the best VR kit on the market. Which is kinda nuts?

Game wise, there is a LOT.

37 PSVR2 Games Confirmed for Launch Window as Sony Posts Full List | Push  Square

Personally, on day one I’m looking at No Man’s Sky and Gran Turismo 7 (both free upgrades), Horizon Call of the Mountain (in the box), and almost certainly a paid upgrade for Tetris Effect. I’ve got a teeny tiny eye on Tentacular (it looks bonkers) and outside of that, I’m also keeping my eyes peeled for the heavily rumoured VR2 port of the critically acclaimed Half Life: Alyx.

I’d probably give a kidney for Wipeout upgrade path but that’s for another day.

Do you VR?

If so, which one? What do you play? Where? I’m interested. Let me know in the usual way (the reply button). Thanks x

What am I playing?

After describing my gaming funk last week, I’ve downloaded a few new games from Game Pass and PlayStation Plus just to give me an indie-shaped break from a heavy AAA completion.

First up on my list is: Jett: The Far Shore (on PlayStation Plus Extra).

Super lush. Super gentle. Super exactly what I need right now.

Hi-Fi Rush has arrived (see trailer linked at the top, available on Game Pass) just at the right moment also so I’ve got some really nice little games to tide me over until the next AAA eats up all my time.

Plus there’s the small matter of Destiny 2: Lightfall to look forward to next month. February is looking aaaaaall kinds of busy.

Might have to book some time off 😁

What are you playing/looking forward to playing next?

Fun fact/aside: something for the Warzone 2.0 players, you can refuel the heli at the gas station – who knew?


4. SOMETHING SOMETHING AVATAR IS ACTUALLY KIND OF GREAT?

TWO BILLION DOLLARS? WHAAAAAAAAAA.

And they said it would be rubbish.

They said no one would care.

And yet here we are and renowned cinematic pioneer and outrageously decent director of all movies that spend >50% of their time in the water, JAMES CAMERON, has delivered a corker.

I don’t care that the editing wasn’t that great. I don’t care that the story beats felt saggy in places. I don’t care about the moans and complaints that it wasn’t ‘that good’. Rubbish. It was magic and the dollars speak for themselves.

Sitting in the IMAX with my Mum and the Mrs the other night watching this for the first time – in 3D with HFR – I was completely and utterly transported back to Pandora. A place I first experienced for 15mins on ‘Avatar Day’ back in August 2009. A place I loved to visit in the way it was supposed to – in 3D IMAX. And at some points, in the water scenes specifically, it was like being in a God damn aquarium; I could not believe what I was seeing.

The pinnacle of special effects. A must-see for cinema fans. For event film fans. For everyone. I don’t care if you disagree, don’t even bother telling me.

I will only accept messages that say: ‘Oh damn, James, you were right’ – thanks.

Read more: Avatar to become only the 6th ever film to pass the $2bn mark.


5. MY BROTHER IN CHRIST, HOW IS IT 2023 AND YOU ARE STILL TALKING ABOUT THE METAVERSE?

The Metaverse - prospects and possibilities | Eidosmedia

We nearly did it. We nearly got through the whole newsletter without having to do it and look, I’ll be honest, I really wanted to write a newsletter without mentioning it.

But three things happened this week that made me think I had to do it.

First, the idiots at McKinsey are back at it again. This time with this rubbish:

It can’t even make it out of the first paragraph without misappropriating gaming success/moves for metaverse tosh.

Two thousand words of utter nonsense that not only manages to wilfully convolute the successes of Roblox (54m DAUs) and Fortnite (30m DAUs) with empty Web3 wastelands such as Sandbox (literally 700 DAUs) – I’m not kidding – but also manages to completely ship the bed with these amazing three ‘key steps’ for success:

  1. ‘Start with Why. [Ask yourself] why does the metaverse fit into our growth and innovation agenda?’ – clue: it doesn’t

  2. ‘Get Practical. Try not to be gimmicky’ – ummmm

  3. Hire a Chief Metaverse Officer. HAHAHAHAHA I WISH I WAS JOKING.

I just can’t anymore with these guys.

Second, if the McKinsey piece made me laugh out loud, this next joke made me genuinely angry. I don’t even want to link to it.

HOWEVER if you’re going to write stuff like this:

‘As we all know, it is a hugely challenging time for the SME community amid the difficult economy and shifting consumer behaviours. This becomes even more pertinent for bricks and mortar operators who also have to contend with the ‘death of the high street.’

The good news is the metaverse have[sic] the answer.’

Just makes me so angry. If you’re a small/medium enterprise struggling with the death of the high street do not invest in sodding metaverse.

Irresponsible and dangerous idiocy.

And get a damn editor and a fact checker.

I’m not linking it. They don’t deserve the clicks.

Third and finally, as much as I do love an OREO love in (I spent two years of my life at Publicis working on the brand across UK and Europe), I wouldn’t be being true to my values if I didn’t call out this ridiculous piece of (admittedly US-centric (and fortunately nothing to do with the brilliant European team)) work that is this ‘OREO metaverse activation’.

Remember the golden rule: when people say ‘metaverse’, they either mean ‘video games’ OR they mean an empty 3D website.

Which one is the ‘The Oreoverse’ do you think?

I’ll let you decide.


BONUS SECTION

THIS IS THE BONUS SECTION. BONUS LINKS THAT BUMP US OVER FIVE THINGS BUT DUE TO TIMING AND SELF-IMPOSED WRITING RESTRICTIONS ARE LIMITED TO PITHY COMMENTARY ONLY.

ENJOY.


YOU ARE REACHING THE END OF THE NEWSLETTER. MIND THE GAP.

It’s been nice to boot this thing back up again. I would make this longer but it’s now 9am on Saturday morning, coffee has been consumed, and the weekend chores are calling.

How are you doing out there?

Hit that reply button, it’d be great to hear from you.

Until next time,

Whatley out x

PS. In Bristol? We’re hiring: a campaign production manager and a senior account manager for the PR & Comms team.

Five things on Friday #340

Things of note for the week ending Sunday January 22nd, 2023

INTRO

Howdy, stranger. How the hell have you been? I know I know. And I checked, it’s been 100 days since we last spoke. One of the last things I said before I signed off last year October was:

‘Work is about to get very busy and what with half-term around the corner, I can already sense the time disappearing into the long nights ahead. But hey, let’s not worry about that quite yet…’

Pleased to know that I absolutely definitely saw that one coming. Did not know just how busy life/work/things would get (and frankly they still are – I’m writing this to you at 937am on Sunday morning, I’ve got my coffee to my right, my kids playing Minecraft to my left – I’ve not even opened the ‘#5things’ link sheet I keep running in the background… this may take some time) and the best thing is, there’s barely anything I’ve been working on that I can tell you about… well, we’ll see about that later.

A fair amount of other stuff has happened while I’ve been off and while I’m not going to spend this whole edition reflecting on it all, some of it will bubble up in the THING selection I’m sure.

For the newbies: welcome. Some of you might be here for the bants, some of you might be here for the interesting things and some of you might just be here for the infrequent metaverse fact-checking. Whatever your reason, you’re very welcome here and fingers crossed you decide to stick around.

What else can I tell you?

No, actually – let’s leave it there and get right on down to THE THINGS, shall we?

LET’S.


1. YES, IT’S 2023 AND PEOPLE ARE STILL TRYING TO MAKE ‘METAVERSE’ A THING.

I think I did alright y’know. I mean we’re what, three weeks into 2023 and I’ve barely written a thing about the absolute horse manure floating around on this ‘topic’. The restraint should be applauded. I wanted to head into the New Year with an open mind.

And yet, whenever I see the words ‘[So and so] did X in tHe mEtAvErSe’ I have this weird reaction of ‘Wait, are we still talking about this? Didn’t this die last year?’

Apparently not.

For the newbies here, this is all you need to know –

When someone uses the M word, just ask them: ‘Yes, but what do you mean?’ – if they say: ‘Decentraland’ (or any other Web3 desolate wasteland), openly laugh at them and ask how many users they hope to reach. If they say ‘Roblox’ (or any other sandbox game such as Fortnite or Minecraft’, say ‘Oh, you mean video games?’ – and then move on.

Because in 2023, we’re all just going to call things what they are. OK? OK!

What have we got in this section this week:

1. HOW SUCCESSFUL ARE BRANDED METAVERSE ROBLOX EXPERIENCES ANYWAY?

A few editions ago now (Thing 1, issue 337), we took a cursory glance at the early response to the heavily reported on Walmart Roblox experience.

In the above article, smart person Peter Gasston takes a better/deeper look at these numbers and some of the other branded Roblox experiences also available on the platform. If you’re hearing metaverse things or being told ‘success stories’ about these activations, then definitely read this – it’s a great reality check.

2. OH YEAH! THIS:

“A spokesperson for the Commission [said its] purpose was to “increase awareness of what the EU does on the world stage” among 18-to-35 year olds found “primarily on TikTok and Instagram” who are “neutral about the EU” and “not typically exposed to such information.””

I know we’re going back to pre-2023 on this but still, this is an exorbitant amount of money to be wasted on what is ostensibly someone’s failure to conduct any serious due diligence on exactly how to reach any amount of young people.

Ridiculous.

3. WHAT ELSE.

Oh hang on, this isn’t metaverse related. Just McKinsey. I mean, why would you believe a damn thing it ever publishes?

SMALL BITS:


2. THE ORAL HISTORY OF THE GREATEST DISNEY FILM EVER MADE

“There’s a strange, magical moment where once you’ve worked on it for long enough, the movie starts to tell you what it wants. It will reject things that feel unnecessary or forced upon it. But it will also ask for those moments that it needs. It just became clear in watching it over and over again that the balances had to be shifted constantly until we found that dance between sincerity and ridiculousness.”

“We actually didn’t think that we would (a) ever be able to license the music or (b) be able to depict Elvis in the movie. We figured at some point someone was going to pull us aside and say, “You can’t do that.” But representatives of the Elvis estate came out to look at our story reels, and they got behind it. So strangely we found ourselves having a premiere at Graceland. We got a special tour of the vault at Graceland where we took a look at these crazy rhinestone jumpsuits…” – wonderful.

This is such a great read.

If you’ve never seen Lilo & Stitch, you really should change that x


3. THIS WEEK IN GAMING

Let’s kick things off with a sweet faux-3D Piccadilly Circus World of Warcraft thing from the talented geniuses I work with at Diva.

Isn’t it great? Love this. We also saw it in person, which makes it even better.
Also available on Linkedin.

Now onto the news:

SOME EA x FIFA OBSERVATIONS

The EA and FIFA split (and let’s be absolutely clear on this: it was EA who did the dumping in this relationship) continues to be an excellent story of success being the best revenge.

December’s World Cup, arguably the best/worst example of exactly how corrupt the football’s governing body has become (Google ‘Salt Bae World Cup’ for literally just one example – or simply ‘Qatar deaths world cup’ for perhaps a less fun read), undoubtedly served to double underline how much of a wise and well-timed moved this was from EA’s execs.

FIFA, in its hubris, after telling everyone that it would build ‘the only FIFA video game worth playing’ (or some such nonsense – sorry, I can’t be bothered to google the quote – but it was ridiculous), went and announced a new FIFA game… in Roblox.

FIFA

And y’know what, I could probably get behind this. It’s undoubtedly true that Roblox is predominantly played by young(er) people, and getting them onboard with football – in the spaces where they are handing out – makes strategic sense.

Except the execution was terrible? 11.6m visits and 5m uniques isn’t to be sniffed at admittedly (for context: FIFA 23 – EA’s final FIFA game – sold 14m copies in Europe alone) but still, AAA content this ain’t.

Roll on July when EA Sports FC turns up and let’s see what happens next…

As an aside, EA Sports has now successfully predicted the World Cup winners FOUR WORLD CUPS IN A ROW. One to keep an eye on when you’re doing the sweepstakes in a few years time eh?

WHAT ELSE CAN I TELL YOU

Oh, Adage went ahead and wrote up ‘The top five gaming activations of 2022’ and… well.. I’m not really sure how they define ‘gaming’ (or ‘activation’ for that matter) but let’s just a take a proper look for a minute.

We have:

  1. There’s the universally panned* Wal-Mart x Roblox.

  2. Then a Tampax x esports team sponsorship. I like this. More please.

  3. Pacsun x Roblox (recreating a shop in Roblox, big whoop)

  4. Carl’s Jr and Hardee’s with Twitch. This is just live-streaming?

  5. American Eagle and Twitch… and this is streamers talking about their clothes.

Absolutely mental stuff.

Aside from setting no real criteria for elevating anything into the nebulous stratosphere that is know as ‘Top’, the activations listed are just plain odd. This feels a tad gatekeepery but it’s kinda telling that when your top five is made up of two Twitch streams, two Roblox worlds, and an esports sponsorship package I wonder if people know what it means to activate in a game?

Other news bites:

AND FINALLY: THE MUCH MISSED ‘WHAT AM I PLAYING’ SECTION

We did a TON of work for Modern Warfare II so full disclosure, I got a code from work and played the my way through the single player campaign. I hadn’t touched a COD properly since Infinite Warfare (and its bonus PSVR section) and I must say, I thoroughly enjoyed MWII. Incredible graphics (the Amsterdam level has to be seen to be believed) and just set me up nicely for Warzone 2.0 (the new DMZ mode is excellent – and I’ve played SO MUCH of it, Destiny has barely got a look in).

I finished (and platinumed) God of War: Rangarök. What a game. Honestly, yes it looks incred but the character development in this game – especially in the latter half of the game really is fantastic. I get why so there were so many arguments about whether or not this should’ve been GotY (over Elden Ring). Fortunately for me, I only count games in the year when I finished them. So I don’t have to make that comparison.

One word of advice: if you’re playing Ragnarök, don’t put it down when you see the credits roll. That’s only the first set of credits. There’s one more thing to do before you see the second (and final) set. Go do it. It elevates the game massively. That is all.

Since finishing God of War I’ve hit a bit of funk. I’ve gone back to Cyberpunk2077 for a bit – see if I can’t knock over the main story of that sometime soon. And I’ve found myself wandering around in Destiny 2 again – trying to mop up this season’s story beats before the major content drop – LIGHTFALL – arrives next month.

On the mobile side of things, I’ve been completely ensnared by MARVEL SNAP. I dabbled in a bit of Vampire Survivors for a bit (and really enjoyed it) but as the games got longer my level of commitment waned shorter and I went back to SNAP.

Oh Marvel Snap. I’ve had to uninstall if five or six times now. It’s not good. I mean, it’s great but a card level collection over 1800 can’t be a good thing, right? Yeeeesh.

Anyway – that’s me. What about you? What are you playing?

Inspire me. Please. Thanks x

*see Peter’s piece in Thing 1.


4. WHAT TO DO ABOUT A PROBLEM LIKE TWITTER, INSTAGRAM, MASTODON… ETC

I mean, we had to talk about it right? Since we last spoke, that knobhead Musk went and bought* Twitter and let’s be honest, has managed to completely wreck it in almost record time.

So what to do what to do what to do.

But here’s the journey I’ve been on:

The first thing I did was go and join Mastodon.

It was the cool thing to do and well, it felt everyone else was doing it too. Plus! It was one of the few services that had a ‘find people from Twitter’ thing plugged in (see ‘Debirdify’). And people were also well up for helping others sign up too – check this write up from WSJ (no paywall).

I even dropped Twitter for a while.

But then it felt like people were splitting (quite a few of the games people left and went to Hive – which buckled quite quickly – currently I think the service has spent more time offline than it has on).

And then I realised I was missing stuff. Game news, movies news, events (eg: the Christmas gathering for Destiny 2 players – The Dawning – hosted by Bungie, completely passed me by – GRR!) and so back to Twitter I went. But it ain’t the same anymore and I’m quite unsure what to do next.

Mastodon is OK but my friends (and my news sources) aren’t there. Instagram is a no. I haven’t posted on Meta’s misery machine 2019 and I’m not about to change that.

So is it just Musk’s crap version of Twitter for now?
Back to newsletters?
LINKEDIN? (absolutely not).

I genuinely have no idea.

Blergh.

So yeah, what to do what to do what to do.

Answers on a postcard please.

*was legally made to follow through with his promise to purchase


5. THE POWER OF DESIGNING YOUR LIFE TO SAY ‘NO’

Ending this first FTOF of 2023 with a good old fashioned blog post. This one from my friend Savannah, on grief, travel, commitment – and being able to know when to put your own oxygen mask on (clue: it’s first).

Sometimes you just have to say NO – and that’s OK.


BONUS SECTION

WELCOME TO THE BONUS SECTION. OPEN AT YOUR OWN RISK. THE AUTHOR TAKES NO RESPONSIBILITY FOR THE NUMBER OF TABS YOU WILL HAVE OPEN BY THE END. NOTE: THESE ARE LIMITED TO PITHY COMMENTARY ONLY.

ENJOY..?

And finally – my favourite podcast ‘OUT TO LUNCH’ has booked its last reservation. After 100 or so episodes, Jay Rayner’s pet project has run its well dry and while I am sad to see it go, I completely respect Jay’s reasons (which you can read here). If you’ve never listened to it before, now’s the perfect time – it’s got great guests, a well-researched interviewer, and some frankly blinding restaurant recommendations to boot. It doesn’t miss.


HOLD TIGHT. YOU ARE REACHING THE END OF THE NEWSLETTER. CAN YOU BELIEVE IT?

As I sign this off to you, it’s 20:44 on Sunday night. I’ve just my running kit out for a (what looks like is going to be a BLOODY FREEZING) jog in the morning (a story for next edition) and I need to sort my desk out for work. The kids are tucked up in bed, the Mrs wants to watch season two of Russian Doll and me, well, I need to wrap this up.

I hope you enjoyed this edition – the first Five things on Friday of 2023 – and let’s hope (HOPE!) it won’t be so long next time. But hey, no promises eh?

A belated Happy New Year to you, friends.

Whatley out x

Five things on Friday #339

Things of note for the week ending Friday October 14th, 2022.

INTRO

Well, howdy.

Funny story. The above image turned ten years old last week and I only know this because not only is it one of easily several hundred photos I still have on my old/dormant Flickr account (remember them?), all licensed under creative commons but it’s also the one that always seems to pop up when you least expect it.

Turns out if you tag decent/free photos with the words ‘Facepalm’ and ‘hungover’ then they’ll start to turn up in all sorts of places.

And it never fails to make me laugh.

Hell, maybe in about 100yrs from now, you’ll be strolling through the internet, and this face will be on posters outside digital pharmacies, trying to sell you hangover cures in the metaverse.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA. ….breathe… HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

Amazing.

Anyway, how have you beeeeeen?

I hope you’re enjoying the crisp, cold sunny mornings. I am an autumn baby and I love this time of year. The browns come out from the cupboard. The coats go on… I think I might even treat myself to a new scarf.

Lovely.

We’ve got a packed FTOF for you this week and as I gaze ahead to the coming weeks, please excuse me if the newsletter takes a short break here and there. Work is about to get very busy and what with half-term around the corner, I can already sense the time disappearing into the long nights ahead.

But hey, let’s not worry about that quite yet…

— AD BREAK —

This is your last chance to buy you, or your team, tickets to the Sweathead Do Together strategy conference next week. I saw a cheeky preview of the content this week and it looks AMAZING. So if you can get along – or if you’ve got a bit of training budget left over for your strategy team – then it’d be great to see you.

— AD BREAK —

…for now, why not slip into something more comfortable, grab a cup of something warm, and join me as we explore THE THINGS together.

Shall we?


1. SO HERE WE ARE AGAIN, TALKING ABOUT ‘THE METAVERSE’

A section of two parts this week.

First, we’re looking at Decentraland and the case of the missing users – then we’re looking at the announcements from the Meta Connect event earlier in week and what that means for you/brands (clue: the square root of eff all).

Let’s do this.

Part 1: How do you solve a problem like Decentraland’s DAUs?

Since last week’s absurd Argos activation in ‘the metaverse’ (see thing one, #338), there has been a fair amount of discussion on what Decentraland’s actual user numbers are.

So I’ve been digging.

First of all, let’s address the major headline that’s been doing the rounds:

Decentraland has just 30 daily active users despite billion dollar market cap

This is categorically untrue.

I know this because there are at least three different ways you can check Decentraland user numbers. Which, well, if you had a basic grasp of any media channel you’d hope you’d know how to do this (looking at you, ARGOS).

  • You can log on to DCL Metrics (a platform built to make Decentraland’s data accessible) right now and look at the 7, 14, 30, and 90 day user numbers.
    That looks like this:

One thing I don’t recommend doing is asking Decentraland itself because you’re likely to end up in a circular conversation with its Marketing Director which ended in a lot of them saying ‘DYOR’ – aka, do your own research (I would argue asking the marketing director of the platform would qualify as DYOR but hey, you do you).

Deep sigh.

The good news is, all the bad headlines have prompted Decentraland to publish its own numbers! Hooray!

Decentraland says:

  • 8,000 DAUs

  • 56,697 MAUs

  • 6,3915 Wearables and 1732 emotes sold in the marketplace.

(Kotaku disagrees with their 8k number and I think I might too, given the methodology).

OK! Crystal clear then! RIGHT?!

I guess it doesn’t matter.

Whether the number is 30, 32, 300, 523, 1866, or 8000 daily active users (globally, btw – these users aren’t split by country, Argos), they’re still split across several thousand land parcels and the consumer penetration is so tiny… it is abundantly clear this platform simply IS NOT ready for brands.

And anybody who tells you otherwise is an idiot.

Postscript:

I asked my friend Matt to join me in Decentraland to see how easy it was to meet. We normally play Destiny 2 together so this was… er.. different?

Point is, it was the busiest I’d seen it and the chat (see bottom left) was horny as hell – in the plaza, not between me and Matt. Grim.

Aaaaand I’m out.

Onwards?

Onwards. To part two.

Part 2: What did Facebook announce at Meta Connect (and what that means for you/brands)

Did you miss Meta Connect?

FB/Meta’s big event about how not only are they building the bridge to the metaverse – with technology and partnerships and software and developer tools – but also introducing LEGS?

‘aRe YoU eXcItEd?’

NEWSFLASH: THE LEGS WERE A LIE!

‘Meta has issued a follow-up statement, which says “To enable this preview of what’s to come, the segment featured animations created from motion capture.”

(you can retweet this)

After all that! The legs were a lie! Absolutely incredible.

HAHAHAHAHAAAA—AMAZING.

Before we properly get going, let’s take a moment and pour one out for the agency reps at FB/Meta who have undoubtedly already been tasked with trying to sell this thing to literally any mug brand that will listen.

It’s not their fault, they have bills to pay, and virtual mouths to feed. Maybe ask them to blink twice if they need help? Which they’ll be able to do with the shiny new headset!

Keep an eye on the trades now as well. Who will stare back and do nothing and who will be first to wade into the dead-eyed swamp of the brands-in-the-metaverse bandwagon?

Here, have some tweets:

One more? Ok, one more.

All the easy jokes ($1499?! 1-2hrs battery life?!) and obvious notes aside, the key take out of this section is that I strongly recommend you make time for is this excellent hour-long YouTube interview with Zuckers himself, via The Verge.

I listened to it earlier in the week and made the following scatter of notes and quotes with additional fresh commentary from me in bold.

Watch and read along, or just read. I don’t mind.

  • He is visibly amused by ‘chief metaverse officers’ – lol, brilliant.

  • ‘This is year one’ – noted.

  • ‘Nothing meaningful until year three’ Remember this when you’re being upsold ‘tHe mEtAvErSe’ from your agencies and platform reps.

  • He wants the 200m PC users buying this instead.

  • Expect ‘version five later this decade’ (it is 2022!)

  • ‘The primary value is presence’ – I really like this as a KSP. And the more I hear about virtual worlds generally, this sense of ‘presence’ is important. Gamers have had this for decades, obviously, but I guess MZ thinks that some people just want to use Excel next to each other.

  • When probed about Apple’s next move, it made him visibly uncomfortable – he didn’t have an answer. ‘We’ll see’.

  • ‘We don’t share numbers until they’re a lot bigger’ – Zuck actually said this. This was the one thing I wanted to get out of Meta Connect and it wasn’t forthcoming. Again, one to bank. If Mark Zuckerberg doesn’t think the numbers are big enough then I’m pretty sure that the metaverse brand experience for frozen chips you’ve got planning can get in the bin as well.

  • ‘Who is this for?’ the Verge asked. ‘Prosumer (people that want the best VR device (demonstrably untrue, hi PSVR2). And people that want a device for productivity.’ What?! Productivity. This thing has 1-2hrs of battery life.

  • ‘We believe the metaverse will be the successor of the mobile internet’ – ugh. Does the Meta Quest Pro pass the busy mum test? I bet it doesn’t.

  • ‘Use cases are entertainment fitness social. Computer users however, they need a $2k workstation. The pro line. VR as their primary workstation. It also makes it a test bed (read devkit) for the consumer line. We will see tech from the Pro line eventually make its way into the consumer line.’ – you’re buying v1. Rule 1: never buy v1.

  • ‘This is not hardware that will make profit. Our ambition is to make money on software and services.’ – Oh wait, the hardware is sold at a profit – but it won’t recoup the R&D. I see.

  • The whole section on open vs closed is a joke. Earlier on in his keynote he made it clear he wanted developers to use his avatar devkits. Remind me, when was the last time you saw an embedded Instagram image on Twitter?

  • ‘In every computing generation pc, mobile, open v close, windows v Mac, android v iOS. Apple is closed – open needs to win out’ A smart metaphor but What this neglects to mention is the hardware failures along the way. Nokia and Blackberry were the original innovators and where are they now…

  • But what if Apple doesn’t let Facebook on its rumoured headset? – great question.

Last thing on this. About 32mins in, shortly after the whole open v closed piece, Mark is challenged about what he does and doesn’t know about Apple’s connected strategy.

And he does something super weird: he uses the word documents.

‘It’s really hard to know what documents or conversations they have over there that connect or don’t the different parts of the strategy…’.

Interesting word. The only time that word is used in the whole hour and it was entirely unprompted. For some reason it really stood out. Like, ‘do you know anything?’ (brain: dont-think-about-the-documents-dont-think-about-the-documents)… ‘It’s hard to know what documents they have over there…’

I wonder if he’s seen something…

Anyway, it’s genuinely a great interview and definitely worth your time.

Metaverse Quick Bites:

Finally, spare a thought for a dear creative friend who, after arguing on the phone with a colleague about ‘the metaverse’ this week, was asked by his wife if ‘people trying to get their clients to be in the metaverse is the equivalent of getting an email from a Nigerian Prince saying he’ll make you rich if you could just send him some money to unlock his kingdom’.

Beautiful.


2. THE LAST WORD, WITH ANGELA LANSBURY

‘The New York Times sat down with Angela Lansbury in 2010 to discuss her life and accomplishments on the stage and screen. She spoke with us with the understanding the interview would be published only after her death.’

I grew up watching Bedknobs and Broomsticks so this one means something to me. In a weird way, an ever present nanny who I knew but never met.

This is lovely and really quite moving.

The last word, with Angela Lansbury.


3. THIS WEEK IN GAMING

I finally started Cyberpunk!

After finishing the frankly superb Netflix produced ‘Cyberpunk: Edgerunners’ (I really can’t recommend this show enough. It’s anime and it’s a touch ultra-violent in places, in the way that anime can be, but it really is excellent and I’m glad I watched it before playing the game as it gives great colour to early game stuff right off the bat), I finally opened up the sealed PS4 disc I’d had since the game launched in December 2020.

And so far… it’s really good!

Image

Best tip that I had was ‘Don’t play it like an FPS, play it like an RPG.’ – and I am. And I’m enjoying it. So if you’ve not played it and were waiting it out, give the show a go then spin up the game. See you in Night City, Choomba.

Outside of that, I FINALLY FINISHED ROLLER DROME. What a game. Please play it, it’s so good. SO GOOD.

Other gaming things of note:


4. A THIRD OF CHILDREN HAVE A FALSE SOCIAL MEDIA AGE OF 18+

Ofcom released its most recent research into the risks of harm to children online this week and it’s as worth reading as it is sharing.

Adam is 8 years old. He has a profile on platform X, using a false date of birth to make him aged 13. In 5 years time he will actually be 13, but his 'user-age' will have aged too, making im 18 in his profile. Therefore, he will be able to see adult content while he is still 13 years old.

This image kind of nailed it for me. Yes, you might think it’s fine now because your supervised 8yr old is viewing content that is for 13yrs old and you’re OK with that but as they get older, and you stop keeping an eye on them, that age moves with them…

And, well, just share that image around your parental WhatsApp groups, yeah?

Thanks x


5. WHAT KANYE CAN TEACH US ABOUT ANTI-SEMITISM

The serious consequences of an unserious story.

An important read.


BONUS SECTION

THIS IS THE BONUS SECTION. BONUS LINKS THAT BUMP US OVER FIVE THINGS BUT DUE TO TIMING AND SELF-IMPOSED WRITING RESTRICTIONS ARE LIMITED TO PITHY COMMENTARY ONLY.

ENJOY.


YOU ARE REACHING THE END OF THE NEWSLETTER. MIND THE GAP.

It was World Mental Health Day earlier this week. Richard Huntingdon wrote this incredibly personal and moving post – and I hope you read it.

I’ve written in these pages before about my own struggles in the past.

If you’re finding things difficult then please know you’re not alone and that you can talk to me anytime. I mean it.

There’s a reply button for a reason x

Keep going. Please.

Until next time,

Whatley out. x

Five things on Friday #338

Things of note for the week ending Friday 7th October, 2022

INTRO

Hello friends old and new… (like – a lot of new people this week – hi!) and welcome to FToF #338.

I hope you’ve had a good week. As I write this intro section to you now, it’s a little past lunchtime on a Thursday afternoon. I’ve been over in Bristol this week, catching up with the Diva gang IRL and generally soaking up the decent Bristolian vibes.

Much fun (mostly).

If there’s one thing you have to watch this week then it’s the video embedded below. I don’t care what else has happened, or even if you read literally nothing else in this week’s edition – the first and official thing we are starting with is something that happens to be funniest damn thing I have seen in months.

You have to watch it:

Thank you, Damien Mulley, for putting this my way – me, and the kids, are still laughing about it.

What else can I tell you?

Oh, yes!

In a personal career high point, I was invited onto Mark Pollard’s Sweathead podcast (iTunes link also available) and honestly, it couldn’t have come at better time. We talked about confidence, strategy, gaming – and strategy & gaming together.

Recording this with Mark sincerely meant the world to me, so I hope you enjoy it.

Finally for this introduction section, if you caught last week’s edition then you’ll know that thanks to an extended mini-summer break we have a bumper crop of bonus links for you. That means that half of this week’s Bonus Section was written last week BUT they’re all still great… don’t judge them, OK? They’re just a bit older, that’s all.

Cool? Cool.

Anyway.

I’m chatting rubbish now.

Shall we get to the things?

LET’S.


1. WE NEED TO TALK ABOUT ARGOS

aka: this week in Metaverse madness

Sometimes you have to pull on a thread and see where it goes. This week’s that thread went and went and went… Let’s get it into it:

Argos!

You know Argos, right?

Proper UK legacy brand, Argos. Been around since the 70s.

As a kid, getting a NEW Argos catalogue was a proper pre-Christmas treat – this is how you knew what to ask for from Santa (I once saw a 20min presentation on how much the catalogue meant to one particular strategist – you know who you are). the world was at your fingertips with an Argos Catalogue.

And then growing up, if you really fancied the girl you were going out with at school, then you might save up a bit and get her something nice from [Argos’ own brand jewellery] Elizabeth Duke – immortalised forever in Goldie Lookin’ Chain’s seminal work: ‘You knows I love you

This erstwhile high street giant, a stalwart of Britain’s town centres, with its unique shopping experience – a combination of an old school betting shop and a new school McDonald’s – was bought by Sainsbury’s in 2016. And while the catalogue is no more and the catalogue stores not far behind it, Argos collection points are still available in Sainsbury’s its online footprint continues to grow.

And I mean grow. Argos Online is the third biggest retail website in the UK and over 80% of its sales now come from online (it’s funny what happens when you close the stores).

So with that brief (?) history lesson about UK-high-street-brand-now-online-UK-superstore Argos out of the way, let’s bring us bang up to date with the latest Argos advertising news to hit this week:

Campaign regurgitates reports:

“Argos and Ocean Outdoor have teamed up to launch what the media owner claimed is the world’s first campaign to run simultaneously in the metaverse and on out-of-home media.

The retailer hopes the campaign innovation will increase awareness of its premium products and tech offering and encourage people to consider buying such items from Argos.

(emphasis mine)

The retailer ‘hopes’. I see.

The press release continues…

The campaign will appear on some of Ocean’s roadside locations, including in Birmingham and Manchester, as well as virtually inside Somnium Space until 23 October. The media and outdoor agencies behind the campaign are PHD and Talon respectively.

But the ads aren’t just appearing in.. er… Somnium Space (that famous metaverse-like destination for UK shoppers), the ads will be appearing in Decentraland as well!

According to Ocean:

Argos is using the space on the metaverse screens as part of its strategy to drive consideration and awareness of premium products and tech brands.

Each of the screens occupy key locations within Somnium Space platforms to deliver maximum engagement and reach in highly trafficked and immersive areas like a conference centre, a GenesisVR Disco Club, a concert hall and the most popular metaverse gaming zones.

Areas include Decentral Games, the busiest single area within Decentraland, accounting for more than 60 percent of all traffic.

I only have one question:

How is this not embarrassing?

Somnium Space is not the metaverse. Decentraland is not the metaverse. And a single google search for the daily active user count for these spaces would tell you this test and learn experiment shouldn’t have even made onto the last page of the media response to the client brief, let alone bought. Christ alive.

Decentraland is empty.

I haven’t seen a single piece of data that suggests the daily active user number in Decentraland is anything higher than low four figures. In fact, when I went in looking for the ad myself (I found it btw), the user count in the ‘busiest single area within Decentraland’ was 162.

162 users.

How many of these users do you think are based in the UK and/or make up Argos’ target market for this ad?

According to Ocean, this number represents 60% of Decentraland’s overall population.

How is this not laughed out of the meeting room?
Did anyone actually visit these spaces before they bought the ad space?
Has anyone got any numbers on UK DAUs of Decentraland?
Literally what is the point of this exercise?

I have no idea.

“Ocean claims the screens are in “highly trafficked and immersive” locations within the platforms, including a conference centre, a disco club, concert hall and gaming zones such as Decentraland Games.”

‘Highly trafficked and immersive’

OK, so that’s hilarious. What about the other space where these ads are? What about Somnium Space? Let’s have a look.

Somnium Space is also completely empty.

I know because I have been there and frankly I am lost for words on this one.

In fact, instead of me embedding anymore tweets, you can click on the one above and scroll back up the thread. The conversation is insane.

If you can’t be bothered to do that, it goes a little something like this:

Me: Steam shows all time users are 479 four years ago. How many of Argos’ target are in Somnium’s three daily users today?

Somnium’s founder: Ahh yes, but as a marketer you should know ENGAGEMENT is a key metric (it isn’t) and engagement in VR 1000 times more effective. People can ‘feel’ these ads. But you obviously don’t that because you don’t use VR (I do).

Me: How many of your VR DAUs are based in the UK? Can you share the 1000x effectiveness data? How do people ‘feel’ an OOH ad?

SF: In Somnium, we partner with TeslaSuits which allow you to actually feel the environment…

Me: How many of your VR DAUs are based in the UK? How many of them have Tesla Suits? Can you share the 1000x effectiveness data?

SF: We don’t share those numbers…

*deep breath*

Look, you don’t have to take my word for it. Go to Somnium Space yourself and then click on ‘Visit Popular Parcel’ – tell me how many users you see. What am I missing?

I. Just. Don’t. Get. It.

The media owners gets to pop a few bottles of champers for a ‘first’ – so what? Like, seriously? ‘Hooray! You were first to tread on a dog turd! Let’s celebrate and hope nobody notices the smell!’

Ugh.

Final PS. on this. If you fancy discussing this further by all means either hit reply to this email or join the 40-comments deep conversation on Linkedin. I’m interested to hear what you think.

Metaverse quick hits:

Finally, if you’re here looking for Walmart in Roblox analysis, that was in last week’s edition (we will revisit soon though).


2. ‘SYNTHETIC GRIEF’

Image

“It is worth remembering that when the worms make their inexorable way through your eye-socket, they will not care whether you lived in a palace or a council flat. Only those you knew and touched can testify your worth; the imagined qualities of people we’ve never met are as insubstantial as those who try to exploit them.”

That is all.


3. THIS WEEK IN GAMING

Only a few things this week. FIRST, I can’t believe we got through all of last week’s things without mentioning the trombone game!

BRILLIANT. Game Pass when?

The Street Fighter 6 built-in commentary looks fun.

As an aside, I signed up for the Street Fighter 6 beta and told all my friends to do the same. All my friends made it onto the Street Fighter 6 closed beta and I… did not.

So if anyone has one or knows how I can get one TELL ME PLEASE. THANKS.

What else? The trailer for the new Super Mario movie is out. Chris Pratt is doing the voice. People are unhappy. I made a joke about Charles Martinet missing out and the replies are INCREDIBLE.

I’m playing:

  • Drifting in and out of Destiny 2’s latest season.

  • Played a ton of ‘Let’s build a Zoo’ with the kids last weekend; wholesome fun.

  • Still struggling to put Roller Drome down. IT’S SO GOOD.

I’m looking forward to:

What are you playing?


4. IT’S A GOOD TIME FOR GOOD TELLY

But before we get to that, I wanted to kick off with this. Tom Wakeling’s ‘Pattern’ – in Tom’s words:

It uses a unique ‘no-CGI’ effect to tell its story of a man being overwhelmed. It’s just picked up a Staff Pick award from Vimeo and it might be of interest to your 5 things peeps.

I think it’s beautiful.

What else? I’m watching and enjoying:

  • Rings of Power (I love being back in the world – and I don’t care what you say, I’ve been enjoying the slow build. Oh – and don’t be racist, thanks). Good reading here.

  • Andor (good writing, top casting, and a slow pulse of a political thriller building underneath – I love where this is going),

  • She-Hulk (a seemingly harmless yet highly playful MCU adventure that’s eminently watchable thanks to a cast who just want to have fun).

And for what it’s worth, I don’t think enough of you have watched LUCA.

So go do that x


5. SIGNING OFF WITH SOME FROGS

For no real reason other than it is gorgeous.

Source.


BONUS SECTION

YOU SAY BONUS. I SAY BONUS. WE SAY BONUS TOGETHER.

THERE WERE SO MANY LEFT OVER LINKS FROM LAST WEEK’S EDITION, THAT THIS WEEK’S EDITION IS SPLIT. I KNOW RIGHT?

SPLIT 1. NEW STUFF YOU MUST CLICK

SPLIT 2. EVERYTHING ELSE


YOU ARE REACHING THE END OF THE NEWSLETTER. MIND THE GAP.

As I write this closing paragraph to you, it’s 1201pm on Friday October 7th and I can’t believe this thing is actually going out on time for once.

If you’ve enjoyed this edition then do please forward it to someone else who might also enjoy it. You can also use this link and share it around on your socials or whatever.

ALSO if you’ve made it this far, why not hit that reply button and say hi – especially the newbies. Did you like your first edition? Will I see you again? Validate my existence!

And now I am smiling ear to ear as I hit that publish button – I hope you are too.

😁 😁 😁

Big love, always.

Whatley out x