Tinternet treats: 05:12:08

Hello Friday! Where have you been all week…. Right, what have we got then? First up is a rather nifty piece of work done by the guys at Cake PR in London. Ever been to London, seen the lions in Trafalgar Square? Well, imagined if they actually chatted back to you…. Second Engadget’s second go at the Nokia 97, iPhone killer, really?? Third is Lifeshacker letting us know about the new Opensource t-shirts, I’ll probably get one…. Last, Kotaku brings us new of a new product from Tap Tap in the form of imusic. That’s it, enjoy your Friday…be kind to your neighbour…unlike that French stiff that lives behind us

For Fuks Sake:
The Lions get a bit Lippy
Engadget:
Nokia 97 hands on part II
Lifehacker:
Opensource t-shirts available at the all new Mozilla community store
Kotaku:
Tap Tap transforms from igame into imusic

Nokia sets the bench mark

I don’t usually write about out-and-out marketing initiatives, but I happen to think hat this is a good one. Global handset manufacturer and collective group of Finish boffins, Nokia, has produced a number of benches complete with their new “comes with music” handsets integrated and placed them in cities around the UK. The really cool thing is that the music is different from city to city.   

In Liverpool, the handsets have lots of Beatles tracks and in my home town of Birmingham (Brum to those in the know) the mighty (mighty) Sabbath feature heavily. We still love you Ozzie. Also, in order to protect them from theft and drunken student pranks, the benches come complete with a security guard and a performer.     

MyTake – I thought experiential marketing had died on its arse (English term for ass) because of the associated costs, but apparently not. I think that this is good move by Nokia and will help get their brand out there and associated with music. One of the biggest rules with product marketing is that the power is in the product. How many times have you been talking to a friend and they tell you “you’ve gotta try it”? 

N-Gaging times ahead

First-up, I wasn’t that big of a fan of the Nokia N-Gage device(s), but I am a massive fan of mobile gaming – whatever form it takes. The guys over at Nokia have stuck with the market for quite a while now and I think they’ve come good with the N-Gage service. If you remember the original device and have a few dubious memories, think again, the device is no more but the games remain as a service.

Gamers can log on to the N-Gage site and download a software link that connects them to Nokia’s library of games, which they reckon will be around 30 by the middle of 2008. They already have the likes of EA, Gameloft and Glu Mobile making titles for the service, and who knows, they could get a few killer franchises on board – Spore maybe?

MyTake – Nobody really “owns” mobile gaming, it’s an open field for any brand to go in and do something great. Sure, we have handhelds from Nintendo and Sony, but a solid content-based system with some appealing titles? Not yet. With Apple getting further and further in to the mobile space, I think a true games service isn’t far off for them either. Nokia beat them to the punch on this one – can they make they most of it?