Morning Update: Backlash after IBM asks women to hack a hairdryer; Cindy Gallop has her say on Publicis restructure
Techcrunch: IBM Asks Women In Tech To Hack Hair Dryers, Women Tweet Back To Tell IBM It’s Not The 1950s
Looks like IBM needs to reengineer what it thinks about women. A tweet went out on IBM’s official Twitter feed asking women in tech to, I kid you not, “Join the #HackAHairDryer experiment.”
Not hack computer software, math problems or something of social impact – a beauty product. According to IBM’s Twitter account, that’s “what matters in science” to women.
But do something dumb on social media and ye shall receive a proper thwacking.
The Drum: Cindy Gallop hits out at male dominant Publicis Groupe restructure
Advertising consultant and former BBH New York boss Cindy Gallop has criticised Publicis Groupe for the lack of women involved at the top level of its new structure with the introduction of chief client officers running the four sectors of the business.
Speaking to The Drum ahead of her fourth Glass Ladder webinar series, a diversity initiative she is running with the 4As, Gallop said: “I find it astounding in this day and age – when it is so critical for the ad industry to reinvent itself for a more secure and lucrative future – that with the exception of Laura Desmond, the entire Publicis Groupe restructure revolves around men, and that not a single one of the four hubs is led by a woman.”
Cindy Gallop will be speaking at the 2016 Mumbrella360 conference.
Mumbrella Asia: ‘Unprecedented’ year for pitches shows brands wrestling with complexity suggests IPG Mediabrands boss Prashant Kumar
There has never been a year like 2015 for pitches, the regional head of media agency IPG Mediabrands has suggested, and this reflects a client-side community that is looking for simplicity and coming to terms with the possibilities of automation.
Speaking to Mumbrella earlier today about his reflections of the past 12 months, Prashant Kumar, president of World Markets Asia for IPG Mediabrands, said that 2015 has been an “unprecedented” year in terms of the number of pitches. On why, he said: “I think about the fact that this year seems to be an inflection point year in terms of moving to automation. I don’t think everyone who called pitch knew what they wanted, but they knew life was different enough to explore.”
Adweek: Omnicom Will Launch Third Media Network With P&G Win
After months of deliberating, Procter & Gamble has chosen which North American media agencies will handle its more than $2 billion in media spend.
The major winner for P&G’s North American media buying and planning is Omnicom Media Group (for which this is all new business). The win is so significant that OMG will launch a third media network to handle it (OMG already houses the OMD and PHD brands). Details for that network are still being firmed up, said sources with knowledge of the plans, but P&G is the charter client—it is not expected to be the only one.
Dentsu Aegis’ Carat, which picked up some P&G business in the last few years, added more work to its roster.
The Guardian: Spotlight leads Oscars race with raft of critics’ awards
Spotlight, the Boston-set investigative journalism drama, has reinforced its credentials as the leading Oscar contender by picking up awards from critics’ societies in New York, Los Angeles and Boston itself.
The New York Film Critics Online gave their best picture award to Spotlight, which depicts the hunt for evidence of child sexual abuse and its cover-up by the Boston Globe’s Spotlight team, as well as best screenplay, best director (for Tom McCarthy) and best ensemble cast.
But at IBM, it IS the 1950’s.
That’s why IBM is being left to eat the dust of every other major IT player.
Their customer engagements are boring, their marketing is boring, their events are sedatives, they’ve no interesting stories to tell, and even when they do, they somehow make them sound boring. Their decision-making processes are something not even Franz Kafka could have dreamt up. This little fracas is just a small symptom of a bigger, sadder whole.
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