Promo Interactive

We’ve all seen TV-to-text cross-platform campaigns, but seldom with such show-biz glitz. When the eco-conscious documentary “The Cove” won an Academy award in last Sunday’s ceremonies and the team responsible went on stage to deliver their short and sweet acceptance speech, one of the producers, Ric O’Barry, held up a sign asking viewers to “text DOLPHIN to 44144”. more

If you’ve seen it in a theater,you may know by now that James Cameron’s “Avatar” is the most innovative product to hit American movie screens since D. W. Griffith said, “Hey, maybe some close-ups would make the Civil War more interesting.” Whatever you may think of the story, if you’re like most audience members, you’re going to be blown away by computer-generated animation that’s at once totally lifelike and completely unlike life as we’ve ever seen it in the movies.

That’s why I was so anxious to get to my local McDonald’s and order up a Big Mac: because the quick-service chain went to great lengths to ballyhoo an elaborate tie-in with the movie’s Dec. 18 launch, promising everything from online game experiences (including some unlocked by access codes from Avatar packaging) to my particular interest: a set of augmented-reality “Avatar Thrill Cards” available on Big Mac packages that, held up to a computer camera, offered interactive visits to the movie’s planet Pandora.

The Internet reality may be augmented, but the commercial reality is that among the several McD stores near my office and home, I couldn’t find one that offered the Thrill Cards in the first five days after the movie opened. more

Well, the boys are back in New Zealand now. They went up against the Department of Immigration and Naturalization and lost, but they haven’t lost their love of the music. When last seen, they were getting sounds out of everything from a barbed wire fence to a sheep. more

Game maker Electronic Arts will partner with toymaker Hasbro to create a new virtual world for the latter’s line of “Littlest Pet Shop” dolls, the pair announced last month.

The “Littlest Pet Shop Online” world, aimed at the same pre-teen girls who are the target market for the two-inch animal toys, will launch at http://www.lpso.com sometime this fall, the companies said. more

We’re watching more video online these days; according to comScore figures, a record 14.3 billion Web videos of all types in December 2008, up 13% from just the month before. Cable nets time Warner and Comcast are reportedly in talks to serve up cable programming over the Web to subscribers who get both TV and broadband. And two separate reports from The Nielsen Company find that (a) Americans viewing video on the Internet watch three hours per month that way, and that (b) the most popular Web video fare in January of this year was full-length episodes of “Lost,”, “Saturday Night Live” and “Grey’s Anatomy.”

So we’re rapidly getting used to the idea that we can watch what we like when and over what device we like, thanks to both the spread of broadband through the land and changes in our audience behavior. more

Teen fans of “American Idol”, which kicked off its new TV season a week ago, will be able to get together and party avatar-style with the launch later this month of an “AI” virtual experience within the Habbo.com world.

It will be the first foray into a virtual community for the American version of the international hit TV show, says David Luner, senior vice president of interactive and consumer products for FremantleMedia Enterprises North America, the licensing division of “American Idol” producer FremantleMedia. more