This is a really great, amazing, wonderfully compelling, fantastic video summation of last week’s iPad lovefest:

In the Boston Apple store, how will they know if people are asking for an iPad or an iPod?

We’ve just overhauled the Portfolio section of the Igor website, improving the navigation and adding eight (!) case studies of recent naming projects: Aria, Boogie Board, Improv, Pulsar, Affinity, Firefly, Anthem, and Palo Alto University.

Paul Revere and the Raiders schilling for the ‘69 Pontiac GTO Judge. The “Judge” name came from the popularity of “Here comes da judge!”, a cultural catch phrase made popular on “Laugh-In”.

Igor’s latest naming work, The MGM / Dubai World hotel and casino “Aria”, has its grand opening in Las Vegas tomorrow. This marks the fifth hotel thus far in Igor’s naming portfolio.

MGM Aria, Las Vegas

Via The Las Vegas Sun:

The centerpiece of CityCenter — the Aria Resort & Casino — will open Wednesday, marking a day of grand opening celebrations for the $8.5 billion project…

…The 4,004-room resort and casino will feature more than 150,000 square feet of gaming space, a 215,000-square-foot pool area with 50 cabanas and an 80,000-square-foot spa, the largest among MGM Mirage properties.

The resort also will include 10 bars and lounges, and 16 restaurants. Aria will be home to Cirque du Soleil’s newest show, “Viva Elvis,” which takes guests on a trip through Elvis Presley’s life and music, with first performances beginning Friday.

Until Wednesday, VIPs and company executives will be testing the waters at Aria, ensuring the resort is ready for its first public guests.

Don’t fret, we weren’t invited either.

But did they come up with the title or the game first?

Via the Daily Mail:

Burger King has released a gut-busting seven-patty Whopper to mark the release of Windows 7. In what may be the most bizarre cross-promotional campaign ever, Microsoft linked up with the fast-food chain to create the ‘Windows 7 Whopper.’

I guess they figure anyone dumb enough to eat this will also buy Windows 7.

For those of us who toil in a nerdly field, the presence of a maverick who stomps on the terra, chokes every bead of bile from life’s clogged ducts, and then vaporizes in a defiant, atavistic lunge, elevates us all. In the Name Game, that man was John Smart of Interbrand.

This month marks the eleventh anniversary of Agent Smart’s death, and consequently the ninth anniversary of when “schwing” stopped being associated with namers. He was our Austin Powers, our Keith Richards, our Richard Branson. Most of the official record seems to have disappeared from the Web. We found only a brief account of his death:

John Smart, unarmed, shot to death on Oct. 6, 1998 when police fired at least 13 rounds into his Mercedes convertible.

That was a late model Mercedes convertible. According to published reports at the time, he was stopped in San Francisco (our fair city) for suspicion of either soliciting a prostitute or drugs or both. Police said that Smart tried to run them down, at which point his legend was eternalized. For a full, rollicking year afterwards, namers of every ilk had to add extra memory to their Palm Pilots just to handle the overflow from their social calendars.

But that equity has faded, and it’s time for another high-ranking naming superstar from a big San Francisco shop to go out in a blaze of glory. We’d happily volunteer, if we thought Igor would rate better than a small mention on page eight of the San Francisco Chronicle. No, it must be someone from a page one agency, an agency like Landor. Any takers? Mr. Wrench?

I personally blame this cover art for a youthful indiscretion of mine at a Boy Scout Jamboree in the ’70s, but that’s a post for a different day. What say we send this to the real tea baggers, give them something to rant about?

Brokeback Mountain Prequel

I have had the experience of the blue robot more times than I want to know. Although usually I just think what he is saying.

Usually.

One of the funniest aspects of alleged naming & branding firm Landor, is the ridiculous rationale they cite for the work they produce. Oftentimes they will, with capricious authority, justify a design based on what certain colors “mean” or “communicate”. These “reasons” become all the more comical when parroted by the officers of their most recent victim.

Landor’s latest for a financial company is a re-worked logo. Fiserve’s Chief Executive Jeffery Yabuki, performs the squawk of shame for the Journal Sentinel:

The new logo, which is the word fiserv. – with a period – is orange because it’s different from the common industry logo color of blue and “has a certain heat and energy to it, but not the kind of danger you perceive when you see red,” Yabuki said.

No red menace here.

Red bad. Red is color of Danger. Danger bad for financial company image.

Unless of course you can sell it to another financial client. From the bowels of the Landor site:

Landor created an identity and retail space for HSBC Direct. The use of white communicates the simplicity of the brand, while red projects a contemporary attitude.

Don't be alarmed, it's just HSBC Direct's Landorian luminosity.

Full Case study

Landor founder, Walter Landor gazing inappropriately at his half-son, Blandor.

Says Blandor the Imponderable: “I fondly recall Poppy and I attending the semi-annual wisdom tooth convention. As we sat on our haunches, grooming each other and eating our sack lunch of turkey biscotti and marshmallow toast, we would randomly jump up and shout, “Wottle up the bull throttle!”. We would then travel the 3 hours home, in complete silence, until our arrival at Mandible Station.”

More on the misspent journey of Blandor’s life.

This product is no joke. GoGirl is selling 40k units a week, those units being funnels. Apparently, women have wanted to pee standing up for a while, something of a “pent up demand”. The idea being you don’t have to sit on nasty public toilet seats just to pee. It also makes getting drunk and pissing in an alley less problematic. Their tag line is also pitch perfect, “Don’t take life sitting down”.