My Kitchen Sucks!, an IKEA campaign we’ve been working on with Market United launched earlier this week:

Shoddy, dated or just not functional — tell us why your kitchen sucks and you could win an IKEA kitchen to the value of $10,000.

With my partiality duly noted, I’m still gonna say that this campaign is pretty damn awesome.

South Australians and West Australians simply own up to their avocado green appliances, stained and kettle-burned laminate countertops and harvest gold linoleum tiles for the chance to win a brand new $10,000 IKEA kitchen (one to be awarded in each state). Voting is open to the public, and entrants can earn extra points by uploading evidence (photos and floor plans) and by publicly shaming themselves (sharing their entry on Facebook, Twitter and email).

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With the recent Nestlé vs. Greenpeace Facebook debacle and Kevin Smith live-tweeting as Southwest Airlines staff kicked him off a flight because he was deemed “too fat to fly”, some* predict 2010 will be the Year of the Social Media Crisis. (Y2.01K?!)


Here’s what’s happening:

Companies entering social media without an adequate understanding of the space, insufficient planning & resource allocation
+
Detractors, critics, angry consumers and mommy bloggers [*shiver*] are better able to mobilise and coordinate attacks against said companies
=
[cue doomsday music]

The perfect social media shit storm.


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I traveled over 20,000 kilometers to attend SXSW interactive – a conference referred to by some as ‘spring break for nerds’. Two weeks ago, when I started writing this post (apologies for the delay, family emergency), I had this grandiose plan that I’d write one brilliant post summarising all that I’d seen and learned. I now realise that’s not going to happen because 1. I’m sober now, and 2. SXSW is more about the people you meet (usually over margaritas: see #1) than the panels and keynote speakers.

BUT, since that isn’t much help for the handful of you that weren’t there, here are 4 of my takeaways:

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