Yahoo and the Big Brother for creatives
A crazy idea from Yahoo! Australia & New Zealand. As Bandt (reg. req) reports, Yahoo “will send rotating teams of creatives to live and work in a transparent box as part of an innovative experiment to champion the “power of online creativity”. The Think Tank box is a fully-functioning creative studio with a desk, PC and white boards. It will house creative teams from various advertising agencies who will work four to eight-hour shifts, 24/7, creating campaigns based on the briefs submitted through the site www.yahoothinktank.com.au (down at the moment 
Yahoo’s idea aims at promoting the online medium among traditional marketers and advertising agencies, in order to convince them making online marketing a major component in their future campaigns.
Yahoo marketing director Brett Corrick explains on Australian IT:
The Think Tank box is governed by the Big Brother: six webcams and the website will allow people to observe Think Tank inhabitants, who will work in shifts of four or eight hours. Online polls will govern the style of music played in the tank each day, as well as how it is decorated. The Think Tank box will operate until Nov. 17th. Unfortunately is not possible to vote the creative who will have to leave the house.
Some clients would really like all their agency teams like that…
It’s an interesting PR stunt and it is doing great WOM for Yahoo! but not all of the feedback is positive.
We (and some others) would question both the output of the session and also what sort of message it really sends about the state of creativity.
http://diablogue.typepad.com/diablogue/2005/11/think_tanked.html
I agree… Creativity has become the most abused word in the global lexicon. Creativity is the by-product of serious thought while working within defined limitations, it is not found in a situtation where executives give a “go have fun” budget to workers allowing them to piss all over true creativity, for the sake of publicity.
See you never again Yahoo!
Thanks a lot Yahoo! Thanks for jumping on the creative bandwagon. Just when I was beginning to feel like part of your culture, you go and do something like this. I thought the brand was mine - guess I was wrong. Hmmm… actually, maybe exploiting creativity does work. It certainly is helping me with my decision-making process