Terry Levine | Noggin Advertising | Copywriter | Digital + Direct Writer | Blogging | Toronto | Canada

ARE CAUCASIANS REALLY FROM THE CAUCASUS?

Russia continues to occupy the former Soviet state of Georgia, despite agreeing to a cease-fire last week. "The Caucasus is a difficult and complicated place," one Russian political scientist told the Financial Times, referring to the small mountainous region between the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea that comprises Georgia, Armenia, and Azerbaijan. Wait, do white people really come from the Caucasus?

More here.

GREAT SPEECHES.

Here, the first in an occasional posting of great quotations.

"It is from numberless diverse acts of courage and belief that human history is shaped. Each time a man stands up for an ideal, or acts to improve the lot of others, or strikes out against injustice, he sends forth a tiny ripple of hope, and crossing each other from a million different centers of energy and daring, those ripples build a current that can sweep down the mightiest walls of oppression and resistance."

-- Robert Kennedy, 1966

ARE YOU A CLOSET JEW?

Are you secretly proud that William Shatner and Leonard Nimoy were the first Jews in space? Do you actually like eating matzah when it's not Passover? Do you have trouble deciding whether Barbra is still your favorite diva now that Madonna is Jewish too?

Then you'll love this trailer for the Toronto Jewish Film Festival.

WHY ARE GEORGIA AND GEORGIA BOTH NAMED GEORGIA?

The Web site of the president of Georgia was temporarily moved to servers based in Atlanta, Georgia, over the weekend, after what appeared to be an attack by Russian hackers. The move was overseen by a Georgian-born executive at a technology company based in Georgia (the state), who happened to be on vacation in Georgia (the country) when the fighting started. Why does a country that was formerly part of the USSR have the same name as a state in the American Deep South?

More here.

OUT OF THE BOX. AND INTO MY TUMMY.

Love this from DraftFCB in New York. Very clever.

Chief Creative Officer: Chris Becker
Executive Creative Directors: Sandy Greenberg, Terri Meyer
Art Director: Jeseok Yi
Copywriter: Claudio Lima
Photographer: William Tran

FORTUNE.

"Fortune favors the prepared mind." -- Louis Pasteur

THE SECRET TO GOOD COMMUNICATIONS.

ABC News journalist Martin Bashir is in a bit of hot water for some tasteless humor during a speech he gave to the Asian American Journalists' Association. There's one line in the speech however, which he attributes to 19th century British Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli (but which I can't find anywhere else), that I found rather clever.

"Every speech that I give I regard as a dress on a beautiful woman. It needs to be long enough to cover the important points and short enough to keep us interested."

Good advice to worried marketers who favor a kitchen sink approach in their communications vehicles.