Joe the Plumber?

Continuing the recent thread of politically-themed design posts, I’ve created a campaign sign for Joe the Plumber, a new d-list celebrity introduced to the public by John McCain in the 3rd and final Presidential debate.

As with another recent post, I’m releasing this design with a Creative Commons license, so that anyone can grab the artwork and use it for any non-commercial endeavor (or at least come up with a cleverer slogan).

Vector (.ai), large jpeg

Creative Commons License
Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.

For my fellow font nerds, the Obama-like font is Avenir, as I don’t have a copy of Gotham handy.

2 Campaigns, 2 Approaches to Microtargeting

I’ve run across a couple of nice examples of microtargeting on behalf of the McCain and Obama campaigns; it’s interesting to see the contrast in the use of technology here.*

Obama’s campaign is running ads in Burnout Paradise on XBOX 360. Fittingly hi-tech, these ads appeal to younger, connected voters; encouraging them to vote early. (via)

The McCain campaign is taking microtargeting literally with this more grass roots/lo-fi approach, This example touts McCain’s economic policy — presumably suggesting it’s “the sh**”*. (via)

*please note the saracasm

All Kinds of Awesome

Here’s some of the stuff that’s caught my eye recently that may be worth your time, too:

The Price is Right (Isn’t It?) Why shouldn’t made-for-web productions should have budget as big as their televised counterparts? This article aims to lay the groundwork putting a fair price on your digital blood, sweat and tears.

Springwise – This is a recent addition to the Review category in my RSS feed. Basically, it’s a steady stream of new business ideas—some new interesting, some stuff that’s been in the market for a while. Kind of a Trend Hunter with a business focus. Worth a look.

dev.mobi recently relaunched as mobiForge. I hadn’t really spent a lot of time exploring this site before the refresh; there’s a ton of content available. They have resources for developers, designers, marketers and more. It looks like a great resource for anyone who’s involved in the mobile space.

And if your mindset is more design thinking/trend hunting/cool data, mobiForge has a sister site, mobiThinking. The content’s not as deep as the main site, but it’s worth an add to the ‘ol feedreader.

Wecome to the social (media) revolt – the gist: by its very nature, the web is in a constant state of change and its always been about making connections, so why is social media seen as a new, groundbreaking idea?

I have to agree with Joshua’s angle; the fundamentals haven’t changed, but the tools we all use to connect/socialize/etc. are getting easier and easier for non-geeks to use, which allows more people to participate and brings the “social” bit of social media to the fore.

A simple idea that provided hours of entertainment this summer is popping up again: John McCain Is Your Jalopy and Sarah Palin Is Your New Bicycle’s Flat Tire. I think the web will be a little less entertaining once the elections are over.