In an effort to get Madison Avenue focused on the creative applications of outdoor media, the outdoor ad industry Monday unveiled plans for a new ad campaign running - where else - in outdoor media. Details of the media strategy were not disclosed, but the effort, dubbed the "Year of the Creative," was announced during a meeting of the Creative Committee of the Outdoor Advertising Association of America in Los Angeles. The new committee is comprised of artists, designers and advertising executives who will concentrate on five specific initiatives: development of an industry creative positioning and campaign; initiation of a series of innovative seminars to introduce agency designers to the creative opportunities that outdoor provides; expansion of the involvement by advertisers and agencies in the industry's annual creative competition, the OBIE Awards; creation of a speaker's bureau that will focus on outdoor design at ad industry conferences and universities; and improvement of the quality of public service advertising within the medium.

Even though more than one in three takes little notice of at least one of the top five mass media, consumers still pay greater attention to those outlets than most other venues for marketing, according to a new study from MediaVest USA.

Preliminary findings that scenarioDNA provided MediaDailyNews show Millenials are not just a phenomenon, but a new consumer force to be reckoned with. They generally go with the undercurrent, and look to their peers more than anyone for guidance and recommendations. "Marketers need to reach the Gen Y leaders to pull the masses," says Tim Stock, managing director and co-autho

As the third-quarter revenues come in over the next few weeks, the industry will be looking at radio's performance to see whether the anticipated recovery in the third and fourth quarters will materialize. Analysts are increasingly deciding that 2003 won't end as well as hoped and are looking toward 2004 as the real recovery year for radio. Bear Stearns said recently that it was expecting radio to register either flat or slight growth (1.5 percent) in the fourth quarter. It said that national advertising, which had been the driving force in the gains in radio revenues, seems to be stalling. In early September, national advertising was up 5 percent to 7 percent compared to the same period a year ago but now Bear Stearns said it's flat.

Blogs, online's niche media format du jour, are chronologically structured logs of text and images published to the Web with easy-to-use software tools. The segmentation and abundance of blog content (think anything from the naval-gazing minutiae of a teenage girl's life to the practical punditry of a tech firm CEO) is fueling a new form of online advertising.

Media buyers have successfully lobbied for changes that give them more transparency on publishers' circulation reports filed with the Audit Bureau of Circulations. But they are pushing for even more details, and publishers strongly suggested they won't make further concessions without a struggle. At issue is what the industry standard should be for that Audit Bureau circulation data, with which advertisers evaluate the $16 billion they spend each year on magazine advertising in the U.S.

After 35 years as a reporter and editor for the Providence Journal, Brian C. Jones (pictured) left his well-paying job to become a poorly remunerated "contributing writer" at the Providence Phoenix. Jones says he made the move because the Phoenix covers important stories that the daily ignores, and it provides reporters with the freedom to produce great journalism: "The alternative papers promise their readers that they will have the smarts, the courage, and the curiosity to look into stories not just because they are ignored by the mainstream papers and the other Big Media, but because they really need telling."

Media advertising does the worst job of any marketing discipline in proving return on investment and network TV is the worst of those media, according to an exclusive survey of leading advertisers.