Over the past 12 months we’ve been on a
journey with Stride gum. A long, chewy journey.

We’ve explored the outer galaxies,
pioneered new technology, created a new reason to chew and discovered a new
alien race. We’re now at the end point of this epic voyage, which is
appropriately situated at the bottom of a deep space mine.

The purpose of this interstellar
expedition?

To fuse Stride gum and video-gaming together in perfect harmony.

Hello there, and welcome to Gumulon.

Available today, free (FREE!) on the App Store,
Gumulon premieres groundbreaking chew track technology, allowing players to
control a free flowing game solely by mastication. Yes, it’s a game you control
by chewing Stride gum.

Gumulon sees you play as Ace, a renegade
alien miner who unintentionally awakes a terrifying subterranean monster. The
aim of the game is to escape from said monster, saving other miners along the
way, by jumping Ace up the deepest mine Gumulon has to offer.

Via the front facing camera of an iPhone or
iPad players use their mouths to control the intergalactic action. You chew,
Ace jumps.

With Gumulon we didn’t want to just create
a throw away branded game. We wanted to create a new experience, with Stride at
its core, that players would want to return to over and over again.

This meant starting from scratch and
building our own software to make chew tracking a reality. For this we needed a
partner, enter Johnny Two Shoes. Chew-controlled gaming. Not a trick, is it?

An indie games studio of incredibly high
quality, their hard work on the project has helped to create a game we’re all extremely proud of. We hope you enjoy it
too.

Also, a massive shout out to super-producer Dom Felton (#MajorBlazer) and creative
tech Will Hooke who have sacrificed their ability to be in same room as each
other to make this happen. Thanks guys. 

There will be more Gumulon chat here in the
near future but at this very moment in the space-time continuum it’s your duty
to go and save Ace. Download the game here.

Cannes Correspondent Alex Rogers reports.

Lesson of the day: it isn't easy to win a Cannes Lion. So to win for creativity one year then come back the next and prove it actually made a difference to client business? Well that is a triumph. And W+K Amsterdam did just that for Heineken on Monday.

To celebrate their Grand Prix of Effectiveness we drank a toast or two with said beer brand. And washed it down with a sip or two of champagne.

The morning after the night before I still had effectiveness front of (hazy) mind. I eagerly listened and learned two life lessons from two powerful women:

To be effective you need passion.  Annie Leibovitz said when you have the opportunity to work on something which you can truly romanticise, it is less of a business, more a way of life.

To be effective you need to be smart. Vivenne Westwood said intelligence consists of two parts: sweetness and light.
-The latter is led by our brain, forms our rationale and drives desire.
-Sweetness is how we empathise and engage with people.
Coupled together in advertising, this is the sweet spot when we tell authentic stories in emotionally engaging ways.

So 'passion + intelligence = effectiveness'? Not the most traditional formula, possibly one planners would refute, certainly one that in isolation won't win you any Cannes Effectiveness Lions, but who am I to argue with Annie and Viv?