World's first commercial solar plant sees the light

In the arid Spanish countryside, PS10, a dazzling array of 624 1,292-square-foot mirrors, directs sunlight to a receiver atop a 35-story tower. There the blast of tight boils water into steam that generates 11 megawatts of electricity, enough to power 6,000 homes. The first commercial-scale power plant of its kind, PS10 came online in March. PS10-type technologies are less expensive to manufacture than photovoltaics, but they work only in very sunny areas. Abengoa, the company that built PS10, has begun a sister project nearby that wilt produce 20 megawatts of electricity. These, together with other planned solar projects at this site, will soon generate 300 megawatts, enough electricity to power 180,000 homes, equivalent to the neighboring city of Seville.

World's Craziest Hotels

1. Ice Hotel (Sweden): 6,000 square feet of ice and snow

Made up of over 6,000 square feet of ice and snow, it's the largest - and the original - ice hotel in the world. Guests sleep in a thermal sleeping bag on a special bed built of snow and ice, on reindeer skins. In the morning, a cup of hot lingonberry juice is brought to their bedside. After enjoying a good (?) night's sleep on a bed of snow, that morning delivery should be quite a delight. With an average temperature of 17 degrees Fahrenheit, bring lots of layers, or just visit the Absolut ICE bar and drink some vodka to stay toasty - in more ways than one.

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Discover the Facts You Need to Know About the World Pharmaceutical Market

Dublin - Research and Markets has announced the addition of "The World Pharmaceutical Markets Fact Book 2007" to their offering

Facts, figures, forecasts and statistics on pharmaceutical markets and companies around the world. The need to understand world pharmaceutical marketplaces, and be able to answer quickly those questions that arise daily, is essential. Therefore an authoritative, current and comprehensive market intelligence source is an invaluable aid for every executive. And that source is The World Pharmaceutical Markets Fact Book 2007.

The 318-page Fact Book brings together a range of often difficult to source information in one single, convenient publication. Keep it near to you at all times, or consider an electronic version to share with colleagues for the search and retrieval of specific information.

It covers 64 key countries and Performance information on 80 major companies The Fact Book presents financial performance figures on leading companies from Abbott and AstraZeneca to UCB and Watson.

Answer questions such as:

* Which country has the highest spending per capita on pharmaceuticals?
* Which pharmaceutical markets are growing the fastest?
* How does the Brazilian market compare with Mexico and Argentina in terms of total health expenditure?
* What demographic development is affecting the market in Latvia and Estonia?
* What will the value of the Russian pharmaceutical market be in 2009 and 2010 and what is the growth rate?

Areas covered:

* World overview
* Market data
* Market projections
* Americas
* Market data
* Market projections
* Asia/pacific
* Market data
* Market projections
* Eastern Europe
* Market data
* Market projections
* Middle east/Africa
* Market data
* Market projections
* Western Europe
* Market data
* Market projections
* Manufacturers� data

Summary:

Thousands of key market facts and statistics at your fingertips! Bringing together a comprehensive range of often difficult to source information in one publication, the Fact Book includes a global overview, five regional overviews and extensive data on 64 countries and 80 major pharmaceutical companies.

Which other business reference provides...

Key economic, demographic and health statistics on 64 markets around the world

Performance information on 80 leading pharmaceutical companies

Countries mentioned:

* Argentina
* Australia
* Austria
* Bangladesh
* Belarus
* Belgium
* Brazil
* Bulgaria
* Canada
* Chile
* China
* Colombia
* Croatia
* Cuba
* Czech Republic
* Denmark
* Egypt
* Estonia
* Finland
* France
* Germany
* Greece
* Hong Kong
* Hungary
* India
* Indonesia
* Ireland
* Israel
* Italy
* Japan
* Jordan
* Latvia
* Lithuania
* Malaysia
* Mexico
* Morocco
* Netherlands
* New Zealand
* Norway
* Pakistan
* Peru
* Philippines
* Poland
* Portugal
* Romania
* Russia
* Saudi Arabia
* Serbia
* Singapore
* Slovakia
* Slovenia
* South Africa
* South Korea
* Spain
* Sweden
* Switzerland
* Taiwan
* Thailand
* Turkey
* Ukraine
* United Kingdom
* USA
* Venezuela
* Vietnam

Let real people have a crack

Those clever chaps that started Skype have done it again. They have found a smart way of making streamed online TV a reality: They call it Joost (joost.com). The big problems of storage space, bandwidth and the time it would take to download your favorite episode of "Mork & Mindy" have been solved by the cunning devils by distributing the content and serving it over a network of personal computers. Your computer speaks to thousands of other computers, simultaneously pulls down hundreds of little bits of the program and reconstructs them on the fly. Fast, cheap, desirable and still as funny as it was 20 years ago.

Apparently this is called distributed networking and the same concept is surfacing in our own industry. Let's call it "distributed creativity."

The basic idea is that you no longer rely on one or two brilliant creative minds to crack your problem (although that is still a very good place to start). Instead, you use the internet to spread the creative task across hundreds of ordinary brains and see what comes back.

Ten years ago, a British creative director thought he could make a business out of posting briefs to a web of established freelancers all around the world. It didn't quite work. The idea was right but the execution was flawed. You don't have to be a professional ad person to come up with great stuff. Just . Maybe they won't get it 100% right but they each might add a little bit of creativity. Sifting through those little bits and then making something of them produces some interesting twists. Trust people, give them somewhere to start and some assets to play with and you will be amazed at what comes back.

Recently, over here, Sony took this approach with their follow up to "Balls" for Bravia TVs. They made a great ad, "Paint" (bravia-advert.com) but then made many of the assets available for people to pick up, play with, repackage and then pass on. Some great stuff happened as a result (youtube.com/watch?v=6X_vAzixa6s). This didn't replace the great ad from Fallon at the heart of the campaign but it added depth, energy and broader appeal.

A fresh approach to generating great stuff. Distributed creativity.

We thought this was a new development over here until we saw the Doritos ads in the Super Bowl. Great minds and great industries think alike, eh? Nanu, nanu.

By: Pollard, Ivan, Advertising Age