In Fuelhaus’ opinion, Lance Armstrong’s Livestrong brand is the freshest and most innovative brand out there right now. That’s why it’s no surprise that they would be the first to develop a unique way to spread support and awareness via Twitter. Capitalizing on the ingeniously simple, authentic and wildy successful yellow wristband campaign started during Lance’s previous Tour de France rides, you can now add the wristband to your Twitter photo and continue to share the love.

With a simple visit to their site and a little information, you’ve got yourself a yellow wrist band supporting Lance Armstrong’s Cancer Foundation and his return to the Tour. The yellow Livestrong avatar follows in the footsteps of the organic response to the recent Iranian riots, where Tweeple began to turn their profile photos green to show support of free and fair elections in Iran.

On a marketing front, The Livestrong avatar is a great way to spread brand awareness on Twitter without being tacky.

If you’re a Twitter user, you’ve probably gotten unwanted tweets from companies trying to sell us with some transparent, scammy sales pitch. Twitter is new skool. It sees through the scam. The old skool adage of “any exposure is good exposure”  is finally being challenged. We make our own rules and we can show our distate in an instant “unfollow” response. It may change, but, for now, scammy sales pitches in 140 characters or less is DAMAGING to your brand. If you’re going to Tweet, make it topical, meaningful and authentic to your followers (your tribe).

Yeah! The Olympics officially open today!
Fuelhaus is so pro, we have our very own expert on the ground in Beijing.

Nate’s Dad, David Moore, is a Sports Staff Writer for USA Today. He’s in Beijing right now covering all the great Olympic stories there. Here’s a photo of him…enjoying the sites before getting ready to work his tail off.

So…if you need any up-to-the minute reporting…give us a call. We may know something that’s not printed yet.

Due to her critically acclaimed success in the JibJab video from yesterday…Kellie has now been asked to run for President. Wow. We knew she was great…but is she ready to be leader of the free world?

Grassroot supporters seem to think so!

Ah, the circle: organic, simple, continuous, complete. It’s a beautiful shape and an integral foundation for design.

but…

Even the very best can be sadly overused.
Have you noticed the latest trend?

It seems like everybody is redesigning their logo these days…and they all seem to look like gumballs. (In the design trenches, we call this effect “2.0″)

CNet, XBox, AT&T, Xerox, the list goes on and on. I think it’s ironic that these huge companies hire these HUGE brand agencies to design or reposition their brand…and the HUGE brand agencies just spit out the same old, tired crap over and over again.

Wanna know how they do it? They parade 4-6 Armani clad “experts” into a boardroom…set up a cool presentation with Starbucks and scones… dim the lights and say: “Round means complete, innovative solutions. Dimension represents a global focus…blah blah”

Yeah, maybe I’m bitter (I’m obviously not one of those HUGE brand agencies)…but I don’t think so. I think the gumball trend is a nice catalyst for bringing up a good point:

Hiring a huge agency does not necessarily mean you are going to get better service. Actually, you’ll probably get the “C” team. Sure…the “A” team comes in and swoops you off of your feet in the boardroom with credentials and designer duds…but the “C” or “D” team…(a bunch of interns and young, cheap account execs and Jr. designers) do all of the work. You’re spending a fortune…but you’re not necessarily getting quality that equals your investment.

That being said… if you want to spend $100k+ on a logo/brand strategy just so you can tell folks you hired “so and so fancypants” then, well, you deserve to have crap.

I just wish you’d throw that $100k+ our way instead. You’d probably get a distinctive, memorable, timeless logo that truly defines your company’s brand. A brand mark that will endure 20-30 years (Paul Rand’s McDonald’s, UPS, IBM & Westinghouse logos are STILL in use today). As it is now, these logos are already on their way out. They identify the 2.0 craze of 2007-2010.

They’ll all need to be freshened up in about 3-4 years.

When the time comes…tell them to give the “not so fancy pants” experts at Fuelhaus a call. We’ll make sure it’s done right.

PS. Thanks to Von Glitschka for the cool gumball graphic. We lifted it from here.