Legendary Filmmaker Spike Lee Joins 12 Global Brands and MOFILM in Giving Everyday Consumers a Chance To Be Famous

Legendary Filmmaker Spike Lee Joins 12 Global Brands and MOFILM in Giving Everyday Consumers a Chance To Be Famous

Award-Winning Director Leads Aspiring Hopefuls with the 'You to the Power of 12 - U12' Competition To Let Their Voices Be Heard at Cannes Lions 2009

NEW YORK, April 16 /PRNewswire/ -- MOFILM today announced that acclaimed director, producer, writer and actor Spike Lee has been confirmed as the host of the MOFILM User-Generated Content "You to the Power of 12- U12" Competition at the Cannes Lions 2009 Advertising Festival, held in the South of France the 21-27 of June. The MOFILM U12 competition gives creatives all over the world the chance to develop branded communication via video for some of the world's leading brands in a competition designed to showcase global talent at the "Oscars of the Advertising World." Not only does the competition allow everyday individuals a unique opportunity to let their voices be heard, but also the chance to obtain visibility in front of top brands and an estimated 10 million video, internet and mobile viewers worldwide. With more than $120,000 in prizes and a chance to be on set of Spike Lee's next production, the competition is sure to generate a lot of excitement.

"Giving aspiring creative individuals this type of opportunity to tell their story truly resonates with me," said Spike Lee. "It's such a unique collaboration of your everyday consumer along with major worldwide brands and focuses purely around what the individual would like to celebrate about these brands."

MOFILM has brought together a powerhouse set of 12 brands to give the creative stage to their passionate consumers and creative talent around the world. Participating brands include AT&T N.A., Best Buy, PepsiCo (Doritos), Hewlett Packard, Kodak, Renaissance Hotels and Resorts, Nokia, Philips, Telstra Australia, Unilever (Omo), Visa and Vodafone International. Each brand will post a brief on the MOFILM website which will explain all guidelines to enter and allow entrants to compete for awards and prizes. Briefs are not limited to ideas linking directly to the brands themselves, but may also ask entrants to submit videos on additional topics that might include video demonstrations of a unique website experience. To further create a buzz, MOFILM will team up with film industry professionals to offer creative advice to entrants via MOFILM's Twitter page http://twitter.com/MOFILMugc at designated dates and times throughout the duration of the competition, to help assist in the creation of video submissions.

"Never before has a group of brands this strong come together with such an exciting opportunity to assist in empowering the consumer," said Ann Mukherjee group vice president, marketing, Frito-Lay North America. "The Doritos brand is extremely excited to be part of this event."

Andy Baker, CEO, MOFILM additionally expressed his excitement for the U12 competition and how it is bringing forth something new to consumers. "One of the last frontiers for open sourcing is the arena of brand marketing," stated Baker. "We are proud to be facilitating such a showcase for the power, creativity and talent of the global creative community and to have Spike Lee on board with us to take part in this amazing competition."

The U12 competition is a powerful demonstration of rarely seen collaboration from many of the world's biggest brands. Collectively they are offering aspiring talent from around the world unprecedented access, visibility and opportunity into the sometimes closed world of mega-brand marketing. This initiative was conceived during a gathering of chief marketing officers who comprise the Marketing 50 and enabled through Accenture and the Marketing 50's C-suite relationships. Accenture is supplying its innovative video service platform that includes sharing and upload technology to support film submissions through Origin Digital, one of the industry's leading video applications service providers. Also instrumental in enabling the program is Hill & Knowlton, who are providing PR and the associated web 2.0 toolkit.

"Not only are we helping these great creators achieve their dreams by giving them access and visibility to hundreds of the most senior marketers and advertisers in the world, they will additionally walk away with many amazing prizes from our participating brands," said Baker. Additionally, MOFILM will be giving away 40 Kodak Zi6 Pocket Video Cameras to encourage early entry submission to the competition. Starting on April 22 and ending on May 20th, cameras will be awarded weekly to the best early entries received before May 20th for each brand. Early camera winners will still be eligible to qualify for all final prizes.

This event follows on from the highly successful MOFILM short film festival recently hosted by Kevin Spacey at the GSMA Mobile World Congress in February, which saw film makers from more than 100 countries compete to showcase their work and win prizes including a new Chevrolet Cruze. The competition will begin on April 14, and the last entries will be accepted on June 8, 2009 at 8:00 am GMT. Brand winners will be announced on June 15. The top three finalists will be announced on June 25 and the grand prize winner will take the main stage at Cannes on June 26, after they will have provided the ultimate in "consumer feedback." The U12 competition is open to everyone. For complete competition rules and to submit video entries, please visit MOFILM at www.mofilm.com.

About MOFILM

MOFILM is a pioneer in creating tailor made content for online and mobile operators around the world. Hill & Knowlton has joined the initiative as communication and social media partners. For the latest information about MOFILM competitions please visit www.mofilm.com.

About Marketing50

Marketing 50, aka M50, is a private community created by senior-most chief marketing officer peers from globally leading organizations for the purpose of sharing insights, solutions and collaborative discovery in a trusted forum free from competition or solicitation.

About Hill & Knowlton

Hill & Knowlton is a leading international communications consultancy, providing services to local, multinational and global clients. The firm's legacy of harnessing the most powerful and efficient means of communication for its clients has made H&K a leading force in encouraging major corporations to embrace digital platforms and social media. H&K's Digital group tracks emerging Web trends and developments in real-time to ensure client communication strategies remain at the industry forefront. The firm is headquartered in New York with 73 offices in 41 countries, as well as an extensive associate network. The agency is part of WPP, one of the world's largest communications services groups.

Source: Hill & Knowlton

CONTACT: Ralph Cochrane, MOFILM, +44 161 927 3150, press@mofilm.com; or
Christina Petroni, Hill & Knowlton, +1-212-885-0531,
Christina.Petroni@hillandknowlton.com

Web Site: http://www.mofilm.com/

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