ihaveanidea | Mike Burns

by Brett McKenzie

Ottawa, capital of Canada, has the world’s largest ice-rink, beaver-tails, a pretty good hockey team (don’t tell that to anyone in Toronto), and Fuel Industries. While we don’t usually write about our own sponsors, we had to make an exception for Fuel because we plain and simply admire what these guys do. In the last two years we’ve seen the explosion they have dealt with as a result of our industry and marketers realizing that this whole “internet thing” is actually going to be big. In a few years Fuel went from four people to an almost 100 person shop. This year they were even nominated as one of Canada’s top 10 agencies. Which begs the question, are interactive agencies, or digital agencies or whatever you want to call them, real agencies? Is there a line anymore? That’s what we aim to figure out.

We know a lot of people in advertising around the world but Mike Burns, Co-Founder and CEO for Fuel is so far ahead of the game that it can make anyone that think they know interactive advertising feel outdated. If you think YouTube and SecondLife is ‘pushing the envelope,’ talk to Mike or Warren Tomlin, Fuel’s Chief Creative Officer and they’ll drag you into three-dimensional, branded, XBox quality online, multi-language, mobile GPS-enabled, RDIF-powered adver-experiences. What the@!#$? Yeah, that’s what we usually ask ourselves.

(Full interview: ihaveanidea | Mike Burns)