Commentary

Real Media Riffs - Thursday, Feb 23, 2006

  • by February 23, 2006
THE ME DIEM IS THE MESSAGE -- Following this week's unveiling of Publicis' new new media unit--Denuo--Madison Avenue is rushing to trademark a wide range of ancient dialects. "It's a fresh idea," boasts Stephen Feuling, making an obvious allusion to the English translation of Denuo, a Latin word, which means, well, "afresh."

"The truth, is we were beginning to run out of ideas for fake media agency names, when it dawned on us that there are so many ancient ones available for the asking," Feuling acknowledged, adding that Publicis toyed with but ultimately rejected Greek, Aramaic, Gaelic, Hebrew and even Yiddish phrases before settling on Latin. "None of them worked. I mean you, had to hear [Publicis media chief] Jack Klues trying to pronounce our first option, Mensch. To be honest with you, his Yiddish is almost as bad as his French. He was really fakakta, if you know what I mean."

As it turns out, the decision to go with Latin was actually a compromise solution. Half the Publicis team was pushing for Sanskrit.

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"Rishad was pretty adamant about it," said a Publicis insider, referring to Rishad Tobaccowala, the new unit's team leader. "He even threatened to walk over the language issue, but then we told him he could be CEO. He shrugged his shoulders and mumbled 'yakShye' under his breath, which apparently means he's okay with the whole thing."

Meanwhile, other agencies have begun exploring their Latin roots. Havas is believed to be considering fortiori, which means "even stronger," while Aegis Group is said to be leaning toward the Latin contraction me diem, which loosely translates into "my day."

That phrase is being championed by Carat chief David Verklin, who believes "it will come," according to Aegis insiders.

Omnicom has locked up e pluribus unum.

"We always knew Latin was great," quipped Bill Cella, CEO of Interpublic's Magna unit, which means, well, "great." So great, in fact, that we're thinking of changing the name of this column. How does "Real Media Non Sequiturs" sound?

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