Post mortem

My friends. My dear, dear friends. My fellow marketing professionals. My brothers and sisters in brandcentric communications. My family of envelope-pushers, idea-busters, truth-bombers, paradigm-shifters and ball-belters.

I have news.

I am dead.

I mean, I'm not dead, obviously. When did a dead person ever type? (Not counting Dan Brown, of course. Fuck me - have you read any of that shit? If he wasn't dead when he wrote it, he needs a fucking colosssal excuse.)

No, I mean that my road is run, my race is closed, the show is up and the game is over. I can blog no more. This will be the last time I post here.

I know what you're thinking (and, in the case of the ladies, I know what you're screaming, sobbing and wailing): WHY, DAVE? WHHHYYYYY?

Well, the reasons are many and varied, but the most important are 1) I can't be fucking bothered, 2) Let's be honest - I probably lost it about 6 months after starting and should have cunted it on the head then, 3) My mother found my blog and told me to stop if I want a penny in inheritance, 4) I've pretty much said it all to the point that anyone who's been reading this for the last few months has the equivalent of a marketing degree, if not a P-fucking-hD.

I would like to thank you all for your interest, time, patience and continued support of what was, for a time, the best blog in the world, bar none, ever, without exception. (I don't think that's an overstatement, do you? I mean, name a better one. Go on. See? You fucking can't.)

I hope to return at some point in the future because, putting it bluntly, I'm too fucking good just to jack it all in. For now, though, I wish you good luck and good fortune. (Unless you're a complete shithound, in which case I wish you herpes.)

I am Dave Knockles. And I WAS THE CLIENT!

We win again

Can you feel it, my agency friends? Can you feel something happening to you? Something slow, something inexorable, something very, very painful and humiliating?

I can tell you what that is: it's us, the clients, winning.

Every day, we're taking control of another square inch of your domain, crawling ever forward towards that special place where all that you hold dear and true is kept locked away.

Here's another example of it.

Some genius yank client has put his business up for pitch (which is a brilliant way to fuck agencies in their paphole anyway) and is also demanding that every competing agency hands over all pitch ideas (for next-to-fuck-all money) AND doesn't want them to pitch for any competitor business FOR TWO YEARS!

This is incredible work! What balls!

Not only are they fucking the agencies now, but also tomorrow, and the day after, and the day after, and so on and so on for ages! What a marvellous frigging wheeze! It also bends one up their competitors' bott-ends by taking agencies out of the market for the forseeable. Superbulent!

Of course, this is absolutely as it should be. Clients, deserve to own all work from pitches, even losing work, because nobody would have done the work if there'd been no pitch. (Even if we only called the pitch to screw the incumbent agency's fees down! Ooh, we are naughty!) So we're doing you a favour, really, when you think about it.

And, naturally, it is only common business sense to restrict the livelihood of an agency because they may, at some point, possibly, work with a competitor. (How dare they work with a competitor? How fucking dare they?)

What's really amazing, though, is that you agency boys just assume the position, bite the pillow and let us give it to you again - just like you always do.

I know, I know - it's demeaning and insulting and makes you die inside. I know. There, there. That's it - just let it out. Oh, you poor thing. Let it out, that's the way. Oooh, have a good blow - there we go. That's it. All better now?

Yes? Good. Now bite that fucking pillow again. I want some more free ideas, you slag.

And I shall have them.

Why? Because I AM THE CLIENT!