With the 2010 calendar year now complete, I thought it appropriate to provide the market with an update on the performance of AdEffective over the past year, our tracking for our operational business and most importantly, an overview of the exciting opportunities ahead for the 2011 calendar year.

In 1999 the Company made its debut on the ASX; recently it underwent a reorganisation and relisted in late May 2010, changing its name to AdEffective in December 2010 (ASX: ABN).

In 2010 AdEffective also acquired several businesses and commenced development of three innovative new online advertising technology platforms focused on delivering increased yield. The first of these platforms – Footar, was launched in December 2010, with the second platform, Yieldom, set to be launched next week at DomainsFEST in the US.

Earlier today, AdEffective released to the Australian Securities Exchange (ASX) AdEffective's Investor Presentation including an address to shareholders from myself.

The address and attached presentation covers 3 things namely,

1) a brief overview of AdEffective and the online advertising industry in which it operates;
2) AdEffective’s products and services; and
3) what shareholders and interested parties can expect from AdEffective in the future.

The full address and investor presentation can be downloaded from the ASX website here.

http://www.asx.com.au/asx/research/companyInfo.do?by=asxCode&asxCode=abn#...

The global online advertising space is growing rapidly and AdEffective’s depth of unique technologies, platforms and management experience puts it in an excellent position to continue growing over the next 12 months.

Needless to say, now that the significant task of re-structuring and re-building the company is behind us, and now that we are well down the path of launching our 3 new online advertising platforms, I am very excited about what the future holds for the Company.

Almost 2 months ago, I mentioned my new role as Managing Director of The Swish Group (ASX:SWG) and our efforts to re-capitalize the company and have it re-listed on the Australian Stock Exchange (ASX).

Click here to download:

SWG acquires MP3, NiceShorts & TheScene.pdf (44 KB)

(download)

Click here to download:

SWG acquires MP3, NiceShorts & TheScene.pdf (44 KB)

 You can also access the above announcement and all other Swish Group ASX announcements on the ASX website (http://asx.com.au/asx/research/companyInfo.do?by=asxCode&asxCode=SWG#headlines).

You would probably have realised from my numerous blog posts, tweets and fan page updates that I’ve been very active of late.

Back in December 2009 I made mention of the announcement to the Australian Stock Exchange (ASX) that an agreement had been reached to recapatilise The Swish Group (ASX:SWG). I was also appointed Managing Director of The Swish Group at this time.

First and foremost my focus as the recently appointed MD of The Swish Group has been to work with the Board of Directors of the Company to restructure if and get it back on to the Australian Stock Exchange.

I’m pleased to report that the stated aim of having Swish re-listed moved one step closer last week with the announcement to the ASX of the Notice of Annual General Meeting.

The full announcement can be viewed here.

Click here to download:

The Swish Group NOM 310310.pdf (1.32 MB)

(download)

Click here to download:

The Swish Group NOM 310310.pdf (1.32 MB)

It can also be downloaded directly from the ASX here.

Should 'all' the proposed resolutions be passed (and subsequent to this, the Company succeeds in raising working capital in the weeks following) then the Company could be re-listed as early as the middle of May, 2010.

For more information on The Swish Group visit the official website here.

Whodeani, aka yours truly, has caught a case of the ‘muso’ bug.

Those close to me would know that I have long harboured a desire to be more involved in the music business, less so from a performance perspective and more to with the whole creative process bringing musical ideas from just that, ‘ideas’, through to being released commercially.

Back in the mid 90’s I was heavily involved in the nightclub industry moving from being a DJ to then designing and managing a very popular nightclub in the Eastern Suburbs of Melbourne known as Jooce.

As outlined in an earlier post (Anatomy of a Hit), I got together with a couple of friends of mine and created a jingle for this nightclub that was then turned into a full length club track that was quite popular in its day (climbing to the top of the club charts and breaking the regular top 50 here in Australia.)

Since then my musical aspirations have taken a back seat to more ‘regular’ pursuits. That was until mid last year when I was ‘inspired’ to bring to market a track called ‘Tweet Me’, a track originally called ‘Release Me’ and created with some friends back in the mid 90’s.

The release of Tweet Me was a lot of fun, enough so that I have decided to significantly expand my musical aspirations ‘and’ output with a project called ’50 songs in 50 weeks’ (or as a good friend of mine refers to it… ‘The Final 5’.)

As the project name ’50 tracks in 50 weeks’ suggests, my aim here is to produce 50 ‘release ready’ tracks in 50 weeks… ie 1 track per week for the next 50 weeks.

The inspiration behind this concept of ’50 Songs in 50 Weeks’ comes from Stock Aitken Waterman, the UK song writing and record producing trio made up of Mike Stock, Matt Aitken and Pete Waterman.

With great success during the mid to late 1980s and early 1990s the three are considered to be one of the most successful song writing and producing partnerships of all time, scoring more than 100 UK top 40 hits, selling 40 million records and earning an estimated $103.78 million (source: Wikipedia).

Their standard method for creating the music was to first write the songs, next they would record the music with extensive use of synthesizers, drum machines and sequencers and then finally bring in a singer solely to record the vocal track.

Their remarkable ‘production line-like’ output and similar song structures had the trio being referred to as the "hit factory".

My thinking is to ‘2.0’ their model using todays relatively inexpensive music recording and production technologies ‘and’ potential global exposure via Social Media.

I’ve teamed up with Paul Brandoli (from Psyked) who I met through his work as producer/arranger on the Tweet Me project. Since Tweet Me, Paul and I have worked on 2 more tracks and are about to start a 3rd.

Am extremely happy with his work and more importantly how we are working together on these new tracks. Enough so that I have committed to have Paul work as producer/arranger and sometimes ‘writer’ on all tracks in the project.

We’ll notify you as the magical tracks come to life week by week and from time to time release snippets of the tracks we are working on. Exciting times.

UPDATE: With the planned re-listing of The Swish Group gathering momentum (and my role as The Swish Group's Managing Director occupying the lions share of my time moving forward), I have handed over the day to day management of the '50 songs in 50 weeks' project to Paul Brandoli.

Much has been done in the weeks since announcing this project and I am extremely happy with the work Paul has been doing. The project is in good hands.

Whodeani has an idea…

Actually Whodeani has hundreds, maybe thousands of ideas and I’m the lucky one who gets bombarded with them daily.

Some ideas are genius. Some are hilarious.  And some are well… Some are just a reflection of the weird and wonderful world of Whodeani… I often need to get inside his head to understand him, so I can say this and not be fearful of losing my job ;-)

If you’ve stopped by the Whodeani site you’ve had a taste of the often hard to ‘put into words’ world of Dean Jones.

If you haven’t checked out the site, hurry up, it’s almost Christmas so you should head there right now.

The idea behind the Idea’s Book was to showcase and put some of Dean’s idea’s out there.  A point of difference, a point of controversy, it adds some spice to the common Entrepreneurs websites you may come across.

As I am the filter of these ideas, there are some strict guidelines around what I will and won’t publish.  The so called ‘genius’ ideas (and he has an absolute doozy ‘beer’ idea) I keep closely guarded, to some day run away with, make millions and purchase my custom white on white Maserati (a girl can dream). Whereas the amusing and weird I’ll happily share with you all.  Scrutiny and criticism is welcomed as long as you can make us laugh out loud or maybe provide an alternative point of view.

And because I love to stroke my Bossman’s ego, I’ll sometimes publish ideas that ‘he’ came up with before ‘someone’ took it to the market and made it what it is today. (Check the date markings for each idea to see when they were originally created.) So I open the vault and bring to you the latest round of Whodeani ideas…

At the top of the list I introduce the concept of ‘Onedoms’ (yes, that’s a one handed condom to avoid timely interruptions).  An ingenious idea that both men and women could be thankful for…

The ‘Next Generation Medical Bracelet/Jewellery’ is a new school take on the traditional medical bracelet.  It transforms into a world of knowledge of the wearer in an easy to access and read format by designing a USB device into the bracelet or necklace.

I often think pampered pooches are treated better then human beings.  I know of pug dog that only eats Osso Buco (any other meat is frowned upon) and Magnum ice cream for special treats.  I once tried to feed him a McDonalds chicken nugget only to receive his snout in the air of disapproval.  So this idea of Dean’s would be ideal for the pooch elitist of this world… Recyclable, disposable ‘Dog Water Bowls’ conveniently packed in a batch of 7.  A pooch on parade cannot just drink from any old water outlet.

For those of you who have never had a beer with Dean, you won’t know that he is a serial label un-dresser.  Read into that what you please.
So it was only natural that he came up with the ‘Removable Beer Labels’ idea using the back as a space for special promotions and competitions, cross advertising, marketing messages - what ever you like. The possibilities are endless.

Last… Well that’s not entirely true as there will never be an end to his ideas… Is the ‘Pen Shaped Perfume for Men’.  Not everyman can confidently carry the ‘man bag’ and more and more men are taking on womanly practices.  Running from meeting to meeting a man needs to spritz and refresh just as much a woman right?  Slide one of these babies into the inside of your suit jacket and you’re sorted.  Just remember its contents before you pull it out to sign that all-important contract and seal the deal.

Sharing is caring and I hope you’ve enjoyed the latest offerings of Whodeani’s ideas.  Always a delight to hear your thoughts so drop us a comment.

But wait there’s more… Well next month that is.

On Sunday November 2nd, 2008 (at 1pm AEST) my father, Les Jones, held his 70th Birthday party in Sorrento with close friends and family.

I was asked to do a speech for this very special occasion... a loose transcript of which (including associated slides) follows...

Les Jones 70th Birthday speech by Dean Jones.

OK. For those of you who don’t know me, my name is Dean Jones and I am Les’ eldest son.

Firstly... id just like to say thank you to you all for coming today, hope your all having a good time.

I’d also like to thank Nanette for organizing everything for today including the lovely food and generous servings of alcohol.

This is really a special occasion, the 70th Birthday of a very special person.

I've been thinking lately about how I might feel at the age of 70, that is after living through a cold war, a world war, a space race, an Internet boom and bust, the current financial crisis… and becoming a father and grandfather.

My first thought is that I'd probably be a little tired and ready for a radox bath and a bit of a rest.

But look at my dad. 70 years old, and in better shape and more active than many people my age.

As famous US Journalist Dorithy Thompson once said…

“Age is not measured by years. Nature does not equally distribute energy. Some people are born old and tired while others are going strong at seventy.”

1938 was an eventful year that saw the US economy go into recession, the birth of Superman, the Invention of the Photocopier, Nylon, Freeze Dried Coffee and the Biro pen… and it was the year when the famous Orson Wells dramatization of the "War of The Worlds" radio programme caused wide-spread panic when it was broadcast more like a breaking news story than a play.

Closer to my fathers interests, 1938 also saw Howard Hughes set a new Round The World Record of 3 days, 19 hours and McDonnell Aircraft, a leading producer of military aircraft, was founded.

1938 was also the year my father was born. November 6, 1938 in Parramatta, NSW.

Shortly after being born, my dad and his mother moved to Mein St. Spring hill, Brisbane spending part of WWII there.

In Brisbane, his Mother met Stan Jones who became his stepfather.

At the end of the war, around 1945, the 3 of them moved to Aspendale/Mordialloc where his step dad Stan opened a pastry cook business.

In 1947 when my father was around 8 years old he moved to Carlton and went to Rathdowne St Primary School.

Around this time he started working to help support his mum and step dad and had a morning paper round… and sold evening papers on the corner of Elizabeth St and Bourke St City.

In 1951, when my father was 12 years old, the family moved to a farm at Maryborough. There he would ride to and from school 8km’s every day.

2 to 3 years later, the family moved into Maryborough Township where my father, then around 14, started playing for Maryborough Seniors Cricket team

In 1955 he won the ‘Defence Department Cadet Engineer Scholarship’ and was subsequently paid a salary to go to school.

He moved to St Kilda in 1956 and stayed at a Methodist church Hostel whilst attending RMIT.

That same year my father joined the department of defense as a Cadet Engineer.

Around 1956/7 he moved to his Aunt’s (Ruth and Uncle Peter) residence in Nunawading and started playing Cricket for Nunawading. He also bought his first car… an Austin A30.

In 1958 my father graduated from RMIT with a ‘Fellowship Diploma of Engineering’ (Communications Engineering). At the completion of his tertiary education and work experience he became a Design Engineer at Government Aircraft Factories (GAF.)

That same year, his parents moved from Maryborough to Webb Street, Narre Warren where he met his future wife, and my mother, Irene.

In 1959 he moved to Adelaide for 6 months to attend Weapons Research Establishment as part of his Cadet Engineer training.

He returned to Melbourne late 1959 and started work at the ‘Government Aircraft Factories’ as a Design Engineer on the Jindivik Drone.

He bought his second car that year… a Vauxhall Velox.

The 60’s were an extremely eventful time in my fathers life.

In 1963 my father married my mum, Irene and very shortly after they were married they built and moved into their first house in Madelline St, Glen Waverly.

The 60’s were defined by 3 things… my fathers working at GAF, his starting a family and his love of dogs.

In 1966 my father would have me. 2 years later in 1968 my younger brother Evan was born.

My father started breeding and showing dogs in the 60’s and would enter them at the royal Melbourne Dog show winning many awards.

I have some very fond memories of our dogs… including my favorite… Prudence.

I remember when I was very young my teacher Ms Nichols at Yarra Valley asked the class to compose a sentence using the words ‘mate’ and ‘hate’.

I quickly raised my hand and said… “Daddy mated prudence and I hate yoghurt”.

In 1970, when I was 4, we moved to Park Orchards to a newly built house on a little under 5 acres.

I have some great memories of growing up in Park Orchards… and in particular the family home which had 36 fruit tree’s, 16 geese, 14 dogs and 4 donkeys… and lots of snakes.

Speaking of snakes… I remember my brother and our then next-door neighbor found a snake ‘very’ close to the house. My father almost fell over trying to race out the door and put his pants on at the same time.

Something I loved doing with my father while growing up was going camping… and it was during the 70’s that we started going on a regular basis both with my father’s friends and families at GAF and with my school friends from Yarra Valley.

In the late 70’s, early 80’s my father was promoted to Design Manager at GAF in charge of 38 Engineers. Around 1986 he was promoted to Chief Designer managing 250 people…and also became a member of the advisory committee for the Civil Aviation Authority.

Dave Prowse will be saying a few words shortly… and he will elaborate on my fathers time at GAF.

I left Yarra Valley in 1983 and soon after became a nightclub DJ.

As an little aside for the 80’s… I was the Park Orchards tennis club champion 3 years running only to be pipp’ed in the final for the 4th consecutive title by an in form Warren Kidd.

This pic (pointing to the pic of me and dad above) is also significant as it would be the last one with my father and me where I was shorter than he was.

In 1989, my nephew and my fathers first grandson Alex Jones was born.

In 1992 my father retired from GAF.

What does a retired career engineer do next…? Obviously, he starts a nightclub with his son.

In 1993, my father, myself and a group of friends including Charles Edleston, who is here today, started a nightclub in Ringwood called Jooce.

The venue was a huge success and everyone involved had a brilliant time.

Jooce would be the first of many business ventures that we would do together.

In May 1994, the 2nd of 3 grandchildren was born… Aimeelee.

Daniel, was born 4 years later in November 1998… and for anyone interested in buying him a present, he is turning 10 in a few weeks.

I think its fair to say that Alex, Aimeelee and Daniel have all brought enormous joy to my father… and to be fair to me, Uncle Dean.

(Short break from my speech where Alex, Aimeelee, Daniel, Thomas and Amelia each delivered a short speech to my father.)

In the late 90’s, early ‘naughties’ my father and Nanette became a couple. Shortly after, September 2000 to be precise… Nannette and my father became ‘official’ at their ‘co-habitation’ party… held here (at their place in Sorrento.)

The 2000’s also saw more grand children, this time from Nanette’s side of the family, with Grandson Thomas and Grandaughter Amelia.

In 2003 Nanette celebrated her 65th Birthday, also held here it would appear (Nanette: "No it wasn't")... and as you can see with this picture both my father and Nannette make a great couple.

I have never seen my father as happy as he has been in recent years and I know much of this has come down to his relationship with Nanette.

Not only are they great friends… but Nanette also shares my fathers love of Travel and Golf.

Over recent years they have traveled extensively overseas visiting China, Slovakia, Turkey and Istanbul.

Anyone that has met my father would know he is a mad golfer… and a very good golfer at that.

My father has made a lot of friends through Golf, some of them are here today.

Which brings us to today… my fathers 70th Birthday.

Dad… I have a couple of helpful tips for turning 70…

Tip number 1... Develop the power of a photographic memory – take photographs of everyone in your life you need to remember.

Tip number 2... Keep a personal diary – it will be a handy reminder of what you did yesterday.

Turning 70 though does have its advantages…

Things you buy ‘now’ won't ever wear out.

You can eat dinner early at 4 P.M.

You have a 'wild' party and the neighbours don't even realize it.

Your investment in private health insurance is finally beginning to pay off and

Your personal secrets are safe with your friends because they can't remember them either.

(My friend Richard called Joe to bring the special 'guest' to the party)

OK…

This last shot was taken recently and shows Nannette and my father enjoying a quality glass of red together. To me this sums up my father.

He is happiest sharing a nice wine and a having a chat with the people he loves.

As I have grown older I am constantly both amazed and re-assured at how smart, generous and patient my father is… more so it would appear, as he gets older. He is the smartest person I know.

Were always told as children that you don’t understand what your parents do for you until you stand on your own two feet and do it yourself.

As Mark Twain said… "When I was a boy of fourteen, my father was so ignorant I could hardly stand to have the old man around. But when I got to be twenty-one, I was astonished a how much he had learned in seven years!"

Since around the time I started working… and especially so when we developed Jooce Nightclub together in the early 90’s… we have become very close and have met on a weekly basis where possible… usually over a couple of Pizza’s at Sophia’s in Hawthorn to talk about pretty much anything… and nothing.

It is my favorite part of my week. I think dad enjoys it to.

Not only do I have a wonderful father… but as we have got older I have also gained a close friend and mentor. Happy 70th Dad.

So let's all raise our glasses to my father. Happy 70th Birthday Dad.

OK... I now have a little surprise (looking at my father)… someone you haven’t seen for a while… a special 'guest'.

Now if everyone other than my father can please walk outside to the balcony.

Dad... come with me (facing the opposite way.)

Everyone but my dad has at this stage worked out what is going on. Nanette, my fathers partner (whom unfortunately is out of shot in this pic), is a little confused at this point thinking that I have brought a strip-a-gram to the party (will make sense 'why' she thought this a few photo's from now.)

Penny dropped... 'Happy 70th Birthday Dad.'

Special 'guest', my fathers 70th Birthday present... a 2008 Mercedes C200 Kompressor. This shot was taken while my friend Joe was waiting to bring the car to the party.

Picture of car taken in driveway at my fathers 70th birthday party.

Photo of me and my dad taken shortly after my speech.

Special thanks to Richard and Joe for helping me keep the present a 'surprise' and for helping me on the day.

Special thanks also to Steve for the great pics.

Well... thats about it. An amazing party... and an amazing day. One that will stay with me for a lifetime.

Thanks for letting me share this with you.

Time for a new years resolution... well a new financial year resolution (I'm from Australia and our tax year finishes June 30.)

For those that know me well, you would be aware that some time ago I dabbled in music.

While I never learned to play an instrument... nor could I play or write music in the traditional sense... I was able however to produce programmed music (usually of the dance genre, though not always) using my computer.

This was a time consuming process of shuffling around notes, instruments and effects using digital music software (mainly Logic Audio by eMagic if memory serves) until I liked what I had produced.

I didn't always work alone... in fact one of the people I wrote a lot of music with at the time (including Deuce by Cleva Cleva from 1993... image and audio included below*) has gone on to bigger and better things... writing one of the biggest hits of 2007 back in Australia actually.

Deuce (7In Plutonium Mix) by Cleva Cleva

(download)

Click here to download:

01 Deuce (7in Plutonium mix).mp3 (5.86 MB)

I also wrote a lot of songs with a very good friend of mine Richard Mataska whom is an extremely talented pianist/musician.

This partnership was a lot of fun combining my skills as a writer (of sorts) and producer with his as an expert muso. (Will try and dig up some of our joint compositions for a future post.)

Your probably asking 'what is the point'... that is... this blog post is titled 'Anatomy of a hit' and so far all I have done is ramble on about my dabbling in computer music during the mid 90's...?

Well I have decided to get back into music...

My intention... to write/produce a hit song over the next 12 months.

A couple of things drove me to this... a change in life circumstances and most importantly... an actual song that has been forming in my head for the past several weeks... the lyrics, melody and most of the music is there... the problem now given my limited musicianship... is to get this song out of my head and into the computer.

I've made a start of sorts... I've purchased Logic Express, iDrum (virtual drum machine)... and have ordered one of those Rollup keyboards so I can write on the road (I travel a lot.)

* No... thats not me singing... :)

*** UPDATE ***

A friend just let me know that the original video clip for this track has just been posted on Youtube. Here it is in all its glory.