Its all a bit much really.

There is a lot going on here all of a sudden.
For a week Cannes has been relatively peaceful. Just myself and 50 or so other jurors pinging our PDA's and voting in air-conditioned rooms. Of course there were the French too, walking their poodles and generally being rude and unhelpful to anybody who attempted to interact.
But it was pretty quiet. Harmonious even.
Now, within 24 hours, the streets are filled with 6000 creative people from over 100 countries.
It is the world's biggest "Who's got the coolest t-shirt" competition. They are all very determined to GET FREAKIN' WASTED DUUUUUDE.

Anyhow the noble folk of the promo jury finished up yesterday.
The last day of judging was a marathon 12 hour session to award Cannes Lions. There was lots of heat. Lots of resorting to stereotype too, which was funny. Aussie judge being quite dry and relaxed. Spanish and South American judges being all fiery and passionate ("ees Gold or notheeng"). Russian judge being surly and threatening. British judge being a bit moany but also witty. Swiss judge being incredibly balanced and precise. German judge firm and loud and pushy. South African judge being heroic, wise, quick-witted, convincing, intelligent, likeable, considerate and erudite. At the end of it all we gave the Grand Prix to a truly astounding piece of work. It was quite goose-bumpy stuff voting for it. Of course I can't tell you about it yet. Although we did have a press conference, complete with flashing cameras and microphones and stacks of journos asking tricky questions.

Our agency has a few Finalists too, which is good. We have not done as well as we had hoped, but
there is no reason yet for me to go and throw myself in front of a Citroen. That I will do later in the week if we don't win. Or maybe just let a Citroen drive over my foot.

I have just been to my first seminar. The guy who invented Twitter spoke.
Which in these times is a bit like hearing Alexander Graham Bell chat about inventing the telephone. He looked like he had just come off the day shift at Blockbusters.
He calls himself Biz. He said he would not sell his company if offered a billion dollars. Which says a little about how important Twitter may become in our lives.
Last year there was a small earthquake in California. Within 60 seconds, if you typed the word earthquake into a Twitter wordsearch, there were enough first hand accounts and information to fill a 500 page book. The news services had one paragraph up on the wires a full 9 minutes later.
Last week in Iran Twitter began what may grow into the first social-media inspired revolution.
Yesterday Stewart Cink, a golfer at the US Open, was Tweeting to an audience of over 400 000 while actually playing in the event, the first ever recorded incident of live and continuous real time sports commentary by an actual participant in an event. Twitter is making history just about every week. All because a guy who looks like he should be working in a video store had a good idea.
Sometimes you just have to love the world.