Odds are, waking up this morning was no easy task. After all, if the Lord Almighty wanted us to work on Mondays, then why would he schedule NFL games on Sundays? Something doesn’t add up.
As the northern hemisphere runs full-speed towards winter’s shorter days and longer nights, Philips claims it has technology to make grumpy snooze button-pushers into actual “morning people,” and it’s enlisting the help of its agency, Tribal DDB Amsterdam, to create a social campaign for its experimental “Wake-up Light.” Testing for the product began last year in the Norwegian town aptly named Longyearbyen, where a population of a little over 2000 qualifies it for the northernmost settlement in the world (video below). As Longyearbyen is plunged into complete darkness for about four months a year, Philips gave the town’s residents its “Wake-up Light” to simulate natural sunlight. From testers’ reviews, it seems that the light was pretty successful, and Longyearbyen-ers reported a better wake-up experience.
Now, Philips and Tribal DDB are asking volunteers to take the “Wake-up Light” challenge using social media. An app on Philips’ Facebook page not only categorizes what sort of a “morning person” a user is, but it asks willing participants to take place in a 21-day experiment with the Wake-up Light, tracking their progress on an iPhone app that tests alertness, mood and ease of getting out of bed. Philips boasts that the “Wake-app” is “the first consumer-facing app to feature tests undertaken in sleep laboratories and clinical studies.”
Full results from the study are set to be released in November. If you’re a skeptic and a slow-riser like myself, you have to admit you’re at least a little interested to see if this experiment goes as planned. View the Arctic experiment below and credits after the jump.
Agency: DDB Amsterdam & Tribal DDB Amsterdam
Creative Director: Paul Fraser
Copywriter: Paul Fraser, Yumi Ichida
Art Director: Mariota Essery, David Navarro, Chris Barton, Kevin Yaun
Account team: Sandra Krstic, Nick Bassermann
Strategy: Antoinette Hoes
Producer: Robert Roosenstein
Project Manager: Sophie Rhys Evans
Executive Creative Director: Chris Baylis
PR agency: OneVoice
Associate Director: Michael Young
Account Director: Holly Kenyon
Account Manager: Emily Pendleton
Production Company Seeding Video/Archetypes: Mini Vegas
Director: Luc Schurgers
Executive Producer: Maarten Boon
Producer: Vincent Lindeboom
Production Company Documentaries: Revolver Media
Director: Stian Smestad
Executive Producer: Raymond van der Kaaij
Producer: Raymond van der Kaaij
Production Companies: MediaMonks (website), Keytoon Animation Studio S.L. (animations), Element Interactive Mobile BV. (Iphone app)