putitout burst into 2013 with a bang so we've only just managed to catch up with a few of our industry friends to see what they thought of last year, and what they expect to be making noise this year. We asked the following people a few probing questions, some of which they answered, some of which they ignored.  There are a couple of recurring themes and some marked deviations, enjoy their pithy comments and expert views, and let us know what you think!

Read on for opinions from:

Alistair Crane (CEO of Grapple Mobile)

Tom Ollerton (Marketing Director at We Are Social)

Luke McNeice (Chief Software Architect at Lola Enterprises)

Harry Fowler (Business Development Director at Cogs Agency)

Gus Ferguson (Director and Co-Founder at QUAD London)

Kam Star (Chief Play Officer at PlayGen)

Jeremy Garner (Executive Creative Director at Weapon 7)

Ben Scott-Robinson (Creative Director at Sapient Nitro)

Tomass Zutis (Head of Technology at Frontera)

Jean Robert Saintil (Founder of Saintil Communications)
 

Milo Yiannopoulos (Founder & Editor-in-Chief at Kernal Mag)

Chris Lake (Director of Product Development at Econsutlancy)

Ben Southworth (Deputy CEO at Tech City)
 

Chris McLellan (Social Media & Communications Manager at Hailo)
 

Chris Crosby (Creative Director and Partner at Prive)

Robert Jackson (Client Services Director at Worldwide TV)

 

1. What agency would you tip as 'one to watch' in 2013?
- 'Upcast Social' - Alistair Crane (CEO of Grapple Mobile)

- 'We Are Social - 2012 new business wins including Jaguar UK and Global, Evian UK, ASOS, Reebok US, Lenovo Global, ESPN UK. More to be announced v soon. The agency grew to 300 people world wide, not bad for 4 and a half year's work.' - Tom Ollerton (Marketing Director at We Are Social)

- 'putitout' - Luke McNeice (Chief Software Architect at Lola Enterprises)

- 'http://www.1da.co.uk and www.wearesupernatural.com' - Harry Fowler (Business Development Director at Cogs Agency)

- 'I know this is incredibly uncool as this is my agency, but I have to say that with all the stuff going on at Quad at the moment we’re definitely up there as one of the key agencies to watch for 2013. The main reason for this is the huge shift in marketing focus and client budgets towards ‘content’ as being the key to online success.' - Gus Ferguson (Director and Co-Founder at QUAD London)

- 'Analog Folk' - Kam Star (Chief Play Officer at PlayGen)

- 'Party in Tokyo – an agency to continue to be watched. Their mix of innovation, creative and playfulness makes stands them apart and makes their work unique in my opinion.' - Jeremy Garner (Executive Creative Director at Weapon 7)

- 'You mean apart from putitout? I have a couple. On the general innovative front, I would say Inition. They are only partially involved in mobile, but I love the way they throw themselves into all the new toys. On the mobile front, I think Nimble Tank will continue on their path to ruling the world. Chris Minas is a genius.' - Ben Scott-Robinson (Creative Director at Sapient Nitro)

- 'A little bias here but I would have to say Frontera. What was only a couple of guys in a room at the beginning of 2012, now if a full service agency out there to disrupt the traditional approach to health & wellbeing.' - Tomass Zutis (Head of Technology at Frontera)

- 'Eat+ Play. The new experiential agency in the works by Shay Ola (rebel dining society) and crew. If their respective work is anything to go by, it will be rather big indeed.' - Jean Robert Saintil (Founder of Saintil Communications)

- 'In terms of mobile I am very much keeping my eye on TV, Home and Shopping applications. I think the cross-over between wifi and mobile apps is finally making a lot of interesting things happen indoors, with brands like Roku doing interesting things on TV and Microsoft's recent purchase of id8 Group R2 Studios looking very interesting as well. And as with last year, people like myself will also be watching what (if any) big moves forward we'll see in HTML5 adoption in mobile apps. In the social media space, I am fairly certain this will be the year that we will be inundated with short video clips from apps like Snapchat. Sometimes sharing isn't caring, but we'll all have some guilty fun watching this trend unfold.' - Chris McLellan (Social Media & Communications Manager at Hailo)

- 'Digital transformation. Not so much a product, more a business trend. So many big brands are still struggling with the basics: team structure, company culture, joined up marketing, making sense of multichannel metrics and KPIs, and so on. I think we'll see many more houses put in order this year. And some more big name failures among those who don't bother.' - Chris Lake (Director of Product Development at Econsutlancy)

- 'I think we're going to start seeing more and more startups solving Government IT issues, in fact, Liam Maxwell has made strides in opening up Government procurement to startups and SMEs and I think there'll be some really interesting solutions being offered. Also, once  Leap motion lands, the whole 'haptic' user interface and interaction is going to very, very, exciting.' - Ben Southworth (Deputy CEO at Tech City)

 

2. What movement or product would you tip as 'one to watch' in 2013?

- 'The anthropomorphisation of consumer electronics.' - Milo Yiannopoulos (Founder & Editor-in-Chief at Kernal Mag)

- 'NEST Thermostat by Apple iPod Creator Tony Fadell.' - Chris Crosby (Creative Director and Partner at Prive)

 

3. What was the coolest thing you saw in 2012?

- 'Work: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4dIr_cY03Js Play: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lsSC2vx7zFQ ' - Alistair Crane (CEO of Grapple Mobile)

- 'My 7 year old nephew, my 38 year old brother and my 65 year old mum all getting Kindle Fires for Christmas. It's interesting to see the user defining the role of the device and not the manufacturer.' - Tom Ollerton (Marketing Director at We Are Social)

- 'In-app purchases or HTML5 acceptance, both badly needed.' - Luke McNeice (Chief Software Architect at Lola Enterprises)

- 'I saw Dhani Sutanto at PSFK conference in London. He had made an Oyster card into a ring and his cycling jacket that lit up as you turned was pretty cool. Jess Butcher from Blippar was there also, Blippar is going to be huge, really huge.' - Harry Fowler (Business Development Director at Cogs Agency)

- http://www.3hundredand65.co.uk/ - Gus Ferguson (Director and Co-Founder at QUAD London)

- 'Other than Digital Shoreditch? Google campus opening party.' - Kam Star (Chief Play Officer at PlayGen)

- 'The possibilities offered by 3D printing. If there's something new that could rewrite the principles of marketing, this is probably it. Why market products when you could spread the ethos of a brand instead, and let people create what tangible product they think fits with that ethos? I'm looking forward to the weirdness and subtle chaos that 3D printers will cause to our industry over the next few years, it'll be fun.' - Jeremy Garner (Executive Creative Director at Weapon 7)

- 'Can I be partisan? The Goodwood Festival of Speed AR driving game. Quite simply fantastic mix of brand engagement and exciting gameplay. My 4 year old is addicted. Sorry, but I am proud... If not that, the coolest thing I saw was Clear, the super simple organiser. As a design exercise, it's absolutely beautiful. As a product, it needs work. I think version 3 will be a world killer. Of course I suspect that Google Glass might be up there too…' - Ben Scott-Robinson (Creative Director at Sapient Nitro)

- 'Increasing use of leveriging existing technologies and data to create new & original services. One that sticks in my mind is a fun mashup of Google Maps & Instagram to create a live feed of photos as they are taken and overlaid on a world map. http://www.mapstagram.com/' - Jean Robert Saintil (Founder of Saintil Communications) 

- 'Mariah Carey's 'Triumphant (Get 'Em)' music video.' - Milo Yiannopoulos (Founder & Editor-in-Chief at Kernal Mag)

- 'I had my head so buried in helping to launch Hailo this year that it was sometimes hard to see what else was going on, but for me last year was clearly the 'Year Of The Pad'. My Google Nexus 7 and the Flipboard app making content discovery almost fun again. Twitter on a pad via Flipboard, for example, is night and day over the desktop experience. 
For obvious reasons, I also thought the proliferation of ideas, products and services in the personal transport space has been fascinating. This sector is a real proving ground for the efficiencies, disruptions and new business models that only mobile technology can produce. The recent acquisition of ZipCar (by Avis) and the continued growth of AirBnB are very telling in terms of the viability of 'resource sharing' as legitimate business models.' - Chris McLellan (Social Media & Communications Manager at Hailo)

- 'Probably some kind of HTML5 wizardry. It's exciting, though I hope it isn't abused by designers, like Flash was. It should enhance the overall user experience, rather than making a mess of it. Here's hoping. Also - and I don't know if this is cool or not - I really liked Penguin's 'Impress A Penguin' microsite (http://impressapenguin.com/). It's nothing more than a creative job ad, but everyone seemed to like it and it was shared around, presumably saving a fortune in job ads. A simple, creative idea, well executed.' - Chris Lake (Director of Product Development at Econsutlancy)

- 'Leap motion, Somantics by Helicar & Lewis  & Digital Sizzle's Art Hackathon' - Ben Southworth (Deputy CEO at Tech City)

- 'Being able to use your tablet or phone as a second screen for your tv. Well done Samsung. Or my new tooth brush, contact charging in the case via usb, charge from your laptop whilst on business. A bit sad I know. Or how they have rehashed the compare the market ads and they are still funny for years.' -Robert Jackson (Client Services Director at Worldwide TV)

4. What’s your biggest industry gripe?

- 'Bullshit language like 'monetize'.' - Alistair Crane (CEO of Grapple Mobile)

- 'Agency obsession with PowerPoint.' - Tom Ollerton (Marketing Director at We Are Social)

- 'The rush to social media with no tangible benefits tied to said rush. Most FB pages I see for companies are just a chat forum for disgruntled customers to bitch and moan and degrade brands.' - Luke McNeice (Chief Software Architect at Lola Enterprises)

- 'For me it’s the restriction that is put on people who want to move round the world. It’s massively outdated and services no-one.' - Harry Fowler (Business Development Director at Cogs Agency)

- 'People saying that SEO is dead… Anyone saying that doesn’t know what SEO is. It’s not dead, but it has matured and evolved very quickly due to Google’s changes from being a marketing discipline in its own right, to being a critical element of a wider content marketing strategy.' - Gus Ferguson (Director and Co-Founder at QUAD London)

- 'How most people can't get their head around change.' - Kam Star (Chief Play Officer at PlayGen)

- 'It gets a bit boring when marketing people talk about 'best practice'. I think it's more interesting to try a new way instead, rather than stick to tried-and-tested models.' - Jeremy Garner (Executive Creative Director at Weapon 7)

- 'That the mobile advertising industry is quite simply not rising to the challenge of delivering exciting, engaging advertising formats. I find it astonishing that, despite the number of agencies making a mint in this space, there is little in the way of smart advertising thinking.' - Ben Scott-Robinson (Creative Director at Sapient Nitro)

- 'HTML5. This has become a buzz word misused on a daily basis which has affected everything from how projects are put together to what sort of skills are required to execute it. The main source of confusion is what falls under HTML5 and what is HTML4 with some JavaScript. Just because something has fancy transitions does not make it HTML5. [rant over]' - Tomass Zutis (Head of Technology at Frontera)

- 'In short, myopia. Much of the work we do at Saintil Comms (uh oh! Shameful plug) works on a perspectivist view. Both across industry/brands/activity and how it impacts and coheres cross culturally. Of course being siloed on a project happens, just hope to lead by example that there's much to learn from stepping out the cubicle, going across town climbing the stairs to the roof and seeing how it looks from elsewhere. Uh, long winded analogy. Sorry about that. On me phone.' - Jean Robert Saintil (Founder of Saintil Communications)

- 'Jeff Jarvis.' - Milo Yiannopoulos (Founder & Editor-in-Chief at Kernal Mag)

- 'The lack of substance behind the promises of entrepreneurial support and funding makes me slightly queasy. Governments, Universities and industry groups talk so much and yet deliver so very little for our risk-takers. Things might be getting better out there, but it's hard to see through all the smoke screens. It's way past time we got seriously serious about supporting creativity in business.' - Chris McLellan (Social Media & Communications Manager at Hailo)

- 'Delivery options, in e-commerce land. There simply aren't enough of them. I'll quite happily pay a premium to have something delivered in a very precise fashion, e.g. a one-hour window, or the same day.' - Chris Lake (Director of Product Development at Econsutlancy)

- 'Handbrake Mentality' - Even though we know the world has changed, we're still all too scared to make the first step in changing ourselves, and thus, in changing the world. In the UK we're too afraid of failure, of standing out, of trying something, and I hope that we can spend 2013 believing in a better, more maker focussed Britain.' - Ben Southworth (Deputy CEO at Tech City)

-  The BBC saying they can't name sponsors when they constantly reference the Barclays premier league. - Robert Jackson (Client Services Director at Worldwide TV) 

5. What has 2012 killed?

- 'Osama Bin Laden and public trust of social media T&C's.' - Alistair Crane (CEO of Grapple Mobile)

- 'Etta James.' - Tom Ollerton (Marketing Director at We Are Social)

- 'Flash' - Luke McNeice (Chief Software Architect at Lola Enterprises)

- 'Apple but it will be a slow and painful death.' - Harry Fowler (Business Development Director at Cogs Agency)

- 'Poor quality content created purely for search engines. If you’re still buying links from sites that aren’t built to attract audiences, and well curated then you’re wasting your marketing budget and potentially damaging your brand.' - Gus Ferguson (Director and Co-Founder at QUAD London)

- 'Fncking QR codes!' - Cam Star (Chief Play Officer at PlayGen)

- 'Telly' - Jeremy Garner (Executive Creative Director at Weapon 7)

- 'To be sarcastic, I would say any originality in mobile app and web design. I understand that usability is important, and that a flexible UX allows for rapid development, but it really feels that most apps and sites are starting to look the same... Ultimately I think this is bad for the industry!' - Ben Scott-Robinson (Creative Director at Sapient Nitro)

- 'The need to do it again. Increasingly we are surrounded by technologies that are focused at doing things well, everything from programming frameworks to freely available online services. The challenge now is about coming up with original ideas and no longer about the nuts & bolts of how to build applications from ground up.' - Tomass Zutis (Head of Technology at Frontera)

- 'With any luck, crowd sourced design (didn't work for Gap so much) but as I live in the real world, I would wager a nonchalance about privacy. We'll be seeing it as an ever growing sold USP of apps, cloud resources and development over 2013. Especially in the US.' - Jean Robert Saintil (Founder of Saintil Communications) 

- 'The idea that social media can be a transformative force for good.' - Milo Yiannopoulos (Founder & Editor-in-Chief at Kernal Mag)

- 'I think 2012 put paid to the notion that social media giants are anything but fairly naive businesses clamouring after your right to privacy and your personal data. These are young, over-valued companies still learning their way, but I do think it is fair to say that the Golden Age of Social Media is now firmly behind us. What they do this year will be very telling. And 2012 killed MySpace. Again. Didn't it? I've lost track to be honest.' - Chris McLellan (Social Media & Communications Manager at Hailo) 

- 'Lots of high street retailers, most of which were very late to the multichannel/digital party. Lord Sugar likes to blame 'the internet' for these things but it pretty much always comes down to a terrifying lack of vision by people who earned a fortune to sit on their hands.' - Chris Lake (Director of Product Development at Econsutlancy)

- 'Bin Laden' - Chris Crosby (Creative Director and Partner at Prive)

- 'The respectability of TV DJ's in shell suits. ' - Ben Southworth (Deputy CEO at Tech City)

- Blackberry - Robert Jackson (Client Services Director at Worldwide TV)