At Social Media Group, sparking creativity and inspiration is a collaborative effort for our clients and ourselves. Recently, we launched an SMG culture jam we call #ManyCoolThings. The idea is that, Fridays when we have lunch together as a team, everyone shares a cool thing that they read or saw in the past week and explain why they think it’s cool. It’s kind of like show and tell for grown ups. The cool things we share are not solely related to social media. They may be anything that we find interesting or inspiring, from media to music, advertising to politics, technology to fashion, inspiration is what it’s all about.

We want you to be part of #ManyCoolThings too. So, every Friday we host our jam we’ll post summaries and links to the many cool things that we find on the blog. You can also follow along live on Twitter through @SMG_Agency.

Incase you missed the live jam today, here are the #ManyCoolThings:

Maxipad Brand Goes for Blood in Brilliant Reply to Facebook Rant
Brands often freeze up when they’re criticized on Facebook. U.K. maxipad maker Bodyform makes the most of it. A week ago, a man named Richard Neill posted a rant on Bodyform’s Facebook wall, humorously calling out the brand for false advertising. Rather than ignore it, Bodyform one-upped Mr. Neill with the video below, in which it pretends to fess up about its pathological lying.

OOH advertising responds in real time to social web:
A newly-installed billboard for Jell-O constantly studies the ratio of happy and sad emoticons on Twitter, then uses the ever-changing data to make a face on the ad smile or frown.

iAd: Breast Cancer Self-Check iPad Ad
Here’s a really simple, smart, actionable iPad Ad created in conjunction with Breast Cancer Awareness Month and the National Cancer Society of Malaysia.

Earmarkd
Earmarkd is a search engine that shows perspectives from left/right and center political sources. It was created for a competition called Rails Rumble, a 48 hour contest where teams across the world develop web apps using Ruby on Rails and other open source tools.

Epic Marketing WIN: Byzantium Security
This is an amazing interactive marketing campaign for a fictional company called Byzantium Security, which, as it turns out, is promoting “Hunted”, a new show on Cinemax.

Binders Full of Women on Tumblr
The 2012 US election, twisting words and social media. Mitt Romney’s “Binders full of Women” comment in the Presidential debate sparked this dedicated tumblr within minutes of him saying it and  is now one of the hottest sites this week.

Kraft NFC pilot delivers 12 times the engagement level of QR codes

Kraft recently piloted a near field communications (NFC) program at select grocery stores, with results showing significantly higher engagement levels compared to QR codes.

Make a Smarter Notification System for Your Phone or Tablet with Pushover
No offense, but your phone’s notification system sucks. With a clever app called Pushover, you can create your own custom notification system that’s a heck of a lot smarter, so your phone only bothers you with notifications you want, when you want them.

McDonald’s: Our Food. Your Questions.
Ever wanted to ask us about the food in our Canadian restaurants? Now’s your chance! We’ll answer any questions about our food.

Curalate
Starting with Pinterest, Curalate makes it easy for brands to measure, monitor, and grow their social curation presence. And we’re just getting warmed up. The platform uses image recognition technology.

What cool things have you found recently? Share them with us in the comments.