CANNES Chapter Three: Through D&AD eyes

D&AD's senior communications manager shares his takeaway impressions as the sun sets over Cannes.

Smartphones are soon to eclipse PCs as the most common way people access the internet. US based venture capitalist Mary Meeker recently caused a stir by stating that mobile advertising is a market worth $20billion – previous estimates had put at around $3billion.

This year Mobile has debuted as a category at Cannes. Mobile creatives have been producing ingenious work for ages, so it has been at other awards shows for a while – D&AD added it three years ago – but it's only now that it’s become a cash cow that the Lions have given it a sniff.

The categories and number of prizes given at Cannes increase every year. The Lions are a profit driven business, and behave as such - as soon as there's money to be made from a category, they'll jump on it. It's about a bottom line. This year it’s Mobile, next year it will be something else.

There’s a grand prix given in every category every year. Irrespective of the quality of the work, the judges are obliged to choose a winner. This means you could never tell a vintage year looking at the list of Lions winners, and it ensures that the prizes will only ever get more common. I think that's a sad thing for those that have worked so hard to get here.

Winning awards is the highlight of many creative careers. It’s a vindication of the late nights, hard graft and talent pumped into fulfilling a brief.

The value of an award decreases proportionally to the frequency it is given out, so as the sun sets on another year of backslapping and hungover business deals, I can’t help feel that by pumping out a new litter of kittens every year, the Lions are drowning their roar in meows.