The handle is currently owned by Jason Castillo, who created it in April after appearing to have forgotten the login details for his previous unspecified handle.  His first Tweet simply states his annoyance at having to create a new account and that he “needs to write stuff down” as he “aint doing this again”.

However, his disorganisation may prove to be quite profitable, as a similar case concerning the Twitter handle @Israel saw Floridian Israel Melendez received a five-figure sum for his account.  Hopefully my own disorganisation will be equally rewarded after losing the spare key for my car, although I’m not entirely sure how to go about this.

What‘s particularly interesting to me about this story are the potential implications for Netflix.  Since announcing the Qwikster rename, Castillo’s account suddenly gained an unexpected spike of new followers in their thousands.  When you consider that @Qwikster’s Tweets mostly contain an army of spelling mistakes, profanity and references to marijuana use, you can imagine that this doesn’t convey the kind of social media communication that Netflix was perhaps intending.

On the flip side, you have to wonder how much of this was actually the “grave mistake” European Domain Centre Director Christopher Laursen purports it to be.  It seems almost impossible for a company as tech-savvy as Netflix to leave what should be one of their biggest social communication channels in the hands of an off-colour grammar murderer, particularly when considering that Qwikster.com was registered by Netflix in May 2010.

But in doing exactly this they have definitely generated a buzz.  The near-sensationalism of Castillo’s Tweets has got Twitter, the US and indeed the world talking about this apparent oversight.  Surely that’s what marketing is all about?

For me Twitter user @RossRegan sums it up best: “@Qwikster is either the best viral marketing tool ever or our new global village idiot”.

Now about my spare key…

At a time when the marketing mix is expanding almost exponentially, primarily due to the growing influence of the internet over the masses, no serious design industry professional could possibly have ignored such an event.

A raft of senior marketing executives from the UK’s largest brands were in attendance and for good reason. There was stuff we knew and stuff we didn’t, but the beauty of what we do here at Waulk Mill is that you simply never stop learning – it’s a buzz that drives myself and plenty of others onwards and upwards.

Our delegation attended seminars as diverse as mobile phone marketing techniques, social media campaigns and viral marketing. Yet there was also time to take in a couple of extremely popular thought-leading keynotes as well as several bars on Earls Court Rd, later on Tuesday evening.

Rory Sutherland, vice-chairman of the legendary advertising agency Ogilvy put a positive spin on the recession and presented valuable insight into how to seize commercial opportunities in mid-recession.

However, the personal highlight for me was a keynote provided by the Managing Director of LinkedIn Europe, Kevin Eyres. Evidently, many marketers are intimidated by the bewildering choices available in terms of business and social networking tools at their disposal. Mr Eyres provided clarity on LinkedIn’s rather obvious niche positioning and provided much food for thought to those looking to use these sites as an effective marketing tool as opposed to yet another drain on valuable time resources.