The official line is;

"From 22-24 July, V Australia will fly three people to Los Angeles to Twitter non-stop about their experiences & promote L.A as Australia's newest short-break destination.

There'll be a film crew following the 3 Twitterers, and their Twitter feeds, photos and video footage can be viewed at www.4320LA.com or at twitter.com/4320LA, so there's a lot more content to come.

It's the first time an Australian airline has tried to position L.A. as a short-break destination, & it's a clever way of utilising a much-hyped technology trend while avoiding price war advertising. "

The site showcases a "tweet wall" which links and image with each tweet. It also has info on the 3 winners and flight details to LA.

One thing I noticed is they didn't link to the guy's twitter accounts. I had to search Twitter to find Matt, Kevin & Nathan. Viewing the tweets purely through the flash interface felt weird although for non twitter users this will be fine. I also wanted to ask the guys a question or reply to their tweets but couldn't do that. Only once I found their accounts could I attempt this. But no reply yet :(

Even with the accounts being hidden they have managed to garner a few followers. Although the numbers are less from impressive. Even the main 4320la account has only managed 557 followers at this half way junction through the promo.

I'm surprised, as I expected that this would generate much more twitter buzz than it has. Although they did tweet that the site got so much traffic it went down due to the stress. So traffic was going to the site but that was the end of the experience for people.

I did a search on Tiwtter for 4320LA and found 3 other people who have used that term. Its then I could see that the guys half way through and at around 3am in LA missed their tweet every minute deadline. A big 7 minute gap! Doh! looks like the guys didn't noticed and have continued on.

I hope they still get the prize even though not meeting the tough criteria to win. You'd hate to battle through only to say 24hrs later it was all for nothing.

Another thing I noticed is every tweet goes via the API. Not from mobile? Maybe that's my conspiracy mind working overtime :)

So it's half way through and you can follow the adventures of the guys for another day and a half. They look to be filming this as well so expect to see a video on the site soon. Or that may just be the award entry being filmed :)
I've also heard there will be a 2nd part to the promo in August.

As an innovative idea, I like this, it's an interesting take on Twitter. However I can't help but feel the whole stunt has fallen flat. For anyone outside the ad industry or not a Twitter user it must seem very confusing.

I think the initial call to entry did most of the work while the actual event itself wasn't needed. The same seems to go for Best Job in the World. Interest has dropped off now that the guy has started blogging.

Between this and Ispy Levis (see below) Australia seems to be doing some interesting Twitter campaigns.

In marketing there is a lot of currency in being "the first" and that currency is running out. I do find Twitter campaigns work best when they are simple like "How Hereto are You" and the more layers you add to it the less effective it is.

There are a many blog posts on the campaign which seem to be PR announcements but I did find this one here which takes a positive view.

The campaign is by Droga5 Sydney and site by Future Buro.