For its client, Mini, Crispin Porter + Bogusky, it seems, has created a site for a ficticious group called Counter Counterfeit Commission, an organization whose apparent mission is to rid the world of counterfeit products. The site has a photo collection of tricked out vehicles purported to be fake Minis. It also has video footage of a police dogs sniffing out fake Minis trying to make their way into the country, a $19.99 consumer alert DVD detailing the apparent underworld of counterfeit Minis and even a phone number answered with a message machine by a guy code named "Bosco" claiming to be doing undercover work in Brazil and Copacabana.
The site is engaging enough with tips on how to detect a fake, an area to upload photos of fakes and rate their fakeness quotient and a victim support area where those who've been had can get support materials.
While $75,100 isn't quite enough to offset the money McDonald's spent on a Super Bowl ad for its strange Lincoln Fry promotion, that's what GoldenPalace.com paid the company for the odd shaped, and ficticious, fry on an eBay auction.
It's all part of GoldenPalace'com's kooky eBay marketing scheme which involved buying space on pregnant bellies and foreheads all in the name of press. The online casino will be taking the fry, along with the Virgin Mary cheese sandwich it also bought on eBay, on a national tour just to get us to write even more about them. We're not sure whether to commend GoldenPalace.com on a brilliant marketing scheme or to wish them a slow, painful death for forcing us to continually write about them.
Gawker Media site Kotaku takes the winds out of Microsoft's sail by releasing details surrounding the upcoming launch of the company's second generation Xbox, the Xbox 360. For those who can't wait, the details are here.
The device is said to be available in late October or early November.
Following the resignation of 25 year Saatchi & Saatchi vetran Mike Burns who was head of the General Mills account and the subsequent resignation of 17 Saatchi senior staffers two days later, Ad Age reports Burns is in talks with Interpublic and, perhaps, other holding companies about a mass hiring of him and his former staffers.
While a General Mills spokesman insists they are pleased with Saatchi's work and have no plans to end the relationship because of this sudden "staff change," major upsets like this in the agency business always have major consequences. After all, while clients may hire agencies to do their work, they're really hiring the faces handling their account.
It doesn't take the organization of a traffic manager to realize Saatchi CEO Mary Baglivo and ECD Tony Granger are dripping salt profusely.
Last night's debut of Survivor: Palau grabbed 23.6 million viewers according to Nielsen overnights. It garnered a 9.0 rating 18-49. Conversely, NBC's Joey and Will & Grace turned in low ratings of 4.0 and 4.3 respectively.
To promote its new PlayStation2 and Xbox Super Monkey Ball Deluxe, SEGA has launched a quirky "boy in a bubble" online serial campaign called My Big Ball. The campaign, created by San Francisco-based Mekanism, offers a peak into the trials and tribulations of the life of a boy so obsessed with the game, he's decided to live in a large, inflatable ball.
The campaign includes a Web site, a series of story driven Web shorts, and banner ads. The website features a series of short films entitled “The True Adventures of Chad, the Boy Who Was So Into Super Monkey Ball Deluxe That He Decided To Live In A Ball.” Apparently, Chad's obsession has led him to live life in a seven-foot rubber ball. The first episode follows Chad beginning his day and confronting the mundane challenges of personal hygiene. It gets messy. In the second episode, Chad struggles to find his place in academia. New episodes will debut every week leading up to the March 15, 2005 launch.
In Vancouver, 3M is promoting its Security Glass with unique out of home structures which encase what appears to be real money in plain view of the public. News reports show people hitting and kicking the structures but, to date, the glass has held up to the test. While we wonder the sort or outdoor riots this could cause, we also think it's an ingenious method to explain the benefits of the product in a truly effective manner. View additional images here.
Maxim wants to offer fame to the man or woman with the sexiest voice.
The company, along with sponsor Bud Light is offering a Maxim Radio promotional gig and $1,000 to the man or woman with the sexiest voice.
Casting calls will be held in New York an LA Wednesday March 2.
Maxim Radio celebrity hosts will comment on the entries in terms of sexiness, uniqueness, delivery, tone and suitability for use. Beginning March 7, 2005, visitors to Maxim Online for one week will be able to hear audio clips of the finalists' entries and click their votes. The winner will be announced on Maxim Radio on Monday, March 21, 2005.
Those interested should bring 30 seconds of their own material to read at the auditions. The New York audition will be held at the SIRIUS Satellite Radio offices at 1221 Avenue of the Americas beginning at 9 AM. The LA audition will be held at the House of Blues on Sunset Strip beginning at 11 AM.
yesterday, RAZOR magazine founder Richard Botto announced the addition of Eric L.
Simon as publisher. In his new position, Simon will manage the magazines advertising and business operations. Previously, these had been overseen by Botto, who will now focus on directing RAZORs editorial operations as editor-in-chief, while also maintaining his role as the magazines CEO. Simon brings tens years of magazine industry expertise to his new post at RAZOR. He spent the last five years at laddie book publisher Dennis Publishing, most recently as associate publisher of music magazine Blender, where he helped manage sales and marketing and grew the books rate base from 525,000 to 630,000. While at Dennis, Simon also served as the companys director of business development and licensing, established its custom publishing division and, as the founding advertising director for hottie magazine Stuff, helped that book quickly grow. Simons arrival at RAZOR marks the latest in a series of appointments expanding the magazines business team. Earlier this month, Botto announced the appointment of Nadine Weiss as RAZORs first West Coast advertising director, and also added two key sales leaders to the magazines New York office: Nicholas Pastula was named as fashion, grooming and fragrance director, while Peter Weinstock signed on as account director, entertainment, technology and finance.
"I wish my life was a beer commercial." That statement has been said and heard many times. While said in jest, it alludes to the desire for a better life. Life would certainly be grand if it mirrored life as portrayed in advertising but, unfortunately, it does not.
Life gets a twist when it stars in commercials. Because marketers need to associate their products with positive thoughts, many paint an unrealistic picture of life and it's racial make up.
Georgia State University Sociologist Charles Gallagher calls advertising's growing need to show all races living harmoniously together a "carefully manufactured racial utopia, a narrative of colorblindness."
While that may be a welcome direction to travel, it does not reflect the realities of life in the real world. Census data states just seven percent of all marriages are interracial and 80 percent of whites live in neighborhoods in which 95 percent of their neighbors are white.
Gallagher says this paints a very slanted picture. "The lens through which people learn about other races is absolutely through TV, not through human interaction and contact. Here, we're getting a lens of racial interaction that is far a field from reality."
Of course, this isn't some underhanded, big brother-like attempt marketers have engaged in to change society. It's just positive thinking says Stanford University Professor Sonya Grier. "Often, advertising doesn't reflect reality - everyone is beautiful and pretty and thin, so a lot of advertising is very unrealistic. It's always been something that reflects our aspirations, what we can be."
It really begs the age old chicken or egg question. Advertisers and media organizations, for the most part, promote utopian perfection rather than gritty reality. Whether advertisers and media should promote perfection or reflect reality is not an easy question to answer. In essence, both directions are well intended. Promoting perfection and cultural ideals is simply a wish for something better.
Reflecting reality brings the hard truths of life to light.
Unfortunately, many of the efforts by advertisers and media in the direction of utopian perfection often seem forced and fake.
Perhaps it's all born out of human nature's natural tendency to move forward, to do better, to improve things. Perhaps the desire for perfection can not be held back. Maybe satisfaction with one's current place in life is not natural. Or, maybe, through media and advertising, the human race has been brainwashed into thinking reality is for losers.
|
