Hardee's Disses Sex For Talk In New Ad

If you can believe it, Hardee's has released an ad without a woman trying to stuff a bunch of straws into her mouth, without a woman writhing atop a mechanical bull and without Paris Hilton slathering herself with soap. nope. Just a bunch of guys talking with their mouths full. Typical.

Word of Mouth Marketing: To Tell Or Not To Tell

While test market pilots proved Procter & Gamble's word of mouth arm, Vocalpoint, is a success and increases sales, the Word of Mouth Marketing Association and Gary Ruskin's Commercial Alert are not pleased with Vocalpoint's army of 600,000 moms who spread buzz about P&G products and others because Vocalpoint does not require its "connectors" to disclose who they work for, a key tennet in the Word of Mouth Marketing Association's Code of Ethics.

While disclosure certainly appears to be the ethical thing to do, the debate as to whether it affects success can be debated until Paris Hilton can remember the name of the product she's hawking. Vocalpoint CEO Steve Knox says the company takes what he calls the "high road" adding, "We have a deeply held belief you don't tell the consumer what to say." Ruskin calls Vocalpoint and other word of mouth marketing efforts hinder trust and are causing a "commercialization of human relations." WOMMA Founding Member, Nielsen BuzzMetrics CMO and former P&G Brand Manager Pete Blackshaw adds, "There are a lot of word-of-mouth programs in play now, many of which are unsavory. As the leader in the industry, P&G has a higher obligation to set the right standard."

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Pointlessly Preachy PSA Fights Steroid Use

Using the "oh my god, your kid is dead" approach, this PSA from the Partnership for a Drug-Free America asks parents to imagine what life would be like if steroids were a part of their children's lives and asks them to discuss the topic with them. The spot will debut this Sunday during ESPN's Sunday Night Baseball

Test Determines Inferiority of Agencies

Brooklyn agency The Brooklyn Brothers has created The Inferiator which, by asking you to answer a few questions, can tell you inferior your agency is to theirs. We're guessing every outcome is going to name your agency inferior. It's simple enough to check out.

Homosexual Finds True Love In Aids Awareness Campaign

TBWA France created this AdForum top five AIDS Awareness video clip in which the life of a man is chronicled from boyhood to manhood as he become aware of his homosexuality, suffers from homophobic attacks and, ultimately, finds love. The clip was created to combat a decline in condom usage among homosexuals over the last few years. It's goofy. It's quirky. It works.

Don't Waste Your Time Working In Advertising

- Unilever in Brazil is promoting its Rexona Sportfan deodorant with a site containing an amusing Atari game, a manifesto and videos.

- Sean Ganann points to an article in Australian Creative magazine by Glue Society's Jonathan Kneebone that says creatives shouldn't waste their time working in advertising but go out and do something really creative.

- Alan Taylor Communications, in the second of its Communicast podcasts, interviews Xbox Live Group Marketing Director Aaron Greenberg and how he's marketing Xbox Live.

- If you're into the whole Web 2.0 thing and don't want to miss any conference on the topic, Eric Weaver has put together a nice list of upcoming events.

- Starbucks "We Built This City" parody gets video.

Minnesota Creates New Town to Promote Lottery

The Minnesota State Lottery wanted to create a place where people could feel at home playing the lottery to they, with help from Colle+McVoy, created an entire town where residents can live in a land where it rains money and the flowers are made out of dollar bills. OK, so they didn't create an actual town but they did create a website for the town of Lucky MN where those who want to play the state lottery can do so with ease.

Dead Man Gets Buried With His Lawn Mower

Here's a strange spot for Viking, a French company that makes lawn mowers. In the spot, an old man dies while mowing the lawn but just can't part with his beloved grass cutter. Apparently, it's supposed to highlight the longevity and reliability of the thing. Hmm. Who knows.

Symantec Releases Second Safety Town Video

Symantec has released the second video in its Safety Town series that follows the travels of a man who had a fraudulent charge made to his credit card. In this episide, the man, Steve, tracks down the store where the fraudulent charge was made and gets a lead on where the card user may have gone. Oh, and he gets rid of the ugly yellow bathrobe. Night Agency created the work.

Gillette Launches NoScruf Viral Campaign

It seems Boston's Digitas has been busy creating a Geocities-like site for Gillette called NoScruf. NoScruf stands for National Organization of Social Crusaders Repulsed by Unshaven Faces, a group ,headed by apparent swimsuit model Terry Tarentelli, that is sick and tired of the unshaven, male scruffy look. In a sort of protest, women on the site appear unshaven with hair on their legs and under their arm pits. There's a couple films that document the movement. The site is purposefully designed to look like crap and just like Geocities sites of yesteryear, there's broken links, cheesy graphics and really bad typeface. It all kinda makes you want to go out and by a really good razor...from Gillette, of course.