A cadre of celebrities have appeared in a new campaign for One: The Campaign to Make Poverty History. The television commercial, which debuted on MTV and ABC April 10, features Bono, Cameron Diaz, Penelope Cruz, Brad Pitt and Al Pacino pointing out global poverty and other epidemics. The ad, which closes with the tagline "We're not asking for your money. We're asking for your voice,: directs viewers to One's website, a clearing hose for a collection of organizations headed by Bono's Debt Aids Trade Africa. Claiming the campaign is not about money is a bit of a misnomer given this statement on the One website which reads, "We believe that allocating an additional ONE percent of the U.S. budget toward providing basic needs like health, education, clean water and food, would transform the futures and hopes of an entire generation of the poorest countries." OK, so it's the government's money but you know whose pocket that comes from.
while there's no question action is needed to fend off poverty and other worldly ailments but these celebrity focused ads just rub the wrong way. Viewing these commercials makes one want to scream, "Dude, just hand over 90 percent of your salary to those who need it and stop preaching!" Granted, no one should be penalized for making a lot of money and it's been proved celebrities are effective at shining the light on the world's problems but it still doesn't feel right.
Writing on his weblog, Association of National Advertiser President Bob Liodice offers six platforms which create the foundation for successful marketing. From product and service quality to continuous improvement to creating one to one connections with consumers, Liodice offers positive fodder for improving a company's marketing efforts.
Reporting in the glib tone as only Gawker can, the gossip site sent head honcho Lockhart Steele (who names their kid like that?) to the launch party for Conde Nast's shopping magazine Domino. With lots of pictures and ripe commentary, you too, can experience the self-importance of a magazine launch party. See Stuart Elliott bid up a storm on the silent auction tables. See actress Marcia Gay Harden (again, with the naming here) kick Stuart's butt outbidding him for a quilted bed sheet. See The Apprentice firees Michael Tarshi and Kristen Kirchner catch camera time. Collect candlestick and pillowcase-filled schwag bags. And revel in glee that now, yes, you too, can become an educated 30 year old homeowner armed with information to buy domestic goods from wallpaper to garden tools.
We've railed against pre-movie ads and we're sure to do it again today, we'll let someone else do it. Writing on MSNBC, Andy Dehnart explains Regal Cinemas' new "The 2wenty," a commercial pod that rolls prior to the movie start time. While well produced and entertaining, Dehnart explains how they ruin the movie going experience as we have come to know it.
In a commercial filled with wildlife imagery, Wal-Mart has announced its "Acres for America" Plan which promises, through a partnership with the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation, the retailer will sponsor the preservation of one acre of land for every acre on which it builds. The program attempts to appease the many complaints the company has received from environmental and labor groups.
While saving an acre of land for wildlife is an admirable thing to do, this program is simply a smokescreen for the real issues at hand. Employees want better pay and towns don't want a Wal-Mart on every street corner. Wal-Mart's "Acres for America" addresses neither. It simply employs the tried and true, squishy, aren't-we-great-because-we-love-nature approach to deflect attention from the primary issue.
According to Ad Age, it's spending $35 million on this deflection. If Wal-Mart simply allocated that $35 million to payroll, it would make great strides towards solving at least half its problems.
Ad Age Columnist Bob Garfield has, as you have undoubtedly heard, written a lengthy piece, finally online, about the future of advertising and the chaos that future holds as the industry morphs into something very different from what it is today. While no one can truly predict the future, Garfield has concisely and accurately put forth argument after argument pointing to a future that, left unchecked, will crumble beneath us like a meteor devouring the planet.
The 25 year old, 7-foot, 6-inch Houston Rockets NBA player has been signed by GPS equipment maker Garmin to appear in two new television commercials as well as a print ad campaign. The work breaks mid-May with Ming's contract extending through 2007. Ming has already appeared in ads for Apple, Visa, Tag Heuer and Reebok.
Ypulse reports VIZ Media will, in July, launch a new manga magazine for young women entitled Shojo Beat. The magazine will cover art, style, design as well as romance, comedy and adventure.
While strolling down Ludlow street in New York's Lower East Side, Flickr user ichbinjenny snapped this photo of a book promotion in the form of street art and wrote, "Now this is book promotion." The ad is a promotion for the book, Angry Black White Boy, "an incendiary and ruthlessly funny satire about violence, pop culture, and American identity," according to Powells.
Goldenfiddle has provided us with a photoshopped image of the pregnant Britney Spears adorning the cover of Vanity Fair just as Demi Moore did years ago. Just as it was then and certainly is now, it's not an image we really want to see. But, in the name of news coverage, however questionably related to advertising or media, we're sharing it for those who just can't get enough of this stuff.
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