Scotland Offers Hotties to Attract Tourism

Jaunted points to a Scottish Tourism Board promotion called Date A Hot Scot where visitors can vote for the hottest Scot on the site and earn the chance to win a free trip to Scotland. And, by taking a quick survey, visitors can gain an additional entry into the drawing. It appears, though, Scotland is only interested in attracting women to its country.

Scion Sucks, It's Just A F'ing Box

There's consumer-generated brand love and then there's consumer-generated brand hate. Web hunter Bucky Turco sent us this funny example of the latter in which the Scion is lambasted for it's boxiness and labeled a retarded mini van that plopped out of some fat guy's ass. Give it a watch here. Click Watch This Movie.

Just For The F of It, Fuse Launches Cable Affiliate Site

JUXT Interactive has created a site for music channel fuse called Just For the F of It, a co-branded site in participation with cable providers that will help cable ISPs reach a younger demographic by leveraging fuse content. Content will include featured bands, fuse programming highlights, and the musings of Mark Hoppus, the former Blink 182'r who has built a huge fan base in the blogosphere. It also introduces future web stars Francois the French Ferret and the Fugly Fairy, and offers desktop icons, downloadable stickers, and Easter-egg music downloads. While the site's interesting, it, unfortunately, is no MySpace killer yet. But that's really not the point. It's goal is to provide an actual reason for someone to go to their usually dreadful looking cable ISP's site.

Buzz-O-Phone Podcasts Brand Bitchfest, Buzz Marketers to Game System

Steve Rubel points to a brand's worst nightmare, Buzz-O-Phone, a service that collects opinions "about a product, service, brand or company? You know, something you either really, really love or really, really hate?" Basically, it's a centalized bitching center that converts the bitching into a podcast for the world to subscribe to making it even more difficult for brands to anachronistically attempt to control their message.

The service was created by Matt Galloway as a means to explore word of mouth. While some brands may initially suffer from pinheads who have nothing better to do in life than complain, it won't be long before brands in the know begin to game the system seeding it with oh-so-glowing commentary on their brand ot product.

Miller Hunts Down Those Who Use 'Fake' Email Addresses

Boing Boing points to an act of lunacy on the part of Miller Brewing which hunted down a person who used a throwaway email address to enter a contest the brewer was hosting so she could avoid future marketing messages from Miller. Apparently, Miller didn't like being tricked, found the user presumably through some sort of IP tracking and sent her this email which read, in part, "We have performed an electronic change of address to update our records so that we can continue to send you special offers, promotions and announcements via email." We'd like to speak with the person at Miller who actually wrote and/or approved this to se just what it's like to be so disrespectful to one's customer.

UPDATE: Ad-Verse takes a detailed look at this, offers more details on how Miller supposedly does this, why they do it and why he calls this crap sociopathic marketing.

Babies Come From Ladies According to 'Snuff Box' Promo

Rapping about babies and quirky coffee moments are the subject matter in two hilarious promotional commercials (1, 2) for BBC Three's new comedy sketch series Snuff Box. The series is written and performed by Matt Berry and Rick Fulcher. Since we don't live in England, we have no idea who these guys are but if their show is as funny as their promos, we're sure it'll get a few viewers.

Church Says Sex Doesn't Have to Be Lame

Grammar-challenged Adpunch points to a refreshing campaign from Granger Community Church which is promoting a five-week discussion series called Pure Sex during which the church will openly support its belief that God wants everyone to have great sex. The series will cover topics such as porn, lust and whether to inform your spouse about your latest trip to Vegas.

The series is being promoted with a billboard campaign which points to a microsite called MyLameSexLife on which sex's fun factor is gleefully lauded.

Pony Launches World's Most Pointless Online Game

We don't no whether to thank or hate Bucky Turco for bringing this feeble excuse for an online game for Pony to us. Called Teddy's Revenge, the game is supposed to somehow extend the company's "Rise Up Now" theme and involves the simplistic control over a character that walks, jumps and adhere's graffiti to storefronts. Pointless. Useless. Utter waste of marketing dollars. To satisfy curiosity, can someone please explain the point of this game and, if you had any involvement in it, what it's supposed to accomplish?

HBO Uses Google Maps to Plot 'The Sporanos' Series Events

For its client, HBO, New York-based Deep Focus is using Google Maps on The Sopranos website to map locations of fictitious events that have occurred during the series to help viewers get ready for the show's March debut.

Absinthe Positioned As Ultimate Panty Remover

Writing on Customer Experience Strategy, Karl Long wonders if this promotion for Absinthe is aligning itself too closely with date rape. While alcohol has always positioned itself as a social lubricant, the imagery on the landing page of this promotion with the image of a woman covering her crotch and the tagline, "the ultimate panty remover," sends a much stronger message.

Long questions the approach writing this promotion seems "to have taken the position that absinthe could be the new 'Roofy' with this recent campaign. Now I say they 'seem' to have taken the position, but this may be one of those unfortunate marketing choices, that seemed like a good idea in the pitch meeting, but in the cold hard light of day, sounds far worse than intended." Perhaps crossing some sort of line here, the campaign and the tone of its landing page do take on a bit of a humorous, cheeky tone so maybe there's benefit out doubt to be given here.