We were waiting for somebody sitting high on the rapier-wit scale to catch the UPS whiteboard campaign (featuring pseudo-indy band Postal Service) and spoof to heart's content. Thankfully it didn't take long.
Shawn of Shedwa points us to some savory whiteboard madness. The mail order bride one is an instant UPS classic, but our favourite is monkey sex. "Let's give this little guy a banana," the demonstrator says pleasantly after explaining UPS vaccinates monkeys and kills neighbors.
What does it mean when a spoof can elicit more satisfaction than the service itself?
Jeff Burkett points to a hilarious spoof of a Microsoft Zune Phone commercial in which "Steve Ballmer" does the informercial-style thing hawking all the supposedly wonderful things about the Zune including Windows Paint, MS-DOC Executive Appointment Calendar, a clock and a RAM driver...all for $9. What's even funnier is a video of the real Steve Ballmer laughing at the $500 Apple iPhone and tossing it off as some sort of over-priced phone no one will buy. If memory serves, the iPod was pretty expensive when it first came out. I guess we'll see who's right over time.
Australian arist Justine Cooper throws herself behind a drug-and-disorder parody show called Havidol: When More is Not Enough.
Havidol is for sufferers of Dysphoric Social Attention Consumption Deficit Anxiety Disorder (DSACDAD), or people who suffer from worry about life, tension, fatigue, aging, or stress. And we're not too sure how Havidol can help, but it does promise to increase your inclination to do spontaneous and exciting things - like jump off cliffs without restraints.
One testimonial reports, "I felt confident in myself and my relationships. I exercised regularly. I slept quietly through every night and awoke each morning feeling refreshed and ready to start a new day. I now know I had a treatable disorder." Thankfully for those in the dark, marketing for Havidol ain't shy - TV, print, outdoor and interactive work are accounted for, and we dig the Havidol merch. If only Zoloft made hoodies this hot.
Check out the exhibition info for Justine's show.
Imaginary disorders are stacking up as a wrist-slap to big pharma, but we wonder which will actually cross over into "Oh fuck, I really need help" land. Major drug companies, marketing mavens in their own right despite all the jokes we make about them, are notoriously clever like that. You know how it is: things start out as a joke, then spiral into serious real fast, and all of a sudden everybody's on Xanax.
We all sort of wondered what happened to would-be rap star Chunky Pam, and as if to satisfy our wildest dreams she mysteriously reappears just in time for the heart-shaped holiday.
In a new MTV-produced video celebrating the merits of griddles and grills, Pam says she wants to be pampered in a way only a blinged-out pizza epicure can. Our favourite line involves Swedish fish and Swedish massage.
Unlike other sultry blondes who slinked into skinnier skins, Pam embraces decadent consumption wholeheartedly and makes it her forte. What talent. What art. What size. If only everyone were so easy to please on the 14th of February.
It's our strong feeling that this ad (via Ichlache) is probably not real, but it vibes like the type of thing Durex would do (particularly outside these fine United States) and it gets the point across in a way that makes our own mouths hurt. The copy reading "Really Big..." at bottom left? Totally unnecessary.
Ow.
Not that we didn't think it was a big joke in the first place but as the furor over Boston's Cartoon Network guerrilla campaign subsides, the predictable trend of spoofs and games has begun. Boing Boing points to Save Boston, a whack-a-mole style game in which you gain points by clicking on the light bright/moonite objects as they dart in and out of Boston's architecture. Depending upon how many Moonites you get, you are graded by hairstyle. Some one send this to Mayor Menino.
Everyone's all worked up over that Snickers Kiss ad and all the publicity it's getting. Flickr user cliffsteringo may further fuel the hype with a few suggestions on how Snickers might extend the Kiss campaign by incorporating it into to the long-running wacky word portion of the campaign.
Internet comedians Joey and David have one-upped Nissan's 7 Days in a Sentra promotion centered around a guy named Marc Horowitz who lived in the car for a week. Having a bit of fun with the promotion, Joey and David produced their own version of the promotion called 14 Days in a Civic in which Joey tries very hard to begin his 14 day journey but is, sadly, interrupted incessantly by his parent's not so peachy keen relationship. Believe us, it's much finnier than the original.
It's your world. Sorry about that, says the latest Second Life satire.
With all the ado about Second Life and everything we can do on the internet now, somebody just had to ask: what's the world like outside the monitor?
Get a First Life answers that question in addition to other critical ones, like What's this body thing, and what do I do with the dangly bits? Why can't I build a dirigible with my mind? Penguins, spoons and you -- what's life like among the flightless? Even teens can get involved - in this zany analog world outside high-speed, you can experience the angst of gym class in real-time, get acne and experiment with recreational drugs.
Of course a service hawking the answers for these types of existential questions, including the one between the lines (that being, why is inet life so much catchier than a stroll in the park or a one-night stand?), can't quite get away scott-free. There's already mad bitchin' going down about the problems with the game of First Life, like laggage. Granted there isn't a server, so to speed up, users may just have to run.
Oh this is beyond good. This is genius. If we could all leave our jobs this way, a career in advertising would be a very satisfying experience. Imagine getting back at all your idiotic asshole co-workers you had to deal with during your stay at the agency. Imagine pulling a knife on that fat ass, know-it-all account director that made you do all his work. Imagine cutting the nads of that smarmy jerk in accounting who couldn't keep his eyes off your breasts. Of course, they are huge and bulging out of your cleavage-enhancing tops all the time but that's besides the point. Imagine TBWA\CHIAT\DAY Executive Creative Director Chuck McBride murdering all the employees in the San Francisco before he leaves to start his own agency. Imagine...oh wait...it's just a spoof YouTube video. Everything's going to be OK.
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