Fear-vertising

Great pisstake.

Where are the boundaries in frightening people on behalf of a large corporation?

Obviously we ad people are unofficially paid to elicit emotional reactions from those who ‘enjoy’ our output, but no one ever seeks to define those reactions beyond what is considered to be against the wishes of Clearcast.

Real tear-jerkers, such as the new Sainsbury’s and John Lewis ads, are completely fine, but if you tried to put a brain-munching zombie in your commercial you wouldn’t stand a chance. Despite that, these ambient fear-based stunts never seem to be subject to the same kinds of strictures as their TV cousins.

Of course the ambient stuff has no regulatory body to insist on what’s right or wrong, but how far can we then go in scaring, swearing or stimulating the genitalia of an unsuspecting public?

Would anyone like to give it a proper go and report back?