I was talking to a friend from a production company last week. He told me that one of his directors was wondering why, with all the safeguards in place, so many ads are just plain awful.

They have strategies that have been thought up by supposedly intelligent people in conjunction with the client.

They then get answers to those briefs that have been created by supposedly creative/intelligent people who spend a great deal of their time working out how to communicate in new and interesting ways that will stand out.

These answers are then not allowed out of the door until another person checks them out and decides that they are good enough, both for the client and for the target market. This person has supposedly made many good ads him/herself and has been appointed to his/her position by other intelligent people who are even higher up than he is.

Then someone on the client side, who presumably has a vested in interest in producing good work that stands out and drives sales etc., checks the ad out and decides whether or not it meets his or her high standards.

Then, having already gone through this system of checks, the ad is often subjected to a dress rehearsal, where it is played in front of people who represent the target market (this stage can also happen at the briefing and creating parts of the process). This gives all concerned another chance to hone their ad to perfection so that it works to a tee.

Then the ad goes on air and, 99% of the time, everyone ignores it and the world would be virtually identical if the above process hadn’t happened.

Of course we all know the many reasons, usually rooted in fear and incompetence, that tend to produce gallons of shite, but it’s kind of odd that a system that is designed to create one outcome so fully creates the absolute opposite, and yet it doesn’t change.

If anything it’s getting worse.

Here’s a nice clip I found of Paxman laying into Sting (starts about halfway):

Oh, and American Apparel seem to think this is a good way of using the digital medium.

have a good one. I’m going to have to see The Princess And The Frog. Bollocks.

x

I support Arsenal.

It’s a bittersweet relationship with more ups than downs, but I’m ashamed to say, quoting Gordon Gekko, that nothing ruins my day more than losses.

When we lose you will always find many fans, myself included, who have a theory on how things should have been done differently, particularly on the part of the manager, Arsene Wenger. We all think we know better than he, shaking our heads in disbelief as we explain just where the cretinous retard went wrong. It’s as if Arsene himself would hear these words and then slap himself on the head yelling ‘Of course! I’m such an idiot for playing Denilson when Wilshere would have been the better pick! What a fool I am!’

Well, Arsene knows, and he knows better than almost anyone in the world, so the idea that we fans, who dip our toes in the tactical water a few times a week, could do a better job than Monsieur Wenger is plainly fucking ridiculous. He lives it, breathes it, thinks about little else and has a wealth of experience to back his actions up. We all think we know better, but that’s miles from the truth. Sure, with the benefit of hindsight we might be able to see after the game a decision that might have improved it, but nobody knows the future and 20/20 hindsight is basically useless.

Which occasionally reminds me of advertising. An enormous number of people think they can write ads. They might not have the training or experience, but they’ve seen a bunch on TV so it can’t be that hard.

But hang on…I don’t think for a minute that I could just jump in and be an account director, planner or client. I would need to learn how to do the job and then practise for a while before I got up to standard. Sure, I could probably mange a few bits perfectly well, but on the whole, I’d be rubbish until I spent a few years getting good.

So why is everyone allowed to be a creative?

Could that just possibly be one of the reasons why advertising is not going currently going through its rosiest patch? Of course, people have fiddled with work in the past, but the fear that now stalks this industry is making sure no one feels secure in an opinion.

And if nobody’s right, then anyone can be.

NEWS ITEM:

I’m helping organize the HAITI POSTER PROJECT, a collaboration of artists and designers from around the world raising money for victims of the earthquake in Haiti.

In 2005, we organized the Hurricane Poster Project. The effort raised $50,000 for victims of the hurricane. Exhibitions of the show appeared around the country and in Europe. Additionally, many of the posters are now in permanent collections of several major museums, including the Library of Congress and the Louvre.

We are doing it again.This time, we are teaming up with Josh Higgins, the organizer of the 2007 So-Cal Fire Poster Project, to raise money for victims of the earthquake in Haiti. All money raised will be donated to Doctor’s Without Borders.

If possible, I’d love for If This Is a Blog Then What’s Christmas? to help spread the word and do a piece on the project.

I have attached a PDF of the details. Additionally, you can find information at thehaitiposterproject.com.

If you have questions, please feel free to contact me or the head of the project (Leif Steiner.)
Leif Steiner
303.506.2320
leif.steiner@moxiesozo.com

On behalf of Moxie Sozo and The Haiti Poster Project, thank you in advance.

Thanks,

I hope it interests you.

This subject was suggested to me by George from Academy. It sounded interesting, so let’s see if some ill-thought-out conjecture and baseless bollocks helps to make it even more so.

George thought it was worth pointing out that directors only do a job for one of two reasons: the reel or the cash.

Having thought about that for a bit, I think he’s right, but that’s partly because those two reasons cover a large bunch of sub-reasons.

Here’s an example: early in my career my head of TV managed to persuade a director who had won a BTAA gold the day before to film a script that my partner and I had written. The ads were not of the Mountain/Odyssey/Cog standard that might tempt a director because of what they might do for his reel, but the director knew that in taking the job on he was keeping my agency sweet for future jobs. It was a favour that would be repaid, either in ‘reel’ or ‘cash’. In the end it was a bit of a disaster because the director’s heart wasn’t in it 100% and his post involvement was pretty non-existent. I’ve since gone on to become a regular blogger, while he is directing Hollywood movies. How the world turns, eh?

Example number two would include those jobs where a director takes on a charity script. he might well want to do his bit for the charity in question, but there’s also the ‘reel’ to think of. Charity ads are more likely to win awards. They just are. If you haven’t worked this out yet, go to the back of the class. So the director gets to satisfy his conscience AND, if all goes to plan, get a tasty award-winner for the reel. I’m sure some directors are motivated purely by the goodness of their own hearts, but there is always that nice added bonus that plumps up the warm feeling still further.

Example number three is the one where they have this great new technique they’ve always wanted to try out. This is usually another disguise for the ‘reel’ argument. If someone’s willing to spend a bunch of cash letting them lose on the suites of MPC then that might persuade them to do a script that they would not otherwise be interested in just so they can get slapped on the back for their great ‘craft’.

However, there are a couple of reasons outside the reel and the cash that motivate directors:

One is the ‘movie factor’. This means that the director will be more likely to shoot a script if it allows them to be in LA for those all-important meetings on Final Destination 6 or Saw 12. The other way of doing this is the Tarsem technique of using up the spare time in the shooting schedule to actually shoot your own movie. Cheeky, but it worked for him.

The second is the ‘tits’ factor. Most directors are men and most men like tits, so a script that involves hot girls wearing very little might also attract certain directors who would not otherwise be interested. Hey! maybe that has helped Lynx over the years. Or maybe the scripts were just good.

Anyway…directorial motivation.

?

Ok, just hang on a second. Before you jump right in, you have to remember that he’s only got the Avatar trailer footage to work with and it’s only a two-parter, so it’s not quite as good as the Phantom Menace annihilation. But it still better than 99.9999999999999999999999% of what’s on YouTube or TV. And it appears he’s in the midst of an Attack of the Clones review. Thank Darwin for people like him.

(Thanks, K.)

By the way, I finally got round to watching the first episode of The Persuasionists. I feel a bit sorry for the writer. I don’t think the gags were that bad, but the whole thing is played so hard for laughs that it kind of reeks of an unpleasant desperation. The acting and direction are terrible so the lines don’t stand a chance. I hope it gets better but I’ll probably never find out because I’ve got better things to do. Like eat some bird shit off an old bit of grating above Paddington Station.

Here’s the new Skittles ad:

It’s perfectly fine.

But it’s not:

Or

It may be down to the darker edge in the last two. It feels like the dilemma of the Touch guy is really quite tragic, which is what makes it funnier. And the Sour guy is a complete arsehole who is willing to ruin the farmer’s business. Having said that, I don’t know if this one conforms to that rule, yet it’s still one of the best:

God knows.

Any ideas?

(Thanks, BB. Via Twitter.)

Some comments on YT:

‘…shocking. stinks worse than turds.’

‘Wow. I don’t know how to say “Awful/Bad/UtterSh*t” in a way that hasn’t been stated already.’

‘I rarely log into YouTube, but I just had to tell your marketing team that you guys should kill yourselves.’

‘WTF? Why hasn’t the Dr Pepper marketing team pulled this down by now? It’s so embarrassing. To think they paid to create this content. Idiots.’

And, of course:

‘Love it. Really effective.’

Mark Denton and the brilliant folks at Coy! have made a fantastic film about Adland (which I believe is the new identity thingie for this year’s Creative Circle).

View it here, see how many references you can spot and send them in to Coy!

The one who spots the most will receive a Coy! lunch. I had one last year. They are one of life’s true joys.

As is Mark’s film.

From the people who brought you ‘Jizz In My Pants’: Mother Lover.

(Thanks, M.)

Nice infographic.

(Thanks, S. Via Twitter.)

Hold your breath for 17 minutes:

Censorship:

Trailer for the Wall Street Sequel. It still fails to answer the question, ‘How did Shite Laboeuf come so far so fast with so little talent and charisma?’