Created: A Salty little sidekick |
Ask any actor: It's not easy to make a villain sympathetic. Which is why we're so enamoured of a new trio of spots by DDB Toronto featuring a diminutive computer-animated salt shaker. In one of the spots for Knorr's Sidekicks meal helpers, the Charlie Brown-esque Salty tries a live video chat with a cute girl, only to fail when he can't get himself into the frame of the webcam. In the latest spot, he tries to mask himself with a little blackface. What's it all for? If you go to the Knorr website, you'll learn that Sidekicks now has a line of products with 25 per cent less salt. You'll read about the company's laudatory sodium-reduction initiative. And you'll find - what's this? - a special giveaway! Send in three Sidekicks wrappers to receive your very own Salty-themed salt and pepper shaker. Which, presumably, will help you consume all that sodium you're not getting from the new line of Sidekicks products. Simon Houpt |
Noted: Facial recognition in aisle 4 |
Remember the movie Minority Report and those eye-scanners that could identify "pre-crime" suspects? Pretty creepy, eh? Well, your supermarket could be going the same sci-fi route, with digital display ads that scan shoppers' faces. The displays contain monitors with embedded cameras that constantly film people walking by. The footage is then analyzed by a program that scans each face, using such features as hair colour and eye shape to determine a person's sex and age. NEC Electronics Corp., which developed the technology, says people should not be concerned about privacy, because the data collected is anonymous and the footage is discarded after processing. Advertisers hope to use the technology to track shopping habits and determine which ads to display to potential customers. Or maybe we should call them "pre-customers"? Dianne Nice
Quoted: The Super Bowl blahs |
Perhaps there can be too much of a good thing. In the past couple of weeks, we've seen Entertainment Tonight coverage of a Super Bowl spot, a one-hour CBS special on classic Super Bowl ads with previews of this Sunday's spots, and a flood of e-mails from friends and co-workers directing us to entire ads posted early as well as ads that were supposedly "banned" from the broadcast. Now, the deluge of discussions around the Super Bowl commercials has led to an outbreak of ennui among some of our colleagues. Steve Hall, who runs adrants.com, complained this week that giving common folk - rather than, say, only "journalists and bloggers" - early access to the spots has sapped his excitement. "The ads are everywhere," he whined on his blog. "Why go to the effort of blogging/tweeting/tagging/commenting/uploading ads when everyone else is doing the same thing." Funny, that's what journalists used to say about bloggers.
30-second spots: Celebrities gone wild |
Dianne Nice
Woods sex scandal sparks calls for protection
We've heard of car insurance, life insurance, even pet insurance, but celebrity-scandal insurance? An agent for British insurer Lloyd's says the company has seen an eightfold increase in inquiries from companies wanting to protect themselves from Tiger Woods-like embarrassments that can cost them millions in contracts and ad spending. Some policies will even cover the cost of producing a new campaign with a replacement athlete. Companies are also including stricter morals clauses in their contracts with celebrity endorsers. We wonder if Lloyd's offers cheating-husband insurance?
A star-studded spat
Yes, celebrities sure do cost a lot, says Dish Network, which launched an ad during last Sunday's Grammy awards alleging that rival DirecTV's subscribers are paying higher satellite bills because of its use of Beyoncé and Christina Aguilera, among others, in its advertising. The aggressive in-house spot seems to have sparked a feud between the two companies, with DirecTV countering with a claim that Dish is actually the higher ad spender. DirecTV also questioned why, during the celebrity love-in known as the Grammys, Dish would deride its use of celebrities in advertising. Good point.
Reading, writing and advertising
"High school will return after a word from our sponsors …" Sound far-fetched? The Toronto District School Board has approved a pilot project with Onestop Media Group that could see advertising featured on digital screens in four high schools. The school board does not call it "advertising," preferring the term "sponsorship," and says sponsors will be carefully vetted. The board says the goal of the project is to equip schools with a modern communications platform. We'd prefer that the board stick with the old P.A. system, which didn't subject kids to ads at school.
A spoonful of skepticism
Perhaps we should sign up Toronto high-school students for a new media literacy campaign aimed at helping kids think critically about the messages they receive. According to Concerned Children's Advertisers and the Media Awareness Network, the groups behind the campaign, children spend an average of seven hours a day watching TV and surfing the Internet. The year-long campaign features a PSA and a website, LongLiveKids.ca, which aims to help children "eat smart, move more and be media wise." What about teaching kids to turn off the TV and computer once in a while?
Why women love beavers and men love … oh, never mind
Monster.com's violin-playing beaver ad is sure to be a hit with women watching the Super Bowl this weekend. According to a survey by U.S. ad agency Venables Bell & Partners, women are more likely to remember commercials with cute animals in them. Men and women alike said humour makes ads more memorable, and chose Budweiser as their favourite advertiser from last year's game. Men reported being more interested in the game itself, but were also more likely to watch the ads again online. And which ads were men most likely to remember? The ones with cute girls in them.