Stylized looks, cool graphics, single line of copy - and a really really clean layout. Oh, my, this can only mean one thing - it is time for THE AWARDS.

For those outside the Ad Industry, a Creative Director's (CD) career is made by how many awards he or she has won, the Cannes Lions being the most prestigious. It's almost like university professors who need to get published to get tenures.

The line says, "Because you never know who else has been sitting there."

HELLLLLO?! But where is the strategy? Who are you trying to sell this ad to?

If the ads are targeted at public toilet cleaners, then the message doesn't work because all the sanitation workers want to get the job done and over with. Can you image what they have to deal with? Hair, used stuff, unidentifiable sticky mess, George Michael!

If it is targeted at families, who clean their own bathrooms; the line "Because you never know who else has been sitting there," doesn't make sense. Unless your family has a stream of visitors, whoever has been on the throne will be a family member - and as disgusting as their bathroom habits may be, you definitely know. Of course, you want things clean, but surely they don't expect people to carry that blue bottle to every public bathroom they will use?

Who are you trying to sell the ad to? To the judges at advertising AWARDS? Nah, ad agencies don't do such a thing.

See the ads in their original glory here here and here.

Television viewers are generally a docile bunch, at the given time, they will meekly go and sit in front of the Television, faces raised, eyes bright and a loose grin on their faces. A few have known to drool, but that is purely unsubstantiated.

But sometimes enough is enough, especially when it comes to Television advertising. This time it's personal and they have taken their crusade onto the ever receptive blogosphere. Some have even formed a Facebook group and the likes of Esquire and auto blogs and local Television stations are picking up the growl.

The object of ire is courtesy of Toyota this time and their 0% financing Television commercials that have been running during ESPN's Monday Night Football. Some report the frequency as high as 5 to 7 times per match. So it's kinda like spam or pop-ups, except that it is on your expensive plasma screen, and you cannot really escape from the jingle.

Normally I would write about how awful the ad is or how great the idea it is. This time the ad is fine, it gets the message across. The music sucks, but this is not the first time an annoying song has been used in a Television commercial. It's the type of song that you will hear in your nightmares, it is the type of song that you will be horrified to find yourself humming to. Savvvved by zeeeeero, savvvvved by zeeeeero.

Once upon a time, in the Jurassic period of advertising, the conventional wisdom was that you need to hit the viewer on the head again and again with the ad message so that they will eventually give up and go buy your product so that they can watch I Love Lucy in peace.

You can thank your grandparents and great aunt Edna for teaching that valuable lessons to the marketers and advertisers because whomever planned, approved and executed the 0% financing campaign seemingly believe that they are still in the Jurassic period.

According to the Toyota spokes person, the dealers love the ads and will spend about 8 to 10 Million US Dollars to ensure that you get to see their ad several more times, on the off chance that you have somehow managed to evade the ubiquitous ads so far.

Unless of course that they really believe that they need frequencies of 5-7 commercials per program to break through the stupor of watching live sporting events on Television. For the ESPN's Monday Night Football fans, there will be no escape this time!

There is no such thing as originality in advertising.

I hope there isn't because the alternative view is that these ads were copied or simple (cough cough) coincidence. Creatives like to think that they are original and out-of-box thinkers and in certain situations, they are. They think laterally or in different ways that an Account Executive might think. In this case however, they are doing nothing more than superficial thinking.

The premise of an anti-shake camera is that – well, it doesn't shake just because your hands are shaking. And we all know that people with shaky hands are old people (excuse my stereo-typing here), mix those two together and viola, you get the idea. It is all logical, makes complete sense.

This type of thing happens quite often in the advertising business, the same thought process that lead Agency A to the Panasonic ads 1 2 3, lead Agency B to the Samsung ad, lead Agency C to the Fuji ad which was short listed at the 2006 Cannes. Having the virtue of being the first always helps, but when compared side-by-side, I find it rather embarrassing or annoying depending on the situation. I actually think the idea is great, and the ad executions are also quite good, unfortunately it is simply not original. Admittedly the Panasonic ads take a somewhat different track.

The scary thing is that all these ads are from big, blue-chip advertising agencies. Don't want to name names, but a click on the links above and you will find who they are. So make what you will of these ads.

Which brings me back to great creatives. I think that in most cases creatives need to dig a lot deeper to come up with relevant, cool and original ads than they are doing here.

They really need to come up with a different thought process that will lead them to a different creative execution or a truly unique idea. In this case it is nothing but "same same but different." Otherwise why bother being called a creative and get to wear jeans and black tees to the meeting with the client?

I really wanted to like these ads. I really did.

The art direction is excellent, the photo technique flawless, the casting masterful, the image is striking and it looks like there is a big strong idea behind it. See the bold and contrasting black and a strip of red, check out the beautiful eyes of the talents, and the minimal copy at the bottom with a very small logo of EOS from Canon. This is what a beautiful ad looks like. Simply gorgeous!

Don't let these pretty eyes fool you because this ad is not backed up by any idea – big or otherwise. And I don't quite get it. What a waste.

I am a Canon EOS user, but I am not sure what 'Vision First,' means. Yeah, it means that vision is important and the eyes kinda say it, but beyond that I am not sure they are trying to sell the sell your soul and expensive Canon L Lenses or the fact that Canon has better image quality. In fact it reminds me of the red trim on Nikon cameras.

The camera coyely featured at the bottom looks like a Mark III, the newest and the most expensive of the Canon line. Is it trying to say that the Mark III will allow you to take such pictures?

Okay, I give up.

There are times when the readers enjoy being challenged to think, which we don't often do, but to be completely so far out there that no one gets it, is a waste of money and time. An ad that requires someone to explain it to you just doesn't work.

I hope this was a scam ad because if I was Canon and I actually paid for it, I'd seriously be pissed.

Via Ads of the World. For better quality images check here 1 & 2.

To understand just how fervent the buzz has been about the movie, you kind of have to look at how Paramount sold the movie in two completely different ways to two completely different audiences. Or, as I call it:

The Tale of Two Cloverfield Campaigns

Campaign The First (Or, We Are Selling You A Movie Which You May Like to See)

This campaign has been, for the most part, made up of the traditional elements of a movie marketing push. The intent has clearly been to sell the movie to a particular audience using, as most campaigns do, clips and other material from the movie in order to build interest and enthusiasm.

The first trailer, as we all know, debuted in front of this past summer's blockbuster Transformers. Aside from a few reports on AICN, ComingSoon and a handful of other sites the trailer mostly took the audience by surprise. And even those members of the audience who knew a trailer for a new, mysterious J.J. Abrams would be appearing I don't think knew what they were about to see.

Exactly what it says.

Why bother advertising when you don't have anything new to say. It can be annoying, especially when it is belaboring to tell us something we know already. I mean, who needs it? But I am getting ahead of myself. Consider this PSA from the German Olympic Committee.

The problem with Public Service Announcements are that rarely are they talking about things we don't already know. The challenge is always the fact that we need to convince the public to stop doing something or start doing something. God forbid that it is something that the public likes to do – Sex, Smoking, Alcohol, eat Fatty Foods.

The standard tactic is to shock people – and some times it works, sometimes it doesn't. Other times you just have an ad that really really sucks.

Let me make a sweeping statement and generalize that all men, women and even some well educated kids know that if you don't exercise you get fat. Here it is again, if you don't exercise you get fat.

The challenge here is to get the public to get off their fat asses and start – doing some exercise, even if it is to walk to the next softdrink vending machine.

Instead, these ads just state that "If you don't move, you get fat."

Yeah, whatever.

Okay, two thumbs up for the execution and idea of using statues, the images are eye catching.

Global Business Services unveiled its new report "The End of Advertising as We Know It " forecasting greater disruption for the advertising industry in the next five years than occurred in the previous 50. To examine the factors influencing advertising and explore future scenarios IBM surveyed more than 2 400 consumers and 80 advertising executives globally. The IBM report shows increasingly empowered consumers more self-reliant advertisers and ever-evolving technologies are redefining how advertising is sold created consumed and tracked. Traditional advertising players risk major revenue declines as budgets shift rapidly to new interactive formats which are expected to grow at nearly five times that of traditional advertising. To survive in this new reality broadcasters must change their mass audience mind-set to cater to niche consumer segments and distributors need to deliver targeted interactive advertising for a range of multimedia devices. Advertising agencies must experiment creatively become brokers of consumer insights and guide allocation of advertising dollars amid exploding choices. All players must adapt to a world where advertising inventory is increasingly bought and sold in open exchanges vs. traditional channels. "Digital entertainment is experiencing faster adoption than anyone had previously anticipated. The advertising community needs to dramatically re-orient its business to serve consumers who increasingly access content in non-linear formats " said Bill Battino Communications Sector managing partner IBM Global Business Services. "Companies must re-look at how they serve content to consumers with business models based much more on engaging consumers in a relationship."

This sad story goes something like this.

An ad agency in France gets a brief from Eurostar to advertise the new times and new station for London. The brief probably went something like, "We have a new time and new station. We want a lot of people to go to London and we want to make it funny and clever and witty and cultural and use some insights of what the English are really about and also make sure that it is nice."

So the agency goes and tries to figure out what the English are like, especially the Londoners. Of course we all know that there are .. er.. some interesting perceptions held by the French and the English of each other. They must have really tried hard and dug deep because they came out with these amazing insights.

1. Teletubbies are the 'in,' thing in 2007.

2. Punk/Mohawk hairstyle is also still 'in.

3. Hamlet. I don't even know where to start.

4. Mr. Bean. Whatever. Okay, somewhat amusing in a juvenile sorta way.

5. Bobbies need more sun.

In fact, I am surprised they didn't bring up the food! And the Headline, that "London is Changing," that is great, but don't you need to show something positive and nice and wonderful and great and .. you get it, so that it entices people to actually want to go visit London? Sadly, I have never been to London, and even worse, the ads don't really encourage me to go to London, especially on Eurostar. This in my books makes for crappy ads.

Aside from the obvious fact that broad stereotyping can be - well wrong, these ads just goes to show what shallow insights can do to an ad. The only positive thing I can say about the ads are the art direction, which is kinda nice.

I am just curious what this agency would do if the French government asked them to do Visit France ads.. that should be interesting.

Sooner or later you are sure to run into AXE advertising in the form of TVCs with hot chicks or Print ads with hot chicks.

Being a guy, I do find these ads funny and oddly insightful of how guys think and act. Obviously some people do find these ads objectionably and demeaning, objectifying women, stereotyping men blah blah.

Taken in the light-hearted manner that it is meant to be seen in, the AXE ads do work and communicates a clear message. Besides, they make no bones (ahem…) of what they really are.

The team working on the AXE brand has their target audience all figured out – first with the sexy chick thingee and now with the Geek thingee. This time eschewing the hot chick thingee, the team has come with with another series of ads targeting Geeks. Now Geeks know that they are Geeks and are somewhat perversely proud to be Geeks.

I love these ads for the simplicity, relevance, clear understanding of the target audience and using a language that all Geeks (and even non Geeks) will get.

Excellent work!

Via Newcreatives.Com.

Product line extensions don't always go as planned, because usually you are trying to 'stretch,' a product or company that may or may not have that stretch.

A perfect example of a stretchable company is Apple - although it could be argued that that is a computer company - they were able to successfully launch one of the coolest PC line of all time. Then they got into music players then they got into mobile phones. Across the categories, they are considered successful. But for every Apple, there are hundreds of unsuccessful stretches.. here is one.

Lets face it, Burger King is not known for it's fine cuisine nor it's classy premises. Into the mix comes illy, supposedly Italy's finest coffee.

While the ad execution is interesting and the message is quite clever, I am not sure that I'd really be getting Italy's finest coffee at a Burger King drive-through. Now if the ad is about getting a juicy, frame broiled, double whopper.. I'd definitely believe that. But Italy's finest coffee? This is just plain freaky!

After seeing the ads, I personally can't decide if Burger King just got classier, or our assumptions about Italian coffee is just plain bull. Neither Burger King nor illy are very stretchable products in this respect and this is a match made in hell. Whomever conceived this union must have been out of his gourd. At least the ad agency tried to make a decent ad out of this frightful mess.

And what is it with the Pope? Are you trying to tell me that the Pope gets his coffee at a Burger King drive-through? Yeah, I know this Pope and the last one are not Italian, but come on. It's almost like Taco Bell opening up outlets in Mexico... oh wait..

Via Ads of the world.

Whatever you may want to say of their fashion, at least Dolce & Gabbana are consistent with their advertising direction. And that is always a good thing when you are trying to build a brand.

After raising a ruckus with their previous ad, which many thought depicted a gang-bang, D&G is going in the opposite direction, but exactly in the same way. Or is it doing the same thing but going in the opposite direction? Yeah, like they say, "Same same but different."

Apparently there is a secret formula to well thought out original D&G marketing plan, and it goes something like this.

> Grab a bunch of clothed people. Either sex is fine.

> Stick a few or a single naked person, but must be oiled.

> Put then in suggestive positions.

> Have the clothed people do something that looks violent to the naked people.

> Stick it in some fashion mags.

> Hope to raise some ruckus.

> Sell overpriced goods.

> Rinse & repeat.. ad nausea.

Voila!!

You now have a perfect, authentic, genuine Dolce & Gabanna ad. I won't even bother ranting about lack of originality or even freshness of the ideas. If shocking people or trying to gain publicity this way is the only way to get attention, then something is seriously wrong with the brand.

Of course, I must admit that, D&G fashion really looks great on the dummies at the mall - and no, I don't mean the people who actually pay for D&G. Honest.

Via AdPunch where more of the 'sex and suggestive violence,' can be found.

Relevance is key.

That thought has been drummed into the heads of ad agency people from the first day that they stepped into the agency. It makes sense -- to successfully communicate, you need to get on the same channel as the target audience and then deliver the message. Especially if you are trying to sell them a product or an idea.

So featuring George W Bush in a Peace Ad kinda makes sense right? After all he invaded Afghanistan and Iraq, responsible for all the deaths in these places, right? And having the dove of Peace @!$%# on him (see his right shoulder) is kinda funny right? A symbol of defiance. To top it all off, the ad provides an interesting statistic (don't know if true or not) The small line reads : Since 1945 there have been only 26 days of peace in the world.

While the ad may provide some amusement to some, it simply is trying toooooo hard. Besides, using Bush in such a role is too easy..

Didn't they teach you at the agency about a thing called 'originality?' This is just lazy thinking on the part of the agency. If you want relevance, try a bit harder to find some real insights, instead of picking a easily stereotyped figure to use in the ad.

Besides, the ad beggers the question so what? So what if there has only been 25 days of peace since 1945? Do you want us to do something about it? Do you want us to join the Portuguese Peace Corp? Should we care? Should we run out and blame Bush for this terrible fact?

Or is it just to make us look at the ad and say - 'Wow. how clever.'

Sheeh, next thing you know, there will be ads with Bid Laden and 9/11.. oh wait..

What do you, as an ad agency, do when the message that you have to deliver is so obvious and so worn out that people have stopped responding to it? Especially if the message is for an anti-smoking campaign - in Brazil.

Shocking visuals and headlines work to a certain degree, but past that point, you need something different. One thing you can do is to bring in naked people - yeah sex/naked people have made a lot of money for a lot of companies, so why not use them in a PSA?

The line reads : You don't smoke cigarettes, cigarettes smoke you

While the ads are somewhat old, it is worth showing here because they do their job really well.

It is either the naked people, or the unusual inside view of their lungs, or the rather gross cut-out of the models, these ads do make me stop and look - closely, Despite their young bodies, the naked figures look somewhat pasty and have a death-like pallor that is disturbing. Intentional or not, that is great art direction.

The agency did a good job in hooking the viewer to stop and look at the ad, and then delivering the punchline in a clear but clever manner.

Glad I am not a smoker.

Imagine this; you are in a room full of naked men, in a communal shower. You are a bit nervous seeing all of them, but you got to take a shower, so you screw up your courage and step in. Your hands shake a bit as you pick up the bar of soap, trying hard not to look at the other men. Then you drop the soap, suddenly the shower is silent, everyone turns to look at you. Will you or will you not bend pick up the soap?

This ad is all about pure insight.

The guys or gals who did the ad know perfectly well how some men feel about communal showers at the gym or at the pool. They use such insecurities to write this wonderful headline.

Headline reads : The confidence to do what you need to. Gold's Gym.

There, in that short copy, you convey all you need to convey about Gold's Gym. No need for long copy, no need for messy graphics showing all the equipment, no need to show the muscled hulk of a man, which is sooo 1960s. Short, concise and to the point - and not to mention a great sense of humor.

Or if you are like me, skip the shower at the gym until you get home.

While there is something inherently wrong about being sprayed on by a can of soft-drink - let alone a Pepsi, this outdoor ad from France is strangely appealing.

Headline reads : New Pepsi Light. Sexy Drink.

I don't see anything sexy about this drink unless it is a unintended symbology of spraying something onto the model's face. Still there are some mixed metaphors here, but then I am not French, so I am probably missing something here. Considerings the fact that it is a French ad they could have pushed the "sexy," part a bit more to get the message across. (Ahem)

I got to say though that the creative team did a great job by eschewing the usual heavy blue color scheme of Pepsi and does away with the faux cool (you know pop singers, football players) -- the ad sure look refreshing to me.

Maybe that is all you need in an ad.

Via AdBlog

The guys over at Coming Anarchy have written an informative post about the logo of Japan's newly-established Defense Ministry. The Japanese government had run a contest asking designers for logo submissions, and 767 responses came in. This was the winning logo:

You just got to wonder who this Chinese ad is supposed to attract. I can see this idea appealing to a certain demographic and it is not women who may be at risk of breast cancer.

English Translation : Frequent massaging breasts enable you detect breast cancer before it strikes.

The idea is good and it gets the message across that you need to massage you breasts - that is if you are a women - to detect breast cancer early. But seriously I don't know any women who would want this type of mouse pad on her desk, or a women who would want to be massaging another women's breast. But then I live a completely sheltered life, so it may be the lack of .. er .. exposure on my part.

Either way, I don't think it is a good way to get a women to massage her own breast regularly. Besides, I got a problem with the word itself - massage. I don't know what you call it, but the motion to detect breast cancer and lumps are definitely not massaging. Besides, the idea is not even original.

Being the curious type that I am I did check out the website provided - which lead me to a landing page for domain names. While the agency is supposedly legit, I am not sure if this is a scam or not.

But I guess you can't blame them, the creative team and the photographer must have enjoyed themselves casting and shooting the ad.

Via Ads of the world.

The next time you sit down to play your favorite your XBOX 360 or PC game, expect to see advertising - lots and lots of it, thanks to what some would describe as the unholy alliance between E.A (If it's in the game) and Microsoft (The Wow starts now).

The guys at ars are bummed and so am I.

It goes like this, consumers put up with advertising on network TV because advertising makes it possible for them to see great shows like Haraldo, WWF or Nanny 911, not to mention the lesser know shows like 24 or LOST. People consider it a relatively fair trade off.

Games cost us anywhere from 40-60 US$. Will running ads in games help reduce the cost, will it, like network TV, help subsidize the entertainment? It's not official yet, but I don't think so, and I have a pretty good idea where this lucrative revenue stream will end up.

I work in advertising so I know that we 'chase' the consumers to reach them with 'relevant,' messages. But is this going too far? Personally I have yet to play a game with dynamic content on em, so I cannot judge how intrusive or not the ads will be. But the idea is simply annoying.

And I am not even touching the privacy issue. Unlike network TV, these advertisers will know exactly who you are, your age, your address, even your credit card number (which you used to pay for LIVE or whatever service you will use). They will know exactly the type of ads to serve to you - the ads that you get maybe different from the one I get although we are playing the same game! Are you going to be OK with that?

I do have a bit of a suggestion to those who will seek to place advertising in games. My suggestion is not a perfect one, but at least it is the lessor of the evils.

The key here is to let the consumer decide if they want an Advertising Enabled Version of the game or the Advertising Free Version. So those who opt for the Ad Enabled version gets to pay less - just like how some websites make money or ad supported software works. I mean we are used to this paradigm already on the internet.

Alternative is not to buy games that have this technology. In that case, everyone loses. Otherwise go get a Wii or a PS3.

Why does shining a light through a dog so it comes out of it's ass, make a great ad? You heard that right - light, coming out of a dog's ass.

Well these ads by JWT Australia won the Prestigious Lions award at the recent Cannes Awards, so someones at Cannes must have thought they make for great ads. Far be it for me to dispute the choices made at the Cannes, but what happens when the idea isn't even original?

The headline reads : For healthy digestion.

This is exactly what happened; whether the guys at JWT Australia knowingly borrowed the idea (hoping that they will never be caught) or just happen to come up the same idea, they are now being accused of stealing the idea of a student. Stealing is bad enough, but from a student? See the student's ad at the bottom and believe it or not it won a Clio in 2005.

Is it too close and suspicious a coincidence?

I have no idea what actually happened so I will reserve judgment (ahem), but this type of thing happens more often than we think and actually get to hear about it. If the guys at JWT are innocent, this is a nightmare scenario for them - especially since all of their names are credited along with the award winning ad. But if they are guilty, then I question their taste in stealing - come on, have class and steal a better ad.

This is just me, but I don't want my name associated with an ad that showed light coming out of a dog's ass. Unless, of course, it wins a Lion at the Cannes.

Via the ever excellent Adrants.

A L'Oreal commercial featuring Penelope Cruz broke industry rules because the actress was wearing false eyelashes, the advertising watchdog has decreed.

The advert for the firm's 'Telescopic' mascara claimed the product could make eyelashes "up to 60 per cent longer".

According to the Advertising Standards Authority, however, the advert misled because it did not make clear Cruz was wearing some individual false lashes.

L'Oreal said it was "common industry practice" to use artificial lashes.

A month ago, I wrote an article Must we offend large women to sell them yogurt? But even before I can move on to another topic, I come across these ads for Fiats.

The headline reads "Fiat Stilo with Skywindow. The largest sun roof you have ever seen." Nice, really nice. The ads do get the message across, but isn't the use of large people to show largest sunroof a little bit too easy an idea to use? A bit too convenient?

While I am not into being Politically Correct about stuff, this type of ad just shows poor judgment by agency creatives in getting the message across. This is nothing more than plain lazy typecasting.

The reason you are called creatives is because you are expected to do something new and creative (shocking isn't it?). Recycling juvenile jokes that you made in 5th grade will NOT make you creative. This is definitely not cool.

I don't find the ads charming (despite the friendly looking large people), convincing or compelling. And who the hell approved these ads anyway?

Via Ads of the world.

This may be a bit old, but Virgin Australia has been accused of using a Flickr photo without permission in their commercial ads. See the discussion Flickr and elsewhere here and here.

Check out the post that started it all - where even the girl in the picture was unaware that her picture was used commercially. Obviously this highlights privacy concerns for people who put up pictures or articles (like us) on the internet.

Come one guys, if you want to commercially use a photo from Flickr, at least get the owners permission and the permission of the model, I am sure they would have been happy to allow the usage for free or for a minimal sum. It's not like Virgin Mobile is broke or anything.

The campaign very clearly gets the message across that Virgin Australia SMS service is cheap or even free. The series of advertising has a bit of that edgy and oh-so trendy attitude that is expected to hook the youth market.

Anyway, a series of very cool ads, great idea, punchy copy but what you did, even if legal in Australia (because it is covered by the Creative Commons License) is plain rude and lacks common courtesy. Grow up.

In my niavete, I thought that money, drugs, sex, more stuff, friends or even family can make me happy. Today I am proven wrong, today I am shown that a Bidet can make me happy, very happ too.

Who knew that a simple Bidet can make you happy? Who knew it was so simple - there I am working more than 8 hours a day (boss are you reading this?), working hard to balance work and family life and my social responsibilities. Duh..

All I have to do now is to get a Washlet from TOTO and I will be happy. Simple.

What's with these manufactures - do they think that showing peoples butts will attract attention? Do they think that it will attract more traffic to their website? Do they honestly think that people will write about it and talk about it? Sheeh.

Personally this Washlet falls under products-I-am-curious-but-am-afraid-to-try. But if it will make me as happy as the talents on the website, I just might try it out.

How do you know when advertising is trying too hard?

Consider; one of the roles of advertising is to convince consumers to buy something that they may not think of buying. Usually this involves making the product or service attractive and removing the barriers. Advertising agencies do that and some do it really well.

Now bring in Junk Food into the mix. Fast Foods have acquired a certain reputation over time. Hell they have been linked to obesity, diabetes and whole bunch of unpleasant and unsightly meladies.

So what do the Fast Food manufactures do? Do they change their recipes, ingredients? Of course they do the sensible thing and change how they advertise the products. I mean, it is so much cheaper to come up with an ad campaign than actually do anything about it.

McDonalds. Yep, the yellow arches of goodness has a campaign somewhere (because I am not sure of the origin of the ad) telling us that they care as much for our children's nutrition as we parents do. Good sentiment, responsible corporate citizenship and all that. It's true because they say so.. there!

The copy reads : You might be surprised to learn who thinks about your child's nutrition as much as you do.

The execution is quite clever and believable. Using the nutrition panel borders on pure genius or pure evilness, depending on how you see it. On top of that, look at that healthy and fit child, kinda hard to find parents who don't want a fit and healthy kid like that. The agency did a great job here on the copy as well – only thing is that it is stretching incredulity.

Aren't they reaching abit here? Isn't it an obvious over claim?

I am all for Fast Food, but not the way it currently is – and while I am not averse to going out for a burger or two (not at McDonalds though, I am more of a flame boiled man) – only thing is that I am not sure I want to bring my kid there.

Are you surprised yet?

This can almost be a companion piece to my previous article Do we really need skinny models in our advertising? Only this time it is the exact opposite.

Here are a series of ads that use raunchy but well known movies to get the message across. The product is a Fat Free Yogurt. The ads are from Brazil and the translation reads "Forget about it. Men's preference will never change. Fit Light Yogurt"

Right, I get the fact that they use rather large women to replace Sharon Stone in Basic Instinct etc.. and that Fit Light will make you thinner I suppose. I mean there might even be an attempt at humor in there, but the whole thing falls flat.

Not withstanding the stereotyping of both women and men, I would be offended if I were the target audience. Moreover I would not buy the product. Execution-wise it is fresh and different, but guys, you want women who think they may have a weight issue to buy your product - not stay away from it because of how you portrayed them. A little sympathy or affirming message will go a long way.

And who are you trying to sell the Yogurt to anyway? Women or to men who like rather larger women?

Just a word to the wise : Advertising is meant to make products desirably to buy. At least with Dove's Real Beauty campaign, no matter what type of women you are, there is a positive message in there.

It's not playing well on my computer. Also another ad here.

You can change the size of the ad if you have a faster connection.

As huge as the video game industry has become, it's a bit surprising that there's never been an ad agency devoted entirely to games. Well, now there is. We profile 822 Digital to see what the game-centered approach does for video game advertising. President Steven Rosenbaum gives us the 411 on 822...

Almost every game publisher deals with an external agency to handle the majority of their advertising. Companies like McCann Erickson and TBWA may not be household names to gamers, but they're surely familiar with their work. These and many other similar companies form not just the backbone of ads for gaming, but a host of other products as well.

While most ad agencies divide themselves among many sorts of products, 822 Digital has taken a different approach. Focusing exclusively on gaming, the year-old agency is looking to cater itself exclusively to gaming clients. They're hoping their unique approach will appeal to members of the gaming industry and might even be the sign of a trend.

We talked at length with 822's President and Creative Director Steven J. Rosenbaum about everything inside and out about game ads and his company's particular approach.

There is a long running argument in the advertising industry. Does advertising reflect the values of the society that it is in or is society trying to mimic advertising?

One point of view is that advertising portrays an ideal place of what we want our society to be. It's all about fulfilling aspirations and dreams. Yes, our brands will make your dreams come true.

But there is a problem. We live in an imperfect world. Things happen, they go wrong – and the solution is never the quick fix that most advertising seems to promise. Specifically the portrayal of women in advertising has increasingly come under scrutiny and attack by groups who feel that the women are not accurately portrayed – especially when it comes to body size.

Unilever is one of the few companies that seem to be addressing the issue in it's advertising.

First came the Campaign For Real Beauty for the Dove Brand. Instead of using slim and svelte models to promote the brand they used "real," women of different body shapes and skin color. It has received wide coverage and praise from women's groups. While other's have complained that it is a cynical attempt to sell even more stuff, whatever the motivation, at least they are doing something about it.

Going a step further, the Anglo-Dutch company based in Amsterdam has recently issued further guidelines here to it's marketers and advertising agencies. While not strict, it "expects," that the models be between BMI (Body Mass Index) of 18.5 and 25. Anything below 17.5 is suspected to signal anorexia nervosa.

So now that someone is doing something about it, will others follow or continue to do what they have always done?

Or ultimately is it too big an issue for a single company or even and industry to overcome? Or, are we, as a society been brain-washed to expect the slim and svelte models in our advertising?