Should Ads In Adult Magazines Feature Naked People?

I've always wondered why ads in adult publications don't feature naked people since contextually that would seem appropriate. Reading such a magazine, at least in part, is a goal-oriented activity -- you buy a Playboy to look at nudie pics and skip whatever content doesn't have them. If you ad features the desired content, it gets looked at. Kind of makes sense, no?

To see how it would work, check out this placement of Volkswagen Tuareg in a photoshoot for a Ukranian edition of Playboy (warning: naked people ahead, not safe for most work places).

On the other hand, "Sexual imagery attracts a viewer's attention and processing resources, leaving few resources available for processing of other ad information. As a result, brand information (i.e., reasons for buying the brand, brand name, sponsorship) is not processed to the same degree." (source)


Sexual imagery leaves few resources for processing other information.

Related:
Brand Mascots in Erotic Fantasies
Advertising With Porn
Shai Interactive Porn Fails to Move Goods
Porn Spam Has 5.6% Click-Through Rate
Forbes on Advertising and Porn
Subservient Store Clerks
Scientist Invents Condoms That Play Music

Culture Snapshot: Creation Science Fair

Living in Boston, while not without its advantages, isolates you from some of the more interesting things happening elsewhere in the country.

Creation Science Fair, 2001, high school:

1st Place: "Using Prayer To Microevolve Latent Antibiotic Resistance In Bacteria"

"Eileen Hyde and Lynda Morgan (grades 10 & 11) did a project showing how the power of prayer can unlock the latent genes in bacteria, allowing them to microevolve antibiotic resistance. Escherichia coli bacteria cultured in agar filled petri dishes were subjected to the antibiotics tetracycline and chlorotetracycline. The bacteria cultures were divided into two groups, one group (A) received prayer while the other (B) didn't. The prayer was as follows: "Dear Lord, please allow the bacteria in Group A to unlock the antibiotic-resistant genes that You saw fit to give them at the time of Creation. Amen." The process was repeated for five generations, with the prayer being given at the start of each generation. In the end, Group A was significantly more resistant than Group B to both antibiotics."

Military Recruitment Ads From Around the World

I put together a YouTube playlist with a compilation of 13 14 recruitment ads from different countries. Comparative military propaganda highlights of the weird:

The three Swedish spots are the best. Au Pair targets women and lures them with an opportunity to blow up bridges (when was the last time a Swedish soldier blew up a bridge?). Cube and Labyrinth are wacky but very stylish. Shows how the Swedish army values cognitive abilities over muscles.

British Army - shots of a party scene are there why? (another spot has a beach and women in bikini)

The Russian spot promises recruits that they finally will be able to afford to buy flowers and a night on the town for their girlfriends. Definitely not for external consumption. (The spot is for "kontraktniki", the volunteer part of the army).

I can't tell if the Ukranian spot isn't a spoof. YouTube has a translated dialog script if you expand "About the video" part.

Other armies in the playlist are Pakistani, Indian, Canadian, American, Czech, Slovak, Australian, [update] and Estonia (thanks, Toivo).

Soda Cans With Hidden Messages

"A Ukrainian inventor, Johan DeBroyer has created an idea for a re-sealable aluminum soda can which features hidden advertising messaging. The ingenious new can appears like a standard soda can -- until it is popped open.

When the tab is turned 180 degrees, the can becomes re-closed with a water-tight and gas-tight seal, revealing a full-color, high-resolution advertising message through the tab opening.

The vast potential for the new soda can is proportionate to the fact that there are 250 billion soda cans consumed annually."

-- emailed press release, Advercan

Glowing Electroluminescent Signage - Luminous Media

Here's a cool piece of ad tech for your production department: Luminous Media makes electroluminescent advertising -- posters, billboards, POS. The video demo is at the end of the post; Michael, director of company's operations, explains how the technology works:

"The technology is actually its own light source, even though its paper-thin.
There are special conductive inks, that when we apply a small electrical current so they illuminate (and very brightly too, as you can see in the video.)

We can also isolate, and define the areas which illuminate to create sequences and basic animations like you see in the Spiderman clip. We can control which areas illuminate at which time by connecting a small electrical driver to the sign (which is generally about the size of a DVD player for billboards.) This feeds the current to the appropriate areas at appropriate times through a custom-programmed timing chip, much in the same way you can create an animated GIF to having specific timings.

And, because they're so thin and flexible our clients use them on billboards, transit shelters, subway stations, for window signage, and in-store retail campaigns."

Machinima Production Tool Kit - MovieStorm

This homage to Pulp Fiction was made with Moviestorm.

Moviestorm is a stand-alone (and free) application for machinima production with an impressive list of features. The company claims this is the first such dedicated tool, but you'll remember The Movies game from a couple of years ago as well as Chrysler's machinima contest. And while machinima production might be a fringe activity, it's a "lunatic" fringe: The Movies Online game community website "has around 29,000 Studios with a total of 138,404 movies and all those received more than 803,000 ratings and comments." (source).

Some of these videos are fan-made interpretations of real commercials, like this one about AllState Insurance:

Behind the Scenes of Best Buy's Social Network for Employees

Gary Koelling from Best Buy talks about Blue Shirt Nation -- a social networking site for the company's employees -- and about how to make a project like this survive the inevitable friction and committees:

"In the description of our seminar, it says that we're going to help you learn how to build a social network of your own. The truth is, and this might make you mad, we don't think you can. Not because of who you are, or what you believe, or anything personal like that. You won't be able to do something like this because of your company culture. Like we said, BlueShirt Nation is a fluke. The Best Buy culture wasn't set up to take on something like this. That's why its built outside of the IT network, that's why a couple ad guys run it. At every minute of every day, we still face the challenges that you'll face in your organization.

There'll be pressure to build the community fast - bad idea. And you'll face pressure to do it - good luck. There'll be a temptation to throw money at it - doesn't work. You'll want to believe it does - call me, I'll talk you down. There'll be talk of scale - big is better.

The truth is, you're at the mercy of the people that you're trying to influence. If you try to force it, its not real and will feel contrived - it'll backfire."

Where to Find Community Managers

If you are on your way to become The Agency of the Future (Forrester's version) and are looking to hire people to manage brand or customer communities, there's a job board run by the former long-time community manager at Lego, Jake McKee. If you don't know what he did at Lego, there was a widely referenced cover story in Wired about how Lego fans helped the company to come up with the Mindstorms robot constructor.

"Lost: Via Domus" Game Ships

If you are into transmedia storytelling, and especially if you are a Lost fan, check out the Lost: Via Domus game (PC, Xbox360) that Amazon began shipping yesterday (mine is on its way). You will be playing a new character -- a photographer with amnesia -- in an environment that is true to the TV series and that has been vetted by the show's creators. There isn't much shooting involved, but you will get to solve a lot of puzzles and explore a lot of places that has remained off the TV screen, including some hidden nooks inside the stations. Many of the original voices were recorded for the game, including Ben's, but unfortunately not Sawyer's.

Despicable Use of In-Game Advertising

Gamespot's Dubious Honors Awards for despicable use of in-game advertising:

2004 (Need for Speed Underground)
2005 (SWAT 4, where the dynamic in-game ads made one of the first appearances)
2006 (Fight Night Round 3, a boxing game with the Burger King's King in it)
2007 (Need for Speed ProStreet):

"Need for Speed ProStreet isn't exactly an example of in-game advertising restraint. Playing the game offline isn't all that offensive, but as soon as you jump on to Xbox Live, the deluge begins. The game has dynamic ads that start downloading the very first time you get online. What's worse and even more ridiculous is that the game's Xbox Live achievement points have ads attached to them. That's right, even the achievements in this game are brought to you by a commercial sponsor." Video review of the game below.




Also note the readers' choice selections as well as nominees.