For [NOTE: the advertising presentations, pictures are more important than for any other work this semester. But if you have trouble downloading the presentation version with images, here is the info from the show.] Ads [IMAGE: Billboards dominating Calif. Coast highway] EXPOSURE Average adult sees 3K ads/day Notices 80 Reacts to 12 Teens spend ca. 10 yrs of their lives taking in advertisement! Ads are "commercial speech" As paid-for expression they get "qualified" (i.e. limited) First Amendment protection Ads are useful info for consumers But there is no protection for ads for unlawful activities, proven dangers to public health false, deceptive or misleading ads But to regulate commercial speech Government must show... clear state interest The regulation must clearly advance this interest & be narrowly drawn IN DEFENSE OF ADS Helped shift from agrarian to consumer society Promoted technological advances Boosted economy by increasing sales Recognized women as consumer decision-makers Provide product info Finance mass media Entertain
Can promote worthwhile causes
POPULAR RESISTANCE Kids twist ad slogans (But: ,,mommy, buy me that) NYers secular religion: "Never pay retail!" Youth fashions from rummage sales--ripped, faded jeans Celebrity appeal to public is not certain Failed endorsements Ringo Starr . . . . . . . . Sun Country wine coolers George C. Scott . . . .Renault cars John Wayne . . . . . . . Datril painkiller Bill Cosby . . . . . . . . . E.F.Hutton (yes, Mr. Jello Pudding!) [IMAGE: Cigarette ad with flaming red background & sex y woman looking straight at camera--"Fire up a real one". But ad carries several govt health warnings] Ad allowed but narrowly tailored. Prominent disclaimers show health info, correct misleading claim CRITICAL ISSUES Ads & kids, schools, health Push materialism, narrow ideas of beauty, social acceptability & happiness Co-opt human/cultural values to sell goods Ads, commercialism, democratic values? Ads the essence of commercialism Tame powerful cultural symbols to sell product Revolution? Che Guevara morphs into the Taco Bell chihuahua And so it goes ... Beauty, love, family bonds, etc. ad infinitum skimmed & linked to productsbellious rock ,,n roll songs, minority
struggle sell cars, computers,
Alcatel ad based on Martin Luther Kings
,,I Have a Dream speech Pitching for Apple Computers
IMAGEs of Mahatma Gandhi, Bob Dylan, Dalai Lama, Joun Lennon & Yoko Ono-- celelbrities who represent strongly held, hones, authentic personal values--their images now sell Apple computers.]
Cultural effect? Ads as "engine" of post-modernism Appropriating lived values to sell something. Symbols of value become "images," empty of true meaning. Is this cultural experience the reason we value "coolness" & ironic distance -- because passion, commitment, etc. are sold out? Advertising finances journalism but limits truth-telling Chrysler ad agency to BBDO & 50 mags: "It is required that Chrysler Corp. be alerted in advance of any and all editorial content that encompasses sexual, political, social issues or any editorial that might be construed as provocative or offensive." Magazine becomes an "editorial environment" for the ads, not a truth-teller Limiting journalism- 2 Advertiser warns 3 news weeklies, it will screen co. image in news & give all ads to 1
Auto co. to major mag: show less skin Huggies mfr.: put our ads only next to ,,happy baby copy Auto co. to Cosmo: change article "How to Be Very Good in Bed" NY mag ed: "I read copy thinking, ,,is this going to cause problems?" (self-censorship)
Culture Jamming Adbuster ads question consumption, reassert democratic values IMAGE: Sleek model, with text "Nothing...W hat youve been looking
for" An example of "decooling," "demarketing" by Adbusters. [IMAGE: Buy nothing day ad, uses picture of a pig to show disproportionate of amount worlds resources consumed by US] Adbusters: ,,97 CBS,NBC,ABC refuse time 4 ,,buy nothing ad. Censorship isnt always governmental. Corporate media does not have to put on ads they con[t like. Adbusters could not buy time for their "demarketing" ads. IMAGE: "Joe Chemo ad--Joe camel on chemotherapy for tobaccocaused cancer, looks nostalgically as his "cool" sunglasses.
North Americans have all kinds of rights and freedoms, but they apparently don't have the right to ... walk into their local TV stations and purchase 30 seconds of airtime for a message they believe in. W hy? TV broadcasters are in the business of selling attention spans to the highest bidder. The y want multi-million dollar Nissan and GM campaigns, not a bicycle campaign from Greenpeace; they want a slice of McDonald's $500-million-a-year ad budget, not some nutritional public service announcement that may actually offend the Big Mac; and they want to pepper the public mindscape with sexy, action-packed program teasers to keep us from turning the channel or turning off the tube, not cryptic warnings of a TV-addicted nation. But now a new breed of '90s activists -- culture jammers -- are taking legal action to open up the airwaves. They want the right to practice social marketing; to use the public airwaves -- not only to sell products and corporate images -- but to sell ideas, stir public debate and empower people to set their own agendas. Arguing for fundamental social change on commercial TV may be our last great hope of social engineering ourselves out of the economic, ecological and psychological mess we're in. (www.adbusters.com)
Paper Describe ad Analyze rhetorical appeal (persuasion) persuasive strategies (famous-person, etc.)
design (colors, characters, clothes, poses, typefaces, etc.) copy (substitution test) Note cultural values (stereotyping, gender roles, race) Relate to pros/cons of ads ANALYZING ADS: early ads slogan/word oriented; hard sell ANALYZING ADS growing influence of visual design, backing off claims in language (public oversold, sceptical) Persuasive Strategies famous-person testimonial plain-folks pitch snob-appeal approach bandwagon effect hidden-fear appeal irritation advertising The ASSOCIATION Principle links product w/ a positive cultural value Myth analysis Ads as STORIES: characters, setting and plot CONFLICT between ...? RESOLVED by buying product Even Typefaces Conve y Meaning print expressive 2 types Serif -- short lines at ends of letters connotations: dignity, formality, elegance, sincerity sans serif -- no serifs fact, plain talk, directness, modernity Custom effects? /Media
Explain the fit
WHICH APPLIES? Celebrity testimonial? Plain-folks pitch?
Snob-appeal ? Bandwagon? Hidden-fear? Irritation? M yth? Association? Beef Colors? Toy figures? Problem with product? Stereotyping Women women as... brainless, helpless mans reward completely satisfied by product passive, horizontal, lower positions counter-stereotypical images... ,,warrior, thinker, manager test: talk politics? relate representation of woman to product appeal ,,Flooded out environment? assoc. w explicit porn "Excuse me, Miss. W ho are you planning to vote for?" Minorities 1st phase: invisibility 2nd: comic, accommodating servile figures (Aunt Jemima) Now widespread (association w/ ,,liberality, ,,openness, ,,freedom? Equal presentation? Social reality? Stereotype?
Pasquale Bruni jewelry Point of Life? "To obtain a maximum of well-being with the minimum of
consumption." --E.F. Schumaker Small is Beautiful
Billboard Liberation Front Altering ads since 1978 "We adhere to the philosophy that public space -- whatever you can see -- is open to public use. Advertising is the language of our culture. Anyone who wants to communicate on that level is going to be involved in a public discourse."
See images on powerpoint presentations. One example: Wording on Gordon's Gin billboard modifiedc to read: "Gordon's Gin. It fucks you up."