Quality Control
Everyone knows how terrible American advertising can be. How terribly overwhelming, and abrasive, and unnecessary… eating up my quality Jersey Shore fix, yo.
via itsnicethat.com
A friend used to ask me if I was going to kill the industry from the inside, when I pronounced my interest in advertising– and it’s nothing like that. Others also sneer at the idea of “manipulating others” for profit. But isn’t that life? You socially maneuver yourself to get what you want; if others are dumb enough to be used, well, they need to pay more attention. It’s all in taking nothing for granted, except maybe gravity, which is practically guaranteed to stay with us– but even that assumption doesn’t need to exist in our dreams, our nightmares, and our goals.
If you take less things for granted, you have less limits to box yourself in. If I feel that advertising is damaging, harmful– I wouldn’t be interested in the industry. I do believe that advertising is an extremely practical (and at the same time, oddly romantic) art– with the pressure of generative constraints (i.e. market audience, current events, timing, the temporality of social agendas, public feelings about this-and-that, etc. These constraints on the art of creating a commercial, or a campaign that appeals to a public– these constraints are what force the best advertising agencies and marketing divisions to appeal and relate products to people in a most innovative and creative strategy.
Incidentally, I think print pants are so back in btw--
Fashion is the same. The tick-tocking of pendulous forces in a laissez-faire market is no different than the swinging popularity of fads, symbols, and era-themed styles: the 80′s, the 90′s, the modern, the retro-modern, the avant-garde moving into the mainstream.
Remember bell-bottoms? Now, remember the transition from bell-bottoms to hip-to-ankle hugging jeans to the ever-now-popular j’eggings? How we went to oooh, scrunchies to UGHHH SCRUNCHIES?
The point is, if the social atmosphere and attitude of acceptance is so fickle, the generative constraints change as well– and, with my obsession in referencing the Rise of the ‘Net- you got it; the Internet speeds the rate of this change with a digital fierceness.
Which makes it too easy for terrible commercials to happen. Because people get lazy, and their creativity factory sort of shuts down. You have to work twice as hard to keep up with the hip, the happening; in two nanoseconds, you might enjoy the glory of being first-to-know–, first-to-copy, first-to-link, but after those two infinitesimal moments pass– who knows if it’s already gone ancient in chat rooms and forums across the globe. Being too early for a meme to be understood by a wide audience can happen as well.
See my rant on "Mother Nature"
Saying all of this, I believe commercials need to be more than flashes of information; obvious cheese-ball lines hinting at domestic happiness with a wave of a Swiffer duster or the stench of lavender aroma plugged into your wall. With this whirlwind of morphing digital media, perhaps commercials that are successful need to be deeper and more subtle with meaning. Simple, appealing, and non-intrusive in a way that you enjoy watching the commercial, or engaging in the campaign. The audience arrives with the power to pull the material they’d like to view; it is now more than ever that commercials need to be salient and interesting enough to be pulled.
Now… I don’t really have any experience making commercials, or sketching out campaigns for, I dunno, adhesive spray– but people are taking dumb commercials for granted, and it’s my observation that who can change this will be king of the hill.
Some great pieces of media I think that really achieve this genuine feel of interest or emotion:
Tavi’s “A Shaded View on Fashion Film” contest winner did well in subtly weaving an emotional narrative between the clothing, setting, and characters. Kudos to the engaging soundtrack and cinematography:
Spike Jonze’s “Tainted Love” for Levi’s commercial; clever, unexpected, entertaining.
A more serious topic: Amnesty International and their message to support “Death to the Death penalty”. The visual is impressive– it allows them to illustrate the mortal issue at hand while leaving an emotional-sans-horrifying impact. I guess you can say it’s emotionally graphic, without being visually so.
Click HERE for an online campaign on amotrophic lateral scerlosis, or ALS.
Er… possibly tactlessly following, my favorite AIDS commercial that advocates safe sex. It’s pretty awesome, slightly graphic, but fun (which is generally not the typical hype around safe sex):
Generally, it’s such a simple concept: make your commercials more interesting, fun, creative, and cool, and a successful campaign or PR stunt will follow.
Graceee
Tags: ads, commercials, digital, fashion, media