'My Super Proposal' Ad Finally Aired Last Night On 'Veronica Mars'

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Now that we've spent the better part of a week pointlessly bitching about which Super Bowl spot was the best, we might consider giving the honor to an ad that, though intended, never appeared during the game. You might remember the guy, now revealed to be Rand Fishkin of Seattle, behind MySuperProposal who was attempting to raise money to buy a Super Bowl ad in which he had planned to ask his girlfriend, Geraldine DeRuiter, to marry him. Well, he wasn't able to raise the $2.6 million needed to purchase a Super Bowl spot and began talking to advertisers to support his effort as well as to CBS who were considering running the spot.

Unfortunately when half time rolled around CBS called to say the spot would not, in fact, air. Undeterred and with a $3,000 gift from his mother, Fishkin bought a local spot on Seattle's KSTW Tuesday night during Geraldine's favorite show, Veronica Mars.

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by Steve Hall    Feb- 7-07    
Topic: Commercials, Good, Super Bowl 2007



Skid Marks Keep Valuables Safe From Thieves

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Here's a little game. Adrants reader John Brock sent us a link to a story about a product called Brief Safe. It's a way to hide valuable in plain site but deter anyone and everyone from going near them. what is it? It's a pair of underwear with a hidden pocket and...yes...disgusting skid marks on the back. Just hang these babies anywhere and you're guaranteed no one will go near them.

John wonders how a product like this would be marketed so let's have fun. How would you do it? What would you do? Tells us in comments and we'll publish the best answer right here on the front page.

by Steve Hall    Feb- 7-07    
Topic: Strange



Sex Tape Yields Yet Another Non-Celeb

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Apparently a sex tape phase is something you go through when you become Paris Hilton's latest elbow buddy. And while we thought Paris was genuinely pissed when her sex tape found its way into public hands, we have trouble believing the same about Kim Kardashian, whose non-career can only improve by proof of coitus with co-star Ray J, who himself is really only famous by association to sister Brandy.

A spokesperson for Kim says she's been caught "completely off-guard" by the forced release, and he vigilantly promises she'll take legal action. After seeing the stylized images and the way she plays up the camera on the badly-named Kim K Superstar, it's easy to imagine she probably prepped for the role in front of her bedroom mirror months in advance. Half-conscious gropes in the dark these ain't.

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by Angela Natividad    Feb- 7-07    
Topic: Celebrity, Online, Video



Beauty Queen Quotables Make Good Ad Copy

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This series of ads by JWT, Bogota promotes CityTV at the expense of beauty queens. The text reads "A beauty contest is about beauty, but you've got to draw the line somewhere."

Well, a pretty girl is a dime a dozen, and pageant girls know that to win a beauty contest they have to seem spotless on the inside too. So they come up with the most robotic, naive responses imaginable, which happen to be really awesome fodder for ads. The quote at left is a response to the question, "Where would you like to travel and why?" And one ad about the pope and Mother Theresa just killed us. Adverbox has more.

by Angela Natividad    Feb- 7-07    
Topic: Magazine, Poster



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Pontiac Offers Money...As Long As You Buy A Car

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In a twist on the usual interpretation of "friends with benefits," currently getting play on Boston Legal and because Pontiac says it's on the forefront of social networking (their words, not ours), the company is launching a Leo Burnett Detroit-created Friends With Benefits MySpace site which promises to offer awards to friends of those who buy Pontiac G5s. Pontiac tells us the promotion works as follows:

  1. MySpace users buy a Pontiac G5.
  2. They register their purchase on the "Friends With Benefits" profile page.
  3. They start getting cash benefits through their "Friends With Benefits" debit card, all the way up to $1,000.

Umm, buying an entire car just to join a promotion? Oh sure, we can understand the post-purchase, down-the-line benefits but, whoa, that's some price of entry. Getting a free. Oh but hey, if your gonna buy a G5 anyway and get up to $1,000, what's to complain about? Oh but wait. You have to bribe your friends to get a G5 too in order to earn the dough.

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by Steve Hall    Feb- 7-07    
Topic: Brands, Online, Promotions, Social



Turkey Uses Playdoh to Get Kids into Soil Erosion

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Child TEMA enlists Istanbul-based Alaaddin Adworks to raise awareness among children about its program, a smaller division of TEMA, The Turkish Foundation for Combating Soil Erosion for Reforestation and the Protection of Natural Habitats. (We can't believe all those words managed to fit in that little acronym.) The result is a series of posters made of playdoh, which will appear in primary schools and magazines so young planeteers in the make know where to pledge their allegiance.

The copy on this ad reads, "If there is no soil there is no tree. If there is no tree there is no life. If there is no life there is no game. Soil is life. Come and join to Child TEMA and let life and game continue."

The English could use some work but it's commendable that Turkey gets kids started early on complex global concerns. We're still trying to get our kids to stop littering.

by Angela Natividad    Feb- 7-07    
Topic: Social



Women's Aid Paints Domestic Violence on Famous Faces

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We've seen plenty of domestic violence ads, but this campaign actually makes us cringe. For Women's Aid, agency Grey London paints bruises onto celebrity faces and plasters them far and wide, hoping people would look, recognize, gasp in horror and decide to get comfortable with talking about their own secret bruises.

Granted there are some conversations that started out taboo and are now part of the public tell-all, like routine plastic surgery. But domestic violence is a deeply personal, humiliating affair, almost always entangled in feelings of love, loyalty and fear of stigma. We doubt any one series of visually traumatizing campaigns will help start a casual discourse about it in a public space. And in the States, you actually do need to have a bruise before you can even report anything. Kind of defeats the purpose, right?

AdPunch has more images if you want to take a look.

by Angela Natividad    Feb- 7-07    
Topic: Magazine, Poster



Kick Start Uses Talking Ass to Make Mulish Boys Study

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VIA Group, the same people who brought you the spilt-milk crying fiasco, orchestrate a strange little gimmick for Kick Start, a campaign to keep kids straight about school.

Because we all know how well that Mr. Ed concept flew, Kick Start introduces Norm the donkey, which magically appears in the bedroom of a boy playing video games, gives him a pep-talk and hind-kicks him when he refuses to do his homework. The boy is then convinced he really should do his homework and is even fascinated by it.

We tried to visit the Kick Start website but confused the actual one with another Kick Start organization for kids that's run by Chuck Norris. Chuck Norris, helping kids build character? Now that would really kick ass. We heard he does all his grocery shopping at Home Depot.

by Angela Natividad    Feb- 7-07    
Topic: Online, Strange



Big Boobs Promote Big Muscles (Sorry, But That's The Story)

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Living up to the (mostly false) accusation that all we (OK, me) write about are curvaceous women promoting stuff, we offer you this video which promotes the book, The Muscly Jerk Guide: Workout & Nutrition Plans, that promises guys, "Now you can build a physique that drives beautiful women crazy & take control of your sex life in only 12 weeks!" Back in November a guy wrote the book and recently released the video, called Hot Girls Answer Every Guy's Question, which asks what woman want in a guy. Of course, all they want are big muscles but what else would they say in a video promoting a book that promises to build a muscular physique in 12 weeks? The video has climbed to the number nine spot on the video tracking site, VidMeter. Call it shallow but there's nothing wrong with a six pack and the adoration that six pack brings.

by Steve Hall    Feb- 7-07    
Topic: Racy, Video



Conde Nast Joins Social Networking

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We love it when companies "discover" social networking, hop on board late in the game, rip off all existing social networking ideas out there, pick a colour template, and then issue a press release saying it's not your average social networking scene.

This is exactly what Conde Nast has done with its on-the-fringe teen site Flip. The only difference is we're not used to seeing so much advertising for Conde Nast merch concentrated in one space. It's a little like a magazine-toting make-up-wearing fifteen-year-old diva tripped over the internet and threw up, resulting in an explosion of purple hearts, stars, flowers, swirls and Lucky ads.

Flip also includes snazzy but deceptive new terminology. Contrary to popular ideas about flip books, creating a flip book on Flip results in what we typically call a photo album or slideshow. But the population, mainly teenage artists and revolutionaries, doesn't seem to mind. And that's what's really important, right? So here's to yet another completely unique social networking website.

by Angela Natividad    Feb- 7-07    
Topic: Online, Social



Company Answers All Your Email Marketing Questions

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If you are involved in email marketing as a brand, as an agency on behalf of a brand, as a list owner or as a provider, you have certainly hit your head against the wall trying to process all the myriad details that go along with the practice; CanSpam issues, deliverability, response rates, affiliate relationships, effect of Subject line, proper frequency, spam filters, competitive activity, offer effectiveness and email design to name a few. A company we've been following for some time but have never written about is Email data Source, a company that answers all these questions. Each time we see a demo, we are amazed at what this thing can do.

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by Steve Hall    Feb- 7-07    
Topic: Direct, Good, Online, Opinion



Joey & David (Try to) Spend 14 Days in A Civic

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Internet comedians Joey and David have one-upped Nissan's 7 Days in a Sentra promotion centered around a guy named Marc Horowitz who lived in the car for a week. Having a bit of fun with the promotion, Joey and David produced their own version of the promotion called 14 Days in a Civic in which Joey tries very hard to begin his 14 day journey but is, sadly, interrupted incessantly by his parent's not so peachy keen relationship. Believe us, it's much finnier than the original.

by Steve Hall    Feb- 7-07    
Topic: Good, Spoofs