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Fuel Efficiency and Cement-Encased Man Don't Work For Honda

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Honda decided the two-hour season finale of guilty pleasure Grey's Anatomy last week was a good time to show their new commercial, previously mentioned here as part of their new campaign promoting the 2009 Honda Pilot.

In the spot, a man in a Pilot approaches a man who had accidentally been encased in cement. He offers to help and after getting the man, still trapped in a cement block, in the back seat, notes they won't have to stop for gas because of how fuel-efficient the Pilot is. The other man, who doesn't seem the least bit worried about the fact he's essentially a talking head sticking out of a chunk of cement, agrees that the Pilot is indeed really fuel-efficient. He read it on a blog.

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by Amy Yen    May-28-08    
Topic: Creative Commentary, Television

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Converting the Converted, and Other Tricks of the Light

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On Wednesday at the One Show Festival, design guru Brian Collins illustrated the power of branding with a history lesson about pirates.

Or rather, just their flag.

Back in 1748, if you had the misfortune of being a single bobbing ship at sea when a tattered vessel with a skull and crossbones crossed your path, you knew instantly what to expect.

"You're fucked." (Collins, verbatim.)

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by Angela Natividad    May-12-08    
Topic: Brands, Creative Commentary, Industry Events, Opinion

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One Show: Advice from the Father of Joe Isuzu, Advertising's Most Beloved Liar

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Jerry Della Femina, founder of Della Femina Travisano & Partners (now DFJP), reminds me a lot of the ads he's sprinkled in TV Land's past. Remember Meowmix's singing cat? And Joe Isuzu? Like the spots, he's impossible to get out of your head.

Because Jerry's voice could cut through Valium. You will listen to every last thing he has to say, uncertain whether it's the ideas seducing you or the man's own confidence.

In the hour Della Femina spoke during One Show's Tuesday afternoon speaker session, I could have filled notebooks with what he continuously called "secrets of life" and "career advice."

Here's a taste.

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by Angela Natividad    May- 8-08    
Topic: Creative Commentary, Industry Events

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Freeze-Packed Used Condoms Call Attention to Beach Pollution

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If you're one of those beach police dudes, you might want to make sure you take your keys out of your little beach cart before you inform a beachgoer they're on a private beach lest you want an angry walrus to drive off with it. That particular scenario is part of a Saatchi & Saatchi LA-created campaign for the beach protection cause group Surfrider.

Along with an amateur-style video with the walrus antics, which, let's be honest, is pretty lame, comes seafood packaging placed in local farmer's markets which don't contain fish, rather various collections of trash collected from the beach. Not exactly the sort of thing you'd want to see when digging through the cooler for that prefect cut of fish.

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'Hey Whipple, Squeeze This' Will Add Four Hours to Your Workday

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A few months ago, a senior copywriter recommended I read Hey Whipple, Squeeze This by Luke Sullivan. I was incredulous, mostly because I've been swinging off Ogilvy's left you-know-what since Confessions of an Advertising Man.

(Getting into Ogilvy is like reading Atlas Shrugged for the first time. It will fuck with your mind.)

Just to be nice, I bought Sullivan's book, and I'm really sorry I did. Because now my walls are COVERED in strategic doodling. I am developing ideas I wouldn't have allocated brainpower to six months ago.

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by Angela Natividad    May- 1-08    
Topic: Creative Commentary, Good, Opinion, Publishing, Tools

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Children's Hospital Campaign Gets Personal

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The Akron Children's Hospital , with help from Cleveland's Marcus Thomas, is running a new campaign made up of video portraits highlighting the lives of two patients staying in the hospital. Nick and Roxanne, both 15, are seen in two commercials (1, 2) as well as several other videos hosted on the hospital's site. Along with videos from many other patients, the dour aspects childhood cancer are left behind in favor of the upside: the fact life goes on, one can live with cancer and one cab even beat cancer.

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by Steve Hall    Apr-29-08    
Topic: Commercials, Creative Commentary, Good, Online, Television, Video

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Beer Commercials Deceive Aliens, Happier Planets Sought

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OK, seriously. Just what is it about beer that is supposed to make life perfect? How did beer, swill such as Miller Lite no less, become the answer to all of life's ills? Seriously. It's liquefied wheat and barley injected with air. That doesn't sound like a life-altering panacea yet marketer after marketer after marketer insist a sip of beer will get you the girl, turn your life into a posh existence, help you one up your friends and turn you into some sort of superior being with qualities only found in, well, beer commercials.

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by Steve Hall    Apr-28-08    
Topic: Commercials, Creative Commentary, Opinion

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Carlsberg Elevates Stature of Beer Babe Commercial

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It's tired. It's old. It's predictable. But it speaks the truth. Yes. Beer. Hot women. And one track mind guys. Ah yes, the quintessential beer commercial. This time it's from Carlsberg Lite who entices three guys with the allure of white-clad fitness trainers...and beer. Created by Saatch & Saatchi Simko, the ad at leasts elevates the tactic a step or two above the Coors Twins or the famed mud wrestling beer babes of yore.

Ooops. it's sorta been done before. Sorry guys.

by Steve Hall    Apr-24-08    
Topic: Campaigns, Creative Commentary

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Sexy Chain-Linked Legs Supposed to Stop Sex Trafficking

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Is it wrong to think this Amnesty International sex trafficking ad is just a tiny bit hot while at the same time realizing it's a clever representation of a reprehensible practice? Please! Don't confuse. It's like those ads where young girls with huge boobs are used to convince you underage sex is a bad thing while making you want to have sex at the same time. (Not with the underage girls in the ads, mind you. Contrary to popular belief, even I know the difference between right and wrong.)

The ad, created by Switzerland's Walker, does catch the eye and that's half the battle in this game. But like the underage sex ads, it creates an uncomfortable awkwardness. Maybe that's a good thing. Perhaps it causes one to feel a bit skeeved. Trouble is, the people who engage in this reprehensible practice, after seeing the ad, may simply be more motivated to find the next young, hot thing to trade like a piece of property.

by Steve Hall    Apr-23-08    
Topic: Bad, Creative Commentary, Good, Magazine, Opinion, Racy, Strange

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Copyranter Calls it Quits

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Copyranter is leaving the blogosphere in favour of more productive uses of his time. Show the 'ranter some love by contributing to the fare-thee-well comment count.

Between us, Bill Green over at Make the Logo Bigger said he thinks mastheads everywhere should be at half staff. We feel him on that. Read his post on Copyranter's departure, which started a big discourse about fact-checking and the interview methods of Katie Couric.

by Angela Natividad    Apr-21-08    
Topic: Bad, Creative Commentary, Online

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