The good.
The yikes (especially this bit: “American officials have known about this vulnerability for years, but they didn’t think enemies would know how to take advantage of it… Now the United States is getting ready to spend as much as $4.5 billion to buy new-generation drones that have the same vulnerability.” We probably have TEENAGERS who can take advantage of it. Don’t you watch movies?!!)
The friggin finally.
This ad showed up at the top of my gmail this morning.
“Find Iran Girls at Great Prices.”
I hadn’t been writing or reading any emails about Iran or girls, but I was curious. I clicked to see if it was a weird auto-advertising error or sleaze for cheap bastards. While loading:
Seems like auto-advertising word fail. I waited.
I guess the results are kind of a mix of both. Auto-advertising picking up a random weird word combination, but then sponsored links that are intentionally advertising Iranian women (or any 18+ women, etc etc).
Summary: all-round fail. You end up with sales on Ralph Lauren Childrenswear next to sexy webcam link advertising. Everyone leaves feeling a bit dirty and depressed, no matter what they were originally looking for (except pedophiles, I guess, and I would imagine they feel dirty and depressed all the time, though I’m not up on my DSM-4).
So, I just got this newsletter and it had been bought out by Everlon Diamonds, running a campaign for some new diamond jewelry with the tagline “the strength of love forged in a knot”.
Does it look suspiciously noose-like to you?
It didn’t help that I already fielded an email about blood diamonds this morning, nor that I always have this brilliant Atlantic article in mind when I look at diamond ads now, but, regardless, I’m pretty sure this piece of jewelry is dreadful. It’s as if you unironically designed a wedding ring that looked like a ball and chain or something.
Due to a semi-long and varied history in various aspects of marketing, I can’t help feeling a spike of vicious glee when I see some marketing stunt gone horribly wrong, especially if it is by one of the big players. As I was reading the industry news this morning, I saw this gem:
Pepsi Promotion Ends With Chants of ‘Pepsi Sucks’
New York Yankees Tie-In Goes Horribly AwryPosted by Ken Wheaton on 04.17.09
Yankees fans who showed up for a Pepsi-sponsored promotion yesterday were none too pleased after standing in line for hours only to find out fewer tickets were being given out than promised. According to the New York Post, “Chanting ‘Pepsi sucks! Pepsi sucks!’ the over-caffeinated mob cracked open cans of the soft drink and poured it onto the pile of swag, sending cops racing to the scene.” And there’s video! Video in which an angered fan also shouts, “Drink Coca-Cola!”
You can see the full AdAge article here, if you have access. Tee-hee.
I was going to have a deep thought about something, but then I saw this and lost my mind a little bit.
