It's a 15 second piece of confusion pointing to a website the majority of people are not going to visit. If you want to defend the right to free speech no one gives a shit about, knock yourself out. But it's also my right to critique it. And as an ad, it was a waste of money.
My suggestion is the same suggestion I would make to someone running a tampon or candy or beer or insurance ad that made no sense: go back to the drawing board and make a point that people can understand, or choose a different medium if your point is unclear.
As I said in this thread before, this is an advertising site. Ads have to make a point quickly, regardless of what kind of ad it is. The average attention span is 8 seconds. Your post above is more than two pages long. And you want everyone to know the truth about something that happened thirteen years ago.
Put your conspiracy/truther hat down for a second. And objectively think about it from a communication standpoint. If it takes more than two pages of facts to explain everything-- and someone decides its a good idea to skip all that and run a billboard in times square with zero information-- do you see how there is a disconnect? Do you see why this is not a good ad?
I don't even know why I'm bothering trying to explain. Oh wait, yes I do. Because this is an advertising site.
All ads should be designed for strategic use. But digital ones even more so. The goal shouldn't be to stalk you. It should be to understand when you are receptive to the message-- and on what website.
As you said, most are neither strategic nor used sparingly. And that is digital advertising's biggest mistake, too. It's not designed to be used sparingly; the believe the larger the numbers the greater the potential.
I don't want to concede they have a point but ...I've had click-through rates of 7% for some of my rich banners onYoutube that were considered "an astounding success," by the people who measured the analytics. And that was for a large media budget.
What no one in the digital sphere really wants to admit is this: most "in-market" advertising is the same as direct marketing that gets sent to your real life mailbox.
With few exceptions, journalism of any kind has never been about seeking the truth and reporting in an objective way. That, as much as any other story, was part of a narrative. The fact it's gotten so blatant in gaming is a larger symptom. The fact it is that easy to shape is also a byproduct of an industry that reacts in horror and shock, rather than investigates with objectivity.
Talking points are used to shape a unified narrative as much as out of sheer laziness on the journalists' part. But being this fascist about it, in such a cavalier way (shadowbanning, anyone?) is just plain stupid and reckless. While boycotts usually don't last or do much in the way of damage, If some news outlets saw a serious enough drop in numbers, they might at least think about biting the hand that feeds them a little less hard.
Far be it for me to make you come down off your high horse, but the sci-fi book industry wasn't saved by your gesture. And if this year's participants (with your being an exception, of course) weren't harassing sci-fi authors, then why in the hell did it get so much press? Why did so many articles across the spectrum write the same story. Why did Neil Gaiman politely tweet everyone to get the hell off his property? Why is the GISHWHES wikipedia updated with the story as well?
Yeah you're right. We're all in collusion. It's part of The Great Conspiracy To Discredit Saint Misha.
That's the problem. You may not realize this, but this entire site, Adland, is devoted to advertising.
And as an ad, this one is confusing, provides very little information, and except for images of buildings going down-- which most likely offended a lot of people on today of all days-- gives the viewer no incentive to seek out more information.
And speaking of offended people, Times Square is the spot for tourists, most likely the American comes are coming from the heartland and are probably greatly offended by the images. As a piece of communication, this makes me question if the creators know anything about advertising. Who exactly were they trying to talk to?
Let me go ahead and give you a hint. If your initial answer to the above question was "Everyone," then it is incredibly misguided. You can sell Toyotas to "everyone." But subject matter like this, which can be described as either whistle blowing or conspiracy theorizing, is too polarizing a subject matter to appeal to "everyone."
Perhaps it was meant solely as a publicity stunt. If that was the case, it was also a poor one. More people were spending their days on twitter trolling brands who were remembering 9/11, rather than thinking about the New World Order.
Whether an ad is meant to sell a product or an idea, it has to be clear, concise, and persuasive. Time will tell how big of a failure this ad was. But let's just say I am not betting that a platoon of newly recruited Truthers are going to descend on Pennsylvania Avenue this week.
How smarmy is this. They seem to suggest that the people they've hit up to be part of the crowdsourcing platoon have somehow won them awards already, as opposed to these people being award winners in their own right. The more I spend time on their website, the angrier I get.
Where did you get the number $1800 from? Are you a member of Colossal Spark? There's no monetary specifics on their site....
More importantly, is the argument that "you're still getting exploited but not as bad as the others," a good argument? I don't think so. We're talking about large brands behind this, with a lot of money. Not mom and pop shops.
Please do email us a review. I would love to read it.
Just to clarify though, I never said anything about stealing ideas, dude bro.
If you are apprehensive about agencies, I assume then, that you don't work for one? That's good-- because if you did, then working for Colossal Spark not only makes lousy business sense from your end (unless you like being underpaid for your work) but it's also a conflict of interest against the agency you worked for.
Some other points:
1. Look at the people on the 'advisory board,' of Colossal Spark. They actually work in advertising. You're not straying that far from the so-called 100 year old creative directors. In fact, judging solely by their photos, they don't look like 22 year old trust fund kids with zero experience who just developed a social app no one wants in the hopes of getting bought out by google.
2. Clients are still clients. They haven't changed. They are still judging your work whether it goes through a traditional
advertising agency, or through a "curator," who tweets for a living.
3. They pay shit rates.
I'm a copywriter, too, fyi. And while I hold no love for the side effects of traditional advertising (politics, out of touch with current trends) I wouldn't touch this with a ten foot pole.
But by all means, if you like it, go for it. Hope you get an invite if you haven't already. If not, I'll ask my friend to recommend you.
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