Shameful, shameful money

The ‘Life Takes Visa’ campaign has a fair number of detractors, notably the Consumerist who found this article on Credit Slips, which in turn criticizes the ‘Morning in Manhattan’ ad found on this page.

The ad shows a perfect clockwork of commerce, with everyone paying with Visa, until someone tries to pay with actual cash. Everything slows down as the man is sneered at, then given his change. Though the only actual slow down in the paying processes seems to be the amount to time it take the cashier to sneer. Don’t worry, before long automated payment systems will eliminate the need for your job at all, cashier lady.

Originally, I liked this campaign when the ads were comparing using credit / debit card as opposed to using a personal check, by far the slowest way possible to pay for anything. But using cash still tends to be faster than using a check or credit card, especially if you have to sign a slip or punch in your pin number. Or maybe the phone line has no carrier, or maybe your magnetic strip is dying and the cashier has to punch in the numbers. Then sometimes the bank service network is temporarily down. You know what, I have two dollars in my wallet how about I give you those instead?

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BYOB

For some reason, naked people = not eating meat. That’s a trend reinforced by this recent NSFW ad featuring Alicia Silverstone. The parody is, like most parodies, just a shot for shot remake, but with the opposite message of the original ad (eat meat instead of don’t eat meat).

The site mentioned at the end, gomeat.com, takes you to the YouTube channel for a comedy group called Shake State. Apparently they don’t like Harry Potter. Or own a boom mike. Let’s watch!

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Plenty of old school rock songs have been played to death by commercials to the point where you forget they were even original artist recordings. This Top 9 List is devoted to the Indie and Alternative Rock songs that have been ruined or marred in one way or another by television advertising.

Click the picture for the commercial Pops in a new window

Number Nine: Punkrocker by the Teddybears by Cadillac

This one ranks not too highly because it didn’t get overplayed quite as much or over such a long period of time as some others on the list. But when this commercial made it to the small screen, the track was just reaching popularity, meaning this spot came out right at that magical sweet spot in the life of a popular music track to taint its listenability.

(Oh there is more…)

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This is why Doom 2 added the double barrel shotgun

This fun commercial is for a new LCD TV ‘Bravia’, put out by Sony of Europe. I like the concept, it is sort of a spoof of stop motion animation…unless they spent the last few years in development on this commercial and actually did all of this by hand. That kind of feat seems like it would rival the first moon landing in coordinated effort and pure technical grit.

This spot did much better than a similar idea I had that just involved releasing a lot of confused live bunnies in the middle of a busy downtown area. I am still on the run from the SPCAA.

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Botched surgeries are hilarious

If it weren’t for this one insane doctor, the strip club in Van Nuys wouldn’t have anyone working there at all. And, apparently, he’s their only customer, so they wouldn’t have any income if it weren’t for him either. It’s a business model that cannot fail.

This beautifully done and tasteful commercial raises the chilling possibility of a 21st century ’superpimp’. Not only does the superpimp manage the girls in this science fiction nightmare scenario, but he medically and genetically creates them as his mind’s eye sees fit.

Besides this shocking revelation, nothing is wrong with this commercial. Everything is fine.

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