Tuesday, July 10, 2007

We are all members of the blackfoot tribe

I missed seeing this last night, but then I rarely see Corrie with anything more than half an eye open.

DEFRA has launched a £5Million ad campaign aimed at making us all more aware of our carbon footprints. Full story from The Guardian.

Nice use of an excellent Kinks track (Shangri-La), but will the man in the street even understand the ad, let alone the underlying message? Let's see.

1 comment:

Emma said...

How!

Or, rather, huh?

I saw it last night. A well stylish ad indeed though, putting my jury hat on, it rathers falls into the not so slick (geddit) 'Elephant, Elephant' league, whereby the visual shows you something and the headline/voice over tells you what you are looking at. Considered a waste of comms effort in some circles.

I'm afraid the Kinks track washed right over me. Can't recall a word. This trend to trawling the archives of the muisc biz and then bolting an ad onto a section of a lyric really doesn't work for me, with only a few exceptions. I really miss the original, dedicated, great jingles and catchphrases of my youth, even those from public infomercials. They must be good because I can still hum them... and abide by their message as I look right, look left and, if all's clear, cross the road.

So OK, I'm 'aware' now I leave mucky footprints wherever I go... only I don't. They are left in the atmosphere, invisibly, where I have no sense of my contribution. And if this is pointing to the same Flash site I couldn't access last time it was 'launched' or, worse, another one (how many do we need???!), good luck to 'em.

Sorry, another triumph of style over substance. But I am sure a box or two are being ticked somewhere.

My advice? Bring it home. Make it real. And leave the viewer with something to do that offers a sense of reward.