pfffft blogs… what a glorious tool, weeee – everybody can self-publish now. but to be honest, alot of blogs are not all that interesting – and pieceoplastic.com is very much included here. i mean, i would not read me…
sometimes i make up lists in my head of people who should really have a blog. and carrie mclaren from the always excellent and thought provoking stay free! zine always comes up on that list.
i have often mentioned his publication and his rants here quoting them from his newsletters.
well, now he has started a blog. his occasional rants about american politics, advertisement and outsider culture can now be found there:
recently i got really inspired by carrie’s rant about the vw car bomb add that had floated around the web awhile ago. i wanted to respond.
but i forgot – or i was prolly too busy trying to upgarde my wordpress install… ugh. (another question i have: why do blogs not upgrade themselves?)
so here it is, read for yourself:
http://stayfree.typepad.com/stayfree/2005/02/volkswagen_car_.html
I generally avoid mentioning advertising efforts that are clearly designed for shock value, but Volkswagen’s new viral campaign really gets my goat.
The blogosphere is afire with word of a commercial for Volkswagen that features a man getting inside his VW, driving to a cafe, and setting off a car bomb; the driver’s plans go awry, however, because the bomb doesn’t explode the car, which remains intact.
In posts about the spot, several bloggers have simply mouthed Volkswagen’s claims that it has nothing to do with it; the company originally said it was filing criminal charges against the creators but quickly settled for a public apology.
The whole brouhaha strikes me as a transparent (albeit clever) effort by Volkswagen to engage in the guerilla-style viral marketing that’s all the rage in corporate boardrooms now. The ad team that created the spot — Lee Ford and Dan Brooks — have claimed they have no idea how the commercial got on the internet. But Adland found a dead link named “Volkswagen” on the Ford and Brook’s website (the site has since been changed and the link is no longer there).
Ford and Brooks told the Guardian that the spot cost 40,000 pounds but wouldn’t say who footed the bill; the spot’s director, however, disputed that claim and said it only cost 400 pounds (extremely unlikely given the high production values). […]
all i can say about this is: exactly what i was thinking… but i also would add to that: viral campaigns really work, if they get us to talk so much about them. the best thing would of course be to just ignore them with a tired smile…
which, i am sure, in a few years we will. this will get old so fast!
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