Will Marketers Say: Save the Planet, Buy Less Stuff?
Submitted by Diane Farsetta on
"The ultimate selling proposition might just be saving the planet," said International Advertising Association (IAA) executive director Michael Lee.
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Marketing
Stealth Marketers Gone Wild: Will the FCC Act?
One of my favorite critiques of our ad-saturated modern world is in "Infinite Jest," the epic novel by recently-departed author and essayist David Foster Wallace. In the novel's not-too-distant future, time itself has become a corporate marketing opportunity. There's the Year of the Trial-Size Dove Bar and the Year of the Depend Adult Undergarment. That's not to mention the Year of the Yushityu 2007 Mimetic-Resolution-Cartridge-View-Motherboard-Easy-To-Install-Upgrade For Infernatron/InterLace TP Systems For Home, Office, Or Mobile, which is often abbreviated.
The novel's system of Subsidized Time is hilarious ... and you can almost imagine it really happening. At least corporate-sponsored years wouldn't present the disclosure problems of today's stealth ads -- marketing messages that masquerade as entertainment or news content.
The Center for Media and Democracy believes that all advertising should be as clearly announced as the Year of the Trial-Size Dove Bar. That's why we just filed a comment with the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). The FCC is debating how its sponsorship identification rules apply to product placement, product integration and other types of "embedded advertising" relayed over television or radio stations.
In 2003, Commercial Alert urged the FCC to address product placement disclosure. "Advertisers can puff and tout, and use all the many tricks of their trade," the watchdog group wrote (pdf). "But they must not pretend that their ads are something else."
Especially, we would add, when that "something else" is news programming.
Return of the Swift Boaters
Submitted by Sheldon Rampton on
"A new group financed by a Texas billionaire and organized by some of the same political operatives and donors behind the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth campaign against Sen. John F. Kerry in 2004 plans to begin running television ads attacking Barack Obama," report Matthew Mosk and Chris Cillizza.
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PR Driving "Carbon Neutral" Greenwashing
Submitted by Bob Burton on
The Advertising Standards Authority of Ireland (ASAI) is alarmed about the extent of corporate greenwashing. The authority's chief executive, Frank Goodman, explained, "You are not allowed to say your product is good for the environment unless you can prove this.
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An Unhealthy Impact on Local Reporting
Submitted by Diane Farsetta on
"A hospital complains about a reporter and pulls ads from the paper. The paper reassigns him. The paper -- offered three chances -- declines to deny that one caused the other," summarizes the Columbia Journalism Review. CJR was following up on a Wall Street Journal article about Carilion Health System, which is Roanoke, Virginia's sole healthcare provider.
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Pfizer to Jarvik: See You Later, Doc
Submitted by Diane Farsetta on
Pfizer's getting ready to resume advertising for its cholesterol drug Lipitor. In February, the drugmaker pulled its Lipitor ads, over charges they were misleading.
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Sears to Start Selling Line of Official U.S. Military Garb
Submitted by Anne Landman on
Sears has entered into a first-ever deal with the United States Military to market a new line of officially sanctioned, military-styled clothing to men, women and boys.
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Best-Selling Cholesterol Drugs Found Ineffective
Submitted by Anne Landman on
Three million people worldwide are taking the new, heavily advertised anti-cholesterol drugs Zetia and Vytorin, despite a lack of clinical evidence that they reduce cardiovascular disease or heart attacks, or help patients live longer.
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Polishing Demand for the iPhone
Submitted by Judith Siers-Poisson on
There were long lines of people in Poland to buy the new iPhone 3G, just like in the U.S. But in Poland, those lined up were paid actors. The Polish subsidiary of the French firm France Telecom (Orange) admitted that they had staged the popular demand for the new device. "It was a marketing stunt," said Wojciech Jabczynski, the spokesperson for the French company.
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NCI: Tobacco Advertising, Smoking in Movies Contribute to Smoking Rates
Submitted by Anne Landman on
Philip Morris and the tobacco industry in general have long insisted that ci
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