QuietAgent.Com, a firm I had never heard of before, has found a brilliant way to get some free media during the Superbowl week-end. Their idea? Create an ad so offensive the networks reject it, and then spread the word that your ad was rejected.
In their ad, they used an image of President Bush and his voice, and then put in a series of things in the background that would make sure the ad was rejected, such as a picture of infected toes, a dog taking a crap, etc. And, of course, ABC rejected it (.pdf warning).
They are banking that this ‘controversy’ will then get picked up by the networks (they are marketing it as “The Super Bowl Commercial you’re not allowed to see”), and much like the Swift Vet ads, get played (blacked out, of course) or discussed over and over. Great idea, and if it works and this does get picked up by the networks and the cable news folks, everyone in the marketing department at Quiet Agent deserves a raise.
Krista
Even without audio, that ad is priceless. Those clever, clever bastards.
Jorge
“teethadonist”
Priceless.
Pb
It’s sad that they can allegedly afford to run a Super Bowl commercial, but they can’t afford the real George W. Bush. Heck, even if you could get permission to use some real sound clips, that’d do it. That bit at the end with the house on fire reminded me about the time he joked about his ‘electrocution’–no, not his term as Texas Governor, his speaking skills.
Marcus Wellby
I could see this controversy causing all sorts of problems. I mean, it isn’t fair to the companies that paid millions to have their commercial spots
covered as if they were real news for a weekaired during the superbowldemimondian
It’s good that you struck this out. The companies didn’t pay millions to have their commercials covered like real news. They payed millions to have their spots covered accurately.
DougJ
That occurred to me years ago…damn, why didn’t I try to make money off it?
Mr Furious
It won’t work. You will never see it on the news.
Lines
Isn’t this really what that boobalicious commercial was attempting to do last year?
Lines
ummm, what was the commercial about? I couldn’t figure it out, and by the end, I didn’t care.
Dodd
Seems to be working so far….
BadTux
This is an old ploy. The Godaddy.com domain registry also seems to do this every year. For the first couple of years it did get them a little PR, nowdays, not so much.
– Badtux the Media Penguin
Paddy O'Shea
I posted this on another thread here earlier today. And of course it works. It’s probably been e-mailed 100,000 times in the last day or so. That’s how I got it.
The only part I don’t get here is the offensive part. I thought it was damned funny. Definitely works the “Shrub fucks up everything he touches” angle brilliantly.
I mean, would you let someone as completely incompetent as Puddin’ Bush change the oil of your car?
The Disenfranchised Voter
Hahaha. Teethadontist.
LOL.
Zifnab
Sonofabitch! I just missed it. Boo.
Bob
mirrored here: http://www.boredmuch.com/view.php?id=854
apostropher
And here.
The Other Steve
That’s pretty clever, even though I think the commercial kind of sucked.
Actually the big story here is, the theme “George Bush is a fuckup” extends beyond the inner circles of political activism.