Media Reflection

This semester has been different for me, largely due to my Zero Period class. Not only do I need to wake up an hour earlier and walk to school in the cold and dark, but I have been introduced to concepts never really discussed before in class. Analyzing advertisements, speeches, political statements, and media usage in general has been new for me. Normally, teachers don't really go into modern media, and so unlike every other class, I had no prior knowledge.

Because of this, my awareness of media and my interpretation of it have changed dramatically. I now look at advertisements and story placement online and on the television, as well as the physical world.  I will be watching a television show, see an advertisement for, say, flu medicine, and just start calling out needs to my family, for instance. Or online, I will spend two or three minutes staring at a sidebar or a pop-up ad. I also have become more aware of how much media consumption I do.

Sort of ironically, instead of making me limit my media usage, I actually have increased it. I blame this mostly on the fact that I have needed to find examples to use in media blogs, so I have actively searched for advertisements and the like. I expect that now that the course is done I will limit that somewhat, though I will still use my computer a lot.

This has taught me the value of understanding media though. My increased awareness has changed how I use the media, and now I realize that it is very important to establish media literacy. I mean, it’s good to be able to look at something, figure out what and how they are trying to sell, and then be able to figure out from that how trustworthy their advertisement is. What I’m saying is, media literacy is a very important skill for people who use media a lot. And I use media a lot.

Being an educated consumer allows you to look past the surface of what companies’ sell, to figure out whether you really need it. In a way, it is a vital part of being thrifty, a trait that I greatly value. And I became a more educated consumer through these media blogs.

Because of this, all in all, I value the time spent working in Critical Thinking, learning about something I’ve never learned about before.

I Clicked a Sidebar

So I clicked on one of the ads that I often see on the side of web pages saying like “New rule for California Drivers”.

http://insurance.comparisons.org/ver2/?sub=1136-mmed

I always figured it was just going to try and get my credit card information or something, but it seems to actually bring me to an article. Now, whether if I tried to then click other links to get the ‘reward’, that I don’t know, and don’t really want to try and find out. But this is very interesting either way.

Because, see, it was very unsuccessful advertising. I only clicked it this time because it was Sunday evening and I needed a third Media Blog. Whether this is legitimate or not, they managed to put their ad placement in such a way that I automatically assumed they were trying to either steal money or download a virus onto my computer.

I doubt that there is actually an easy way to find new insurers and save hundreds of dollars for myself, but it is quite possible, even probable, that many of the ads I see on the edges of web pages actually link to something not dangerous. However, for any legitimate, safe, links buried in there, I won’t click them, because I don't trust them not to try and take advantage of my curiosity.

Either way, though, once I finish posting this I’m gonna run my Anti-Malware software. Just in case.

So Many Dumb Ways to Die

I have known about this song for a while now, but I only recently learned from a friend that this is actually an advertisement.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IJNR2EpS0jw

Apparently, this is actually a safety announcement from the Metro Train Station, as I guess a lot of people not me knew about. I’m completely baffled by how I didn’t realize this, because it says as much at the end, but somehow I managed to completely miss that. So… yeah…

Aaaanyway, this is an extremely creative way to advertise something. Although they are not selling a product, they are trying to spread a message. It sticks in people’s brains because of the black humor involved, using humor and gestalt to hopefully stop people from getting hit by trains. I feel like the reason I did not receive this message was more due to my own lack of observation than any failure on the part of the advertisers.

If more things were advertised like this, I would buy more products. It uses the very simple yet apparently hard to achieve method of making the audience want to watch the advertisement. Since we want to watch it, we will pay attention and view the product in a positive light, making us more likely to buy the product, or in this case, listen to the warning.

So, if for some reason an advertiser is reading this: Do that. Hire someone to make a funny video. It doesn’t take much, just sing about it or have some comedian talk about it. It doesn’t have to be as easily viral as this, it just has to be amusing. Trust me on this.

Product Placement- Men In Black 3

Men in Black 3 was a pretty good movie. It wasn’t till the second time I watched it though that I notices how much product placement there was.

http://images.search.yahoo.com/search/images;_ylt=A0oGkk.a7ulQlGAA9G1XNyoA?p=men+in+black+3+poster&fr=yfp-t-701-17&fr2=piv-web

Now the link I provided is not a good example of product placement, but you’ll either have to trust me on this or watch the movie yourself under scrutiny.

Product I noticed being advertised were Coca-Cola, New York Jets, Dunkin’ Donuts, Cadillac, and Cracker Jacks, in various scenes, some more pointed than others. For example (this might not make sense if you haven’t watched the movie), Griffin clearly pulls the ArcNet out of a Cracker Jacks box. The Cracker Jacks are easily visible in multiple scenes during a very important plot point in the movie, including advertising the idea that there is a prize inside the box.

Product placement in movies is a common idea, and effective. I personally don't know whether it works or not, but I assume it does, or else companies would stop doing it. I rarely ever notice it, but that’s part of the point. If you notice the product placement, part of its purpose has failed. It is meant to subconsciously link in your mind, say, Pepsi with a love scene. Most movies, at least live action modern-setting ones, have plenty of product placements, often inconspicuously.

And really, it doesn’t bother me, unless it gets in the way of the plot. So in that way, product placement is a very effective way to ‘cut through the clutter’ to consumers.

Succesful movie poster! I found one, it worked! Yippee…

http://www.impawards.com/2013/abcs_of_death_ver2.html

Do I even need to explain why I like this movie poster? I can’t possibly be the only one who loves the concept of putting on your advertisement the angel of death reading to a baby the ABC’s or gruesome, horrible, death. Because I looked the movie up when I got home, and that’s what it is. Twenty-six short films based around people dying.

Sure, this advertisement won’t work on everyone, but I like it. They used gestalt in a way that stuck with me, because who expects Death and a baby sharing a tender moment over the ABC’s? Normally with a baby in the picture I’d also say need to nurture, but I feel like really this baby is more for comedic effect than to appeal to our natural parental instincts.

I would also like to point out the top of the image to the audience, although it may not be easily visible in a small picture like this. It says “from the directors of…” normally followed by well-known movies as a sort of celebrity testimonial. For this one though, the other movies directed involve “Hobo With a Shotgun”, “Tokyo Gore Police”, and even just “You’re Next”. I have watched none of these, but I like it.

Basically, what I’m saying is that this was a very good use of Wit and Humor, and especially Gestalt, to make me interested enough to look it up when I got home, and want to watch it now. The advertising methods weren’t all that complicated, they were just well done.

National Geographic Diabetes

Finally I actually think to use an advertisement from a magazine. In this one, Sanofi Diabetes is advertising their product in an informational sort of way.

 [image failed to upload]

Instead of actually advertising a product, Sanofi sets up this ad as more of a statement, saying that diets, pills and exercise are helpful, but insulin pens will really help with your diabetes. The way this is presented, to me at least, gives the impression that they’re just there to help, and they really are trustworthy, not just a company selling a product.

However, just about every diabetic knows that insulin pens can be bought. So by giving this impression to their audience, they are not teaching anyone anything, they are merely putting their name out there. I’m not saying this is a bad thing. On the contrary, I feel that this is a good advertising method, as long as the audience is established and judged to be responsive to this.

I do find the placement interesting, though not necessarily strange. This was found in an issue of National Geographic. The logic may have been perfectly innocent, just thinking that this is a widely subscribed magazine, and I believe that was the main reasoning.

But still, I wonder if the advertisers tailored their message here? Obviously, when reading National Geographic, subscribers are not offset by blocks of words like shown in this advertisement. So they don't need to worry as much about people being offset by the amount of wording. If the top picture catches people’s interest, then they will probably read through. Also, the ad seems to rely mostly on logic rather than a more emotional appeal (except for the top, which appeals to your emotional attachment to family).  It makes me wonder if they just decided logic would work better in National Geographic. If so, I’d say it was a good call.

what? billboard

Ok… just… what? What are you advertising here?

I look at this picture and am confused. I assume it’s advertising something, but what? “Regency”, whatever that is? Is there a product called Guess? What are they selling? What are they called. Plus, this is on a billboard, so by the time I pay attention to it it’s already past.

This billboard is a really good example of not being in any way clear when advertising a product. Again, I assume something is being advertised. I’m not really sure, to tell the truth. Maybe some rich software magnate just stuck a picture up on a board and put “Guess” next to it. Maybe Regency is a street sign.

The point is, I can’t tell. Whether this particular billboard is advertising something or not, it is an uncommon, but not unknown issue. Every now and then an advertiser will make an ad that just leaves the audience confused.

And I am confused.

PETA... why?

PETA doesn’t make very good ads sometimes.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HFFpr-qAWHo

Now, most of PETA’s ads are just really really pathetic dogs making me feel incredibly guilty and sad, but every now and then they try and use humor and/or sex to sell their ideas. To me, at least, it doesn’t work. I think this is meant to be humorous. I certainly hope so. It didn’t really pan out for me, though, because I was just left with a feeling of slight disgust mingled with confusion.

What this shows to me is how sometimes, companies and organizations completely lose their purpose during advertising. I thought that PETA’s purpose was to convince us not to kill animals and to adopt instead of buy pets. All this showed me was a weird attempt to connect going vegan with having really violent sex. So… yeah. That didn’t really pan out for them.

PETA really is a good example of the whole idea of turning their message into a matter of trivialities. Now instead of focusing on saving animals like they should be, when I think of PETA right alongside my images of puppies are images of women from their various attempts at sex appeal. Which, may I point out, has nothing to do with what they’re ‘selling’.

This is another thing that happens often it seems. An advertiser will use some method of advertising to sell their product, but the method is just not suited to the product. Now, maybe they can pull it off if the use the clash to their advantage, but that’s a tricky thing. Companies attempt to reach consumers through methods people wouldn’t normally expect, but it ends up just being images instead of a message.

Most Car Commercials Ever

Prepare yourself for the exact same car commercial you’ve seen a dozen times before.

http://www.youtube.com/user/Chevrolet?v=kmWRkLZqwn4

It’s kind of ironic, actually. The purpose of this ad is to tell the viewer that the new Chevrolet Malibu is a commercial based around the idea that the Chevrolet Malibu is new and better than ever. Yet by doing so, they follow the exact same guidelines of seemingly almost every other car commercial ever.

Allow me to demonstrate with a description of my own new car, the Mitchell NewCar. The commercial opens on a road winding through the mountains, driven by a young, handsome man, giving a slight smile as he winds his way towards the sunset. Soft but dramatic music builds in the background. The music gains volume as a deep soothing voice over describes how “with ___ horsepower and a ___ engine, the Mitchell NewCar is safer and smoother than ever before. Reinvent yourself in the NewCar”, and the scene changes to winding through the city streets. The music comes to a climax as the car drives past the sun or the ocean or a house or something, and then the screen cuts to my logo.

It seems like, with a few exceptions, car commercials are either this, or no voice-over on desert roads, or a truck smashing through snow-drifts or mud or something. Except every now and then, all automobile commercials are telling me the exact same thing. We are a good car, the best car, even better than anything else we made before, and definitely way better than our competitors. Buy us.

What this means is that I am now dead to this method of advertising. Instead of showing me that this is a good car, I am left feeling that it’s a mediocre car. If I didn’t have to check the name earlier so that I could put it into this post, I wouldn’t even remember what it was called.

I suppose my final conclusion is that this does not work well anymore. Car companies will need something new if they want to convince me that their car is good.

anti-smoking ad

This ad is shown in the previews of DVD’s, and actually really threw me off at first.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DFcphFan_WE

I was talking to friends when it first came on, so I didn’t understand that it was saying “this is what smoking companies will tell you”. It looked like a really over-the-top smoking ad, and so when the guy in the wheelchair started talking, I was confused and startled, undoubtedly the purpose of the announcement.

Whether this is actually an advertisement is sketchy, being more of a public safety announcement, but it’s use in media was interesting enough that I used It anyway. After all, this was not found on the internet, or on television… this was in the previews for a DVD. The movie Men In Black 3, I think.

I’m not sure why this was placed in the previews. Normally, I just skip them. I only didn’t this time because the disk wouldn’t let me. It doesn’t seem like a very good place for an announcement, though. It probably cost a considerable amount of money to put this in the previews of movies, and as I just mentioned, I normally just fast-forward or hit menu to skip my way through them.

So although the announcement reached me, it was a failed use of media. It found a place for itself where very few people would see it, in my opinion, and even less would pay attention.

However, I will admit that it was well-made. After all, I remembered it. They played off a lot of the classic images used in smoking ads then startled the viewers with an image of an old, dying looking man in a wheelchair. In this way, the shock factor was its main attempt to stick in the minds of the audience.

In spite of this, though, I’d say it’s use of media was not successful.