Totally Bizarre Advertising
Posted by Thomas J. Brown at 0912 hrs
We've all seen those annoying little Flash-based banner ads that entreat you to play some game in the hopes of winning an iPod or something similar. They range from actually fun (I once saw a "Wild West" shooting gallery one) to fairly odd ("outrun the gorilla!"), but below is one of the most bizarre I've ever seen:
As if the premise of a competition composed entirely of slapping a sumo wrestler's belly wasn't odd enough, the prize for out-slapping your opponent is that you will, "find out your crush's name!"
Wha?! How does that make any sense at all? I often wonder who comes up with this stuff, which leads me to wonder who pays for it. No self-respecting company could possibly think that this union is a natural one. Can you imagine if Apple had a banner ad like this? "Eat 50 eggs and win a free iPod horoscope!"
4 Comments
On 14 April 2008, Michelle said:
You can't really put anything past those crazy Japanese, you know. Either they're on the forefront of the next REALLY BIG thing in the intertubes or... okay, or they're just crazysauce.
On 14 April 2008, Emily said:
My question is: if its your crush do you think you already know who it is? Call me crazy but I always knew the name of the guy I liked. The definition in the OED (A person with whom one is enamoured or infatuated; an infatuation; so to have or get a crush on, to be enamoured of, take a strong fancy to) implies that you have prior knowledge of this person. Maybe its meant for when you see a hot person on the street that you fantasize about later. Ok that's enough procrastination for me today back to my thesis.
On 14 April 2008, Thomas J. Brown said:
I think they mean you can find out who has a crush on you.
On 15 April 2008, Emily said:
You're probably right, but that's not what they say on the ad. It is unclear. It says "your crush's name" which means the crush belongs to you. Anyway its weird and disturbing.
On 1 December 2008, said: