NHS wins coolest health care system award.

I've been writing or rather, trying to write a paper on the politics of health care provision. In so doing I've come across this great video by the NHS on the 'essential use of condom wear'. Titled 'beer goggles', the message I'm getting is that too much alcohol blurs your vision, thus leading to casual sex with unattractive women... thus one should use condoms just in case this leads to undesirable genetics? You know, the more I blog, the more I realize how viral ads might not actually be the best form of conveying a message as I anticipated it to be, in terms of message richness and 'readability' in corp comms talkspeak. Here's the fun ad! I'm not sure why it struck me as bizarre but it might have been the facial acrobatics the fat lady is attempting.



Admittedly this ad does add value to NHS nonetheless! Apart from disparaging its distribution system (my money=bum on the bench's medical benefits), it makes me think of it more fondly. Naturally this is no comparison at all to the MOH's advertising methods... wait, are there any?

By the way ripping off the Youtube embed link for an SWF video upload into blogger is way more efficient- and I must say, smarter, than copying it into Photobucket or Google pages (that by the way is pretty much defunct) that I'm-all-that techies have been writing about all over the Internet. Yes, I am shamelessly showcasing my indubitable talent for amateur blogging, so sue me.

Doctor, doctor.

Wow this is weird. An ad by Treximet which is the equivalent of our Panadol:


I don't think 'holding my head in my hands' has ever been so literally illustrated before. Don't think this ad would soothe any headache I had.

The following is kind of irrelevant but I should think, interesting, for those into branding, semiotics, social networks etc.- which was what really got me interested in advertising and subsequently my internship last summer, in the first place. Anyway for those who want to , check it out.

Culture Networks (Lecture)

View more presentations from Tim Stock.

All the above is from Brandnoise.

Sheepvertising

Check out Samsung advertising their LED technology with LED-lit sheep!

"More than a million internet users have watched the viral video in the four days since it was released online.

The 200 second ad also sees the creatures manoeuvred into position to create a giant sheep and even has them creating the Mona Lisa with the various coloured LEDs on their back." - Telegraph UK

What are they going to make animals do next?!?! But yes, pretty cool.

That's not very nice!

Gizmodo: How to shame one into going to the gym.

If SBS did this, they'd lose money, considering how weight-conscious Singaporeans are. Wouldn't this encourage anorexia and lower national self-esteem? Although this would probably make for a successful business collaboration between Slim 10 and the public transport system.

Ad-dict

Advertising tools of today: the dead, or the KAWAII!!!

Apparently advertisers are sick of sex scandals, druggies and wifebeaters (i.e. Chris Brown) tarnishing their ad campaigns, and have decided to turn to the dead. After all, “You’re not going to catch Elvis in a sex scandal, or Albert Einstein’s not going to hit his girlfriend.” -Trendhunter

In my opinion, however, that might not work so well with everyone- as Anna Nicole Smith exemplifies.

A safer bet would be the KAWAII. It's been found that people turn to The Cute during hard times. This phenomenon has also been digitalized through the Internet, as the increasing number of websites like Cute Overload have evidenced. Check out this tv ad and the Michelin Baby:

Trends via TrendHunter.com.

From Trendhunter

I genuinely think he looks way more appealing that that freaky tyre dude they usually employ. Although is that a 'he'? Hmmm. Well, you can't go wrong with fat babies and rodents/household pets I guess.

Ads these days!!!

Trends via TrendHunter.com.

For the uninitiated, the above is an ad by Durex. It contains three delightful bunnies painted in orange, blue and sweet pink, doing it like they do it on the discovery channel. Well, in slightly more variation perhaps.

Being cute, entertaining and potentially sexual fodder for the disturbed isn't what the video's all about. It's yet another safe sex-ed ad on essential condom use. Unfortunately, its meaning didn't really sink in till I read the explanatory text that came after. And that was only until I distributed the video, laughed about it, watched it again, laughed at it again, then scrolled down to the considerably less charming chunk of a paragraph below.

Recently, discussions have been broached on the efficacy of Social Media in message communication. This case study proves that desired cogency is hardly always the end result. And isn't it sad that some people are just too stupid to understand the importance of contraception?

On a lighter note, aren't sexverts great?

Check out a Trojan ad and where it all began. In the '70s.