Badvertising

There are lies, damned lies, and advertising

• I’ve never seen that before in my life, honest!
Remember that great 2003 Honda ‘Cog’ TV commercial with the chain reaction of car parts? Beautifully shot by Antoine Bardou-Jacquet for ad agency Wieden+Kennedy, at a cost of – hold your breath – £1million. Great idea, stylishly realised. Won the Grand Prix at Cannes and spawned loads of imitators and spoofs. 

Not their concept unfortunately. It was ripped off the German short film ‘Der Lauf der Dinge’, (The Way Things Are), by David Weiss & Peter Fischli (1987). Of course the ‘creatives’ responsible denied ever having seen the original, meaning either they’re lying or they’re just not very well educated in modern culture. What would have been so wrong with paying the originators for using their idea and ‘interpreting’ it how they like? They had a million pound budget for crissakes. It’s not a crime to be inspired by something, but if you’re going to have the gall to nick another’s idea wholesale at least have the balls to admit it and credit the creator.

Here’s a link to ‘Der Lauf der Dinge’;

Der Lauf der Dinge - original film, 30 mins

Here’s a link to Honda’s Cog rip-off;

Honda's purely coincidental commercial

Coincidence? Con incident more like! Wonder how much of that million quid budget was allocated to the creative process? (£28.99 on Amazon for the original).

• Our survey said

A sneaky little ploy in advertising, especially on TV, where a company boasts that “X% of people asked said that our product was the best”. Especially prevalent at the moment in make-up and hair products for some reason. But take a close look at the small print. More often than not the survey sample size is pretty low to say the least. One TV advertisment recently boasted that “87% of women agreed that our shampoo gave them fuller body and longer lasting colour!”. The sample size: 35 people! That’s like asking round the office for a show of hands. Not compelling evidence in my book.

But first prize goes to Reebok Easytone trainers and their ludicrous claim that these overpriced plastic slave labour clogs could visibly tone your bum and legs. The survey size? Five. That’s right, they asked five people and built an ad campaign around it. Five people?! What did the fucking creative do – ask his family round the dinner table? Mum likes ‘em, sis likes ‘em, I like ‘em, but dad and Rover disagree. The Advertising Standards Authority took a very dim view and Reebok were forced to pull the outrageous claim from their ads.

• Products so good we had to fake the ad

Again it seems to be mainly beauty products here. Take a good look at current L’Oreal ads for eyelash gunk. They boost volume by over 50%! Give you fuller, thicker lashes than all their contemporaries! You won’t believe the difference! Too fucking right you won’t. The small print halfway through the ad states, “Filmed with lash inserts and augmented in post production”. It actually says this on the ad. So confident are they in their product’s effectiveness that not only do they have to use fake lashes, but they then have to touch the bloody things up in Photoshop! Fuck me, with that as a precedent I could bring out a wonder hair restorer that gives bald men locks worthy of Samson himself, filmed using wigs and hair-do’s cut n’ pasted from Google! 

We see this sort of thing all the time on women’s magazine covers, where celebs have had countless hours of retouching to remove moles, freckles and have pounds of flesh literally trimmed off their fat arses in Photoshop. And worst offenders are work-out videos. A friend of mine is regularly tasked with trimming the flab off the likes of Rosemary Connely and Carol Vorderman just to fit them on the bloody cover. 

• You can never have too much hyperbole

Either you have a product that does something new, different or very well; or you just blow shit up out of all possible proportion and pretend it’s some kind of statement of fact.

People never just have a good night’s sleep. Instead they waft around on clouds with fluffy sheep skipping over fences and fairies lulling them to lullaby land.
A Big Mac isn’t just ‘tasty'. It’s better than winning the lottery while shagging a dozen Playboy bunnies as you score the winning goal in the World Cup.
Lynx doesn’t just mask your armpit odour. It transforms even the most repulsive geek into a tart magnet surrounded by literally thousands of salivating wanton supermodels on heat, begging for it on all fours.
Admen will argue that they’re just being “post modern” or “selling the dream”. I would argue that if you’re being post modern then you’ve run out of ideas and your employer should reconsider your salary. And if you’re “selling the dream” then your product has no meanigful features worth advertising.

• “The funniest movie you will see all year”
Oh yeah, says who? So you know what makes me laugh do you? It’s only fucking February and I’m sure another ‘funniest comedy of the year” will be along in a week or so. And no doubt it will have Vince Vaughan and Jennifer Bloody Anniston in it.

• Critics are calling it...
Well, the critics called it a lot of things actually, when you read the full review. But we decided to cherry pick the one single positive word in the whole piece, despite the overall summation being it was a piece of crap to be avoided at all costs. “Brilliant” - Daily Mail. (“This book sucked beyond belief, in stark contrast to the once brilliant author’s back catalogue”).

You can always judge a review’s worth by the size given to the reference of the quote. If it’s any good, you’ll see it rated Five Stars by, in large letters, Empire Magazine or Film 2010. If the movie sucks it will be Five Stars and in tiny tiny text The Daily Star or Gary Fucking Bushell.

• More clichés than you can shake a stick at

Oh god, where to start?

- Dad, boyfriend, husband is a numpty, plonker, fool, sucker or embarrasment

Men, particularly white, middle class males, are always the punching bag in ads. Mere male cocks up and it’s always the woman or kids rolling their eyes and explaining that they should have used Product X to solve the problem.
The AA boiler repair campaign is a painful example. Poor old John Cleese can’t get it into his head that the Automobile Association also now repair boilers and plumbing. (“Faulty showers”, groan). He doesn’t even think of calling a heating engineer for that matter. Instead he sits at home in a sleeping bag and his long-suffering, eye-rolling daughter has to come and sort him out. Then just a couple of days later his pipes burst and the fool has forgotten completely about the AA’s new service and daughter has to come sort the demtia-ridden geriatric yet again. Poor old John doesn’t need the AA, he needs a fucking social worker.

- Gravel-voiced voiceover man
In a woooorld where... In a tiiiime when... A new word for horrorrrr... And always the same larynx lacerating growl voicing movie trailers. Grrrrr! I’d like to see him advertising shampoo for a change. “L’Oreaaaaal - because you’re woooooorth it”.

- Mr Smug takes a drive in the country
Cars are only ever bought by smug, self-satisfied twats who swan off to the Scottish Highlands or sun-drenched beaches of Spain, and cruise around leisurely listening to Top Gear’s ‘50 Greatest Driving Songs’. You never see the poor bastard stuck motionless for three hours on the M25 like 90% of owners, or begrudging the fact that he’s had to take out a second mortgage to fill the bugger up at the pumps.

If it’s not that then it’s a small city runabout that inexplicably dances on rooftops, transforms into a mechanical Michael Flatley, or blasts UFO’s from the sky with its laser beam headlights. 

• Oh come on. Really??!!
“I’m a PC, and Windows Pish was my idea!”. There’s an ad for Windows Whatever that seeks to highlight the benefits of ‘secret browsing’. The idea, so the ad claims, is that hubby can surf for birthday present ideas for his beloved wife without her knowing what he’s been looking at. Yeah, right! Now come on, we’re all adults here. We all know the dirty little oik has been ogling YouPorn.com and slipping a quick one off the wrist while she’s been down the shops. Why else does he look so embarrased when she pops back in through the door? Just call it P’orn Free’ and be done with it.
The other ad in the campaign I don’t get is the pleb on holiday in Spain, who is enjoying his stay so much that he feels the need to tap into his computer back home, sit alone in a bar, and watch saved videos of monkies eating their own poop. Why the brainless, imagination-free-zone went overseas in the first place I’ll never know. “I’m a PC and the best thing I could think of spending my precious holiday time on is watching old videos on me own”. If you’re a PC mate I’ve never been so glad of being a Mac.

Bad Max

7 reasons why Max Mosley was the worst thing to happen to Formula One

Max Rufus Mosley is the son of Britain’s favourite fascist Oswald Mosley, MP and founder of the British Union of Fascists. Oswald married and had three children with wife Vivien, and also had a long standing affair with his wife’s sister. After Vivien’s death Oswald married his mistress Cynthia in secret in the Berlin home of Joseph Goebbels, with no lesser personage than Adolf Hitler as a guest.

In his late teens Max was involved in his father’s new right wing political party the Union Movement. He went on to become a barrister, then founding member of the March motor racing team in the 1970s, and in 1991 was elected president of the FIA, world motorsport’s governing body.

• Budget caps and "the loonies”

There was many a row in the Noughties surrounding the subject of budget caps, designed to halt spiralling costs in F1. Max’s assertion was that teams’ extravagant spending was pricing new entrants out of the sport. When Flavio Briatore and others argued against Max’s proposals they were famously dismissed by him as “the loonies”.

What Mosley didn’t reveal to the world at the time was that he had been sanctioning secret deals with Ferrari to gift them an estimated £80million a year and special veto over technical regulations. Max’s proposal was for a cap of £40million a year for new teams, or half what he was giving to Ferrari just to stay in the sport. Who’s the ‘loony’?

• The Indy fiasco

The US Grand Prix at Indy in 2005 was an unprecedented, and ultimately needless disaster. Problems with Michelin tyres and a newly resurfaced track meant the Michelin rubber couldn’t take the wear and tear of the banked corner, and resulted in several dramatic tyre failures. Hamstrung by American law, Michelin couldn’t allow their teams to race on the circuit as it was. The problem was further compounded by the then no tyre change rule.

Fourteen of the twenty cars had no choice but to pull out, but not before offering every possible chance to stage some sort of viable race for the fans. They were prepared to start behind the six Bridgestone runners, and forgo any points for finishing, if the FIA would agree to a chicane being introduced to slow cornering speeds. Races had had last minute track changes on safety grounds before.

As a hundred thousand odd fans waited in the stands, and many more millions sat at home, the looming fiasco was kept from them till the six cars left the start line. Mosley steadfastly refused any sort of compromise to stage a race, and even threatened to sue the Michelin shod teams for not turning up with suitable tyres! As a result unsuspecting fans were given a sham instead of a show, and Formula One left the United States altogether in 2007. Responding to fan fury over the ‘race-that-wasn’t’, Mosley called them “idiots who don’t know what they’re talking about.”

• Crashgate

During the 2008 Singapore Grand Prix, Renault driver Nelson Piquet, Jr.  crashes his car, instigating a safety car which eventually allows team mate Fernando Alonso to take an unexpected win. The following year Piquet admits that his team bosses had ordered him to crash deliberately to facilitate Alonso’s victory. Team principal Flavio Briatore and chief engineer Pat Symonds are found guilty and thrown out of the sport for life and five years respectively. (This was later overturned on appeal, due to FIA incompetence).

The team as a whole, however, was handed a disqualification from the sport, bizarrely suspended for two years in the incredulously unlikely event that they ever tried the same trick again! So a team that deliberately puts idrivers, track marshals and trackside fans in serious jeopardy gets away effectively scot free, while another found in possession of a rival’s technical documents suffers the harshest penalty ever handed out in sporting history. Now read on...

• Spygate

Following the 2007 Australian Grand Prix Ferrari engineer Nigel Stepney tips off McLaren’s chief designer Mike Coughlan that the red team had been running an illegal floor. McLaren ask for clarification, and though the part is found illegal and banned, no punishment is dished out. Ferrari’s Kimi Räikkönen wins and team and driver keep their ten points. 

Later in the same year Stepney steals a 780 page document from his Maranello employers containing a gold mine of technical and strategic data, and passes it on to Coughlan. Coughlan then shares some insights with Fernando Alonso and test driver Pedro de la Rosa, but no technology finds its way to the cars. During a spat between team principal Ron Dennis and a petulant Alonso, the driver attempts to blackmail his boss with a threat of exposing new information to the FIA. When the espionage is fully investigated McLaren are fined a jaw-dropping $100milion and stripped of all constructor points for the season.

Fair enough, cheating is cheating and the team deserved punishment, although many in the sport regard it as rather heavy handed, to say the least.

Contrast this with a similar case at Renault at the close of the same season. It is discovered that Renault have a raft of McLaren technical data loaded onto their mainframe computer system, including drawings of McLaren’s shock absorber, fuel system, mass damper and seamless shift transmission.
Action taken by Mosley and the FIA: none whatsoever.

• Sir Jackie Stewart - “certified halfwit”

Triple Formula One World Champion, and tireless champion of safety improvements in the sport, Sir Jackie Stewart made the fatal error of speaking his mind over what he called the “unjustifiable” McLaren Spygate penalty.

At a media lunch Mosley responded in typically mature fashion;
“It’s annoying that some of the sponsors listen to him because he’s won a few championships. But nobody else in Formula One does — not the teams, not the drivers. He’s a figure of fun among drivers. He goes round dressed up as a 1930s music hall man. He’s a certified halfwit.”
Max Mosley – certified fuckwit.

• The Martin Brundle libel writ

Commenting on Spygate, then ITV commentator Martin Brundle speaks his mind in his Sunday Times column. He intelligently details the facts and questions the apparent double standards. Mosley hits straight back with a libel writ against Brundle and the newspaper.

Mosley then writes to ITV bosses and urges them to dispense with their commentator’s services on the grounds that his commentary is “not up to standard”! And in October 2008 the Daily Mail reports;
“Alan Donnelly, the official representative at races of FIA chairman Max Mosley, has been trying to dissuade BBC executives from employing Brundle, who has been at odds with the governing body since he questioned their handling of last year’s McLaren Spygate affair.”

Consider the facts. Martin Brundle has won universal fan acclaim and an unprecedented six Royal Television Society Awards for sports broadcasting. Max Mosley will be mostly remembered by the general public for something other than motorsport...

• Just call me ‘Spanky’

Mosley’s writ against Brundle and the Sunday Times ired not only the journalist and paper, but seemingly the Times’ owner, Rupert Murdoch. In March 2008 his other paper the News of the World published lurid accounts, photos, and online video of Mosley skulking into a basement flat and indulging in S&M sessions with five hookers. On the video prostitutes are seen dressed in black German prison guard uniforms and speaking with German accents to their stripe suited ‘prisoners’, at one stage inspecting their heads for lice. One of the more dramatic moments comes when the court is played a recording of part of this game, in which Mosley and hooker ‘B talk in German while another woman – identified as ‘A’ – protests, in English: “But we are the Aryan race, the blonds.” 

The revelations lead to strong condemnation from all quarters, from Bernie Ecclestone, (initially at least), teams and drivers, motor manufacturers and sponsors and fans worldwide.

Here are some of the reactions from those involved in the sport.

Martin Brundle: “The specific detail of the scandal surrounding him is largely irrelevant, in my view. The sporting regulation he has used over the years to keep teams in check relates to bringing the sport into disrepute. If you live by the sword, you die by the sword. Sitting on the fence on this issue for any of us inside the sport is not an option. We must condone or condemn the situation he finds himself in. Mosley’s position as president is untenable.”

Jody Scheckter: “There is absolutely no question that Mosley should resign. From a purely motor racing point of view you can’t have somebody like this running the sport.” 

The Crown Prince of Bahrain, in a personal letter to Max: “Under the current circumstances it would be inappropriate for you to be in Bahrain at this time.” (Mosley was barred from the 2008 Bahrain Grand Prix).

Sir Jackie Stewart: “The FIA involves motor clubs from all around the world, with so many different religions, different cultures and sensitivities. If Mosley had a government position in Britain, the US or Germany, or was chairman of a public company or head of the Olympic committee, he would have already gone. He would not have waited, he would not need to be told, he would know it was the correct thing to do and I am surprised he is still there.”

BMW and Mercedes statement: “The content of the publications is disgraceful. As a company, we strongly distance ourselves from it. This incident concerns Max Mosley both personally and as president of the FIA. Its consequences therefore extend far beyond the motorsport industry.”

Bernie Ecclestone: “What people do privately is up to them. I don’t honestly believe this affects the sport in any way... I think Max was probably just taking the piss.”

Mosley of course refused calls to stand down, and fought and won a case for libel against the News of the World, the judge ruling that there were no Nazi overtones involved in the orgies. German uniforms and accents, black and white prisoners’ garb, verbal mentions of Aryan races. No Nazi overtones. Fair enough then.

In July 2009 Mosley finally and reluctantly stepped down as president of the FIA. Mean-spirited, acid-tongued, arrogant beyound belief, Mosley claims his legacy is in upgrading safety in both motorsport and the European car industry. But type the words 'Max Mosley' into Google and you’ll soon see what his actual legacy is...

Panel beaten with the Ugly Stick

9 of the ugliest F1 cars

Widely acknowledged as the most unusual, and for some the least attractive Formula 1 car of all time was Ken Tyrrell’s P34 6-wheeler of 1976. (I for one, however, have always loved this car, long before I was into the sport). When ribbed about it’s appearance, Ken reportedly retorted “The best looking car is the one that crosses the line first”. And so it did in a 1-2 finish in Sweden.

However, in terms of looks, Derek Gardner’s design is Marilyn Monroe compared to others that have made it off the drawing board. Here are a some of the Susan Boyles that have graced the race track and disgraced F1.

1971: March 711

The great Ronnie Petersen (orange car) suffers the indignity of sitting in this Thunderbirds inspired balloon car.

1972: Eifelland MkI, MkII, MkIII

Just as you can’t polish a turd, it would seem you can’t develop one either. The car is based around a March 721, and they have managed to make it even less appealing. It should come as no surprise to learn that Eifelland are a company that make caravans.

1973: Ensign N173

Part Batmobile, part submarine, all ugly. The JPS-style pin striping only accentuates the awful shape.

1975: Maki Engineering F101-02

Perhaps more suited to snorkelling than racing. How it fit under the tunnel at Monaco is a mystery.

1975: March 751

Presumably the tray at the back is for carrying the mechanics’ tea and biscuits.

1976: Ligier JS5

I know ground-effect skirts were the order of the day in the 70’s, but did they need to make an airbox that big just to accommodate the skirt of the lovely lady emblazened on it?

1978: McLaren M26

James Hunt tests a mid-wing configuration in Spain on the already clunky looking McLaren. Inversely proportionate to the looks of its driver.

The subsequent M27 tests a very unusual rear wing but the car never appeared on track. In fact the next McLaren raced was the M28.

The Arrows A5 of 1982 revisits the M26’s mid wing, with similarly ugly results.

1979: Ensign N179

The cockpit’s so high they had to bolt a ladder on the front to allow driver access.

1983: Tyrrell 012

The piece-of-shit de resistance! Tyrrell pull out all the stops, seemingly fabricating this abomination from plywood and an oversized boomerang. If it looks fast, it is fast, but if it looks this ugly it should have stayed in the garage.

6 Wheels on my Wagon
Tyrrell’s P34 was not the only car to play with the idea of superfluous wheels. A few others have tried and tested similar ideas.

1982: Williams FW08

Like the P34, this configuration really worked. So well and so fast in fact that the design was ruled illegal before it could race, and the regulations amended to limit wheels to four only.

1977: March

No doubt following in Tyrrell’s wheel tracks, and stealing a March on Williams’ later design, this car was tested but never raced.

1977: Ferrari 312T6

Tested by both Niki Lauda and Carlos Reutemann, but never raced, this configuration had double wheels on a single rear axle. As far back as the 1930s Alfa Romeo had employed such dual wheels in hill climb events with some success.

1976: Ferrari 312’T8’

Seemingly pushing the design envelope beyond destruction, this very rare spy shot shows an 8-wheeler 312 being tested by Clay Regazzoni. It later transpired that this was mocked up to wrong foot Ferrari’s competitors, and draw attention away from the real project of the time which was an Indycar for Mario Andretti.