Mediaite » World Wildlife Fund

PSA’s Gone Wild – Falling Bears and Perverted Soap

Tommy Christopher — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 16:44:27 +0000

Public Service announcements have come a long way since Smokey the Bear sternly assigned us all with the task of preventing forest fires and Woodsy the Owl asked us to “Give a hoot, don’t pollute!”

Nowadays, the trend is toward edgy, “Look at me!”-type spots designed more to generate buzz than to deliver a message. This is exemplified by two new environmental spots (via AdFreak) that are so wrong, they’re just…wrong.

The first is a UK spot for PlaneStupid.com that aims to showcase the environmental impact of air travel in weirdly metaphoric terms. The spot is somewhat graphic, and like September’s WWF ad, disturbingly evocative of 9/11:

Since they’re not based in the US, perhaps Plane Stupid can be forgiven the 9/11 imagery, although their logo and their donation pitch don’t help any: (emphasis mine)

We won’t pretend sponsoring us makes up for taking a weekend break in Prague, or flying to the Copenhagen conference. But we promise that we won’t spend it on fancy chairs for our office. To tell the truth, we don’t even have an office. All we have is a burning desire to stop domestic flights and a spectacular plan… which we can’t afford on our own.

I contacted PlaneStupid.com for comment, and I’m awaiting their reponse.

The second spot, a parody of SC Johnson’s “Scrubbing Bubbles,” is from the makers of Method soap, and it’s supposed to make you support ingredient labeling of cleaning products. The clip is funny and disturbing at the same time, creepily making its point. On the other hand, I guarantee you’ll spend part of your day singing the parody jingle, and the rest of your day trying to get the Bill O’Reilly-esque catchphrase “Use the loofah” out of your head.

A Shine-tastic job!!!

While the ad is certainly memorable, the cause attached seems more designed to deliver the message that Method is awesome and everyone else sucks. I’m sorry, but I don’t see ingredient labeling as having much of an impact.Anyone who cares enough probably already uses greener products, and I don’t see the average American looking at a label and saying, “Dialkyldimethylammonium methyl sulfate? Eff that!!!”

The PSA’s of old had only 30 to 60 seconds to make their point, whereas today, all you need is an attention-getting hook to get people to your website. Perhaps it’s just as well. Poor old Woodsy Owl would probably be branded a Marxist socialist freak today, and wind up as a plate of hot wings.

WWF ’9/11′ Ad Was Not a “Rejected Spec Ad” – Shocking Video Uncovered

Tommy Christopher — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 12:02:39 +0000

On Tuesday, Mediaite reported that the World Wildlife Fund denied responsibility for an offensive ad that featured an image of multiple planes headed for the Twin Towers.

Now, Ad Age is reporting that WWF has revealed that although the ad was created on spec, it was run once in a local Brazilian newspaper:

Sergio Valente, president of DDB Brasil, said the ad was presented to the WWF in Brazil in December 2008 and approved; it then ran once in a small local paper.

“When I saw it, I said, ‘Stop running that ad,’” Mr. Valente said.

The ad agency, DDB Brasil, is denying responsibility for a video version of the ad that’s making the rounds. This denial is a little hard to swallow, since the video’s intro features a title card with DDB Brasil’s name on it, along with a date in June. That’s an awful lot of trouble to go through to frame a company for producing a video ad that it admits to doing a print version of.

Here’s the very disturbing video:

WWF 911 commercial
by dalagelli

Offensive WWF “9/11” Print Spot is a Rejected Spec Ad

Tommy Christopher — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 21:15:21 +0000

Twitter is currently ablaze with outrage over an extremely tasteless World Wildlife Fund ad that overtly exploits the World Trade Center attacks of 9/11/2001. Mediaite has learned, exclusively, that the ad was not commissioned by WWF, but rather, was a pitch that they rejected.

From WWF’s forthcoming statement: (via email)

“WWF strongly condemns this offensive and tasteless ad and did not authorize its production or publication. It is our understanding that it was a concept offered by an outside advertising agency seeking our business in Brazil. The concept was summarily rejected by WWF and should never have seen the light of day. It is an unauthorized use of our logo and we are aggressively pursuing action to have it removed from websites where it is being currently featured. We strongly condemn=2 0the messages and the images portrayed in this ad. On behalf of WWF, here in the US and around the world, we can promise you this ad does not in any way reflect the thoughts and feelings of the people of our organization.”

It is amazing that anyone thought this was a good idea, and equally amazing that someone would report this story without considering that it could be a spec ad. This isn’t the first time this has happened. Acticons’ Caleb Howe uncovered a series of very high profile, extremely tasteless spec ads that featured the History Channel logo, and were even erroneously given CLIO Awards. The news that WWF isn’t behind this ad leaves PETA as the undisputed champion of tasteless ads by animal-related organizations. Here’s the full text of WWF’s forthcoming statement:

WWF STRONGLY CONDEMNS UNAUTHORIZED AD CAMPAIGN WASHINGTON, DC, September 2, 2009 – World Wildlife Fund today issued the following statement in response to an ad posted on several Internet sites that has been i naccurately linked to our organization and contains messages and images related to the events of 9-11. “WWF strongly condemns this offensive and tasteless ad and did not authorize its production or publication. It is our understanding that it was a concept offered by an outside advertising agency seeking our business in Brazil. The concept was summarily rejected by WWF and should never have seen the light of day. It is an unauthorized use of our logo and we are aggressively pursuing action to have it removed from websites where it is being currently featured. We strongly condemn the messages and the images portrayed in this ad. On behalf of WWF, here in the US and around the world, we can promise you this ad does not in any way reflect the thoughts and feelings of the people of our organization.”