Product Placement is Everywhere!

Ever since we have begun studying media and its effects in our Critical Thinking class, I've begun to notice product placement even more in TV shows and movies. As said in one of the videos we watched, "If you notice it, it isn't working." This means that the people who pay to put their product in a movie or TV show are trying to send us a very subtle message by putting their product next to our favorite character. The message is to buy their product because this awesome character uses it. One example that I thought of was how workers at MI6 in Skyfall use Sony Vaio laptops. Agent 007 is one of the coolest characters of all time, so why wouldn't someone want to use a Vaio if James Bond does?

 

 

Another example of this that I noticed a few years ago while watching Twilight was the product placement of Apple laptops. This would make all the tween/teenage girls want to use Apple products because Bella is, so maybe a hot vampire and a hot werewolf will fall in love with them if they buy Apple stuff!

 

 

I find it a little annoying that so many movies that I've seen are littered with products throughout their duration. Going to a movie theater or ordering a movie at home is supposed to be a time for someone to relax and escape from their life for a couple hours and become immersed in a captivating plot. When we watch a movie, we don't want to be bombarded with even more advertising. We see enough everyday! Just driving to the store and back we will probably see at least a dozen advertisements, whether it be billboards or flyers or whatever else. Will we ever escape??!

 

Another thing that kind of sucks about product placement is that it can ruin my good feelings and opinions about a certain TV show that I think is above all that stuff. I feel like certain shows are selling out by putting products in their show for money, but at the same time I understand that they need the money for their filming budgets. This is similar to the part in Merchants of Cool where they are talking about Sprite and hip hop. I feel that true fans of these artists would think that they were selling out, too. No one wants to see their favorite "gangster rapper" endorsing an item that isn't "gangster rap", if you follow me.



In conclusion, I understand why TV shows and movies do this, but I think that it's frustrating and makes them look bad if we notice it too much.



Bueller...Bueller...

 

 

This is one of my favorite movies of all time. It definitely appeals to our need to escape from the stress of school, since it seems like Ferris doesn't have a care in the world. They do almost everything one could possibly do in a day: go to a baseball game, eat at a fancy restaurant, go to a museum, perform in a parade, and more. I've always wanted to have a day like this somehow, but unfortunately I don't know anyone quite as sneaky and persuasive as Ferris Beuller. I've always wished that I could be like him.

 

One of my favorite elements of this movie is its characters. My favorite, next to Ferris himself, is definitely his best friend Cameron (the one in the red). He reminds me of myself sometimes because I stress so much about everything and I eventually have a breaking point and just go crazy. Not as crazy as smashing my dad's car, but it's gotten pretty close. His awkwardness and dorkiness just make him pitiful and lovable so you have to root for him. I also love the friendship that is shared between him, Ferris, and Sloane (Ferris's girlfriend). Sloane, the other main character, is who every girl wants to be in high school. A beautiful cheerleader who everyone knows, dating the funny popular guy. She and Ferris seem to have a perfect high school relationship.

 

Another element of this movie that I like a lot is the sense of humor. It's obvious but subtle at the same time. The scene that makes me laugh the hardest is when Cameron is in his car debating on whether or not to go over to Ferris's house, since he actually is sick while Ferris is just faking. It shows the conflict that is constantly within Cameron: "Should I have fun, or should I listen to what my brain is telling me and do the right thing". This is a real life struggle for many teenagers, but the way Cameron deals with it in this scene is hilarious.

 

 

 

 

The main reason why this movie is in my top 3 of all time is because of how ridiculous it is, yet you feel like it could happen to you. Also, it is something that a kid could watch with their family (besides some language/innuendos) because even though it's about skipping school, it's generally wholesome. It's a teen movie that isn't all about sex and drugs and all that stuff, it's about friendship and having fun. I would definitely recommend this movie to anyone who likes comedies.







Victoria's Secret

 

Honestly, this commercial just makes me really, really angry. Maybe it's supposed to be a "joke", making fun of how glorified the Victoria's Secret Angels all are. But even so, just listen to what they are saying.

"Tell me you love me. Tell me you miss me. Excite me. Dazzle me. Delight me. Tell me there's no other woman in the world like me."

I know that this is basically the angels reciting what most women are thinking and wishing that their signinficant other would do for them for Christmas. But the whole commercial is just them lounging in their bras and underwear with perfect bodies wanting someone to tell them that there is no other woman in the world like them. Obviously not!!! Probably about 0.00001% or less of women in the world have bodies that look like this.

Personally, whenever I see these commercials I know that I feel bad about myself. What girl wouldn't? Even though our moms always tell us "honey, you're beautiful the way you are. Those girls aren't even real," we continue to compare ourselves to them. We see this everywhere we look. There are girls who are half naked with zero flaws in many ads and commercials, making us feel that we need to buy the product they are promoting in order to get just a little bit closer to being one of "them". This is very similar to the idea of a "midriff" from the video we watched in class, Merchants of Cool. Girls are being sexualized (if that's a word) earlier and earlier. In the video, we saw a thirteen year old telling us that she feels as if she needs to put on makeup and look good anywhere she goes. There was also video of her grinding on some guy at a party. She was only 13!! What's it going to be like in 50 years? Will girls be doing this when they're 8?

 

 

Whenever I see ads like this for Victoria's Secret, or their commercials on TV, I always say to myself "yeah, we get it." Even though Victoria's Secret's choices for marketing are limited, due to the fact that it's an all women's apparel store mainly comprised of underwear, they should change it up a little bit. Maybe make a commercial that's funny instead of one that tries SO hard to be sexy, in the meantime making girls want to cry and go on a diet of celery.

 

The approach that I feel the Victoria's Secret marketing people are using is to make the girls feel that they need to get their stuff in order to look beautiful. They don't promote natural beauty or modesty, but they support flaunting what you have as much as possible. When little girls see this, they think that it's okay. I may be taking this a little too far, but I think that these ads are corrupting young girls' minds. Also, it is poisoning to the minds of teen girls and all women, making them believe that being the same body type as these models is the only way to be beautiful. This is completely false. All body types are beautiful. More girls need to realize that just because they look different from Victoria's Secret Angels, that does NOT mean they aren't good enough.



 

Where Is The Love - Black Eyed Peas (LYRICS)

http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/blackeyedpeas/whereisthelove.html

This is one of my favorite songs of all time, sorry if you think the Black Eyed Peas are lame. I totally agree with you if you're talking about their new stuff, but this song is classic. I'm going to pull out some of my favorite lines from this song and explain what's great about them, in my eyes.

Overseas, yeah, we try to stop terrorism
But we still got terrorists here livin'
In the USA, the big CIA
The Bloods and The Crips and the KKK

These lines really appeal to me because it's explaining that even though we try to help other countries' problems with terrorism and violence, we neglect the problems we have here. The amount of time we spend on external problems outweighs the amount of time we spend on internal problems. Even though people probably don't think about it a lot, there is a serious gang problem in our country.

The truth is kept secret, it's swept under the rug
If you never know truth then you never know love

This part reminded me a lot of things that we discussed about politics in zero period, like the use of weasel words and vagueness within campaigns. My opinion is that if someone doesn't tell the whole truth and omits parts of the truth that are undesirable in many peoples' eyes, they are still lying. This contributes to problems within the world, because many governments don't always tell the truth. We are lucky because we have a government that we can usually rely on, unlike many other countries in the world.

Wrong information always shown by the media
Negative images is the main criteria
Infecting the young minds faster than bacteria
Kids wanna act like what they see in the cinema

This part of the song is sort of similar to the last one when it says "wrong information always shown by the media", because many products or campaigns will exaggerate the truth quite a bit in order to get our attention. Also, by "negative images is the main criteria", I think that they were talking about the news. How often do we see a positive story as the main story on the news? Exactly. The other thing that stood out to me in this part of the song was "Kids wanna act like what they see in the cinema" because for some people it's true. I feel that there are some violent people in this world who are violent because of things that they saw on TV or in a movie or even in a violent video game. This is a problem that can never be solved, though, because we can't tell parents to restrict their kids from watching or playing whatever they want.

This song is obviously different from many rap songs we hear today that are about girls/sex, alcohol, weed, and gettin' paper. I think that's a good thing.

I suggest you look this song up if you've never heard it. I hope you like it as much as I do!!

Google Chrome commercial

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R4vkVHijdQk


I saw this commercial air last year and I have always loved it. It makes me want to cry every time that I see it because it's just so darn sentimental and cute. The main thing that attracted my attention was, of course, how cute the little girl "Sophie" is. The technique used to do this was "Transfer/Association" because the idea of this man using Google Chrome to show his daughter all of these cute videos of herself so that she can see them when she's old enough is a very nice one. People will probably remember this when they want to use Google Chrome, even though it is likely that no one will use it for this purpose.

I also saw that they appealed to the need to nurture, as well as the need for guidance. Since the little girl is so cute, it brought out our need to care for cute things. Her parents obviously care a lot about her, and she seems to have a good life, so it brings out our need for guidance because it makes us think "Wow, I bet she feels really safe and loved in that environment. I want the same thing."

There is somewhat of a stereotype in this commercial. Maybe I'm looking too deep here, but Asian people are often thought of as "tech savvy". The father who knows how to do all of these things online is Asian, feeding into this stereotype. But, they are also trying to tell us how Google Chrome is so easy and user-friendly, so maybe this stereotype doesn't apply here because "EVERYONE can be tech savvy if they use Google Chrome".

The target market for this commercial is definitely either young or middle aged parents of the middle-class or upper-class. It seems like they wanted to appeal to young parents by using this approach because of the relationship between Daniel Lee and his baby daughter, which they can identify with. This can also target middle aged parents who have kids who are already grown up because they remember things like this happening to their children, such as the first time they rode a bike or a time when they went to the hospital.

Overall, I think that this would be an effective commercial because it's so clever and it also demonstrates how user-friendly Google Chrome is.

Levi's Print Ad

I found this Levi's print ad in an issue of Seventeen magazine, which is a good magazine to put it in considering the main model is a young female and most of the subscribers to Seventeen are young females, too. She seems to be having a lot of fun and is splashing around in water with the sun shining down on her with the company of a couple of her friends. This is the image that the people who made this ad wanted us to have of how Levi's jeans will make us feel. Also, since she's wearing a jean skirt in water, they are saying that their denim is durable and strong.

In the written part of this ad, they keep saying "I am" this, "I am" that. Who is "I?" I'm guessing that they are writing as if they are the jeans or jean skirt or any Levi's product. It says "I am your sleeping bag", meaning that one can sleep in Levi's jeans? I've done this before, and it wasn't very comfortable, but that's just me. I also sort of got a camping, outdoorsy vibe from this ad. The sleeping bag statement added to this, making me imagine friends wearing Levi's jeans sleeping under the stars in their tents. Maybe this was the type of person to whom they were trying to appeal to, someone who likes the outdoors and needs jeans to suit their interests.

The ad also says "I am your armor," meaning that these jeans will protect you. This statement seems to be attempting to appeal to the adventurers of the world. If they wear these jeans, no matter what they jump off of or climb or swim in, they will be safe. This is empowering and makes someone feel safe.

The last statement is "I am ready for whatever you throw at me". This is just sort of like saying "etc.", because they already listed sleeping in the jeans and doing crazy stuff in the jeans.

Most people probably won't do any of these things in these jeans, but it's the feeling that the words being used give us that is the really important part. The statement "I am" is very definite and powerful. This gives someone a sense of security and trust. They want you to trust the products that they are trying to sell to you.

They did a pretty good job of avoiding the use of vague words, except for the last part. Are these jeans really ready for whatever you throw at them? Or, are they trying to say that when you wear these jeans, YOU will be ready for anything thrown at YOU in life? We may never know.

The Lights The Lights The Lights

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6YlnK5LGmk0



This commercial is just extremely weird to me. My first reaction was confusion. Why would anyone use a song that just repeated "the lights the lights the lights" over and over again? And I wasn't really sure what emotion the woman was expressing at first. I realized at the end that it was happiness and shock. What was she happy about though, the deals at K-Mart?

First, I want to focus on the song choice. I did some research and found out that this song is by The Grasscuts, and it's called Lights. I listened to it, and I had to turn it off after about 30 seconds. It's just so annoying!! "The lights the lights the lights" over and over in a strange, off-putting tune. A good commercial is supposed to appeal to the majority of people, or at least the majority of the certain "type" of people that they are trying to sell their product(s) to. This commercial tends to air on channels that almost anyone over 14 years old would watch, such as USA Network and TBS. One day after seeing this commercial for maybe the third time, I asked my friends if they had ever seen it. Almost all of them said yes, and so I asked what they thought of the song. They ALL hated it, I wasn't the only one. Also, check out the dislikes and negative comments on the video I linked at the top of the page. It seems to me that dislikers of this song are the majority of people who have watched this commercial.

The second thing I want to focus on is the woman in the commercial. She is sort of odd looking already, and I don't understand why they would do a double take in slow motion. It makes for weird hair and an awkward, prolonged blink. I understand that K-Mart was trying to show how shocking and amazing the deals will be at the "triple doorbuster" sale, but I just don't get why they would show it with a slow motion double take. Just didn't look right to me.

If anyone watches the same networks and channels that I do, they probably saw this commercial a hundred times before the sale happened. K-Mart must have payed a huge amount of money to pay for all of these airings, and I think that it was definitely a waste of their budget. Everyone in the room with me would groan with irritation whenever this commercial would come on. That's not what advertisers want their commercials to do, so obviously this commercial sucked.

Is this commercial really even that effective if you think about it? No. Everyone is so distracted by the strangeness of it, and everyone is so confused by the song choice that we forget what the commercial was even for. I bet that anyone who watched that commercial forgot what it was advertising in a matter of seconds, or maybe didn't even realize it to begin with. They just jammed all of the information into the last 4 seconds with a woman speaking quickly and the hours of the sale on the screen for just an instant. One would think that if someone really wanted to get a message across, they would make the information they need people to know a lot more prominent.