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internet

Charter to Sell Your Browsing History for Targeted Ads

It's one thing when Google uses your search for boobs to deliver targeted ads for plastic surgeons in your area. It's another when your ISP uses deep-packet inspection to snoop on which sites you visit and for how long, and then essentially sells that data to advertisers for super-targeted. That's exactly what Charter is about to do, calling it an "enhanced online experience." Naturally, the program is opt-out, not opt-in, so you've gotta take the initiative to hang on to one last shred of privacy. And no, they're not passing on the money they're making off your browsing habits in the form of discounts. Oh, this better not migrate to other ISPs like pay-per-byte billing. [DSL Reports via Consumerist Photo via Getty]

ads

Adam Sandler Whispers Sweet Nothings In Your Bluetooth Headset

I'm still a little undecided as to whether or not I'll be seeing Adam Sandler's You Don't Mess with the Zohan, but the movie is using a clever, tech-oriented marketing ploy that's definitely gotten me interested. Twenty-five Regal Entertainment theater lobbies will feature a decorated salon chair that when sat in (while wearing a Bluetooth headset) will beam 6 voicetones to the user's ear. We're not sure exactly what Adam Sandler's new character sounds like, but we're betting if you mix the characters of Adam Sandler Billy Madison, Adam Sandler Little Nicky, and Adam Sandler The Waterboy, you'll have a pretty close approximation. [press release via crave]


adwatch

HTC's First Big Ad Push Focuses on Fingering

This is HTC's first big TV ad in the US. Rather than focus on their devices individually, HTC's going for a general "brand" awareness. Seeing as how they've previously marketed their phones under the four big providers' own names (AT&T TilT, T-Mobile MDA, Verizon 6700), it's a smart step in breaking away from their control. This particular ad, one of a few that will hit print and online outlets, is underwhelming. It wants compare the HTC Touch with the iPhone (implicitly), but if you've read any of the many reviews of the device, you'll see that it's nowhere near as usable. If we were HTC, we'd focus more on their slide-out QWERTY devices that are like Sidekicks, but for businessmen.

gadgets

Funny...That Cloud Makes Me Want to Talk to My Doctor About Viagra

Just when you thought advertising couldn't invade our lives any further, a new company has repurposed artificial snow-making machines to create "Flogo"—ads that look and float like clouds. Each Flogo is made using a mixture of soap-based foams and lighter-than-air gases pumped through a snow machine fitted with a computer designed stencil in the shape of the desired ad. More »

advertising

Sony "Foam City" Ad Turns Miami Into World's Biggest Bubble Bath

In Sony's new "Foam City" ad, Miami becomes a soapy free-for-all when 120 million gallons of bubbles are unleashed in the streets. The world's largest foam machine was custom-built for the shoot, and pumped out over 500,000 gallons of foam per minute. The commercial is for Sony's cameras, and locals got Alpha DSLRs, Cyber-shots, and Handycams to shoot the experience. The amateur footage wasn't in the ad, but you will eventually be able to see it in an online gallery. While it follows the same urban pwnage theme of the Bravia ads—think clay bunnies and Superballs—we can't help but wonder, "Where's all the color?" See the making-of video after the jump. [Sony] More »

printers

Big Pussy Beats The Shit Out of a Printer in the Name of Low Ink Prices

In a new spot for Kodak EasyShare printers, Vincent "Big Pussy" Pastore takes a cheap HP out to the docks and yells at it for conning him into buying high-priced ink, before giving it a beating-and-a-half, Office Space style. After sending the printer off to sleep with the fishes, he welcomes the new EasyShare to the family. It's a shame seeing the commercialization of all the goombahs since the Sopranos ended, but at least this one is filmed with some dignity; if I were Paulie Walnuts, I'd be looking for whoever put me up to that terrible Denny's ad and introduce their kneecaps to my baseball bat. [Kodak]

apple

Bad Vista "Reviews" from Apple's Latest Vista Sucks Ad Not Actually Reviews

You'll probably be seeing Apple's newest "Vista Sucks, OS X Rules Your Face" ad, starring hilarious John Hodgman and perpetually besmirked Justin Long all over the web soon. Basically, the banner keeps pulling up bad Vista quotes as Hodgman hammers the emergency banner refresh, but neither of them are from actual reviews of Vista—even though that's what Hodgman calls them. More »

comcast

Comcast Wants to Put a Camera in Your Cable Box

Before you start freaking out, hold on. They just wanna know who's in your living room. That's all. It's for a really cool features, really! When you turn on your TV, the box will recognize you and make recommendations or pull up shows in your profile. Still not sold? Well, if it detects kiddies in the room, parental controls will pop up to block naughty content. Oh yeah, and it'll serve up custom ads, just for you. Awesome-o, right? Well, don't get too excited, it's still in testing. [NewTeeVee]

retromodo

People in the 1930s Sure Hated Their Dogs

We thought that the dog doodie diaper was the worst pet gadget of all time, but it's been usurped in the hallowed tradition of pet owner stupidity. This advertisement starts with the lead "Dog Rides Comfortably in Sack..." and just gets worse from there. More »

adwatch

Michael Bay, Transformers and Giant Explosions Shill for Verizon FiOS

Verizon's new FiOS ad is a splashy, big-budget popcorn flick compared to Time Warner's cheaper, low-fi satire spot. It even stars the king of big boom summer movies, Michael Bay, blowing a bunch of shit up and hanging out with Transformers, saying the word "awesome" a whole lot. Come to think of it, it's pretty much exactly like his movies, which you can pirate even faster with FiOS. Awesome! [Verizon]

badvertising

Escalator Ads Are the Most Awkward Way to Advertise

Here's a creepy way to advertise a hair salon: stick the lower half of some guys face at the bottom of an escalator, and place various hairstyles on the stairs. As the escalator moves, said guy gets a new haircut with every stair that passes by. Creative? Yes, definitely. Unsettling? Oh, hell yes. It's at a mall in Mumbai, so it's not like I'm going to be forced to see it anytime soon, but if there's anything America likes it's slapping advertisements on every surface available, so don't be surprised if you start seeing crap like this in malls and airports in the near future. Check out a shot of the full escalator with all its haircuts after the jump. More »

ads

Time Warner Says Verizon Is a Constipated Gay Man with Magic Fingers


This Time Warner ad taking on Verizon FiOS is so ludicrously hilarious it almost does make want to sign up with Time Warner. In the spot, Verizon is a constipated (wait for it), overly enthusiastic gay-coded dude with magic fingers shooting red lightning and flying Vs (for Verizon!), touting "THE FIBER." It's so ridiculous it almost seems fake. More »

hd dvd

How to Revive HD DVD: A $2.7 Million Super Bowl Ad!

Resuscitate an Ailing Format for Dummies. Step 1: Deny you're sick. Step 2: Fire Sale! Step 3: Profit Buy a 30-second Super Bowl spot for $2.7 million. Step 4: Profit. More »

software

Microsoft's Patent Prevents You From Skipping Ads With DRM

Fantastic. Not only are people trying to stop you from skipping ads on your DVR, Microsoft's patent will stop you from skipping ads on video you watch on your computer. The technique uses DRM to prevent any sort of playback until you watched the appropriate number of ads, and would essentially allow content providers like NBC or other networks to place their shows online and make sure they get their ad time's worth. Although we're in favor of any method that would get more people to put shows online, the fact of the matter is we're used to skipping over commercials via our DVRs anyway. To BitTorrent we go. [Patent via Electronista - Image courtesy Geekpedia]

great moments in advertising

Norton Fighter, Symantec's Awesome Japanese Ad Mascot, is Back


You may have seen the first Japanese Norton 360 commercial featuring the Ultraman-esque Norton Fighter mascot a few months back. Now, Symantec has made what amounts to a full-length tokusatsu episode featuring the guy, and man is it great. More »

adwatch

European PlayStation 3 Ad Actually Makes Sense

Ditching the whole crazy people in a motel motif that dominated Sony Europe's first year of PS3 marketing, SCEE's gone and made a commercial that shows off what the PS3 can do and entertains at the same time. It wasn't easy, but we think firing off the employees that were shooting up during work hours was a good start. Save that crap for your own time. [Crunchgear] More »

funnies

The Top 5 iPhone Ad Parody Videos


Those man on the street iPhone commercials have inspired a lot of parodies, partially because they're so easy to replicate. SNL did a couple of amusing ones of their own, but YouTube is full of amateur parodies that are just as funny as the ones the pros made. I went through them and picked five of my favorites of the bunch. That one above was made by a guy who was mugged and beat up in Brooklyn for his iPod Touch. When he got home that night, he made that parody video. Yeah, that's the first thing I'd do after getting my ass kicked as well. Hit the jump for four more quality parodies. More »

clips

Concept iMac Commercial is Old Navy Meets Apple

This concept iMac holiday commercial was made by Ragus Media's Mark Richardson. While this may appear to be the product of a lot of patience and a very long power strip, Richardson informs us that each of the shots is actually a still rendered in Maya, taking about 8 hours a pop. Then light effects were added in after with Maxwell Render, which could be manipulated in real time on the production system, a quad core Mac Pro. Given the complexity of the light animations, that's pretty damn impressive. As for the spot, it really cracked us up—the love child of the star-crossed Apple iMac and $3.99 Old Navy sweater. [ragusmedia]