Articles killed the radio star

Please tell me this is actually an official renaming, and not a painful attempt at "hip" rebranding.



First of all, way to break the bank on that ad. Second of all, no one calls you that (I guess Radio Shack doesn't have friends?). Third of all... no. Just no. There are companies that can pull this off - such as McDonald's drilling down to "Mickey D's" (although that always made me want to stab myself in the ear) - but Radio Shack? You are not one of those companies.

Now, if this is actually part of a move to completely rename the company "The Shack," because your name has gotten kind of obsolete in the modern era... well, it's still kind of stupid. But at least it's much less stupid. So I hope, for your sake, that that's the story here.

EDIT: Looks like it is. However, I refuse to withdraw my gripe entirely, seeing as how the print ad on that Gizmodo page is the worst kind of "please whore yourself out for our benefit" faux-viral nonsense that companies routinely spin these days. Anyone who actually follows those instructions deserves to be slapped in the face.

The Summer of Condiments

Oh dear.



[Twentysomethings hang out at a party while the announcer talks. Edgy, animated text matches his words on the screen.]
Announcer: "Don't go unnoticed. Don't blend in. Don't be ordinary, boring or bland. In other words..."

Now, if I just showed you the first nineteen seconds of that ad, what would you think it was for? Some sort of hip clothing company? The latest premium malt beverage? Granted, it's kind of a lame ad regardless, but it's when we get to the product that things go completely to hell.

Announcer: "...don't be so mayo."

Honestly, the first time I saw this ad I still didn't figure it out, even after this line. Mostly because I never expected to see an ad for a condiment that looked like an ad for Smirnoff Ice.

Announcer: "We are our own unique one of a kind flavor. We are Miracle Whip, and we will not tone it down."

That's the entire ad. You will not "tone it down"? Someone wanted Miracle Whip to "tone it down"? If the tone on Miracle Whip were any lower it would be sub-zero. I understand the pitch - "Miracle Whip! We're not mayonnaise! We taste different, you guys!" - but this was the best angle they had? The official mediocre condiment of rebellious youth?

You know what this ad is like? Imagine you're a teenager and your dad shows up at a party of yours, dressed in contemporary clothes he can't possibly pull off, and saying things like "I was hoping I could chill with you dawgs for a while," putting all the emphasis on the "cool" words that clearly even he knows he really shouldn't be saying. Now, if that happened, you'd be embarrassed both by and for him, right? Well, that's how I feel after seeing this ad.

You're not cool, Miracle Whip. You're not cool and you never will be. You just make me sad.

So, you want me to do your job for you, at home, for free.

If there's anything worse than a bad ad campaign, it's one that desperately wants to enlist you, the viewer, to do the legwork. And better yet, to do the legwork and pay for the privilege.

AT&T has set up a site where you can now - get this! - make three-place-name stupid mashups of your very own, and then get those put on a t-shirt, which you can then wear, for the low low price of $17.95 plus shipping (which adds an astonishing six bucks to the total, meaning you're actually paying nearly $25). And won't you be proud when someone asks about your shirt and you have to explain to them not only that you're an embarrassing corporate shill but that you actually paid money to be an embarrassing corporate shill?

It took a lot of chutzpah on AT&T's part to push something like this, especially since the name generator isn't even very good. Would it really have been that difficult to, say, write into the code something that would keep letters from repeating if they were ones that didn't look good doubled up? I tried inputting Philadelphia, Delaware and Prague like in the ad, but instead of getting Philawareprague, I ended up with "Philaawue." Terrific. You couldn't even set it up to make the ones you used in your ads? Putting in Virginia, Colorado and Sacramento - which I assume are the constituent parts of "Virgicolomento" - gives me "Virorento."

The bad, albeit unsurprising, news is that you can't just type in swear words; AT&T recognizes them and tells you that you "owe the swear jar 25 cents" - at least it's not 25 dollars - and requests you try again, without even letting you see your creation in lights. The good news? It can still be tricked. See if you can figure out how I feel about this "viral" campaign from the following screenshot, which was not doctored in any way:



The last two aren't close to being real place names, of course, and I get the feeling they wouldn't print this even if I were willing to buy it, but I think I made my point. Population: 1, indeed.

La la la I'm not listening

The old adage is that sex sells. That may be true, but I think most people would draw the line when it came to thinking about the sex lives of their parents. Don't tell that to the makers of Canadian Club, who ran this ad in a recent issue of Sports Illustrated:



Man, what sells booze like the knowledge that it fueled your dad to pick up women in bars 40 years ago? I mean, isn't that what everyone wants to think about when they're out at the bar? "Say, if my dad could get ass thanks to Canadian Club, what's stopping me?"

Also, nice attempt at being cool by punctuating the slogan with a "Damn right." I'm sorry, Canadian Club, but you are not a bad-ass brand of liquor and you're never going to be. You're a fairly inexpensive blended whiskey, not the choice of kings. You know who drank Canadian Club? My grandmother. Now there's someone I'm looking to emulate at the bar.

One word.

[We finally found the ad online, so I've edited it into the post. It's only the longer, "Shyeah"-less version, sadly. - W.E.M.]



This commercial for the new Taco Bell Chili Cheese Nachos BellGrande that would have been otherwise unremarkable has one word that made me completely tune out. See if you can spot it.

Big Brother: It's time to teach you the rules.

Little Brother: Rules?

Big Brother: Shyeah! Always, ALWAYS get chili on your Nachos BellGrande.

Just embarrassing. Must be why they overdubbed it in the longer version of the commercial. But wait, here's the alternate dialogue:

Big Brother: (unnaturally high pitched) Yeah! (then, in a normal voice) One: Real men don't own lap dogs. Two: Never date girls with dragon tattoos. C: And this is the biggie- Always, ALWAYS get chili on your Nachos BellGrande.

If this was a bid for "relevance," F--. If this was a bid for "retro nostalgia" (for both Wayne's World and the doofus older brother in Home Alone, I guess) F---.