My industry embarasses me

I work in advertising, and I've always been pretty realistic about what that involves: selling shit. It's certainly creative, but it's primary purpose is to move money around the economy. That noted, I primarily view my role as creating something interesting that doesn't irritate or anger whoever sees /hears it. Hopefully I go beyond that and manage to amuse / entertain them. The large percentage of ads are crap (just like the large percentage of movies, music and TV is crap), so I try to work at places that endeavor to do better work. Keep in mind that without advertising, there would only be 13 different magazines printed, and they would cost $30 a piece. Your cable bill would be about $190 dollars a month for 7 channels, all of them begging for money constantly like PBS. It's intrusive and not perfect, but it helps spur the creaky cart of capitalism along. Plus, I get to be creative just about every day, work with interesting people and I don't have to follow a dress code.

But this is the kind of stuff that makes me want to run for the hills.

CBS is going to start putting ads on eggs. That right. Fucking eggs. Because research shows that half-awake / hungry people are the perfect demographic for "CSI:Miami." And they are calling it "egg-vertisng." Get it? Whooo! That's rich. Here are some of the other "egg-cellent" (to paraphrase Vincent Price as "Egghead" on the 60's "Batman" TV show) gems they've mined from the rich soil of wordplay:

“CSI” (“Crack the Case on CBS”)
“The Amazing Race” (“Scramble to Win on CBS”)
“Shark” (“Hard-Boiled Drama.”).
Variations on the ad for its Monday night lineup of comedy shows:
“Shelling Out Laughs”
“Funny Side Up”
“Leave the Yolks to Us.”

And yes, someone did get paid to write those.

George Schweitzer, president of the CBS marketing group, said he was hoping to generate some laughter in American kitchens. Ah. So that's the sound I've been hearing echo through my neighborhood every morning.

Next up in the ad que: getting bent over and gang-raped by a bunch of guys dressed like Abe Lincoln while they shout out what exciting programs are on The History Channel that week. It's a great way to reach the target audience in an unexpected way.