Remember those warm, fuzzy “Reach Out and Touch Someone” ads on TV? They were sappy, soppy spots that made pregnant women weep, as distant relatives (usually gray-haired grannies) heard the voices of those they loved. Anticipating Skype video conferencing (if only they had known…), the ads used image-in-image to double the poignancy.

Those were the days when communication was about… well, interacting with other people. As opposed to, say, yourself.

Try these on for size:

• Create the illusion of communication. You maxed out your emergency credit card the first week of school. Your parents are looking for some answers. A text message isn’t going to cut it but a voicemail would mean that you tried calling them.

• Just tell your side of the story. You just partied hard last night and going to work is just not on your radar today. You dread having to call your boss and answering any awkward questions he may have. Instead just leave him a simple voicemail letting him know that you won’t be coming into work today.

• Have your cake and eat it too. You desperately need to call your girlfriend but she is a talker and you don’t want to spend an hour on the phone with her because you would much rather watch the game with your buddies. Leave her a sweet voicemail and get a reprieve for the night.

• Play the field more effectively. You are dating quite a few people at the same time. You don’t want to leave them all text messages because there is nothing romantic about that. But a nice voicemail to each would score you points.

Are you sick, yet? These are real examples of how Slydial can be helpful to you! (If you can stomach it, there are more here.)

Given that people are listening less and less to their voicemail messages, I wonder how “off the hook” you really are with Slydial. But if I needed any validation that messaging today is about Me Me Me, now I’ve got it.
[Thanks to the Bell System Memorial site for bringing back those touching memories of long-distance service.]

[via Reaction [beta])

Seen in Tokyo: 

Suddenly, I’m not that thirsty.

Seen in Tokyo:

A pair of bumper sticker-type ads on the train doors:

+ Touch Sensor = Softbank

+ Motion Sensor = Softbank

That’s interesting to me. Not so much that Softbank is pushing a touch- and motion-sensitive phone (whoever isn’t doing that already will be soon), but that they are pushing the technology inside. Both touch and motion sensing have been around for a long time; now there is a sense [!] that consumers care that those capabilities are inside the box, much as they care about WiFi, a TV tuner, or GPS.

Wow, times have changed. Do I attribute this to the iPhone Effect? You betcha.

Seen this week in TSA bins in Los Angeles… and San Jose… and Seattle… : 

Zappos.com is a great source for online shoe buying. We’ve found that the user comments are helpful, the site is easy to navigate, and the purchase goes smoothly.

What a great place to advertise: right in the bin into which you have to put your shoes and laptop computer as you pass through TSA security screening! You’re thinking about your shoes, you’re looking into the bin, and if the line moves slowly, you have nothing else to look at. Brilliant.

They’ve expanded into accessories (of the leather-goods type), too, hence the following:

These Jawbone headsets are gorgeous. I have to tell you, though, that I’d find it really, really hard to pick up and purchase any one of these. Sweet Talk? Dirty Talk? Trash Talk?

To the extent that branding taps into our desires and desired identities, this campaign is counterproductive in my case.

On a philosophical level, you might choose to interpret the line as being offensively racist. I probably would. But that’s another story.

[via Engadget Mobile]

A funny thing happened on my way to the CNET blogs today…

I saw the following ad:

Huh? That’s really funny! Now, I never, never click on banner ads. Never. But this is too good to resist.

Yes, I did it. I clicked.

And, believe it or not, I’m going to recommend that you check out the advertising page, too. www.stayathomeserver.com (is that a great site address, or what?!). The page opens with a tongue-in-cheek video news report, and then… well, just check it out yourself. And don’t leave without reading the whole book, it’s a total riot. A spoof on those books that help you discuss sensitive issues with your young children (like intimacy, non-nuclear families, handicaps).

Can this possibly be the same Microsoft that just last week sponsored Telecom TV at Mobile World Congress under the ad line, “We call it… Telco 2.0″? [brief pause to stifle gag reflex]

Maybe advertising this good means I’ll have to stop laughing at Microsoft. Heck, I’ll have to stop laughing at the ad, first.

seen in Jerusalem:

Subverting the subversive.

“they shall beat their swords into plowshares paintbrushes”

Seen today in Jerusalem: 

Kudos to National Geographic for being true to its tradition of respect for other cultures.

Now available: an alternate edition of the Israeli edition of National Geographic magazine — targeted to the “Torah Observant community” (the term is inclusive of National-Religious, Sephardic, and haredi groups). Presumably, this NG version selects articles that avoid controversial discussions of evolution, and edits out those images of indigenous women that kept the boys in my fifth-grade class so interested in anthropology.

Thanks to Mr. Deadfish for the National Theographic title.

An advertisement in an Israeli newspaper that caters to the haredi market:

The ad reads: “One for All” (less literally, “One Size Fits All”). In this case, that one building developer is right for various “streams” of haredim. The implication is that this contractor recognizes the subtle differences between different groups of haredim, and knows how to meet each one’s particular needs.

If you don’t hang around the “Black Belt”, you likely saw a row of “identical” black hats under the yellow hard hat; it’s only haredim who are accustomed to instantly make the distinctions in style and proportion that signify group identity. The ad is clever. It’s tapping into what black hat-wearers (and their families) experience all the time: the assumption by non-haredim that haredim are a homogenous group (they’re not), that they are all the same (as if any two people ever are).

I’m not sure how relevant those subtle distinctions are to home construction, though.