Thank you, Tim Nudd at AdWeek, for posting the 30 Freakiest Ads of 2011. Some of them were quite disturbing (I think the anti-child abuse PSA from Ireland hit me hardest (literally). And some are freaky in the way they just push the boundaries of what is taboo. But many are prime examples of the… Continue reading The Freakiest Ads of 2011
Tag: television
Celebrities in The Uncanny Valley
Wired magazine recently posted a clever infographic: “Where Celebrities Fall in the Uncanny Valley.” I don’t want to take this one too seriously, and really just wanted to share it. It’s pretty funny…and also accurate. I think it’s really just an inside-joke at the expense of the Wired editor who is included on the chart.… Continue reading Celebrities in The Uncanny Valley
Kung Shoe
This Fall 2010 television commercial, Kung Shoe DSW (also archived on their corporate site), uses a clever pastiche of contemporary action and martial arts cinema to advertise Designer Shoe Warehouse‘s “Killer Boots.” It’s cute and funny and obviously an effective, eye-grabbing advertisement for the company, as artfully made as any Jan Svankmajer film. It is… Continue reading Kung Shoe
The Vytorin Double: You Are What You Eat and You Eat What You Are
Vytorin is a single pill — a drug that combines two different medicines (Zetia and Zocor) to combat the two kinds of cholesterol (generally called “good” and “bad” cholesterol”) which they identify as coming from two different sources (“food & family”). As Time magazine reports, there may be truth in these claims, and also problems… Continue reading The Vytorin Double: You Are What You Eat and You Eat What You Are
Late Night with Wax Figures in the Men’s Room
There was a particularly uncanny moment last night on The Tonight Show with Conan O’Brien. Wait for it: The Tonight Show with Conan O’Brien – Wax Figures, Redux: Creepy Wax Tom Cruise Stalks Wax Fonzie In The Bathroom (removed from Vimeo) The wax/flesh boundaries are blurred in unexpected ways in that video that leave even… Continue reading Late Night with Wax Figures in the Men’s Room
The Addams Family Returns…Online
A public service announcement: The Addams Family is now streaming for FREE on YouTube, from MGM. A pastiche of horror fiction iconography — and also an indictment of the 50’s nuclear family, the conventions of the sitcom, and all things domestic — this show is perhaps one of the most interesting and clear-cut manifestations of… Continue reading The Addams Family Returns…Online
Mock Band: The Simulation of Artistic Processes
Rob Horning‘s recent essay in PopMatters — called “Doomed to Dilettantism” — performs an alarming and fantastic excoriation of the trend toward substituting “professionalism” in the arts with “amateurism” by consumers. Ingeniously, Horning connects the proliferation of faux-artisan strip mall stores like Michael’s (the chain craft store “Where Creativity Happens”) to the consumerist propensity for… Continue reading Mock Band: The Simulation of Artistic Processes
The Uncanny Valley of Advertising
Russell Davies describes the invasiveness of advertising as approaching its own “uncanny valley” in a Nov 2007 post on his blog, advertising practitioner: It seems like we’re about to enter a period where our digital lives will be full of the online equivalents of those messages you find on your television when you check into… Continue reading The Uncanny Valley of Advertising
Gel Remote: Object Empathy and The Tactile Uncanny
Adbusters # 78 asks “What if design stood up for itself? What if instead of bowing immediately to our demands, design gently pushed back?” In the “Psychodesign” slideshow (by Sarah Nardi), products like Panasonic Design Company‘s experimental “Gel Remote” (above) are framed as a political use of the uncanny, animating the inanimate icons of everyday life in order to… Continue reading Gel Remote: Object Empathy and The Tactile Uncanny
Parade Floats and the Uncanny
Here in the USA, it’s Thanksgiving morning. The annual Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade in NYC is just getting started, and while I’ve never been a fan of parades, one can’t deny their significance in both small town culture and in big city holiday fests, alike. The news media treat them like spectator sports. For the… Continue reading Parade Floats and the Uncanny