If we keep pushing the boundaries, how far will adverts need to go?

Please be advised: The content of this post - due to its nature - is graphic and contains images that you may find offensive. If you're squeamish, this may not be for you.

With a catchy post-folk soundtrack jangling in the background, a group of teenagers drive out to the beach for a day full of the kind of care-free frolics that make you want to return to those sepia-washed, halcyon days.

And then this happens:

This is the latest example of shockvertising – the intentional development of adverts that are designed from the ground-up to catch our attention.

In a society where we are constantly bombarded with advertising messages and promotions, we have become accustomed to tuning-out. How many of us now pay anything more than a perfunctory level of attention to commercial breaks on television, or the 10 minutes of product placement before a movie?

With the instant distractions that smartphones and tablets now offer us, advertisers are working harder than ever to secure a slice of our attention and shockvertising is becoming ever more prevalent.

Like a slap in the face, this medium is intended to wake us up from the perceived catatonia brought on by the hundreds and thousands of adverts that we absorb each year.

Traditionally the mainstay of government-sponsored public service announcements - such as those that remind us of the consequences of drinking and driving at Christmas or graphic images on cigarette packets – shockvertising pushes the bounds of social acceptability to breaking point (and occasionally beyond) in an effort to grab our attention.

This ad by D&G was banned for promoting gang rape

By focussing on taboos such as sex, violence, profanity, brutality or drug abuse, advertisers hope to have their messages recognised above and beyond the white noise background of advertising to which we’ve become accustomed.

Alongside the obvious shock value inherent in the grotesque, shockvertising can be less overt and more subversive, targeting established religious or political norms and challenging established perceptions.

The instigator of shockvertising, Italian clothing brand Benetton, covered many of these topics in their seminal 1980s campaign, which was the first to transgress racial and sexual lines.

The NHS's 'Get Unhooked' campaign drew huge numbers of complaints

But does shockvertising offer any additional value? Experts have been asking this same question for the last three decades with opinion still split.

Whilst some campaigns highlight broader social causes, such as human trafficking, child abuse or animal cruelty in an effort to engage public awareness, others are merely there to ensure that their product or brand sticks out in our memories.

This has been particularly prolific in (although not limited to) the fashion industry, with Benetton, Calvin Klein, Sisley and Dolce & Gabbana all courting controversy through their choice of adverts

Several have been deemed too much even for the increasingly calloused social sensibilities and banned outright.

A hugely controversial campaign from WWF

It is difficult to argue against any campaign that is creative, carefully thought out, well executed and which make people think about the realities of uncomfortable situations.

But with a rising tolerance to graphic images, has the advertising pool diluted the power of the shock advert?  

Is this the only way for advertisers to get their messages across and if this is the case, how far will they need to go in the future to register the same impact?

Perhaps the question should not be whether or not shockvertising brings value to a brand, but whether or not it should be used to sell jeans. 

This blog was originally written for Core Marketing. 

Facebook's growing pains are at least in part down to its parents

The above image has been doing the rounds of Facebook and bobbed into my newsfeed just in time for the site’s tenth birthday.

One decade and 1.2 billion active users later, the slightly seedy ‘who would you rather’ concept of thefacebook – comparing photos of female university students – has evolved into the digital juggernaut that is today’s byword for social media.

But Facebook is far from a faultless success story, with allegations of handing over users’ details to third party agencies (including the NSA), a failed bid to purchase zeitgeist social network Snapchat and dissatisfaction amongst users for exactly those reasons outlined in the graphic above.

I’m no Zuckerberg apologist but I find the aesthetic amends that have been made to the site relatively palatable. Facebook is a digital platform. It is part of the technological sphere and as a result will doubtless undergo a raft of iterations during its life; that is the nature of the beast.

What I intensely dislike, however, is Facebook’s ‘mother knows best’ attitude to what we should or should not be seeing. This video from Veritasium outlines the core issue - Facebook would like us to sponsor posts.
Obviously!

Perhaps of greatest concern to the site are the numbers of teenagers who are reportedly cashing in their social media chips and taking their business elsewhere, with one report going so far as to suggest that Facebook may have jettisoned three million US teenagers in the last three years alone.

For the majority, however, the threat to leave Facebook rings hollow. How many of us who are in our late twenties and early thirties – the genuine early adopters of the platform – would actually close our profiles?

I know of only a handful of people my own age who aren’t active on Facebook: one who is hiding out from the Russians – no, seriously, he is – and another who just doesn’t ‘get it’.

The truth is that we’re now hardwired into the Facebook experience.  People’s whole lives will soon be charted via their Facebook page, a portent of which has already come in the form of the little baby found at the very bottom of your timeline, marked ‘born’.  Creepy, no?

Where else would we go? No other social media platform offers the same level of flexibility that you can get from Facebook.  Twitter? Too short. Google+? Just for geeks. MySpace? No. Just…no.

While it has all the makings of a true vox populi, we have to remember that we don’t own Facebook. 

It isn’t ‘ours’ although it’s where we handle most of our social activities and store our photos. It belongs, in fact, to a group of shareholders and I’d wager dollars to doughnuts (or quids to croissants) that what they’re really interested in is ensuring that the ubiquitous adverts are continuing to rake in the funds.

And with the site’s revenues hitting £7.9 billion in 2013 (up 55%) and annual profits totalling £1.5 billion – that’s just over one dollar per user – I honestly don’t think that they give a shit whether we're seeing what our friends post or not. 

Why Google+ is the one to watch in 2014

If you mention ‘social networking’ to most people, it’s not unreasonable to believe that the first name that pops into their heads will be Facebook. 

There’s a good reason for that, as Facebook has recently surpassed 1.19 billion active global users since its launch in 2004.

The root of its success is that it embodies the ‘social’ element of social networking far more completely than any of its competitors. A digital Jack-of-all-trades, Facebook allows you to upload life events, photos and videos, share your location and manage your social calendar all through a single portal.

However, as with any product that relies on popular consensus Facebook’s foundations are built on shifting sands and security is never guaranteed.  As tastes and technologies change, users find themselves organically migrating from one platform to another.  

Facebook, we’re being told, is undergoing a crisis as the teen market – so vital for the success of so many products – is abandoning the service in droves. Teenage apathy, after all, was the giant killer that brought down the once unassailable MySpace.

So if Facebook’s reign does begin to wane, what young upstart will take up the crown? Believe it or not, it might just be Google+.

Once maligned with a shrug by those in the know as the ‘why bother’ of social media, Google+, the social platform bought to you by – you guessed it – Google, is really starting to find its feet.

Offhandedly dismissed by many commentators on its launch in 2011 as a den of geeks and boring, grey-socked technology people (potentially due to Google’s on-going invitation only soft launch policy, re: Gmail), Google+ has built its user base spectacularly and now occupies the slot of second most popular social network, with 540 million active users.

Compared to Facebook’s 1.19 billion, this may not seem all that impressive, but considering that Facebook was launched nine years ago while G+ has only just marked its second birthday, this is not something to be sniffed at.

While businesses have faltered in their efforts to position themselves successfully on Facebook, Google+ makes it far easier for companies to integrate their presence into the site and it is now not uncommon to see a red +1 button on a company’s website.

There is also far greater benefit to businesses in having a Google+ presence.  Let’s not forget that the bedrock of its core business is the search engine market so a company profile on Google+ (supported, perhaps, by some sponsored content) offers a boost to brands when it comes to their placement in Google search rankings.

Combined with a solid SEO strategy, the implication (tacit as it may be) is that if you use Google’s products then you may just find yourself heading up the list of ‘organic’ search results.

With a combination of business appeal, seeming omnipotence and good timing, Google+ is definitely one to watch over the coming year.

This post was originally written by me for inclusion on Core Marketing website. 

Impressions: Omega DLC for Mass Effect 3

So I finally managed to get my hands on the Omega DLC for Mass Effect having *ahem* completely forgotten to download it during my first play-through.

Please consider this fair warning: SPOILERS AHOY! 

Omega, baby!

Firstly, it's great to be back on Omega! This was categorically one of my favourite locations from ME2, offering a perfect counterpoint to the Citadel.  I loved roaming around its bleak interiors - particularly during the mission to recruit Mordin - but I always felt slightly disappointed that you never got to go more than 'skin deep', visiting a few linked locations in what felt like very close proximity.

This DLC is definitely the tonic for that particular malaise.

When you first bump into 'pirate queen' Aria T'Loak on the Citadel in ME3, she has been displaced from Omega by Cerberus, with the human supremacists/indoctrinated Reaper agents having gained complete control of the station.

Aria wants it back and she's going to use Shepherd to get it because, "I only recruit the best".  Aw shucks.

Aria: blue.

Following some preamble on the Citadel, the opening cinematic is an impressive introduction, with a stolen Cerberus cruiser breaking the blockade around the station before the rest of Aria's assembled mercenary fleet arrives.

Once on board the station, we are back to familiar territory, with a series of objectives that any player with even a passing relationship with the series will find familiar: shut down object A; go to location B; find an alternative route to checkpoint C, and so on.

Having had to ditch their damaged ship via escape pods, the first task is to find some allies (which gets a tongue in cheek "story of my life" response from Shepherd that is only one eye-roll away from breaking the fourth wall), which in this case are the Talon mercenaries first encountered in ME2.

The majority of the game involves Shepherd and Aria taking a circuitous route around Cerberus force fields to reach Afterlife and regain control of the station, from the dastardly, moustache-twirling* General Oleg Petrovsky.

You are joined intermittently by Nyreen Kandros, a former member of the Turian Military and new head of the Talons (that was a spoiler, by the way...just in case you ignored the warning at the start).

Aria is a decent squadmate, bringing a number of powerful biotics (most notably the impressive and potentially devastating 'Flare' and the energy-sapping 'Reave') to the fight along with her cocky banter and 'Golden God' mentality.

The same can't be said for Nyreen, who I didn't feel brought anything particularly new or interesting to the combat, beyond a balance in the weapon loadouts (pistol and assault rifle against T'Loak's shotgun and SMG) and some additional firepower to take down the waves of Cerberus troops. Oh, and awesome Turian armour.

Nyreen: Sweet armour

During the cutscenes, however Nyreen comes into her own, acting as a foil to Aria. You may as well have one on each shoulder, with Aria's gung-ho, at-all-costs attitude tempered by Nyreen's unbendable code to protect the innocent.  The interplay between them is handled beautifully and fits in well with Shepherd's position as neutral peacemaker.

Alongside the standard rogue's gallery of Cerberus troops, Omega offers up a couple of new enemies to get your teeth stuck into.

Rampart Mechs are an update to the previously encountered Loki Mechs. With increased aggression, tactics and weaponry - including a sweet blade that you do NOT want to let get too close to you - these units are far beyond the mere cannon fodder of their predecessors and are enough of a nuisance to cause last-minute tactical rethinks.

And then...there's the adjutants.

Midway through the campaign, Nyreen begins to mention a non-specific terror that is roaming through Omega, butchering everything that it comes in contact with.  This is demonstrated in truly understated fashion by a trail of dead Cerberus troops that you encounter in a powered-down area of the station.

As with all of Mass Effect's survival horror-sections, nothing is going to attack you while the lights are out but the background ambiance including disquieting noises from the unseen menace, the meandering route over industrial catwalks and bridges and deep shadows cast by your torch still managed to raise the hairs on the back of my neck.

The in-game dialogue had seriously hyped these critters and I was expecting to run into some serious opposition.  It was ever so slightly disappointing, then that having faced down my first adjutant it felt a bit...meh.

Grrrr! ...wait, do I have somthing on my face?

While still a potentially devastating foe, the adjutant didn't come close to the terror of facing down multiple banshees with their distance-closing teleports.  What it does offer, however, is a powerful lunge attack that can devastate your shields and an arm-mounted cannon that can deliver seeking biotic projectiles.

As with the Lair of the Shadowbroker DLC for ME2, one of Omega's greatest strengths comes in its lavish backgrounds and views out across the station. The sepia-tinted backdrops, complete with crashing vehicles and criss-crosses of weapons fire are as beautiful as anything on Illium or the Citadel, albeit in a slightly different way.

While Leviathan and From Ashes provid DLC experiences that add considerable depth to the Mass Effect Universe, Omega operates within the established story framework, with the majority of characters, enemies and locations that will be familiar.  The return to the formerly plague-ridden wards where you first meet Mordin was a nice touch, as to was the unavoidable return to Afterlife.

This DLC doesn't offer anything beyond what I had come to expect from the Mass Effect series (move into cover, take down some grunts, focus attention on the bosses, move on) but at the same time, that's one of the things that I love about it.

The additional powers offered by Aria and Nyreen provide a broad pallet of biotic and tech powers and not being able to bring my regular crew with me (Garrus and Javik/Liara) enabled me to utilise a variety of different tactics, several of which I would like to bring back to the Normandy for future missions.

It's worth noting that I entered this campaign with my FemShep on the cusp of Level 60 and while this was a relatively straightforward mission, it was by no means a walk in the park. This is particularly true of the final showdown in Afterlife, where the difficulty is amped up and your squadmates aren't around to help...

* Please note, no moustaches were twirled at any point during the game.

And today's 'Bandwagon Award' goes to...

Congratulations to the Metro, which has demonstrated that you only have to scratch a little way beneath the surface to find its true scaremongering, Daily Mail colours.

The story of Amazon's proposed introduction of eight-rotored octocopter drones to make deliveries direct to your door within 30 minutes of placing an order is either a wonderfully delivered bit of PR, or a true masterstroke in revolutionising the way in which we all receive our parcels.

Below is the story, as it was carried in today's Metro (Tuesday, 3rd December, 2013):

It was when I reached the bottom of the first column that my eye was drawn to the following:

The link here between military drones controlled remotely by trained members of the armed forces and what is essentially every lazy delivery boy's dream Christmas present is tenuous as best, but is another outstanding example of snap journalism tarring all technologies with the same brush.

While there have indeed been instances in the past where military drones have been blamed for the deaths of civilians, what Amazon proposes is an entirely different technology.

I doubt that these little guys will come armed with missiles. 

As our reliance on technologies continues to grow, new developments needs to be introduced and embraced by the general public. Most importantly, it needs to be understood that the same technology can have different applications - something that the Daily Mail breed of journalism will never attempt to understand as long as they can instead feed our fears.

Think before you Tweet: a cautionary tale

Peaches Geldof is potentially in some very hot water indeed.

The daughter of Boomtown Rat Sir Bob, Peaches is facing a potential contempt of court for tweeting the names of two women who allowed Ian Watkins, former singer with the band Lost Prophets, to abuse their children.

The act of tweeting these women’s names to her 160,000 followers is enough that Geldof could find herself facing up to two years in prison, should the Crown Prosecution Service opt to make an example of her and use the full extent of the law.

While you can understand Geldof’s actions - as a mother herself, the shocking actions of Watkins must raise particular levels of bile – they are still in contravention of the law.   

The victims of sexual crimes are granted anonymity for life under the British judicial system. The protection of their identities is sacrosanct and extends to the prevention of publication of any details that could lead to the identification of these people.  Clearly, naming these women could quite easily lead to the identification of the children.

Peaches Geldof

Far from being a stand-alone incident, this is just the latest in a string of examples of people – both celebrities and ordinary Janes and Joes like you or I – who have broken the law by making often flippant or emotionally-fuelled remarks on social media.

With an increasing number of people taking to social media, the risk of poorly worded or ill-considered tweets being in contravention of the law is on the rise.

Take, for instance, Sally Bercow the wife of the Speaker of the House of Commons, John Bercow.  Mrs Bercow landed herself at the centre of a litigation brought by Lord Alastair McAlpine through her ‘irresponsible use of twitter’.

Her tweet was, of course, subsequently retweeted by some of her 56,000 followers, further spreading the libellous message.

When I was studying for a journalism degree at university, the majority of the second year was given over to provide an understanding of the theory and practice of media law, so I feel comfortable that I’m not going to accidentally defame anyone.

This is, however, clearly not a practical solution to an ongoing problem; people have neither the time nor the inclination to get to grips with the finer points of libel law before sending their first tweets (whether they should is a different conversation for a different time).

Social networks provide us with outlets through which we can broadcast our successes and frustrations and just as in the real world, these often come without the benefit of a filter. 

Particularly in the case of events such as those surrounding Watkins, we can feel that an expression of our anger or frustration across social networks would be no more damaging than to do so with our friends in the pub.

There is an epilogue to this story, featuring another musician called Ian Watkins, although he may be more familiar to many as ‘H’ from the pop band Steps.

A tale of two Watkins. 'H' is on the left. 

Not only has he had to suspend his Twitter account due to the outpouring of misguided abuse from those not careful or willing enough to check that they had the right Ian Watkins, but the US entertainment website E! published his image in error as part of a story on the on-going trial.

The message, therefore, is clear: spare a thought for what you type into that little box on Twitter, because as we are all now publishers so too do we all fall under the auspices of the courts.

This blog was originally written by Dan for the Core Marketing website.

I'm not asking for much...but the Citadel would be nice

One question and slightly irritation that has burned away at me for some time is the lack of commercially available replicas of ships from BioWare's Mass Effect series.

I may well be showing the geekiest of my stripes here, however growing up I remember collecting the Micro Machines packs of ships from Star Wars.  These were nifty collectibles (OK, let's call a spade a spade: they were toys), available in packs of three and encompassing vehicles from every corner of the Star Wars universe.

Please remember: no one ever said I was cool. 

From fan favourite X-Wings, TIE Fighters and Star Destroyers, to rebel ships rarely seen on screen for more than a few fleeting seconds.  One pack even included the 'blink and you miss it' appearance of Luke's T-16 speeder - presumably the same one that he used to bullseye wamprats - which is visible in the background of the farmstead's garage on Tatooine.

While I'd not necessarily expect the same kind of treatment for those vessels that turn up throughout the Mass Effect series, there are still some exceedingly memorable and, lets be honest here, really cool vehicles many of which are available as in-game collectibles that Shepherd can pick up along her/his travels.

These models are then available to view in the Commander's cabin aboard the Normandy. Like this:

That's some fine collectibles you got there, Commander...wanna play?

As a grown-up with an easily disposed-of disposable income, I'm more interested these days in the larger-scale replicas. Something that would look great on a shelf or in a custom built, climate-controlled and hermetically sealed display case. *ahem*

While there are a few commercially available models out there, the range is really limited with a few iterations of the Normandy, an Alliance fighter, Alliance and Turian cruisers and a credit card meltingly expensive model of Sovereign.

And that's it.

What about the Citadel? Where are the wasp-like Geth ships? And what about the Shadow Broker's base? Or Omega? Or the Collectors' Ship?!

Even ground vehicles like the Krogan's six-wheeled tank-slash-APC or the Mako, with it's loose concept of physics would be welcome additions.

With the trilogy having now been put to bed, it's looking doubtful that I'll ever be able to build my own replica of the display case seen in Shepherd's quarters, but should Bioware ever opt to licence out these models at any point in the future, my message is clear: