The Musings Of An Opinionated Sod [Help Me Grow!]

I love this ad from Air France for their Business Class seat …

It’s simple, effective, engaging and disrupting … I just hope Air France can live up to the promise which, if my past experiences with them are any indication, is unlikely.

Still, putting all that aside, this ad at least gives me a positive impression about Air France – something billions of other airline ‘business class’ ads fail to do*.

There’s a great book called Why I Hate Flying by Henry Mintzberg.

In it he describes that people who fly [especially Business Class] are mental because ultimately, they are paying for someone to decide when they can eat, what they can eat, what they can watch, when they can sleep, when they can wake up and when they can use the loo. 

I always thought this would make a great brand idea for an airline – but for some reason, the majority seem happy churning out the same old cliched rubbish time and time again. 

Good on Air France for trying something new … it certainly worked for me … but the bigger issue is how the airline industry is going to counteract all the crap going on in the World with terrorism – because if they don’t, we’re going to see more and more brands disappearing or fighting for a slice of a much smaller pie. Talk about brands under attack!

*Exludes Virgin Atlantic of course … they’re the best airline EVER and not because they’re a client of mine. Oh no.

I swear to God that the following is absolutely true … and it will stay with me for the rest of my life.

So I was in Shanghai on Friday running a workshop.  All went really well and by the end of the meeting, lots of people came up and said thank you for what I had taught them.

Anyway, this one lady walked up to me at the end, with a USB ‘Thumbdrive’ in her hand and asked if it would be at all possible to have a copy of the preso.  Naturally I agreed and I plugged in her device into my laptop and waited for my computer to recognise it so I could move the file over.

Now my laptop has a program that automatically opens any photos or videos held on a thumbdrive or CD so while I was doing some other work on my computer, I noticed in the background, a bunch of photos had been uploaded.  For some reason, my eyes couldn’t stop staring at them, mainly because [1] everyone likes the idea of ‘snooping’ on someone’s photos and [2] my brain just couldn’t work out what the hell they were.

Then … like being hit by a truck … my brain finally worked out exactly what I was seeing. 

HOME-TAKEN PORNO PHOTOGRAPHS!!!

I kid you not … they were very, very, very, very full on!!!  I mean sooooooooooooooo full on!!!!  I mean …. BLOOOOOOOOODY HELL full on!!!!!

For a few seconds, time stood still … maybe I froze, maybe I held my breath, maybe I just gasped … but whatever it was, she noticed something was wrong because within a nano-second, she had lunged for my computer mouse and closed the ‘offending’ program shouting, “THAT’S NOT IMPORTANT”.

I was soooooo shocked I didn’t know whether to laugh, cry or just sit down and ask for a cup of tea then a cold shower – but one thing I did know was that there was no way I could look her in the face … there was no way I would have maintained control if I’d done that. 

Weird thing is, this woman was one of the sweetest people in the conference – she was more likely to be Mother Teresa than Jenna Jameson … but she proved it’s the ‘quiet ones you have to be careful of’!  Seriously, I saw parts of her that only a gynaecologist, waxer or boyfriend, should see but I have to admit, I did wish I could have had a longer gawp at the pictures but it was so out of context, my brain just took too long to register what it was seeing. 

What made it even funnier was that my laptop was still connected to the projector … so her ‘front bottom’ was on display to the whole room – but luckily [for her] everyone was chatting after a long day so they missed the most amazing 7 seconds of any presentation, EVER!

So how did it end?

Well I copied the file and without either person looking at eachother, we sort of mumbled that it was ‘good to meet eachother’ and she ran out of the room while I had to sit down and try and work out if I’d just seen what I thought I had seen!

So to this poor lady who is the subject of my dedication, I thank you … you made a long flight back to Singapore, literally fly by and I have been laughing out loud at random moments throughout the weekend as I remember the weirdest few seconds of any meeting I’ve ever attended. 

Oh and to people who think we rule technology rather than the other way round … don’t get too cocky … if it can screw over the nice lady I met on Friday, it won’t think twice to bugger up your lives when it so chooses!

I’m travelling for a few days so see you when I get back next week.  Don’t forget to sign the www.giverobajob.wordpress.com petition!

Alright … so I am being a teensy bit sarcastic, but the reason I say this ad could be effective is because when I saw it, it stopped me dead in my tracks.

OK, so it stopped me because it is a pile of shit, but hey … with most ads tending to wash right over me, you could argue this one is far more effective because at least I noticed it.

Of course, if you did argue that point of view, I’d have to give you a right good kicking but as per normal, I am getting totally off the point I want to make.

“So what’s that then?” I hear you cry.

Well, you’d think an ‘ad’ like this could be [or should be] the final nail in the coffin for the agency that did it … but in this case, it’s the work from their newly appointed agency, DDB.

Now this surely begs the question …  what the hell was their pitch winning strategy if it ends up producing work like this!!

Could it be …

1. Making Technology Relevant? 

2. Making Technology Sexual? 

3. Making Technology Pointless? 

Hmmmmm … I’m not really sure … but what it does seem to prove is that despite what many companies may say, many change agencies for financial, rather than creative reasons – which ultimately demonstrates that they see little or no value in the power of creativity or customer engagement.

Bit of a problem that – for companies and for agencies.

Send this link to everyone you know then click on it yourself and sign the petition!

www.giverobajob.wordpress.com