Since it's still a drug and not an actual beauty product, you have to have some sort of medical condition to take it. That's why one of the first bits of fine print in the commercial says that the drug is only for people who suffer from "inadequate or not enough lashes, also known as hypotrichosis." Like Brooke, apparently.

"Ad for eyelash drug Latisse goes too far" [Consumer Reports Health Blog]

RELATED
"Yeah, Your Eyes Are Discolored And Red, But Your Lashes Look Great!"

(Thanks, Chris!)

Grey says:

This absurd Bumblebee Tuna display was jutting into the isle at my local Safeway. It had a black screen, single silver button, and a card stock sign demanding I "push the button." Out of nothing more than utter disbelief and morbid curiosity I bow to the will of the sign.

"Will it start talking to me, the grocery store shopper?" I wonder. "Perhaps it will suggest some Tuna-themed dish for me to prepare for dinner tonight?" No. Instead I see the lowest resolution version of some 30 second, made for TV ad I'd ever seen.

When it stops it goes black, waiting for the next passerby to cave to the demands of the card stock sign. No coupons. No cooking ideas. No direct engagement with the shopper. Just the same, unimaginative advertising penetrating deeper into our everyday experiences - as if the market isn't saturated enough. I don't know how this could possibly be effective, but apparently they think it will be.

At least the damn thing isn't auto-play. I hope someone figures out a way to hack these things and deliver and useful, informative, or somewhat interesting message on one of these.

Maybe you should go back see what it looks like when you put the sunglasses on.

In a lawsuit filed Sept. 28 in Los Angeles Superior Court, Amber Duick claims she had difficulty eating, sleeping and going to work during March and April of last year after she received e-mails for five days from a fictitious man called Sebastian Bowler, from England, who said he was on the run from the law, knew her and where she lived, and was coming to her home to hide from the police.

Along with messages from the fictitious man, Duick received a fake bill for damages to a hotel room where the man had stayed.

Toyota's lawyers say Duick agreed to the prank when she filled out an online personality test sponsored by the company, but her lawyer says the agreement she clicked didn't mention anything about the nature of the prank.

Tepper, Duick's attorney, said he discussed the campaign with Toyota's attorneys earlier this year, and they said the "opting in" Harp referred to was done when Duick's friend e-mailed her a "personality test" that contained a link to an "indecipherable" written statement that Toyota used as a form of consent from Duick.

Tepper, said that during those legal negotiations, Toyota's lawyers claimed Duick signed the written legal agreement, which they said amounts to "informed written consent."

"So if [Duick] signed something, she's informed that she's signing 'A,' but in fact she's signing something else," Duick's attorney said. "It's written and it is consent, but you're not informed about the thing that you're actually signing up for? "It didn't say someone was going to be stalking my client. It was premised upon keeping my client in the dark, upon fooling her that these e-mails were real."

Update: Our reader Michael Belisle posted a link to the Toyota Matrix marketing/prank website, where Toyota explains how the prank works.

YourOtherYou is a unique interactive experience enabling consumers to play extravagant pranks. Simply input a little info about a friend (phone, address, etc.) and we'll then use it, without their knowledge, to freak them out through a series of dynamically personalized phone calls, texts, emails and videos. First, one of five virtual lunatics will contact your friend. They will seem to know them intimately, and tell them that they are driving cross-country to visit. It all goes downhill from there. The Matrix integrates seamlessly into the experience and you can follow the progress of your prank in real-time online. Each piece of the campaign assures that the experience is as Google-proof as possible.

"Woman Sues Toyota Over 'Terrifying' Prank" [ABCNews] (Thanks to Steve!)
(Photo: Capture Queen ™)

The Daily News says:

"They fired me because they said I was overweight and I couldn't fit in their clothes anymore," she said.

The 5-foot-10, 120-pound stunner was amazed to see her body digitally distorted for Ralph Lauren Blue Label.

"I was shocked to see that super skinny girl with my face," she told the Daily News. "It's very sad, I think, that Ralph Lauren could do something like that."

Ralph Lauren, who dispatched legal nastygrams to bloggers who covered the story and reproduced the bobblehead ad, has released this statement:

"For over 42 years we have built a brand based on quality and integrity. After further investigation, we have learned that we are responsible for the poor imaging and retouching that resulted in a very distorted image of a woman's body. We have addressed the problem and going forward will take every precaution to ensure that the caliber of our artwork represents our brand appropriately."

Ralph Lauren model Filippa Hamilton: I was fired because I was too fat! [Daily News via Gothamist]

Michelle Singletary at the Washington Post notes that the FTC is attempting to correct this oversight. They're also asking the general public for input on what would make the service less confusing to use.

In an effort to help keep people from ending up on impostor sites or falling for promotions for free credit reports that aren't really free, the FTC is seeking public comment on proposed amendments to the free-report rule. The credit card legislation passed this spring requires the agency to create amendments to the law by Feb. 22, 2010, to prevent deceptive marketing of these reports.

Over the next two months, you'll have a chance to weigh in on the FTC's rulemaking effort. Do take the time to comment, especially if you feel you've been deceived. This isn't a trivial matter. These rules will dictate how you get your credit reports. Most of what the FTC is proposing will make things better, but the agency needs to be tougher.

"We are encouraging consumers and anybody else to comment," said Katherine Armstrong, an FTC lawyer. "We want to know if we got it right."

Here are three rule changes they're proposing:

1. All credit bureau advertising and upsells would be removed from the process until after you have received your free credit report(s).

2. The "sponsored" links from the credit bureaus would be removed.

3. Other companies (like our much-hated "freecreditreport.com") would have to send customers to a landing page that reads, "This is not the free credit report provided for by federal law."

What do you think? Whether you agree or disagree, or have other suggestions, you should send them in to the FTC:

To read the text of the Federal Register notice with all the proposed changes, go to http://www.ftc.gov. Comments must be received by Nov. 30.

To submit your comments electronically, go to http://public.commentworks.com/ftc/FreeCreditReportNPRM. Comments on paper should be mailed or delivered to Federal Trade Commission, Office of the Secretary, Room H-135 (Annex T), 600 Pennsylvania Ave. NW, Washington, D.C. 20580.

"Underlining 'Free' in 'Free Credit Report'" [Washington Post]

Well...a lot. That "free" trial of resveratrol suddenly turns into a recurring charge of $80 or more on customers' credit card bills. The free trial is 19 days, All this is explained, of course: in the fine print, on a separate page that most customers, blinded by the word "free," ignore. Arnold Diaz of New York's Fox 5 spoke to some victims of this particular scheme.

This scheme is remarkably similar to its cousins the "free" credit report and the acai berry free trial. On their sites and on ad banners, resveratrol peddlers often claim that their products were endorsed by Dr. Mehmet Oz, health adviser to Oprah Winfrey's audience. Concerned that consumers are being lured in to buy a product with questionable benefits and even more questionable billing practices using his image, Dr. Oz, along with Oprah's Harpo Productions, are suing many of the peddlers of resveratrol. You can read the suit here as a PDF download. The collection of screen shots is particularly dismaying.

In addition to using Dr. Oz's image, FOX 5 says resveratrol sellers also set up fake clinical study web sites (with a disclaimer that says the study is "fictional" at the bottom) and fake news report web sites. Ironically, when commercial news sites publish their stories about these schemes online, guess whose ads come up alongside them?

Meanwhile, we'll stick to getting our resveratrol the old-fashioned way.

Free Trial Scam [Fox 5]
RELATED:
Easy Weight Loss And Free Cash: A Dubious Product Online Marketing Empire Revealed
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Careful, Those Free Acai Products Might Come Attached To A Delicious Scam

We're not sure this will teach Ralph Lauren anything about the Streisand Effect, but it's still fun to see a company mangle its own heavy-handed intimidation tactics.

Update: Our original post said that Photoshop Disasters caved to the takedown notice, but that was incorrect according to several readers. A commenter below writes, "Photoshop Disasters didn't cave - Blogspot policy is to remove the offending post until the investigation is complete. PsD had a post up about it yesterday." We've changed the wording in the first paragraph to more accurately reflect what happened.

"The criticism that Ralph Lauren doesn't want you to see!" [Boingboing]

From the FTC:

Under the revised Guides, advertisements that feature a consumer and convey his or her experience with a product or service as typical when that is not the case will be required to clearly disclose the results that consumers can generally expect. In contrast to the 1980 version of the Guides – which allowed advertisers to describe unusual results in a testimonial as long as they included a disclaimer such as "results not typical" – the revised Guides no longer contain this safe harbor.

What this means in practice is that from now on, advertisers who use customer testimonials in their ads will be on the same legal footing as those who make product claims themselves.

In its guidelines, the FTC acknowledges that critics are concerned that the new rule might have a "chilling effect" on the free speech of advertisers, but ultimately concluded that the addition of more or larger disclaimers wouldn't solve the problem and that even legal footing for testimonials "will not impermissibly chill truthful speech in violation of the First Amendment."

The FTC says:

The critical question for determining whether an ad is deceptive under Section 5 of the FTC Act – for all advertising, whether or not testimonials are involved – is what is the net impression consumers take away from the ad as a whole.

The revised language in Section 255.2 would come into play only if a truthful testimonial: (1) conveys to consumers that the testimonialist's results are "representative of what consumers will generally achieve with the advertised product or service in actual, albeit variable, conditions of use"; and (2) the advertiser does not have adequate substantiation for that claim.

So it seems like all spectacularly amazing and unusual results will need to be clearly portrayed as spectacularly amazing and unusual from now on. Acting like the results are normal and slapping "results not typical" underneath isn't going to cut it. Seems like it'll be a real headache for infomercial producers.

Here's the final word on the matter from the FTC (emphasis ours):

The effect of the revision at issue is to treat ads that use testimonials the same as all other ads. Section 5 of the FTC Act requires advertisers to have substantiation for the messages that consumers reasonably take from their ads, which means they must first know what messages consumers take away from those ads. The Commission sees no reason why an advertiser should be exempt from those basic obligations simply because it chooses to communicate its claims through the use of testimonials; yet, that is precisely the effect of the safe harbor afforded by the 1980 Guides. Accordingly, the Commission concludes that the safe harbor for non-typical testimonials accompanied by disclaimers of typicality should be eliminated.

FTC Publishes Final Guides Governing Endorsements, Testimonials [FTC]
Guides Concerning the Use of
Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising (PDF) [FTC]
(Photo:cecildadj)

That one seems so blatantly horrible that we're sure it must've made it onto FAILblog or some similar site in the past, but there are plenty of undiscovered gems at Your Logo Makes Me Barf, like this disturbingly explicit "Women of H.O.P.E." design:

Or this restaurant sign, which we imagine is located near an intersection with a mysteriously high number of car accidents:

Abuse your eyes at Your Logo Makes Me Barf.

(Thanks to hobronto!)

Windows 7 is indeed launching soon, so we figured you'd want to see this now so you have time to stop by the Party Plus store and stock up on crepe paper—don't worry, you don't have to hang it up, just leave it on the corner of the table—and of course balloons.

Never install a new operating system without balloons.

We suspect that this promo was actually written, directed, and edited by a Songsmith-style software being developed in Microsoft's research division.

"Mainstream Press 'Cringes' At Win7 Launch Parties" [Slashdot]

If you didn't visit nytimes.com over the weekend, here's what happened: the paper reported on Monday that they'd essentially been tricked, by someone who knew how to game their oversight policies, into displaying malicious ads to some users who visited the site.

The creator of the malicious ads posed as Vonage, the Internet telephone company, and persuaded NYTimes.com to run ads that initially appeared as real ads for Vonage. At some point, possibly late Friday, the campaign switched to displaying the virus warnings.

Because The Times thought the campaign came straight from Vonage, which has advertised on the site before, it allowed the advertiser to use an outside vendor that it had not vetted to actually deliver the ads, Ms. McNulty said. That allowed the switch to take place. "In the future, we will not allow any advertiser to use unfamiliar third-party vendors," she said.

Security consultant Dancho Danchev thinks that a particular, sophisticated crime group was behind the ad, which happens to be the same group that Microsoft filed 5 lawsuits against in Seattle's King County Superior Court earlier this week.

The lawsuits allege that an unknown number of individuals using various business names distributed malicious software through Microsoft AdManager, the company's online advertising platform.

[...]

Click Forensics, a company that tracks click fraud, on Thursday said that it had discovered a 200,000 computer botnet — a group of compromised computers harnessed to work in unison — linked to the Microsoft lawsuits. In a blog post, Steve O'Brien, VP of sales and marketing at Click Forensics called it "one of the most advanced sources of click fraud we've seen."

The botnet, known as the "Bahama botnet" because it at one time directed online traffic through computers in the Bahamas, is believed to be linked to the malicious advertising that appeared on the New York Times Web site several days ago, according to O'Brien.

Although O'Brien suggests that the cyber crime group believed to be responsible is located in Ukraine, Richard Boscovich, senior attorney at Microsoft for Internet safety enforcement, said in a phone interview that it's not clear where the people responsible are located.

"Microsoft Files Five Lawsuits To Halt Malicious Advertising" [InformationWeek]
"Times Web Ads Show Security Breach" [New York Times]

"A Campaign With an Edge" [UglyDoggy via AgencySpy]

According to the viewer, the radio ad from a company called "Nelson Research" (which apparently chose the name so that listeners would mishear it as "Nielsen") offered $2,000 worth of grocery coupons. A call to the advertiser, however, resulted in a demand for a credit card number, and an admission of a $3 shipping charge — plus more fees down the road. The viewer took a pass, and alerted Matarese, who had a producer sign up. Turns out that shipping charge was just the start of a long list of fees, tied to three separate products.

The grocery coupons came from GrocerySavers.com, and required a $2 shipping fee for each $10 batch of coupons. The other two deals were even better. The "US Patriot" card brought with it a monthly fee of $19, and a second "discount" card, the Liberty Fun Pass, was another $19 a month. Before getting a single discount, cardholders are out $400 a year, unless they cancel during a 14-day trial.

We think Matarese is being a little too kind when he says these offers aren't scams because they hew to the letter of the law. If you really want to save money using grocery coupons, follow the advice of super-shoppers like Kathy Spencer — and stay away from sc*ms like Nelson Research.

Radio Ad for Free Groceries Exposed [WCPO]

(Photo: Editor B)

How the World's Biggest Corporations, From Starbucks to Wal-Mart to Barnes & Noble, Claim to Be 'Local' [Alternet]

(Original photo by pierofix; altered)

50 Sluttiest American Apparel Ads of All Time [StyleCrave via Adfreak]

"Use Firefox to Fix the Web's Biggest Annoyances" [Lifehacker]

Today I noticed a new group of signs posted outside and inside my gym XSport Fitness in Lombard, IL saying that for $10 more I can have access to any XSport Fitness club. These new signs were plastered nearby all the existing signs advertising monthly membership of $19.95. Since I would enjoy using several of the XSport fitness gyms spread throughout the Chicago suburbs and Chicago I eagerly went to sign up. However, after speaking to the employee at the front desk I learned that nothing on the sign is actually true. It's $10 more if you pay $30 a month, which is not actually that gym's rate. Also, even though the sign clearly states Chicago, the upgrade does not work at ANY Chicago gyms, only suburban Chicago.

A group called FRANCA, a nonprofit group representing non-Japanese residents in Japan, is organizing a campaign to get McDonald's to withdraw the ads. In a letter to McDonald's execs, it writes:

Our association finds the following things problematic:

1) The character speaks broken accented Japanese (using the katakana script, one used for foreign loanwords). The impression given is that Caucasians cannot speak Japanese properly, which is simply not true for the vast numbers of non-native (and Japanese-native) foreigners in Japan.
2) The character is called "Mr. James" (again, in katakana), promoting the stereotype that foreigners must be called by their first names only (standard Japanese etiquette demands that adults be called "last name plus -san"), undoing progress we have made for equal treatment under Japanese societal rules.
3) The image used, of a clumsy sycophantic "nerd" for this Caucasian customer, is embarrassing to Caucasians who will have to live in Japan under this image.

So far, FRANCA doesn't seem to be having much luck. Mr. James's is alive and kicking, at least to judge by the photos on his blog.

No doubt white people are more threatened in Japan than they are elsewhere. But it's hard for me to see the big deal here. If you took those photos from his blog and put in new captions, you'd pretty much have the Verizon guy.

Mr. James : McDonald's Japan has a gaijin clown [Japan Probe]
FRANCA protest letter to McDonald's USA HQ re "Mr James" Campaign [DEBITO.ORG] (Thanks to Shari Custer!)

First off was Dancer in the Dark. It seemed a little off to me that the next closest thing to what I was actually searching for was 'Aliens in the Attic'—I mean, if you're looking for something to make you sob and snuffle unattractively in front of your TV and require 'in the' in the title, perhaps 'Flowers in the Attic' would be a better choice? And surely there are closer hits to 'Dancer' than 'Aliens'—'Dances with Wolves', 'Dirty Dancing' or how about 'The Dancer'? I chalked it up to what amounted to a search engine burp and kept moving...

But when Leff kept searching, there it was again and again, a shadowy sign of search results gone awry. Aliens in the Attic. Aliens in the Attic. Aliens in the Attic. Screwy algorithms? Angry robots? Divine intervention? You be the judge. Full story here.

Tell Me Lies, Tell Me Sweet Little Lies [I'm a DIRTY robot!]

a) A small, boring boxy car shouldn't be bragging about 33 MPG.
b) Nobody who needs to tint their windows would be driving a Hyundai.
c) The art director can't tell the difference between an Elantra and an Accent.
d) All of the above

Hint:

"15 Billboards That Don't Belong Next To Each Other" [BuzzFeed]

When we first saw this ad, we thought it was a joke. It's not. Get in touch with Out of Your Life, and they'll send you a Break-Up Box for your jewelry. Send it in, get your cash back, and buy yourself something fabulous!

We guess this is empowering, but it's also weird. We're also unaware of what the etiquette is about who gets engagement rings back, but thankfully Out of Your Life has provided an info page. We're impressed by their downright scholarly description of this peculiar area of property and family law, with the historical precedent and minority view, as well as extra complications like if there are conditions attached to these lavish gifts (we have no idea what sort of conditions they might mean).

So if you're like the woman in this ad, blinged out in your own personal conflict diamonds, cash that love in!

The clip never caught on, though, with only about 2,000 hits, and the movie crashed and burned. The officials at the high school had no idea there was a business transaction involved in the ceremony, and they weren't too happy to learn of it from the WSJ:

The stunt did succeed in outraging officials at Hamilton High and the Los Angeles Unified School District, who were horrified when informed by a reporter that a movie company had essentially planted a paid advertisement in the midst of a graduation ceremony.

Hamilton High Assistant Principal Roberta Mailman says neither she nor anyone from the school was contacted for permission — either for the stunt itself or for filming it. Before learning of the payment, she says, "I thought it was a great speech."

School District spokeswoman Gayle Pollard-Terry says she is unsure whether the episode violated any policy, but adds that Ms. Mejia's diploma is safe. In a statement, Local District Superintendent Michelle King wrote: "Obviously, this is not condoned by the District. It's unfortunate."

Hey, $1800 isn't too bad for a college freshman starting her first year at MIT, so we don't begrudge the student her money. But what's next, o Intelligence Group? How about you wire a baby to deliver an E-Trade pitch at his baptism? Or maybe bribe some pallbearers to "drop" a casket during a funeral! We think you were on the right track with hijacking a big life event ceremony to sell crap; we just don't think you were aiming low enough.

"Fellow Graduates, Before We Greet The Future, a Word From My Sponsor " [Wall Street Journal]

According to The Big Money, in a letter he wrote to the Parents Television Council (who complained to him about the commercials) Boddie said that the ad campaign "diminishes not only the product but the brand itself," and he's asking Hardee's to pull it from all markets.

"Hardee's Biggest Franchisee Attacks Hardee's Ads" [The Big Money] (Thanks to Joanne!)

RELATED
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Thank you Sugar Information, Inc. for setting the record straight!

Carrie McLaren & Jason Torchinsky are coeditors of Ad Nauseam: A Survivor's Guide to American Consumer Culture. In previous lives, they worked together on the hopelessly obscure and now defunct Stay Free! magazine.

Hardee's joins Burger King, Quizno's, and Carl's Jr. in the consortium of chains who have attempted to apply the "sex sells" adage to fast food. Hot!

I wish I could remember what year this was from in order to pinpoint exactly how anachronistic it was. I do know that the tagline "Sells the People Other People Copy" was used during the 1930s, predating MTV's infamous "Buy this 24-Year-Old and Get All His Friends Absolutely Free" ad (below) by several decades.

Carrie McLaren & Jason Torchinsky are coeditors of Ad Nauseam: A Survivor's Guide to American Consumer Culture. In previous lives, they worked together on the hopelessly obscure and now defunct Stay Free! magazine .

The Huffington Post example is typical. The fake news headline, "How I Make $1700 a Week Posting Links on Google" linked to fake TV station News 5. The home town of the now-prosperous mother featured in the story—mentioned in the lead paragraph—magically changes based on users' IP address. Mine says Brooklyn, NY.

And News 5 is just the tip of the iceberg.

It turns out there's a whole fake-media empire pushing the story of the massive profits to be made by gaming Google from home: The Boston Weekly News, USA Financial Post, America Finance News, New York Finance News, Ohio Business News, the New York Tribune News, the Bakersfield Gazette, the San Jose Times, and the prestigious New York City Hearld. No, not "Herald"; Hearld....

Google rigging isn't the only story out there. The Slate ad, ostensibly from an ABC affiliate (the fictitious News 3), hawked an anti-aging pill called Resveratrol Ultra. Still, most of the examples Wired found focused on Google, which makes a certain kind of sense. Focusing on building up their fake links first stands to make any future campaigns more effective.

"This Just In: Fake News Sites Are Great!" [Wired] (Thanks, tonedef!)

Carrie McLaren & Jason Torchinsky are coeditors of Ad Nauseam: A Survivor's Guide to American Consumer Culture. In previous lives, they worked together on the hopelessly obscure and now defunct Stay Free! magazine .

We have also shared with all of our pharmacy departments that this is an unacceptable practice and should not be repeated. At Sam's Club we always have the health and welfare of our customers and members in mind with everything we do and we deeply regret that this incident occurred.

You can read the full response over at Salisbury News.

(Note: Joe says Sam's Club gave him permission to publish the email, so you can ignore the "privileged and confidential" warning at the bottom of it.)

(Photo: Joe Albero/Salisbury News)

I'm an avid reader (checking multiple times per day) and thought you guys would appreciate the attached ad I was presented with after I finished taking a friends' "How well do you know me?" quiz.

"Hey Dan!" The ad said. "Hot singles are waiting for you!"

And on the left hand side was a picture of my wife!

Apparently, this particular ad grabbed a picture of one of my friends to display with the ad and unfortunately, just happened to grab my wife's picture.

I promise this is not doctored.

Thought you'd enjoy it.

Wait. How sorry was that?

The business said it was "totally against" its communications strategy, that it had removed the content and would ensure it did not happen again.

Now if you'll excuse us we need to go promote our new book. #Wimbledon #Nena #shameless

"Habitat sorry for Iran Tweeting" [BBC News] (Thanks, Charles Star!)

Guest Bloggers Carrie McLaren & Jason Torchinsky are coeditors of Ad Nauseam: A Survivor's Guide to American Consumer Culture. In previous lives, they worked together on the hopelessly obscure and now defunct Stay Free! magazine.

The study, presented to Congress earlier this month by the environmental consulting firm TerraChoice, found rampant greenwashing in every product category.

Congress is now considering how to curb the problem.

"Study: 98 Percent of "Eco-Friendly" Products Make Misleading Claims" [Mother Jones] (Thanks, Jennifer Hughes!)
[Photo: Shira Golding]

Carrie McLaren & Jason Torchinsky are coeditors of Ad Nauseam: A Survivor's Guide to American Consumer Culture. In previous lives, they worked together on the hopelessly obscure and now defunct Stay Free! magazine.

On the downside, as a pill recipient at Salisbury News notes, "Now my 3 year old thinks all prescription pill bottles are just tasty snacks".

I can't wait to see what's next. Wal-Mart promoting its gun department with the Pez "suicide" dispenser?

Saturday at Sam's Club [Salisbury News] (Thanks to Droford!)
(Photo: Joe Albero/Salisbury News)

Guest Bloggers Carrie McLaren & Jason Torchinsky are coeditors of Ad Nauseam: A Survivor's Guide to American Consumer Culture. In previous lives, they worked together on the hopelessly obscure and now defunct Stay Free! magazine.

The cleverly named Commercial Advertisement Loudness Mitigation Act, or "CALM", would require the following:

(1) advertisements accompanying such video programming shall not be excessively noisy or strident;

(2) such advertisements shall not be presented at modulation levels substantially higher than the program material that such advertisements accompany; and

(3) the average maximum loudness of such advertisements shall not be substantially higher than the average maximum loudness of the program material that such advertisements accompany.

The Wall Street Journal says that the industry is already planning to deal with the commercial loudness issue on its own.

Broadcasters say they are addressing the problem already. "The major television broadcast networks, including ABC, NBC, CBS and Fox, are each, individually, implementing policies that attempt to control loud commercials," said David Donovan, president of the Association for Maximum Service Television, a broadcast industry trade group, speaking at a hearing Thursday before the House Energy and Commerce Telecommunications Subcommittee.

A representative from NBC said that Congress can expect an industry-wide review of commercial volume in July. Broadcasters could begin implementing it by the fall.

Do you think they'll actually do this? Should Congress pass the bill? Or do you not care about loud commercials?

Lawmakers Make Noise About Loud Commercials [WSJ]
Commercial Advertisement Loudness Mitigation Act (Introduced in House) [THOMAS]

Consumer Reports' Money blog says that the FTC is updating its truth-in-advertising guidelines, which were last looked at in 1980, to include bloggers among those who have to reveal when they're being compensated.

In other words, an advertiser who greases the palms of bloggers to fabricate "spontaneous" Internet buzz for his product or service can't pretend that he's not advertising. Blogs that promote products "are consumer endorsements. To the extent they're paid for, they come under jurisdiction of FTC," Richard Cleland, assistant director of the FTC's Division of Advertising Practices told me in a recent interview.

I would type more, but M&Ms are falling out of my mouth and onto the keyboard, making it difficult. You should go buy some. They are delicious.

"Is that blogger review really a paid ad? The FTC wants you to know." [Consumer Reports Money & Shopping]
(Photo: Lin Pernille ♥ Photography)

A spokeswoman for the mall told the Washington Examiner that after receiving a complaint from the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund, they're pulling the ads down:

In a statement, Fischer said Tysons holds "nothing but the greatest respect for the men and women who have served this country and we apologize to the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund for any unintentional similarities" to the Wall.

"We are responding to the Fund's request and are moving quickly to remove this advertisement," she said. "The ad design, which was developed as an evolution of the long-standing Tysons Corner Center campaign 'Where the Stores are,' was not intended to emulate any representation of the Memorial Wall."

We also have a feeling there's going to be an interesting marketing meeting this week about "appropriate imagery" in future Tysons Corner advertising.

"Tysons Corner ad shocks Vietnam vets" [Washington Examiner]
"Tysons Corner Center: 'War Chic'" (Thanks to Anne!) [why.i.hate.dc]
(Photo: Dave Stroup)

Chris, who pointed out the new ad to us, also sent the following email to Post:

Dear Post,

Bear Grylls advertising your Trail Mix cereal? Really? The guy will eat ANYTHING. He has and will eat a sheep eyeball, goat testicle, scorpion, spider, snake, rotten lion-killed zebra, berries out of poo. And this is the guy you want me to take cereal advice from? Really? Don't get me wrong, I love that guy and I love irony but,... REALLY? That's like opening a Dick Cheyney day care facility. [Actually, we think it's more like Cheney promoting a gun safety course. -Ed.] Your commercial is like taking survival advice from Gordon Ramsay. I seriously can't think of a worse choice,... unless you want me to think that your cereal tastes like maggots with elephant dung juice squeezed over the top. I'm just sayin'.

Here's the Post commercial:

And here's what Post's new spokesman eats when he's off the set:

Personally, we think a much more entertaining match-up would be Bear Grylls eating a box of Hannah Montana cereal. We're not sure that would be any less disturbing, but it would at least make more sense since Grylls will eat anything.

In another version with a different voice, presumably the "sanitized" one, he just places his out, palms down and parallel, and thrusts his hips. The word is that the commercials got pulled, not because they're horrible, but because some viewers found Pasta Dude's moves to be vulgar. However, the ads still aired for a while time in in L.A. and the West Coast, a nod to its rich history of people, with varying degrees of success and skill, trying to be rappers.

But judging by the campaign's short life, it seems the rhymin' rigatoni's final cries of "Pasta playa hata" were prescient. At least now we finally know what happened to The Noid; he knocked up a box of Kraft Mac & Cheese.

TRANSCRIPT

Mom: Why can't we ever agree on what to eat?
Pasta Dude: Check it, y'all, with the hip hops to perfecta from Domino's!
(screams)
Dad: What are you?
Pasta Dude: Five varieties of oven-fresh yum, the whole family's down, we're all gettin' some!
Kid: This is tight.
Pasta Dude: Pasta dude, uh! Pasta Dude, yeah!
(Mom yells)
Kid: Mom....!
Pasta Dude: Pasta playa hata...

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Domino's Ill-Fated "Pasta Dude" Commercial [SoGood]

We know commercials have to be edgy and all to get noticed these days, but this one just sort of falls off the edge into Makes No Sense land—unless some consultant figured out that equating toasted sandwiches with Scott bangin' the oven somehow increases sales.

Update: Here's the Schick Quattro commercial for ladyparts that someone mentions in the comments below, courtesy of Mark.

Update 2: Laura pointed us to this blog, where a guy estimates that the $4 toasty torpedo is approximately 75% smaller than the $5 Subway sandwich it's intended to compete against. We hope Quizno's next ad for the toasty torpedo argues that size doesn't matter—it's how good it tastes.