>I hear you on your wish that ads would just be what they are
>and state their case and quit trying to be so damn likable. Or
>edgy. Or poetic. I think most people would say the same thing.
>But the horror of focus groups have taught me that people
>really aren't all that great at figuring out what they want in
>an ad. They can say they just want the facts, please, but then
>some bright, imaginative ad will come along and make them
>forget all about the more straight forward ads. The problem is
>that so many ads go for that and fail, that the end result
>being a lot of obnoxious advertising. Whereas it could have
>just been a lot of boring but unobjectionable advertising.

I can't deny any of this. It's like politics...we all SAY we want to vote on our leaders based on reason and 'the issues'... but let's be real, we are all creatures of hype and we vote on emotion. And everybody likes a good, funny commercial, just ask Kevin Nealon.


>But yeah, a lot of those Helvetica ads were not very
>impressive from a conceptual perspective. Just a different way
>to dress up the same unobjectionable advertising.

The Coke ad example seemed like the Helvetica ad was even less manipulative. Coke wasn't going to make you any happier or more attractive, but it was Coke, and it was there, and that's really all the reason you should need to drink it. Sort of a 'you can lead a horse to a soda fountain' mentality.


>Am I the only one that thinks the American Airlines logo was
>the crappiest "shining example" of Helvetic offered in the
>film?

Man, I was thinking the same thing. Congratulations to American Airlines for not changing their dried up crusty ass logo from 1967. Way to strive, guys.

(You know, even UPS updated their Paul Rand joint, fellas... it's okay to spitshine the ol' corporate ID every now and then)

Some designer is going to watch this movie and take it as a challenge, though. Maybe AA will see this flick and say 'holy shit, we haven't updated our logo!' I give it 3 more years, tops.