The Opposite of Advertising

So I noticed this ad on Gmail the other day:



My first reaction was "Oh boy [sarc mark]. Just what I always wanted!"

But then I realized that the ads on Hotmail are so very bad. They make no sense. they are insulting and stupid. Some on Facebook are the same. Here are a few that I noticed recently and captured like an injured Pokemon.



The above ad is a little sexist or something. I am not sure I'd like to be present for that pitch meeting. "Sexy superhero goes back to get her education!" Then someone shouts, "Oh and she bounces up and down!" That went without saying. Then the next meeting someone came up with a new idea to trump that with "Sexy superhero goes back to school, but she has the head of and old dude or something." Pictured below: WHY!?

Also he looks pissed to be graduating in that body. Speaking of pissed. Look at this cop who also, BTW, was bouncing up and down. Usually angry people don't bounce.

You don't know how much I pay . . .officer.

This last one is from Facebook. I copied it because it makes no freaking sense and it has bad grammar: who makes a fifty word ad without at least proofreading the copy! And why does it look like the Batplane?

These weren't even the worst. They were just dumb one I noticed recently. What is the opposite of advertising, you know where your goal is to scare away any potential customers?

De Moded

This is a story about the one time I was really excited and positive about something. Ever. So I recently started an MBA program from Western Governors University (WGU). FYI this school is awesome and you don’t even know OK! Sorry, I had to get my defensiveness out of the way early. So anyway, this school is pretty cool. Whatevs. So I got my results back from my first assessment that I have been waiting for. If you don’t know what an assessment is, it’s basically a test. Anyway so they provide comments on the results. There are several sections but you have to pass them all (and it’s open book so no big deal). FYI I totally passed. So here is the comments I found waiting for me this morning: Great job on this task! All aspects of the task are acceptable; the task is complete. Keep up the great work! Sweeeet. So I am awesome and stuff. Possibly the smartest person alive. So in hubris, I read the comment aloud to my coworkers and post this feedback verbatim on Facespace. Then someone replies with: Where are you getting your mba. Seems like a computer generated response. Moded! Dang. Too ashamed to admit WGU is an online unie, I reply with “you reply is computer generated.” That’ll show ‘em. So it turns out I suck and everything I stand for is lame. I was about three seconds away from emailing the evaluator department to investigate. What is this is just the same old crap they say to everyone automatically who passes? I don’t need to investigate. My heart tells me it is. Why wouldn’t they have a prewritten comment saying “’atta boy. Keep on trucking!”? I would. Who has time to write great job to everyone who passes? So I suck. No more positivity from me ever. From now on I’ll stick to handing out the moded not receiving them.

A Message for the Kids

So I stumbled across this cute little fellow on my Pokedex. Actually why the heck do they have a Pokedex? It is like an iPhone that does only one thing. That is as dumb as an iPhone that only shows books (oh wait they make those: Nook and whatnot). Anyway look at this little guy. He is smiling and having a great time. Smoking up a storm. He is young and living his life. As you can see from his skull and crossbones tat, he is a rebellious teen. Puff puff pass. Look at his eyes, looking upward to a bright future. But then we see what happens when Koffing matures, "evolves," and turns into Weezing. Looks like he has a couple kids in tow, one with a neat circle, whatever that is supposed to mean. Notice how unhappy Weezing is compared to Koffing. His sullen eyes. His small lazy puffs. He's just going through the motions. The kid doesn't look too keen on that second-hand smoke either. Might as well get used to it. It won't be long until he starts first handing anyway. Smoke up, Johnny!

Message for kids: smoking is fun when you're a coughing teen, but when you grow up and start wheezing up blood and your skull tattoo is wrinkling, life is not the bag of oysters it once was. Don't smoke or something.