Killer marketing in terrifying toilets of Japan

In America, public restrooms can be creepy, either because of the condition or the company. But in Japan, going to the bathroom seems to be one step short of sleeping naked in a graveyard. Looking to tap this fear with a cute marketing twist is Ring author Koji Suzuki, whose new bathroom-based horror novella Drop is being printed on rolls of toilet paper. Billed as "a horror experience in the toilet," the story takes up only about three feet of paper. You may need the rest of the roll to write a desperate plea for help, because Japanese bathrooms are apparently scary places to hang out. First, there's Hanako-San, the ghost of a schoolgirl who has scared kids to the point where some would rather pee in class than risk a restroom run-in. Then there's Kashima Reiko, a bisected ghost who wanders school bathrooms saying, "Where are my legs?" But my favorite is this note from the Suzuki article: "Parents would tease children that a hairy hand might pull them down into the dark pool below." That's some scary shit.

—Posted by David Griner

Published on May 26, 2009 | Permalink | Comments (0)
Filed under Griner, Japan

Enjoy the world of books while it's still here

Apt Studio and Asylum Films put together this great stop-motion film, called "This Is Where We Live," to help celebrate the 25th anniversary of 4th Estate Publishers in the U.K. It's easily the best book-related video we've seen in a while, and not just because it's the only book-related video we've seen in a while (not counting the Art Spiegelman thing from McSweeney's). All that's really missing here is a Godzilla-like Kindle character rampaging through town, setting everything alight and handing out e-book coupons. See lots more over at the film's Web site.

—Posted by Tim Nudd

Published on March 5, 2009 | Permalink | Comments (3)
Filed under 4th Estate, Apt Studio, Asylum Films, Nudd

Have some Internet with that mystery novel

Anthony E. Zuiker, creator of television's most overrated crime drama, CSI, has hooked up with EQAL, maker of the Web's most overrated teen/young-adult dramas, lonelygirl15 and KateModern, to bring Zuiker's new mystery novel to the Web. Basically, Zuiker has written a book called Dark Chronicles, and EQAL will create a Web site for it, featuring extra interactive content. Mediaweek explains: "After every five chapters, readers will be instructed to enter a code on the Web site to unearth new content—ranging from videos to audio files to photos." Seems to me this approach would fragment and dilute the user experience in both media. When I'm reading a book, I want to be engrossed in the book, not prompted to visit the Internet. Conversely, an immersive Web experience should be engrossing in and of itself, not an extension of some book. Now, if they save us 300 pages by revealing whodunit online after Chapter 5 and make the rest of the site an ultaviolent, sexy, rock 'n' roll video game, then I'm in.

—Posted by David Gianatasio

Published on March 3, 2009 | Permalink | Comments (0)
Filed under EQAL, Gianatasio

Art Spiegelman book gets its own HD trailer

Art Spiegelman’s collection of sketchbooks, titled Be a Nose!, hit bookstores on Sunday, so animator Lars Edwards and the band the Black Keys collaborated on this high-definition cartoon trailer for it, done in the style of Spiegelman's work. Not surprisingly, McSweeney's was ultimately behind this post-modern hodgepodge. It's not much of an advertisement in the classic sense, but it is engrossing and the music is catchy, and it opens a good-sized window onto the endless prairie of weird that is Spiegelman's work. And, typical of anything McSweeney's is involved with, it's passingly amusing but doesn't really go anywhere. Via Cartoon Brew.

—Posted by David Kiefaber

Published on March 2, 2009 | Permalink | Comments (1)
Filed under Arts, Kiefaber, McSweeney's

Guinness World Records joins 21st century

The Jim Pattison Group, parent company of Ripley Entertainment, bought the Guinness World Records franchise in early 2008, and was determined to wipe the dust off the old book and breathe a little life back into the whole enterprise. Thanks to a dose of modern marketing and some sweet co-branding, they've done it. There are now two Guinness editions: the basic 2009 edition, complete with its shiny foil cover and replete with all-new 3-D photography; and the 2009 gamer edition, coordinated with Twin Galaxies, the world's official video-game scorekeeper. Don't want to just read about it? You can play Guinness World Records: The Videogame (trailer posted above), now out for the Wii and DS, or head over to watch videos of the latest records on the Guinness World Records YouTube channel. All of which should help Guinness keep its own record as the best-selling copyrighted book of all time. Not bad at all for a 54-year-old brand. Via Underwire.

—Posted by Rebecca Cullers

Published on January 28, 2009 | Permalink | Comments (0)
Filed under Cullers, Guinness, Video games

Lose even more weight on the AdFreak diet

Inspired by Alex Bogusky's The 9-Inch Diet, the editors of this blog are issuing a weight-loss book of our own: The 8-Inch Diet. In in, we suggest serving food on 8-inch plates, to further reduce portions and make you look even more svelte than the big losers using the 9-inch plates. Beyond that, we were stumped for material, so we collected a bunch of Emeril recipes with bran substituted for ingredients like sugar, salt and flour. (It's still more scientifically sound than anything Alex suggests.) Also, our tome is illustrated with stomach-turning artwork from this very blog, such as the anti-chaw guy with half a face, the corpse-like Euro-anorexia gal and the freakishly furry Burt Reynolds. (Stare at Burt for five minutes, and you won't feel like finishing that crème brûlée!) Oh, and if you pile up your 8-inch plate with cinnamon chocolate-chip pancakes 12 flapjacks high and keep going back for seconds and thirds, you deserve to split your pants at your sister's wedding, fatty!

—Posted by David Gianatasio

Published on January 12, 2009 | Permalink | Comments (2)
Filed under Gianatasio, Health

This is your brain on D&M Publishers' books

This ad campaign from Rethink in Vancouver for D&M Publishers, an independent publishing house in Canada, might be a tad too clever for its own good. See the three full ads here. Or maybe the approach is spot-on, considering the target audience of presumably brainy readers who don't mind working an extra beat to take in the ads' subtly mind-blowing message. Either way, it's somewhat amusing that the ads rely entirely on visuals to make their point—an unintentionally ironic nod, perhaps, to the fact that no one reads anymore. But I might be reading too much into it. Via Ads of the World.

—Posted by David Gianatasio

Published on January 5, 2009 | Permalink | Comments (0)
Filed under D&M, Gianatasio, Rethink

Hodgman fans flesh out his mole-man army

In a season rich with religious celebration, it's good to know someone is honoring AdFreak's patron saint, John Hodgman. While best known for his "I'm a PC" acting work, Hodgman's talents are truly on display in his writing, most notably his 2005 book The Areas of My Expertise. Now, his follow-up tome, More Information Than You Require, has sparked an ambitious fan effort known as the 700 Mole-Men Project. Artists around the world are challenged to illustrate each of the 700 mole-men whose names are listed in Hodgman's new book. The endeavor is a natural evolution of the 700 Hoboes Project, which helped visualize Hodgman's bizarre appendix in The Areas of My Expertise. So, if you've got some artistic skill and a desire to stake your claim in the pantheon of history's greatest mole-men, post your creation on Flickr and add it to the 700 Mole-Men Group. Oh, and consider buying Hodgman's book. It offers advice on such weighty topics as "how to cook owls" and "how to be a famous minor television celebrity." The man speaks from experience. I hear his braised owl is to die for.

—Posted by David Griner

Published on December 23, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (0)
Filed under Griner, John Hodgman

Read this guy's novella ... if you can find it

Acclaimed novelist Mike Heppner's latest effort, Man, from Small Anchor Press, part of four-book cycle, is not for sale anywhere. Even so, he's got a unique marketing and distribution plan for it. Five-hundred copies have been left in random locations across the country, and people who find them are being asked—in a note left inside each book—to send e-mails revealing who they are, where they found the book and what they thought of it after they read it. So far, Heppner has gotten two fairly positive responses, both from Philadelphia-area college students who found the novella in their school libraries. That's fairly savvy media planning and not a bad strategy for hitting the target audience. And 498 copies are apparently still out there. This story is just made for the nightly news. And if Oprah ever finds out, well, who knows? Via <HTMLGIANT>.

—Posted by David Gianatasio

Published on December 10, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (0)
Filed under Gianatasio

Librarians proudly going down with the ship

How long can libraries—repositories for the print pages that become more outdated every day—last in the age of instant information? They're probably already as marginalized as the morning newspaper in terms of usefulness and functionality. Allen & Gerritsen does a good job of putting human faces on the brick-and-mortar neighborhood knowledge banks in a campaign touting the historic Boston Public Library system. The ads star real librarians as "heroes" willing to share what they know with smiles and good humor. (No stereotypical stern-faced patron-shushers here.) The effort subtly celebrates libraries' heritage as a vibrant part of the communities they serve and focuses on the dedication, knowledge and courtesy of the BPL staff. People sharing what they know, rather than Googling until their fingers go numb, is what this campaign is about. Still, I can't help feeling a bit sorry for learned folks whose value to society is cloesly tied to their performances at the local bar's trivia night. The ads ask, almost wistfully, "What do you want to know?" There's no need to inquire about the future of libraries. We already have the answer.

—Posted by David Gianatasio

Published on October 29, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (6)
Filed under Allen & Gerritsen, Gianatasio

Buy my book. You probably won't regret it.

Well, despite the tortuous grind here at AdFreak (it's a brutal 100 words a day, phew!), I've managed to write another book in my spare time. It's available for pre-order at Amazon.com. It's a work of staggering brilliance—at least, my mom thinks it is. And as long as you're not one of the six people who bought my first book, you shouldn't be inordinately prejudiced against the new one. The reviews have all been raves. OK, there's just one rave so far, but that makes one more than last time! If sales are brisk, I'll get to do readings in bookstores. (I'll be reading from the works of A.M. Homes, naturally.) If you don't buy my book, I'll be forced to read the entire manuscript into your voicemail in a high squeaky voice. Which is my real voice, by the way, and extremely annoying. Consider: If I am actually J.K. Rowling writing under a pseudonym, this book could be immensely valuable in the future. Can you afford not take that chance? (And don't tell me in the comments that "Yes, I can afford not to take that chance." Where's your book? Jerks.)

—Posted by David Gianatasio

Published on October 6, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (2)
Filed under Gianatasio

Wieden's Tony Davidson, devoted boob man

Now that Alex Bogusky has his diet book, I wondered what his peers would do to top that. (After all, there's always Crispin envy out there.) It turns out some were already hard at work. Wieden + Kennedy London creative chief Tony Davidson is out with a book about "the minds of men" called One-Track Mind. From what I can tell, it's about how men see breasts everywhere. In fact, Wieden London's blog says Davidson "has spent many years taking photos of things that remind him of breasts." Like sunnyside eggs and pancakes. And the guy doesn't even work on the Wonderbra campaign.

—Posted by Brian Morrissey

Published on September 8, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (4)
Filed under Europe, Morrissey

Read a book, or risk a nasty shrunken head

This "Read more" ad from Young & Rubicam for Israeli bookstore Steimatzky (see a larger image here) may appear to champion literacy. But the image, which could have been pulled directly from a Tom Piccirilli novel, simply shows non-readers that they have lucrative careers ahead in carnivals, freak shows and Rob Zombie movies. Dabitch at Adland points out another problem with this ad: "Most men I know always want a little head." Still, AdFreak is officially in favor of reading, at least until we get that vlog started.

—Posted by David Kiefaber

Published on August 18, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (2)
Filed under Freaky, Kiefaber, Print, Y&R

Summer reading, courtesy of ex-Y&R ecd

Speaking of books by ex-ad people, Jim Othmer, former executive creative director at Young & Rubicam in New York, has a new novel out called The Futurist. I haven’t read it, but Heidi Julavits says it’s decent! (She also thinks Jim is “eye-poppingly talented.”) Actually, it’s getting good reviews generally (aside from LA Weekly’s opinion that Othmer “just seems like an asshole”). Written by an ex-Y&R guy, the book naturally is a dark comedy. It follows the adventures of a futurist (aka bullshit artist) in a world gone pear-shaped; the Web site says the story is “equal parts subversive satire, genuine physical fear, and heartfelt moral anguish.” The first chapter of the book appeared in the Virginia Quarterly Review and earned Othmer a National Magazine Award finalist nomination. It also allowed him, he says on his blog, to finally quit his day job after spending “the last 20 years seeking the title ‘former adman.’ ”

—Posted by Tim Nudd

Published on June 8, 2006 | Permalink | Comments (1)
Filed under Y&R