Chocolate, Knife and Gollum.

When I started this post, I had no idea what to give for its title. Finished the post in about ten to fifteen minutes, was thinking about the title all through the way, then thought for ten minutes after that and finally gave what it says. So if you are thinking something really cruddy about the title, please don’t, I really put a good load of thought into it and I couldn’t come up with anything. I could use some good suggestions though.

This ought to be one of the best ads on a pillar, you know, the pillar is not just holding up the ad. Its like making use of the pillar.

Again, hats off to sheer creativity. Although I remember seeing the aluminium wrapper of the Cadbury’s chocolate bar is golden color, not purple. I wonder if that’s world wide or only in India.

See, books are good for sitting on, especially when made of concrete.

If we sit up there, we’d probably be closing our eyes real tight, holding on to board even more tight and praying to all the Gods of all religions know and unknown. This guy has not only the guts to keep his eyes open. But he also has the balls to say he can see the Bridgeport BMW.

Talking about a real twist…

I dunno what this picture is about, but if its about road safety, they’ve made a damn good impression.

Who ever thought of this one, sheer genius.

I guess this is about abuse, small yet solid images.

We see archways which sport ads for the money, now here is an archway which I’d like to describe is “WOW”.

This is what they have there (where ever there is), now here where I stay, we have one big word, like Pothys or Saravana Stores or some cement company or jewellery store.

Funny Fact: I was composing this on MS Word 2003 and it red underlined the word “Jewellery” and showed me that there was no such word. I had to use the dictionary just to check. Looks like the MS doesn’t recognize “Jewellery” as a word of the English Language. Buts thats ok, we do…

That’s not an elf, that’s Gollum. For those of you who have no idea what I am talking about, it’s a fictional character from the “Lord of the Rings” trilogy by J.R.R. Tolkiens. Its very evil, very much unlike an elf. The Gollum looks pretty realistic though don’t you think?

Nike – This one reminds me of Wile E. Coyote and Road Runner in the Road Runner Show by the Warner Brothers. Ask any kid who watches the POGO channel, they’ll know.

Karthik Hariharan

Ad Spoofing

Spoofing is something that can really bring a smile on any one’s faces, just like the posts under the Ad Wars title. But then again, they are more prominent in the TV commercials rather than print commercials as we have very little spoofing of print ads. Here is one spoof ad made by Set Wet Zatak ridiculing the Axe deodorant commercial. Not really funny but surely puts a smile on the face.

Karthik

Funny Classified Ads

Through advertisement you can even sell your used toilet paper..

That is the power of advertisement..

AdvERtiSeMeNT RoCKs

Shiju….

my Personnel blog (www.crazycoolads.com)

Naughty Lemon…..

Nice way to say how the Twist tastes……Nothing wrong.

Would’ve been Nicer if the lemon was facing the camera….

Not that its very educational to know how a lemon’s willie looks like, you know, just out of curiosity…

Shiju….

my Personnel blog (www.crazycoolads.com)

The Ultimate ad war

BMW started it, Audi answered…Bentley chairman had final say.

Facts you need to know before viewing the ads:

1. BMW started it.

2. Audi answered.

3. Subaru needed to say something.

4. Bentley Chairman had the last word!

Shiju….

my Personnel blog (www.crazycoolads.com)

The Power of Art

I am going to start this page with an age old adage that goes “A Picture is worth a thousand words”. This proverb is so famous that even Wikipedia has a page for it. Look it up if you don’t believe me. Pictures, really good ones, always make a connection, stirs a thought or emotion, which again are too many in number. I surfed the net to find out what the different kinds of emotions are and this is what came up:

Accomplished
Aggravated
Amused
Angry
Annoyed
Anxious
Apathetic
Artistic
Awake
Bitchy
Blah
Blank
Bored
Bouncy
Busy
Calm
Cheerful
Chipper
Cold
Complacent
Confused
Contemplative
Content
Cranky
Crappy
Crazy
Creative
Crushed
Curious
Cynical
Depressed
Determined
Devious
Dirty
Disappointed
Discontent
Distressed
Ditzy
Dorky
Drained
Drunk
Ecstatic
Embarrassed
Energetic
Enraged
Enthralled
Envious
Exanimate
Excited
Exhausted
Flirty
Frustrated
Full
Geeky
Giddy
Giggly
Gloomy
Good
Grateful
Groggy
Grumpy
Guilty
Happy
High
Hopeful
Horny
Hot
Hungry
Hyper
Impressed
Indescribable
Indifferent
Infuriated
Intimidated
Irate
Irritated
Jealous
Jubilant
Lazy
Lethargic
Listless
Lonely
Loved
Melancholy
Mellow
Mischievous
Moody
Morose
Naughty
Nauseated
Nerdy
Nerdy
Nostalgic
Numb
Okay
Optimistic
Peaceful
Pensive
Pessimistic
Pissed off
Pleased
Predatory
Productive
Quixotic
Recumbent
Refreshed
Rejected
Rejuvenated
Relaxed
Relieved
Restless
Rushed
Sad
Satisfied
Scared
Shocked
Sick
Silly
Sleepy
Sore
Stressed
Surprised
Sympathetic
Thankful
Thirsty
Thoughtful
Tired
Touched
Uncomfortable
Weird
Working
Worried

Now, I didn’t compile this, this is by a Yahoo Answers user who gives the credit to www.livejournal.com . There is also a Wikipedia page listing the emotions here on this link http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_emotions .

Thus we will be putting in lots of creative stuff on this blog as well. If you have any really good creatives that you think everyone should see, send it in to acmb15@yahoogroups.com and we will post it asap.

Here I have posted some ads which I think may substantiate that proverb. Although, a few words are written to complete these ads, I guess most of us would figure out what the ad is trying to say without the words themselves.

Karthik

AT&T Ads

Submitted By
Karthik

Us – Batch 16

Hi again. I’ve been keeping pretty busy for the past few days. Not that I never could find the time, its more like, as a new blogger, I really didn’t know what to write about. Since it is a blog that has been created for Ad Club, I just couldn’t write anything and post it.

Anyway, I recently procured the photos of our batch, Batch 15 that is. These photos were snapped for an article in a local magazine. I am not sure whether I can give out their names, so I’ll let you know on that once I ask them.

This is Mr. S. M. Joe Rajan. We simply call him Joe sir. He is person who runs the Ad Club on a day to day basis. He talks to all the lecturers to make appointments with them for taking classes. Rarely takes a day off, very understanding and never uses a cell phone. All in all, a great person we are all happy to be associated with.

Batch 15

So this is most of our batch, we have a few missing, I’ll try to get snaps of them as well later on. Ok. Ladies first, sitting from the left to the right are Pooja, Arathi, Aruna and Tasleem.

Gents standing from the left to the right are Shanmughanandam with the belt pouch for his mobile, the red capped dude is Sendil, the next guy who looks like an over worked lawyer is Balaji, the I-am-very-innocent looking guy next is Hariharan, Ganesh is the bloke in a Levi t-shirt.

The Distinguished looking gentleman in the middle is one of our lecturers, former president of the Ad Club Madras during the year 1997-1998, Mr. U Jayraj Rau. You can find a snap of his younger self in the list of past presidents of Ad Club Madras on this link Past Presidents .

The thin guy standing behind him is Vikram, and then bearded me, next to me stands Shiju who has this look on his face which I cannot comprehend what he was thinking when this snap was taken. And then finally good ol’ Joe sir.

In Class

This snap is almost all of us. The Guy in the black t shirt is Sunil. He left Ad Club a couple of months after he joined us to pursue his higher studies in the UK.

Tasleem posing for a snap. Doesn’t it remind you of Mary Jane by Kirsten Dunst in Spiderman when she poses for Peter Parker in the genetics laboratory?

Of Doordarshan and All India Radio

Hi. My name is Hariharan and I’m a Loyola college graduate. Joining Ad Club Madras was one the best things that I’ve done. In one of the many lectures that I’ve attended here, I found one particular lecture very interesting that I thought deserved to be heard by more than classmates. The lecturer’s name is Mr. Chandran and he is a retired deputy director from Doordarshan Kendra, before which he had served in All India Radio for more than thirty years. Educated at Madras University, he completed his bachelor’s as well as masters in English Literature.

 

Now being well versed in English prose and poetry should not be a surprise but being well versed in Tamil prose and poetry was something that surprised me a lot. He was able to quote from literatures of both languages relative ease. His general knowledge was so vast that I felt that my knowledge was quite infinitesimal when compared. Thus the class was more of us asking questions and him explaining almost all of them patiently.

 

Of the many questions that were thrown to him, one was why the Doordarshan and the All India Radio was never so famous or rather a television that people preferred as a final choice although it is oldest station in the country.

 

He started by pointing out how the programs in Doordarshan and All India Radio were superior when compared to that of other channels and radio stations. He spoke in length about the nature of various programs, viz education, rural development, youth welfare, music (including classical, folk and instrumental), agriculture, drama and so on and compared them to the other commercial channels who aim only at entertainment and making the maximum profit as well as maximizing their TRPs. We all had to agree with him to a large extent. Doordarshan is the only channel that gives news for people with hearing disability, that is sign language. All India Radio is the only station which broadcasts news in a variety of languages irrespective of state.

 

What I will be writing here will be only a small part of what all he said in class and only a small fragment of his never-ending spring of information.

ALL INDIA RADIO – WAVE LENGTH

There are two FM Stations commissioned in Chennai, Madras A and Madras B. India’s first FM was commissioned in New Delhi followed by Mumbai and then Chennai.

VIVIDH BHARATI

Though originally started for entertaining the Armed forces, today Vividh Bharati caters to the entertainment needs of millions across India. It includes revenue oriented commercial programs.

ALL INDIA RADIO’S EXTERNAL SERCIVES PROGRAMME

All India Radio has an external services program which broadcasts programs in languages like Sri Lankan, Pakistani Urdu, French, German, Russian etc., This greatly aids the Indian Government’s effort to bring about inter cultural harmony across the different countries of the world. All India Radio service is available in Pakistan along with their own radio broadcast.

 

There are monitoring units in India which monitors all the news that broadcasted in our country. There are certain rules and regulations that control the news. Some broad outlines of these rules are that the media cannot speak ill of a leader of the nation or state. The media cannot speak against the judiciary and the government.

Only the government broadcasts news in the widest range of languages. The languages that are broadcasted in India other than the local languages are polish, Hebrew, local languages of Andaman and Nicobar, Pakistani Urdu, French, German, Russian, etc.

What he said was much more when compared to what I have written here, my inability to note down all that he said has made me incapable to write here and I don’t think I will write what I can recall from memory since there can be errors. I think I will have to learn to shorthand so that I can jot down more than I can now. This will be all for now.

Hariharan Vel.

From the Library

For those who have never visited The British Council library before, let me tell you, it’s a wonderful place to learn as well as have fun. There are several rows of books ranging from accountancy to zoology. Most of these books are British publications although you will find an occasional American or Indian publication. Not to mention, they’ve almost all the top journals and newspapers of Britain.  Anyone with a laptop is granted free Wi-Fi access and for those of us who do not have laptops, there are twenty four computers here with internet facility which may use. Out of the twenty four, eight are reserved for children and they always seem to know where to find the online games whether they are five or twelve years old.

 

There is a room filled up with books for children from five till teens. This chamber is soundproof for these delightful tiny tots usually read out loud as they are initial readers, not to forget the I-will-wail-till-you-get-me-that-book kiddos and an occasional I-will-wail-no-matter-what-you-say-or-do child. The charming little ones can choose from story books which have large pictures and large words to books on arts and craft, history, geography, weather, animals and dinosaurs. I have to be honest, I have learnt a lot from borrowing these books. The older children can choose from a variety of science fiction and much other variety of novels (this is where I spend the bulk of my time). These are some of the many other things that I have no time to mention about. Oh yeah, the café is really good as well.

 

Hi. This is Karthik again and it’s a beautiful Saturday afternoon and I am sitting here at The British Council library, waiting for a friend to arrive. Earlier when I used to come here, I generally head for the book stands, pick out a couple of books, one on advertising, another magazine for looking at the British print advertisements. But today, I am sitting in front of a computer because of my new fondness for blogging.

 

And Saturdays are usually the most crowded days since children have their school offs and their parents can bring them here. The working people who have borrowed books generally come on Saturdays to return, renew or get new books. What is it in the library that attracts anyone is the fact that everyone can walk in and read any book or journal they like whether they are members or not. You might also want to have a look at the number of dictionaries they’ve got, open them and look into them if you have the time. Also they’ve a photo copier machine which you can use to make copies of pages from their books.

 

And now I have to finish this blog because my friend is here and I don’t want to keep her waiting. If I’ve interested you enough about the Council library, I can vouch that it is definitely worth a visit (probably even get a membership to borrow books of your own).

 

The British Council in Chennai is located at 737, Anna Salai. Their working hours are from Monday till Saturday, 11 am to 7 pm. Contact no is 42050600. Website – http://www.britishcouncil.org .E-Mail – chennai.enquiry@in.britishcouncil.org . 

 

Cheers and Happy Reading,

 

Karthik

The First Step, Genesis.

Hi. My name is Karthik and I am starting this blog on behalf of Ad Club Madras and my batch mates. The idea behind this blog is to make more individuals aware and interested in the advertising industry by letting them know how this industry works as this is a much unsung enterprise and not many know the wheels within wheels of the advertising industry.

For those of you who have no idea what Ad Club Madras is all about, let me expound as to what we are and what we do.

“Ad Club Madras is the premier industry organization for advertising professionals in Chennai and South India.

The Ad club Madras was formally founded on 7 April 1956.  Though registered as ‘Club’, the Club has grown into an institution educating, entertaining and enlarging the thought process of those in the industry. It is perhaps the only Ad Club in India which has a variety of activities including sports and entertainment going beyond the usual meeting seminars, awards and conferences.”

Now this is what is given in our website. Makes us sound like a really posh and sophisticated ol’ club where elderly ladies and gents from the industry meet for evening tea, play a game of bridge and pool and leave for home when they’ve de-stressed themselves. Well, this is what we are not. Or rather, that is what it is not to me or us.

Now you are going to ask who this “me” is or who these “us” are and what is that we do?

We are a group of students studying a course initiated by the Ad Club Madras in the year 1994. This is what our official site has to say about this course. My friends and I are studying in the 15^th batch that started on August 6^th 2008 and we are eighteen in number.

“Post Graduate Diploma Advertising Management

Advertising is growing in dynamic proportions, providing splendid opportunities around the world, and we at the Advertising Club Madras discovered that the southern part of the country has lacked a professionally maintained course to develop and motivate the upcoming ad personnel. As a result of this, the Ad Club along with a group of highly reputed advertising professionals initiated the Post Graduate Diploma in Advertising Management program in the year 1994.”

All said in the above paragraph is true so I am not going to be making any changes to that. We are seventeen in number and this course is for nine months. We enjoy our classes immensely. Now don’t start thinking that I’m advertising what I am studying because I am not. And even you if you still continue to do so, well, I don’t have a problem with it since we really do enjoy our classes. We have people from all over the city coming and sharing their knowledge with us.

Notice how I said “sharing their knowledge” rather than lecturing us? Well, that is because we are not lectured. All our lecturers come to teach us what they’ve learnt rather than come to teach us what we have to learn. And since we are studying in the fifteenth batch of this course, so we have former students coming in to teach us what they’ve learnt.

In one of the above paragraphs as well as in our website, you will find the reason for the Ad Club Madras to be started. Every venture has an idea or reason behind it. So finally I come to the reason why this blog has been started. To tell you the truth, I really have no idea. The Ad Club Madras, with its glorious fifty nine years of existence, had its website recently launched on October 1^st 2008. And then one of our lecturers* whose name is Nytik Joshi said we should start a blog and showed us the blog of an institute called Chennai Business School. Not much of a response then… Then we had another instructor whose name is Kiruba Shankar who assigned me the task of starting this blog. I was asked to start this blog on 31^st of October but I thought I’d start with a new month so that’s that.

To begin with, I had no idea what to write here, but then again, once you start, it never stops, if you’ve read all this way and still not cursing me, I thank you very much for being ever so patient with me. Now coming as to what will feature in this blog, my initial ideas were to match what I’ve seen in the Chennai Business School blog, to write what happened in class and what we learnt there, but then again, I am not so sure as to what will get posted here for there are people with me with diverse ideas who will contribute more than what is going on in class. So with hopes to write again very soon, I shall end with this blog for now.

I thank both Mr. Nytik Joshi and Mr. Kiruba Shankar in helping me, rather pushing me into starting this blog. A push that, I am more than happy to have got.

Karthik Hariharan

* I use this word at the moment for I do not, as of the moment, find a good word to describe what they are to us. They are more than lecturers, something more in the lines of guides and counselors.