Knowing Who To Believe Just Ain’t As Easy As It Use To Be

Its Over Here, Over There, It’s Everywhere!

It seems we are surrounded by controversy; video games, movies, campaigns, blogs, books, newspapers music, sports… it’s everywhere and its sells!

In any industry if you want to be noticed and ‘loved’ you must take a stand and offend.

Offend to attract (that’s secret many have discovered)

However, there are rules to this tricky little game, if applied right they can produce fruitful outcomes, though if applied wrong can be your ultimate down fall.

One must remember to choose your position carefully. Do not offend your target market and choose your enemies wisely. The ‘management’ of controversy is like walking on a tightrope…. It’s a very thin line with little margin for error.

RACE SPACE

Is recycling really a good thing when it comes to key controversial messages distributed globally?

What’s your dirty little secret; Text(er) or Visual Thinking?

What makes you say “a-ha” faster?

For many people, myself included it is easier and quicker to digest information, either in an academic or commercial context that contains both simple and complex data, when placed in the form of a visual/s.

Ever heard that old saying “a picture is worth a thousand words”? Well there is some truth behind this.  Human beings process visuals 66,000 times fast than text. Hence, we are constantly ‘visual thinking’ when we look at something. Without noticing, visual communications and visual thinking is ubiquitous in our everyday lives, as we draw our own individual connotations and denotations from an image.

A Tail about David Vs. Goliath

Once upon a time, in the early hours of the morning, on a small street, often referred to as the Golden Mile, in a suburb called Kings Cross, a horrible shooting occurred…. this is when our main character Miss Clare Werbeloff (Chik Chik Boom Bogan Girl) graces us all with her very first national television debut….. Let’s see what she had to say for herself.

<INTERMISSION>

So let’s look at this from an organisational perspective. Clare is the ‘company’ and she has just lied to her consumers therefore losing her credibility, ‘cheated’ her way into the spotlight, made racist slurs and made it perfectly clear she is only hear to ‘gain’. Now as an organization I would say she is about to go down the drain. Don’t you?

♪♫♪ Playing the Mouth Organ ♪♫♪

Controversy in various industries can be thrust upon an organisation or they can generate and use (or abuse as some might say) controversy to their advantage. Now no one is suggesting by any means that controversy can be ‘tamed’ aka controlled. However it does attracts media attention, hence attracting awareness of the company, company’s brand/s or issue/s they are trying to promote.

Just like Uncle Ben said to Peter Parker in Spiderman: “With great power comes great responsibility”. Some companies have taken their leadership role along with this mentality and transformed it into advocating for important humanitarian, social and political concerns.

How Could You Be So Heartless?

Effective or Offensive?

>>Any Publicity Is Good Publicity<<

I’m sure you have all heard the old adages

“Any publicity is good publicity, good or bad”

”I don’t care what they say about me as long as they get my name right”

“Publicity darling. Just publicity. Any kind is better than none at all”

Brush Away The Cobwebs

The technique of using controversial issues, if you could call it a technique, in advertising, public relations and marketing campaigns are breed and “controlled” with the intention of breaking through the clutter.

Clutter means;

‘to crowd together in disorder; to fill or cover with things in disorder; to throw into disorder; to disarrange; as, to clutter a room’

That’s Like So Controversial

Firstly, let’s get formalities over with

WELCOME TO MY BLOG

This blog will primarily focus on and discuss controversial material published in the media, which have been used to sell a product or promote an idea. We aim to question: Why exactly we use controversial images and text? How do we make these materials controversial (techniques)? Do they have any effect on our audiences? How do they measure up along side other techniques? Do they really achieve what we wanted them to? And finally will we enter into that oh so grey area of ethics? In other words, should we really be pulling on people’s heartstrings or distressing them in order to accomplish our own greedy personal or commercial vendettas?