Bad Ad, Worse Product

[im10ashus]

This summer, TV public service announcements produced in Los Angeles and designed to discourage terrorism are due to appear on Iraqi TV and possibly on TV stations elsewhere in the Arab world. The PSAs depict in graphic, slow motion detail the awful human impact of suicide bombing. The message to Iraqis and other Arabs is "don't suicide bomb."

It is not quite clear who is funding the project. The two companies (one American, the other Lebanese) which co-produced the film have already made PSAs for Iraq. Last year they produced a TV spot called "Sovereignty" which was put out on Iraqi TV to encourage Iraqis to vote. That project had the backing of the U.S. government. However the producers are coy about naming the mysterious benefactors who are funding this latest effort.

"I call them an independent, non-governmental group of scholars, non-political people," producer Drew Plotkin told Newsweek in June. "Some may live in Iraq, some may live abroad. For a variety of different reasons—from safety concerns to wanting the focus to remain on the issue itself—they decided to remain anonymous."

But whether or not this million-plus dollar venture is the product of the U.S. military's "psychological operations" department, it boggles the mind that anyone could think it would work.

cont'd...

http://www.tompaine.com/articles/2006/07/11/bad_ad_worse_product.php

[Cocoa]

1. Suicide Bombs: The Silent Killer

[A Simple Game]

2. Doesn't matter.

You need electricity to watch tv, don't you?

No one in Iraq will see the PSA's.