Poor Placement of Commercials
 

Honda gets my nomination for this month's award for the most inappropriate placement of a commercial. On the Tour de France coverage on OLN, they showed a group of 10-12 year old boys, loudly proclaiming, "I wanta ride!". Then, they all got on motorcycles and rode off, bypassing the leg and character-strengthening stage of bicycle-riding in their lives. I don't believe it's legal in the U.S. for anyone that young to ride motorcycles on the street.

They might as well learn early, girls dig bad boys with motorcycles ;)

Sony made the same mistake for their PSP consoles.

One bulletin board ad depicting a young black girl in a grip by a white women.

Sony was saying they were trying to show a comparison for the game console they were introducing. A white PSP.

Of course, they also had other ads with a black women gripping a white women.

To do a comparison, I can understand wanting to show the difference but this was really poor judgement. What was Sony and the advertising company they were using thinking?

Off topic, but UMD disks are going the way side. No support for it. Who want's to pay the same amount as a DVD for a UMD disk? You can't even play UMD on a TV set. No connection out to a TV. Target has pulled all the UMD disks from their stores and will now be selling it online, only.

One of the biggest laughs I had watching television was watching a dramatic, tension-filled episode of "Hill Street Blues" and then an inappropriate placing of commercial in the next break. I forget exactly what was happening in the episode but in the scene the character is totally breaking down, tears streaming, heart-wrenching moment and then silence. My whole family is silent. Cut to the commercial break a cartoon cat pops up going: "I'm happy! Happy Cat!" We all crack up.

Remember that year at NAB when Sony introduced a portable hard drive recorder and called it the "Pedophile"? It took hours of people laughing and reports zinging everywhere for the American Sony department to convince the headquarters in Japan that the translation simply wasn't appropriate for English culture.