Thursday, January 04, 2007

More Coke hates kittens

Original post on how Coca Cola's Argentinian ads owed rather a lot to the 'Ninja' video for my mate Patrick's band here, a story which suddenly seems to have been picked up on by lots of news media, including BBC, SKY, and Channel 4 so far.

In fact, Coke look to be distancing themselves from the advertising agency Santo Buenos Aires as quickly as their sugary feet can take them: The Guardian has them quoted as saying "The piece in question was commissioned to a local advertising agency ... which assured us that each element was original. Therefore, we are surprised by the alleged claim."

Which is fair enough - they signed off on it, but it was the agency who swiped it (presumably thinking, 'hmm, we're in Argentina, that's miles away from the people who made the original video! What could possibly go wrong!'). So let's hope the whole thing is sufficiently embarrassing to Coke that they urge Santo to pay 7 Seconds of Love a decent amount for their original work to make the whole thing go away. Otherwise, if people keep mentioning Santo Buenos Aires in their blogs near words like 'thieving' and 'bastards', their google hits are going to start looking really quite embarrassing.

I'll put up links people send me, but do keep them coming...

SKY news link, via londonista

BBC

The Guardian


UPDATE: Ooh I really like the background pattern on that Santo website. They probably STOLE IT OFF MY MUG.


11 comments:

Spinsterella said...

Yeah, there was a really big piece on the Channel 4 News about it last night.

You've got Jon Snow on your side now, everything'll be all right.

Anonymous said...

is there nothing they won't steal? Tsk.

Anonymous said...

Funnily, Jono said that the ad had been ripped off from "an S-K-A band..."

I believe that's pronounced 'ska', Jon. Do try to keep up.

Anonymous said...

Little bit in The Guardian...

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,,1982217,00.html

Anonymous said...

Mr Schulenburg has assured me they're gonna 'stick it to the man'

James Henry said...

Hello Pugh! The phrase I heard was 'fight the power', but I suspect the sentiment's the same....

Anonymous said...

Hmm, that pattern looks suspiciously like the wallpaper in The Tap Room too...

A pleasure to meet up with you and patroclus at said establishment the other day, by the way. No doubt I'll be seeing you around. It just better not be in front of the last tub of hummus in Tesco.* Grr.


*um, largely because you're bigger than me, so I'll have to go home hummus-less.

Mangonel said...

Oh I love love love love love love love love love love your mug too.

Still high from watching the finale - Yaaaaaaay! It was fab! Thank you!

Anonymous said...

You mean like this?

http://www.stevedix.de/blog/530

As someone who puts various humour and music out on the web, and who's had stuff stolen by unscrupulous publishers in the past, I'm right behind Joel and co.

James Henry said...

Marvellous stuff Stevey-D...

Anonymous said...

Prefab Sprout once stole a marketing idea from me. But since that idea involved sending people cassette tapes inside hollowed-out onions, I don't miss it much.

True story.