An electronic community for members of CSCL 3331 ('Science and Culture') and interested others.
Sunday, February 27, 2011
Zeldox = Tolstoy --- uhhhhhh, what?
I took up particular interest with this advertisement. The issue that I have with this advertisement is that the correlation given between the product and Tolstoy was so poorly done that it hurt. They are using the Tolstoy book as a signified to try and create a sort of relationship between his beliefs and the beliefs of their product. Even more interestingly, and immoral in my books, is the use of a quote at the bottom. The actual quote from the book is quite small and used out of context with the ad. Nevertheless, it is used as part of a small paragraph and is given the sense that the whole paragraph was taken directly from his book by putting his name at the bottom versus right after the small quotation. Not only that, but the quote wasn't taken from the book depicted in the image. Advertisers will often play around with signifiers/signifieds (amongst other techniques) in order to give meaning to their product but it was done so obviously and poorly in this example that I can't help but feel it has the opposite effect. The book in the ad is titled Peace in order to represent a desire that most people with Bipolar Disorder may have. Zeldox is hoping people will see this and go, "oh well Tolstoy said this and he was a pretty good guy. If he and this company share similar beliefs I bet their product is pretty darn good." I guess I'm the most upset by the manipulation of the quote in the paragraph under the image because it is really misleading.
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