Fun Size Bytes (from @Tj)

Product placement

weselec:

lonelysandwich:

Twitter/dwineman

GE executive: “Do you like the Cisco equipment?
Jack Donaghy: “Of course. It continues to be the gold standard by which all business technology is judged!”

YouTube - “30 Rock - Cisco Telepresence”

Desi Arnaz: “Hey, the last one! You’d better get another pack!”
Lucille Ball: “Okay!”

YouTube - “Lucy and Desi pimp Philip Morris Cigarettes”

Wayne Campbell: “Contract or no, I will not bow to any sponsor.”

YouTube - “Wayne’s World - Sponsors”

David Lynch: “Product placement in a film putrifies the environment.”

YouTube - David Lynch on Product Placement

I’ve tried on more than one occasion to articulate to a friend of mine what bothers me about the way 30 Rock handles product placement. I think the closest I have come is this: when they turn on this ironic, “buck the system” way of dealing with something that is an unfortunate part of their job (to write in product endorsement), they are really just taking the easiest way out - writing it as plainly as possible - with the expectation that viewers will feel it’s funny that the writers hate having to do it as much as we hate having to watch it. What I actually end up feeling is that they have found the path of least resistance to converting their problems into my problems. In short, now I am being advertised to in the middle of the content, and nobody even cares enough to try and make it less painful. It’s distractingly insulting and takes me out of the show to a point that I want to stop watching. And no Coke can on Friends ever did that.

There was a particularly bad episode of It’s Always Sunny In Philadelphia a few weeks ago that was clearly sponsored by Dave & Buster’s. The extent to which the sponsorship dictated the content was appalling - but they wrote an entire episode around it and I have to respect the effort that went into that.

It’s awful that we’ve come here at all, but as far as execution goes the 30 Rock approach makes me feel like they think I’m dumber than I am, and it gets more irritating with each iteration.

A year or so ago, CSI:NY had a Coldplay song as a ringtone (INORITE?!) and not only that, but one of the characters commented on it, and the other one said the name of the song. I went something like this:

Guy 1: Is that your ringtone?

Guy 2: Yeah, my girlfriend loaded it on my phone… it’s “Talk” by Coldplay… something she’s really good at… I’ll call her back later…

And then he sent it to voicemail.

At the end of the show—GUESS WHAT! There was a special number you could text to have THE SAME RINGTONE sent to YOUR cell phone!

Really, what are the chances?!

SYNERGY, BITCHES!