An advertiser's job is to interest you in a product, and hopefully, persuade you to buy it. Watch the following ads and reflect on how successful the ad is at delivering a message.
Consider the following questions:
1. Does the ad tell a story? If so, what is the basic structure?
2. What is the tone of the ad—is it humourous, playful, serious, informative, etc?
3. Who was the message intended for? Who is the target audience?
4. What techniques are used to persuade or inform me?
5. What is the overt message? Is there also an embedded message?
6. What values, lifestyles and points of view are represented in the message?
7. Are printed words used in the ad? What effect do they have?
8. Does the commercial succeed in delivering the message? Do you feel inspired to act? Volvo Trucks (Sweden) KMart Ship My Pants (US) Molson Beer (Canada) Evian Water (France)
Why are some ads more successful than others? Take a look at a short video called How to Write a Boring Ad that makes fun of traditional commercials.
Here is SeamBI's gallery of brand integration as you read about in the article on digital integration.
Is this the latest ad trend? Another approach that has been attracting a lot of interest and curiosity, is the notion of prankvertising where the advertisers devise a prank and film real live people experiencing the unexpected, film it and upload it on YouTube and then watch it go viral. While setting up the prank is expensive, the company saves by not paying for ad space.
This year is the 100th anniversary of Rosa Parks' birth. She is often referred to as an unlikely hero of civil rights, but as you will learn in this video, this is not quite the case. Use what you have learned from reading Outliers to explain the factors that led to her becoming a symbol of the civil rights movement and how her modest act of refusing to give up a seat on a bus led to major changes in American segregation laws.
Take brief notes as you watch the video and then work with a partner to write a 250-word description of the elements that contributed to Rosa Parks' remarkable story while making references to Malcolm Gladwell's observations about outliers.
Read the questions after the video and audio recordings then watch the video and listen to the audio recording. Be able to discuss the questions with a partner or with the class.
Video: Eli Pariser--Beware of Online Filter Bubbles
Questions:
1. After watching the video, explain the relationship between the filter bubble and Mark Zuckerberg's comment that "a squirrel dying in your backyard may be more rlelevant to your interests right now than people dying in Africa."
2. Explain how Pariser first noticed the effects of personalization on the web.
3. Explain the danger algorithmic editing can have on democracy.
4. What are some of the companies mentioned in the video that use personalization?
5. Who were the traditional "gatekeepers" and how is that different from what is happening on the web today?
6. Explain the request Pariser making to people such as Google's founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin.
Listening: Refusing Facebook Has Social Cost
Right click the picture and to open the link in a new window and then click on the Audio file to listen to the discussion between Nora Young and Alice Marwick (or read the summarized article if there is not enough time to listen to the entire interview)
1. What is "technology refusal"? What is your experience?
2. What are the costs of opting out of technology?
3. Explain the business model of "free" social-networking sites.
4. How does the speed of new technology affect the decision to opt out?
5. What role does age seem to play in opting out of technology?
6. Where is most social-networking technology created and how does this affect people in other parts of the world?
More articles to reflect on regarding the internet and social media:
Michael Agger talks about Nicholas Carr's book The Shallows and how the internet is changing the way we think and process information in this article: The Internet Diet
An advertiser's job is to interest you in a product, and hopefully, persuade you to buy it. Watch the following ads and reflect on how successful the ad is at delivering a message. 
