The Language of Conviction

Here is a short and beautifully designed typographic film...

Short. Different. Printed.

Some simple and amusing press ads for Welt Kompakt newspaper. Clever uses of Facebook status updates combined with recent news topics...







(via www.ibelieveinadv.com)

Long Copy Ads

Its always good to see some long copy, especially as it seems to be dying out. Here are a couple of fantastic, modern examples from Krispy Kreme and Wispa:







If you have a favourite long copy ad, please send me a link!

Spamalot

Here is another classic piece of Spam for us all to enjoy:

MR JOHN SFIZO
THE CHIEF AUDITOR (F.N.B).
JHB R.S.A.
SOUTH AFRICA
Telephone; +27 76 047 6608.
contact E-mail: johnsfizo@gmail.com


Dear Sir/Madam,

I know that this massage will come as a surprise to you since we don't know each other, but for the purpose of introduction, I am Mr John Sfizo,THE CHIEF AUDITOR of First National Bank of South Africa (F.N.B). There is an account opened in this bank in 1998 and since 2004, nobody has operated on this account again. After going through some files in the records, I discovered that if I do not remit this money urgently, it would be returned to the treasury.

The owner of the account is Mr. Smith Andreas, a foreigner and miner at Kruger Gold Co., a geologist by profession and he died. Since 2003, no other person knows about this account or anything concerning it. The account has no other beneficiary and my investigation proved to me as well that his company does not know anything about this account and the amount involved is US$18,500,000.00 (Eighteen million, five hundred thousand united states dollars).

I am only contacting you as a foreigner because the money cannot be approved to a local bank here but can only be approved to any foreign account because the money is in United States dollars and the former owner of the account Mr. Smith Andreas also a foreigner.

Please reply urgently so that I can inform you of the process and procedure to actualize this transaction. Send also your private phone numbers, email address including details of the account to be used for the deposit. I want us to meet face to face or sign a binding agreement to bind us together so that you can receive this money into a foreign account or any account of your choice where the funds will be safe. I will fly to your country for withdrawal and sharing and other investments. I need your full co-operation to make this project succeed because the management is ready to approve this payment to any foreigner who has correct information of this account, which I will give to you later immediately if you are capable and willing to handle such amount in strict confidence and trust according to my instructions and advice for our mutual benefit because this opportunity may never come again in my life. I need a truthful person in this business because I don't want to make mistakes. I need your strong assurance.

With my position now in my office, I will get the necessary approvals for the transfer of this money to any reliable account that you can provide with assurance that this money will be intact pending my physical arrival in your country for sharing. Transfer will be completed through a corresponding bank and I will destroy all documents of transaction immediately we receive this money leaving no trace to any place. You can also come to discuss with me face to face after which I will make this remittance in your presence and two of us will fly to your country at least two days ahead of the money going into your account.

I will apply for annual leave to get visa immediately I hear from you that you are ready to receive this fund in your account. I will use my position and influence to effect legal approvals and onward transfer of this money to your account via a coresponding bank with appropriate clearance forms of the ministries and foreign exchange departments. At the conclusion of this business, you will be given 25% of the total amount, 70% will be for me while 5% will be for expenses that will be incurred during the process of transferring. I look forward to your earliest reply through my e-mail address:

CHIEF AUDITOR
Mr John Sfizo
Telephone; +27 76 047 6608.

How very lucky that I should be selected to share in these millions...

Here's another funny one:

Hi, I am a "FOREX GENIUS", and I would like to show you how I work for just a minutes per day and let my robots make me thousands of dollars per year while I do whatever I want.

It's so amazing, and simple....I am SHOCKED that not everyone is doing what I am doing...there really is no competition, and everyone could be rich if they want to be. It's crazy that I just have to work a few minutes per day.


Press here and I'll show you how my robot makes me rich:

I wish I had robots that made me rich...

Spam

Here is a couple of funny spam emails I've collected:

Hi,

We would like to show you why you may be "fat" and why you're unable to lose weight no matter how hard you try.

First off, please always know that it's not your fault...


Press here to see why you're fat:...


And here's another:


Melissa has a message to give you.....


Hi there, my name is Melissa and I'm a 31 year old married woman. My friends at The Married Wives Affairs Club wanted me to send a personal message to a few people who have visited dating communities in the past, and we understand that you have. I hope that I am not bothering you in any way, and I'm POSITIVE that you are going to LOVE what I have to say!!!

Before I start, I want to tell you that married women like me are not sluts, we love our husbands, but you only live once, and we have needs and want to have fun.


Okay, I'm a little nervous, but here I go...

I have been a member of the The Married Wives Affairs Club for almost 1 year now, and I must admit that I am addicted to this site. I love my husband, but he travels A LOT for work, and I have needs that I just can't control. I'm not looking for love, just for no strings attached love making with men that I will only see one or two times in my life.

My husband is also very conservative when it comes to making love, so the guys that I meet at the The Married Wives Affairs Club have to want to pleasure me everywhere, and when I say "everywhere", I mean in every spot.

Here's what I want to do, I want to invite you to check out this AMAZING affairs community...please check it out, you will see very beautiful married women that are lonely, and you can be the one to make them feel so much better...and the LOVE MAKING that you will have may be the BEST of your entire life!

Come on...you know you're a little curious right?


If i get anymore funnys I'll post them up.

Putting the Sans in Comic Sans

I have just read a very interesting article on the BBC news website, entitles, 'Do typefaces really matter?'

It gives some great examples of how fonts can subliminally influence the reader. For example, in logos for more traditional establishments your font needs to reinforce a sense of stability and safety.

There is also a reference to the uproar that the film Avatar recently caused. I don't know whether you would of noticed, but the first thing that struck me when watching the film was the strange choice of subtitle font. Only after reading this article have a realised I was not the only one to dislike it. Apparently there was some sort of anti-Papyrus uproar (Papyrus is the name of the font)on the internet.

This also made me think about other fonts that are laughed at by the design community. For example, the notorious Comic Sans. I found this amusing Hitler short on YouTube:



There is even an anti-Comic Sans website: www.bancomicsans.com which claimes to put the 'sans' in Comic Sans.

The font is even quoted as one of Time Magazine's 50 worst inventions of all time:

"Imagine a whole operating system designed around Clippy, and you get the crux of Microsoft Bob. Designed to be an easier interface for Windows 95 users, Bob envisioned your computer as his house — with you as a guest. Ever so accommodating, he'd even supply cartoon sidekicks to guide you through simple tasks. The software was expensive and overly cutesy, and it failed to compete with Apple's Macintosh, the user-friendly standard. And though Bob is long gone, he left one enduring blight on the Web: Comic Sans, perhaps the worst font of all time, was created exclusively for Bob."

6 Words

Another excersize we did with Roger Horberry: The six word story.

So the Guardian ran a blog competition for readers to upload their own six word stories:

Where the fuck's the door handle?

Life. I want my money back.

They also published a few from some more experienced writers:

Armageddon imminent. Make list. Tick most.
Ian Rankin

Found true love. Married someone else.
Dave Eggers

Big bang. No God. Fadeout. End.
Stephen Baxter

And here are some of my attempts:

Hit pheasant. Should have worn glasses.

Red wire? Blue wire? I'm colourblind.

The Horberry

A couple of weeks ago I attented a copywriting workshop wit a man called Roger Horberry. Why am I only telling you about this now? Well I've had things to do and people to see.

Roger has a book:

(No you can't click to look inside, I just stole the picture off Amazon)

He got us to do some really fun exercises to get our creative juices flowing. One of which was to re-write a paragraph selling a product in the style of a celeb we would get at random. I was given the name of Peaches Geldof and decided to get her talking about wine...

"This wine is like totally epic, and like really fruity. It's got loads of grapes in it, not that I give a shit. I've got better things to do. It comes from Burgundy - my dads probably been there, he's like... really famous. You can buy it from Asda, I've never been there, but you could send your assistant? That might be cool."

I really think I captured the Peaches we know and love.

Roger also told us a few things about tone of voice:

It is content + expression + audience.

It is personality in print.

It is everything you don't have to say, but probably should.

He told us some other interesting things like how we could summarise text down into bullet points but it would take out all the character and tone of voice. He showed this by getting us to cut down famous speeches into bullet points - they were very uninspiring after that.

I would probably buy Roger's book if my Amazon wish list wasn't a mile long already. I still believe that I will one day win the This Morning competition, pay off my student loan and buy all the books I want. One day...