From: hal@finney.org
Date: Mon Jan 29 2001 - 11:46:19 MST
Spike writes:
> Now, let me look into my crystal ball and guess what TV
> ads will be like in 5 yrs. This making fun of death thing will
> play out soon. There only so much you can do with it, but
> consider nudity. It gets your attention quickly and holds it,
> its cheap in that a low priced model nude is better than a high
> priced one clothed. Its funny if done right. Nudity doesnt
> really get old or boring: no matter how much of it you see,
> you always want more.
Europe has of course used nudity like this for a number of years, but
I am skeptical that we will see it in the U.S. in this time frame.
There was an FX claim several years ago that we would see nudity on TV.
It was satisfied by the broadcast of Schindler's List, which although
it shadowed the breasts there were a couple of scenes where nipples were
visible, and that satisified the claim.
This was a highly controversial judgement because the claim excluded
"reality based" shows like National Geographic specials, and it was
unclear whether Schindler should count. In the end it was judged that
it was not reality based in this sense and the claim was satisified.
However it is clear that the network only allowed the nudity because the
movie was a serious and sober look at a terribly sad episode in history.
It was not at all the kind of lighthearted exploitation of nudity that
Spike envisions.
I think America is still too prudish to allow nudity in ads, at least
frontal nudity. Maybe we'll see more bare butts. They've used those
in prime time so this would be the logical next frontier in advertising.
Hal
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.5 : Sat Nov 02 2002 - 08:05:26 MST