Advertising Books

This is me responding to an article I was just reading on The Huffington Post. Where was the Superbowl Ad for Books?
Superbowl somehow manages to be an international event despite much of the world not knowing or caring a lick about American football. With it comes a seeming endless supply of loosely related articles, blogentries and videos… and I’m pretty sure that is simply to ride the wave of the superbowl search spree. I don’t need http://www.alexa.com/ to tell me that everybody is searching ‘superbowl’ using google.
However the article I’m talking about here is perhaps more related to the superbowl than many. The focus, though, being on what wasn’t there rather than what was. No superbowl ads for the latest novels apparently (not being american I am one of the millions who will watch a couple off the ads off youtube but won’t ever watch the actual game – though it is aired in Australia – I’m sure my mum will watch it).
That seems pretty obvious though. Who wants to watch ads about books? That’s pretty much like watching ads about watching grass grow or something. Compared to much of technology these days books don’t do much of anything. Apparently they tell stories – which could be pretty cool – but anybody whose anybody knows the good ones come to dvd anyway eventually. The poor old publishing industry is increasing being told by the world they are no longer needed – that technology has made them obsolete.
Let me just say for me there is nothing like a book… Yes I am one of those people who smells books and loves it – well except for some old ones which unfortunately smell faintly of puke. More than that screens give me a headache and being that I work in an office and do all of my uni assignments on the computer and watch more TV than I should my eyes really need the downtime they get when I sit down with real paper and ink. No such thing as square eyes my foot, the red left eye I develop towards the end of every work week isn’t caused by intentionally poking myself repeatedly.
I’m getting off-track. How to advertise books. She suggests in the article ads that have the high profile acts of the other ads carting books around or reading a book. Basically doing things which are still selling the books as an unknown, undescribed entity. In essense? We are attempting to sell bricks.
Rather than trying to sell books as books you should be trying to sell the story. In today’s word the main way to sell a good story is through film. That doesn’t mean holding the book to the camera though. It means showing through film the contents of the book. No, not the contents page either. What I am suggesting is a book targeted trailer.
Why are the only books that get trailers the ones that turn into movies – and therefore have lost all their good booky goodness. ‘As seen on TV’ is a fantastic selling point, well it seems to be a selling point for just about anything. So why not books?
Understandably books don’t get quite the same budget as a movie and filming aspects of the books would have to be done intentionally for advertising of that book. So perhaps instead a publisher could advertise their current best sellers or new releases all together. I’m not sure about the specifics but I certainly could envision a couple of ads which would encourage me to check it out.
Not as a screamer ad (you know the ones – loud annoying voice screaming at you while flashing through the sales goods – very cheap advertising). In my head I see an ad like the in cinema cinema ad which flicks through clips from a tone of movies while playing really high emotional music. But perhaps simply one of those ads where the characters seem to be discussing the product entirely in too much depth before mentioning what it is they are talking about. Mmm… Perhaps, though those have to be done well – though admittedly the level of acting required is far less as well.
I’m sure people with far more advertising experience than me (2 seasons of Gruen Transfer probably doesn’t make me an advertising profession) could come up with some better ads than I. In fact advertising books would make a great Gruen Transfer ad challenge – but that is a little on the irrelevant side. //Something that the word irrelevant made me think of. Fun fact – moot actually means to bring up for discussion. However in US law it meant something which wasn’t defined within law… therefore it would be irrelevant – thus moot got a meaning almost opposite its original.//
I say all this from the perspective that as a reader I would be interested in books shown to me as movie trailers. The best part is they don’t even have to be good for your audience to want to see them. Think of it as a video blurb… With the tending towards e-books (which I don’t like – give me paper anyday) maybe video blurbs could become a thing. Then advertising costs wouldn’t be as big of an issue because you were going to do it anyway.
I don’t know how many chick flicks I’ve watched only to be disappointed. I am very rarely as completely disappointed by a book. I think if you advertise on the same level – still keeping in mind you aren’t necessarily looking for the same audience as movies – books would be a hit. Maybe even the next big thing, after all even corsets made a comeback (even if they do wear them as outerwear rather than underwear nowaday).

Relevant Lies? Mansions and Bad Deeds

Well... I probably could have fit this all into a single post but it felt like it was getting a bit long. I am going to continue what is completely my own views (though I doubt they are completely unique I mean surely somebody else watched it and thought of this? was even written with the intent) of the Invention of Lying's religion scene. In my last post I spoke of the interesting social response to the Man in The Sky being responsible for EVERYTHING that happens. Once again I must WARN that I will recount the movie when I see fit.


Now I don't remember all of the 10 things he had to say about this Man in The Sky. I remember the general gist of them though and a couple more quite specifically. The first one is what started it all. I swear that the people were less interested in the fact that after death it wasn't nothingness then they were interested in the fact that there was a MANSION for every person.

I thought this was very weird. I mean I got all of the other Christian basis. But when have we ever said that we each get a mansion? I mean that is very materialistic... very human... very earthly... Surely that is something thrown in for the materialistic humanity relevance. I mean I know we get that we get to go live with God in His house and that most of the references to heaven are well and truly extravagant and sort of give you the impression better than the most extravagant of this world.

The actual relevance of this one I can not take the credit for. But rather a Christian blog I follow posted an interesting article... Strangely enough specifically on the use of the word mansion and its biblical relevance. The blog The Sola Panel is pretty interesting and I recommend a read of the Mansions article if your interested http://solapanel.org/article/mansions_a_wordwatch/. Basically mansion was a word used explicitly in the bible... in the KJV (King James Version (the one with the thou's and shalt's and thine's)) at least. John 14:2: “In my Father's house are many mansions”(KJV).

There isn't much more to that particular story but just the fact that that... which is such a big deal in the movie... is actually stemmed from biblical text I find fascinating. The writer of Invention Of Lying knew a bit or cared enough to do a fair bit of research I must say. The other random thing is that nowhere in that blog article is there any mention of The Invention of Lying and yet it was there at quite an opportune time to cover the mansion issue for me.

Much of the rest of what I remember of his 10 things that I can remember relate to heaven and getting to heaven and I think there was one which covered the existence of a hell as well. Now the heaven one for me. The was a both a positive and a negative to it. The negative though was quite large and I can honestly say for it and it alone I was quite irritated by the scene as a whole.

He introduced the concept of sin, yes we can all agree on that one. There are bad things that people do. From here however it took a terrible down turn. Bad stuff was only terrible CRIMES by the world... you know like killing a person on purpose or rape... hitting another person in anger or... i'd say a little white lie here but I realise that is the equivalent of an oxymoron considering the context of this lie-less world...

A couple of particularly strategic audience member start testing various actions... seeing if they constitute a major badness... whether or not they could get away with it. One or two nervous people realise they want a list, need a list, of every SINGLE major bad thing so that they can avoid doing them. Afterall you can't do more than 3 things and go to heaven and get your mansion.

The three things is interesting. The fact that there are chances leaves it just open enough to get out question about the fact that you'll be sharing heaven with "BAD" people. There something people don't like. What do you mean they can do a bedside/gaol cell conversion and go to heaven? How is that fair? (those are real life question not the movie - sorry to be confusing)

In a lot of conversations I struggle against this magic world 'fair'. The fair rules are yet to work on anything in this world.... why should they work on God? Maybe when things don't seem fair its because we apply a word with a particular meaning to a series of concepts which are completely different to the word meaning. Who knows? Life's not fair. Life doesn't make sense. Might as well hope on the best band wagon going don't you think?

Back however to the negative of all of this. I HATE this part of the religion scene beyond any incrimination that perhaps Christianity is just a lie in our world same as theirs. The fact that they taken my religion and inserted a high jump bar. Admittedly it is more a low jump bar - I mean it isn't exactly hard to avoid killing 3 people in a lifetime. But in Christianity... in Jesus... It is what he has done, not anything we could do/could avoid doing. Everybody is stuffed basically and by believing (an issue which didn't ARISE in Invention of Lying - but how could it? - these people have to believe cause they can't conceive that maybe... it isnt?...) you get to heaven... There is NOTHING YOU CAN DO.

That I know to be the most essential part of my beliefs. It seperates Christianity out a little from the other religions. I mean a lot of Christians are very religious in both the good and bad forms of it. When it is just ritual without belief... is it any good at all? In Christianity you don't need to do anything. You choose to do things, show that you are thankful for the fact that Jesus bares your sin. But just because you attempt to make yours a 'light' load for Him doesn't make it any less of a load. Its like exchanging a lead balloon in for a hot air balloon... doesn't matter what kind of lead balloon you've got... it still isn't going to work so great.

Chances I agree. But I don't agree that God has a number on it. As terrible as it may seem that some 'bad' people will go to heaven and others, good people, will not. It is the way of things... AND in that I don't think the movie portrayed that particularly well at all... Reducing Christianity down to a religion where you place a foot wrong and die... That's just disgusting... What can I say though... In a movie for the general public these things will happen... It could be worse... It could be good deeds get you to heaven...

Relevant Lies? The Good and The Bad Of It

The other day I watched The Invention of Lying. I'd been looking forward to it. So much so that on discovering that for some completely bizarre reason it was not being shown at the first cinema I visited I got into my car and drove to another. It wasn't like I had anything better to do with my day. The movie in all... Well I think it is the type that would have made a good bit of literature, a theorised culture almost utopian - I mean without lying the world would be perfect right? As a movie it was quirky and interesting but not the greatest movie I've seen.


However by removing lying it gave the occasional reference to regular culture which was often intellectually funny. Now I think about it... The problem with the movie? It is based in English humour but pitched at an American audience. I think had I thought of that sooner I may have been able to appreciate it a bit better. Slapstick goes subtle... the two humour styles are quite mutually exclusive. That is an observation I made post movie rather than during so it is probably a little exaggerated never the less...

Anyhow apparently from thinking it would make a better book than a movie. The 'reinvention' of the Christian religion was quite interesting. Firstly I am against any implications that Christianity is some grand lie. For a work of fiction I do not object to religion being invented. In fact I found the writers knowledge of how Christianity gets interpreted to be quite intellectual. I can't tell whether he sits as an atheist or a Christian but any way the relational stuff between the main character and his crowd is quite an accurate response of how I feel many people actually respond to Christianity... if they don't reject it for being 'unreal' without listening.

This is a Spoiler WARNING. I am going to talk through the scene. IF YOU HAVEN'T SEEN THE INVENTION OF LYING. You may not want to read it. Not that it gives away the ending - but I mean its a chick flick is that even possible?

Ok in the movie he tells a lie about the existence of any form of afterlife to his dying mother. Which of course others overhear, news spreads and uproar at his place. He is very distressed. So he puts in a substantial amount of effort into these ten things? Yes rather like 10 commandments you could say. He even goes to the trouble of making them 'tablets' to add significance.

As far as the 10 commandments go there isn't too much similarities between them and his 10 things. Number 1 is where it is truly interesting. That there is a 'Man in the Sky', this man just created the existance of God basically. However it his next statement that I found to be one of the most interesting.

The Man in The Sky is responsible for everything that happens on earth. Or basically something to that effect. Fair enough. That is a fairly well Christian belief. I believe that God is responsible for everything that happens. Most importantly the Good and the Bad. A distinction his crowd (these purely factual humans are very curious) makes quickly. You watch as members of the crowd digest the fact that this Man in The Sky is responsible for the BAD things (nobody has asked yet about the good things). One by one hands go up.

Did he give my mum cancer? Did he cause that earthquake that killed thousands of people? Is he why my cat died last summer? The main character (can you tell i can't remember his name?) answers truthfully... well consistently within the limits of his created lie... YES. The crowd gets more and more restless. Until it is practically a riot. People out to TAKE DOWN the Man in The Sky. Regretting this God person. He after all caused all this BAD stuff to happen.

I think this is something that Christians have to confront in modern society. It is an area of huge debate. It is one of those token objections that non-Christians pull out to explain why Christianity is stupid, why God isn't right. People don't like the fact that a God, particularly the God (i mean if you have multiple you might as well throw in a bad one right?) could do bad things.

And Christians, just like the main character, have to say yes. Yes he causes that to happen. This is the kind of thing that stonewalls a Christian. People aren't willing to consider that something exhibits control of the good AND the bad. So as soon as it controls the bad, its bad, even people that basically figure there probably is a God don't like this concept. They do the crowd thing and REJECT REJECT REJECT. Unfortunate for the Christian.

This is the suffering debate. Beyond even the debate Christian to non. The whole concept of the suffering stuffs with the heads of Christians new and old alike. Coming to grips that God is the reason for it. Its hard. So explaining it to a non-Christian? Its pretty close to impossible. You have to accept so many other things to accept that He does that to and that it is for the grand scheme good if not for the momentary inconvenience (on that compare your life to the age of the universe I mean... there's no beating it) it is in your life.

Back to the movie the crowd make the critical next realisation. Some bright fellow works out that the main has said that the Man in The Sky controls everything, he never explicitly said bad. Maybe... He is responsible for the good things? The main with quite some relief (he really would like the crowd not to tear his yard apart in revolt against the Man in The Sky) says 'YES'. So then he cured my mum's cancer? He saved my daughter from being hit by that car? He helped that person in the diving accident to be recover fully? YES YES YES. Now there is something that these people managed to think about that others often don't.

Just as is our culture people let the minority bad ruin it for the majority good. How many times have you felt ripped off because somebody did this last time and got hurt so now you only get to watch it get done. That's probably something you see more of as a young person but any way you look at it. Humans are pessimists by trade. We want to get the most dreary version of something possible. The trick is to remember than everything is from God... The good, the bad... the inbetween...