I'm pretty sure most of you will remember the genius of Cadburys last year....
I thought the premise was class, maybe not so much the song. Not entirely sure why, I don't have any particular tie to it, but there is something about the background story to the song that it just doesn't sit right on the advert for me. Anyway, I digress. Plenty of people saw potential and YouTube heroes began spawning remakes. Some of them were gash on a grand scale. More inclined to think there was a racial element to the 50 cent video as opposed to someone thinking it was a good idea, because it is truly abhorrent. Deep Purple's 'Smoke On The Water' was pretty amazing. The Eastender's theme tune was total banter, I saw how the gorilla suited the grunge of Nirvana's Lithium. 'Welcome to The Jungle' was a bit tacky, but I could see the idea.
This particular piece of creative splicing deserves some kind of recognition:
Anyway, not to be miss out on taking advantage of this sort of micro-cult following, it appears Cadburys have come to some agreement with one of the junkies and used his version. Or at least, his idea. Nothing like the potential of your version making it to force more vids on the internet. All advertising is good advertising, especially when it's free.
However, the idea will grow old, but people will still like it... for a bit. maybe not so much as the first two. It's akin to a successful film franchise churning out sequel after sequel. It'll still get money in, but rarely as much as the first.
Adverts don't have to be popular though, they just have to be recognised. Commercialising at it's best. You don't have a good idea and move on, you have a god idea and then squeeze it until it's bone dry. You work it until it's completely dead. The charm of the idea long forgotten.
I'm all for seeing ideas reach their potential, and something creative like marketing does appeal to me. The question is, could I quite happily rape ideas until they are pretty much dead? I don't know. Maybe I'll just have the initial ideas, make the original campaign and let others work them through.
