Who Do PR Folks Think They’re Fooling?
August 24th, 2010Despite the inflammatory post title, I’m not really talking about all PR folks, or all PR activities. But there is a subsection of PR that I just can’t imagine the people writing the PR copy actually believing anyone in the world will believe.
The example that prompts me to write this is a translation I did regarding a hairbrush with a blue handle with some kind of simple flower design. The PR materials talk about how the blue handle makes it easy to coordinate with other items in a persons’ travel bag. The person writing this must have known that there is nobody, anywhere, who decides what to put in their travel bag based on how well color coordinated they are with the hairbrush’s handle. The document goes on to use an expression that really typifies this type of PR: “the design and color makes brushing your hair fun”. The whole “makes X fun” PR phrase: what is its purpose? There’s not a single person on the planet who thinks, “Hey, they say having a blue handle makes brushing your hair fun. Maybe they’re right! Maybe I should go get this blue handled brush, it’ll make brushing my hair fun!”
I mean, I understand that some PR has a subliminal or attitudinal effect, so even if it isn’t taken at face value by most people, it subtly affects them. But this kind of overblown “having a blue handle makes brushing fun” PR…it just seems like it would have the exact opposite effect. Here I am translating the document, and all I can think is “boy, what a bunch of wankers”. It isn’t even the “any PR is good PR” thing, because it doesn’t make their company stick out in my mind, they just get lumped in with all the other companies that use this ridiculous PR, into a faceless blob of “people who make products that have so little going for them, they don’t really have anything to showcase”.
But then I think about the PR guy who wrote this. Did he think that someone, somewhere, would be swayed by this? Or did he have to do it because his boss said “Write!” In which case, did his boss think that someone, somewhere, would be swayed by this?
It’s just a baffling mystery to me.
Valentino Update
August 10th, 2010I went to the local department store the other day, and noticed they were having a sale on bargain budget slippers. “Ah-ha!” I thought, “Cheap cheap slippers! This is one of the known natural habitats of the Valentino. Perhaps I can glimpse one in the wild!”
What I found exceeded my expectations. Two different species of Valentino cavorting peacefully!
Construction Company
June 14th, 2010
That there building is a local construction company’s office.
Every time I see it, I think, “You know, you’d think if you ran a construction company, you’d want an office that was a little better constructed”. Then I have to remind myself that, for all I know, they specialize in road construction.
The Valentinos, the Most Prolific Fashion Family in Japan
June 4th, 2010Japanese TV loves (and I mean LOVES) to report on all the knock-off products and copyright violations rampant in China. Part of it is for the moral indignation factor (moral indignation is good for news ratings, and Japanese news shows LOVE moral indignation stories), and part of it is for the inherent humor when the copies are just plain bad (like the Chinese knock-off of Disneyland, which, I have to confess, even I found pretty damn funny).
However, while China copies everything from Apple to Ziploc, Japan is more specialized: Japan copies Valentino.
Don’t ask me why they picked this one brand, but the apparel manufacturers of Japan all seem to have gathered in some dark, smoky room and decided, “from now on, let’s focus our efforts on Valentino”. Perhaps they just really dislike Valentino, and wanted to destroy its image. Which worked: I had no idea Valentino was an actual non-Japanese non-budget brand, nor did my wife. I just assumed Valentino was the go-to name when you decided to make some cheap clothing, like “Valu” is the go-to prefix for cheap stuff in the US.
So, for your edification, a gallery of Valentino knock-offs. Please note that it only took me 15 minutes to find all these pictures. That’s how much fake Valentino there is in Japan.
Also, sorry, due to the small image size, some of the brand names are too small to read, so I’ve labeled them all.
Arvore Valentino
Calro Valentino
Franco Valentino
Gianni Valentino
Hugo Valentino
Izax Valentino
Luciano Valentino
Mario Valentino
Nicola Valentino
Raimondo Valentino
Romeo Valentino
Rudolph Valentino
Stefano Valentino
Valentino Adriano
Valentino Atelier
Valentino Christy
Valentino Milan
Valentino Rolenta
Valentino Vasari
The two things I am most fond of: the brands which are pretending to be Italian but put the surname before the first name, Japanese style (Valentino Adriano, etc.), and the whole subgenre based on 1920′s film star Rudolph Valentino. In addition to the Rudolph Valentino shirt above, I have seen, in stores, “Rudy Valentino”, “R Valentino”, and “Valentino Rudy” products (all unrelated to eachother).
Random Image Blowout Part 10
May 31st, 2010Here’s a little advice for you (for all values of “you” that include “posting a permanent outdoor sign”): Don’t use the color red.
Red ink, for whatever reason, seems to have a marked propensity for fading in the sun, unlike black ink. I see tons of signs around town where the red letters have disappeared, usually resulting in signs that make no sense. Occasionally, I see one that makes sense, but not in the way intended:
Originally: “Please don’t feed the fish”
Now: “Please feed the fish”
Random Image Blowout Part 9
May 26th, 2010
That’s a mailbox with a built in intercom. Nice.
Random Image Blowout Part 8
May 19th, 2010Seen at a food stall in Yoyogi Park.
Random Image Blowout Part 7
May 16th, 2010
You Kill the Kobold and Find a +1 Bracelet of Profitability
May 2nd, 2010
I’ve always had a thing for bracelets and necklaces (as people I went to high school with could vouch for), which has calmed considerably as I’ve grown older. However, a few months ago, I got a craving for a bracelet, and started looking around for something colorful and made of thread. Finally, I found one, but was presented by a bit of a conundrum: although wearing a bracelet in no way makes someone less capable at their job, it’s best to avoid having a colorful string thingie dangling out from under your suit’s cuff at a job interview.
I quit my previous job in September of last year (yeah, I voluntarily quit a job in the middle of an economic downturn), and found the bracelet shortly afterward. I was in the midst of trying to establish myself as a freelance translator, but had my doubts about how well that would turn out. Would I have to give up and go back to working at a regular company full-time? When would I have to wave the white flag and go for a job interview?
So I decided not to put the bracelet on, for the time being. The string bracelets I like are tied on, meaning that the only way they come off is that they tear apart after years of wearing, or you cut them in half. You can’t just slip them off for job interviews and back on after you get home. Putting on the bracelet only to cut it off a few months later for a job interview would be adding injury to failure. So what I decided to do was to put the bracelet on when I had become sure that the translation gig would work out for me — the first month where my bank account balance was greater at the end of the month than it was at the start.
So, it was with great relish that yesterday, I put on my bracelet. I had more money at the end of April than I did at the start, and it looks like, even though some months may go in the red, on the whole this whole “work at home and listen to music really loud” thing is going to work out.
“Just Yesterday”
March 20th, 2010People say that as you grow older, your sense of time changes, so that weeks, months, and years pass by in the space of a day.
Maybe aging is part of it, but I don’t think that’s the whole story.
When you have kids, the counting of years becomes easier, because of the concrete milestones involved. You go from no kid, to suddenly having a baby, and then a year later your baby is walking around and trying to stuff things in his mouth, then he’s talking, then he enters nursery school, then he finishes his first year…
When my eldest son, Alex, turned one, people around me were saying “Already? It seems like he was born just yesterday”. And my reaction (well, usually internal; I didn’t actually say it much) was “Actually, it seems like a year ago”. The same thing when he turned two, and the same thing when he turned three. I was blessed, in that every year felt like a proper year.
However, yesterday he finished his first year in nursery school, and while I won’t say it felt like only a day, it did feel like only a month.
So, why the change in my sense of time? I’m pretty sure it comes down to my own schedule.
For the last ten years (up until last October), I worked a bizarre schedule. I was part of a 24/7/365 network monitoring team. My schedule was constantly scattered. Some days I’d have off, some nights I’d work, some days I’d work. There was no constancy whatsoever. Then, from October, I switched to a much more ordinary schedule: I go to sleep every night, and wake up every morning. From Monday to Friday, I go to my “office” (the downstairs room in our house) and do translation work.
I think the reason that time seems to go faster as we age is, in part, due to each week more or less resembling the previous one. For the first time perhaps ever, I’ve been experiencing the “It’s Friday already? But it was just Monday, like, yesterday!” phenomenon. And that seemed to map almost perfectly to “He’s finishing his first year? But it seems like he just entered school.” For the average adult, this probably doesn’t start at age 35, but more around 22 or 23, after graduating from university and joining a company.
So, sure, aging may be part of it, but I’m reasonably sure that the main factor is actually just having a steady schedule.
