Director Bram Van Riet of Caviar (Venice, Calif., Brussels, Amsterdam) shows us the schoolyard isn’t the only place bullying goes down in a new :60 PSA, “Safer Internet,” for the European Union and Schoolnet out of LDV United, Antwerp, Belgium. The PSA demonstrates how seemingly harmless cyber jabs can be anything but.
The spot opens on a young girl surfing the net in her bedroom. She types “Hello Everybody” on a social networking site, clicks “Post,” and the games begin. An electronic beat ushers in rapid-growing pimples, the apparent physical manifestation of another user’s mean-spirited posting. The girl’s computer chimes and we see that another user has presumably called her a pig, because her nose morphs into an oinking snout.
We cut to another bedroom where a young man posts on his computer, “You fat cow!” Back in her bedroom, the girl’s belly and cheeks balloon, splintering the backside of her chair, then her face distorts as if rubberized; the result of three other girls’ insensitive use of photo-finishing software. Finally, with her face stretching like Play-Doh and the room quaking, the girl stops the madness by clicking “Report Abuse” on her computer. Over the teary-eyed and thoroughly frightened girl, a super appears, “Block bullying online.” The PSA closes on a black screen over which the tag, “Keep it fun, keep control,” and the site www.keepcontrol.eu appears.
The LDV United team included creative director Kristoff Snels, copywriter Melanie Daems, art director Kris Lenaers and producer Petra De Roos.
Kato Maes exec produced for Caviar, Brussels, with Tatiana Pierre serving as producer. The DP was Nicolas Karakatsanis.
Editor was Simone Rau of Caviar, Brussels.
Google Opens Its Defense In Antitrust Case Alleging Monopoly Over Online Ad Technology
Google opened its defense against allegations that it holds an illegal monopoly on online advertising technology Friday with witness testimony saying the industry is vastly more complex and competitive than portrayed by the federal government.
"The industry has been exceptionally fluid over the last 18 years," said Scott Sheffer, a vice president for global partnerships at Google, the company's first witness at its antitrust trial in federal court in Alexandria.
The Justice Department and a coalition of states contend that Google built and maintained an illegal monopoly over the technology that facilitates the buying and selling of online ads seen by consumers.
Google counters that the government's case improperly focuses on a narrow type of online ads — essentially the rectangular ones that appear on the top and on the right-hand side of a webpage. In its opening statement, Google's lawyers said the Supreme Court has warned judges against taking action when dealing with rapidly emerging technology like what Sheffer described because of the risk of error or unintended consequences.
Google says defining the market so narrowly ignores the competition it faces from social media companies, Amazon, streaming TV providers and others who offer advertisers the means to reach online consumers.
Justice Department lawyers called witnesses to testify for two weeks before resting their case Friday afternoon, detailing the ways that automated ad exchanges conduct auctions in a matter of milliseconds to determine which ads are placed in front of which consumers and how much they cost.
The department contends the auctions are finessed in subtle ways that benefit Google to the exclusion of would-be competitors and in ways that prevent... Read More