Samsung's Own the Floor campaign is a high-tech version of Stupid

 

There are so many layers of dumb in this ad, it's almost hard to get a grip on it.  But I'll give it a try with an internet-friendly numbered list:

1.  The guy doing the vacuuming is having so much fun that it doesn't bother him in the slightest when his kids knock over a plant and leave a pile of dirt on the rug right and just keep on running, never mind that, yes, that IS dirt on the rug and I don't care how good that vacuum is, it's going to leave a stain and you're going to need some carpet cleaner.  It's also as if the kids intentionally knocked over the plant BECAUSE dad was having so much fun vacuuming, they wanted to give him something to vacuum.  

2.  Mom gets her turn at the vacuum and proceeds to spin all over the house, as if determined to have more fun than her husband.  Maybe she's a little worried that he's encroaching on her territory.  Next thing you know, he'll be cooking and her panic level will really shoot up.

3.  If you can afford to live in this house, then yes I guess you can afford this ridiculous $500 vacuum cleaner made by a company famous for producing overpriced, fragile electronics built to be traded in every six months or so (exactly what we're looking for in a household appliance, right?  But if you can afford to live in this house, you can also afford to have a cleaning woman come in two or three times a week to do the vacuuming for you.  And when you do that, you probably aren't all that interested in making the cleaning fun, are you?

A Soon-to-be-very-dated Progressive Insurance Commercial....

 

...because when this is all over, nobody is going to want to be reminded of those days where we HAD to work from home and communicate over Zoom.  But that's not really what any of these "stupid people doing stupid things on Zoom" ads are all about, is it?  

No, none of these "slice of life" ads featuring Conference Calls Gone Bad (the Apple "Underdogs" ads which feature more goofing off than work, the Folger's ads which feature distracted idiots who can't even remember to put their pants on or are desperate to prevent coworkers from seeing their kids, etc.) are actually about the petty annoyance of Zoom Conferencing.  They are, instead, all about how much corporate America seethes at the idea of paying people without getting them into the office and physically under the thumb of Mr. Boss Man.  You get the idea that corporations have come to see Zoom in the same way Republicans see Unemployment Benefits- just a Free Ride to goof off while still collecting a paycheck.  Apple, Folgers, Progressive etc. all feel cheated by Remote Not-Work because they hate their employees and are convinced that those employees will just pretend to be productive if they can get away with it-- and it eats employers alive to think that they just might be getting away with it. 

So no one is going to convince me that Working from Home is going to become the New Normal any time in the near future, and I find it downright laughable when CNN, etc. tries to predict the Future of Work by asking employees what they think about working from home.  As if it's going to be up to them in any way, shape or form.  Ask the employers.  They still want their workers to rise early, brave traffic, and sit in a physical office that the employer is perfectly willing to pay for if it means they can be 100 percent certain those employees are wearing pants while working the phones all day.  Because its a power thing and its a distrust thing.  That's not going to change just because we have a pandemic now and then. 

Lowbrow humor from Toyota and Highlander

 

Oh, how adorable- the most original commercial ever.  For the first time we see, in the same commercial:

1.  Precocious kids who twist their faces into weird contortions as they bleat phrases they really have no business understanding but It's Funny Because It's Kids.  I can't believe it took seventy years for someone to think of having kids say embarrassing things in front of a parent!  Hys-TERICAL!

2.  Eurotrash dweeb dad who serves up a great big plump, slow moving softball for those kids to knock right out of the park and then looks flummoxed when those kids....knock the slow moving softball right out of the park and freak out Eurotrash dad for the entertainment of the audience.

I mean, I'm just AMAZED that they managed to fit these two concepts into the SAME brief commercial. Well done, Toyota!  I'm off to buy a Highlander because...um, wait a minute.  Why is this ad supposed to make me buy a Highlander?  It looks more like a commercial for birth control to me.  I'm certainly convinced that I don't want anything like these kids.

Oh Seriously. It's an F---NG HYUNDAI!

 

Why bother to build a good product when you can just hire a British voice actor to narrate an artsy, overlong piece of utter nonsense which includes like "At Hyundai we build cars...year after year" like that's some kind of thought-provoking Deep Thought?

I didn't even get thirty seconds into this junk before realizing I had a gem for this blog without even really trying.  This isn't putting lipstick on a pig.  It's dumping a lipstick factory and about eight gallons of rouge on that pig before giving it a perfume bath and sticking it into a Louis Vuitton Dress.  In the end, you've reaching for an Oscar for Best Short Film with an attempt to sell a FREAKING HYUNDAI.  I mean, give me a break!

Samsung dangles another trinket and knows we'll fold

 

When you are judging yourself based on your smartphone's ability to fold compared to the phones of the people around you, you might as well just call it a day.  Or at least rethink your priorities and try to figure out what went so very wrong in your life.  But who am I kidding?  You're far more likely to respond by dipping deeper into your credit card debt and getting yourself one of these Look At Me phones so you can "flex" with the best of them.

Because you are a very, very sad person who has no sense of value, and no sense of pride, and no sense that you've actually accomplished anything that makes you at all worthwhile or valuable or even notable in any way, shape or form.  So if you want people to know you are alive, you'd better go out and spend a thousand dollars on a shiny piece of metal and plastic that can do something that might catch someone's eye and attract someone's interest- because there's nothing about you personally that is ever going to do that. 

A sad person who will be mesmerized by this blur of images, and overwhelmed with lust at the thought of owning something that might make someone else momentarily envious of you.  You've always wanted someone to me envious of you, and god knows there's nothing about who you are or what you do that is ever going to accomplish that.  And after all, this phone- an overpriced bauble though it may be- is still significantly cheaper than an Audi or a Lexus or a BMW.  

Jake from State Farm is a Walking, Talking, Scene-chewing Curse

 

For some reason, this smirking little toad with the fake smile forever frozen on his stupid face can't convince Aaron Rodgers that he isn't getting some special "Rodgers Rate."  The result seems to be that Rodgers is forever kissing up to an otherwise anonymous State Farm Insurance Choad- playing golf with him, going on car rides with him, eating lunch with him- in order to keep what he thinks is some "special rate" which by the way he really needs because money is tight when you're a franchise quarterback in the NFL.

And now Pat Mahomes- ready and waiting in the wings for the not-too-distant day when Rodgers simply cannot perform on the field anymore (probably three games into his new contract with whatever team he insists on being traded to this summer) to be Jake's Best Friend and Toady, thanking this grinning smarmy jackass every few seconds for his Special Mahomes Rate as he goes about his everyday life, getting haircuts, doing laundry, or just Hanging Around with Jake for No Reason Whatsoever Are We Aware that Mahomes has Actual Friends and a Family in the Real World.  All so this terrible actor*/wannabee comedian can do everything possible to convince NFL millionaires that they are Nothing Special All State Farm Employees Hang Out With Their Customers 24/7. 

But it seems to me that after last February, Pat Mahomes might put two and two together and figure out that hanging around with Jake might not be the best thing for a guy whose primary goal is to collect Super Bowl Rings.  Aaron Rodgers has exactly one, while his list of playoff failures just keeps on growing.  Pat Mahomes also has one ring- which is half the number of playoff losses he can count.  I think the message is pretty damned clear:  doing State Farm commercials might be good for your wallet, but it doesn't bode very well when it comes to winning Championships.  

*the original Jake from State Farm was dumped because the company decided that more extensive use of the character required the hiring of an actual actor.  So they hired....this guy.  Uh huh.  WTF-ever, State Farm.

Bambee deals with those little annoyances that go with running a sweatshop (errr, business)

 

The radio commercials for this service are so very grating- "as a small business owner, you have so many headaches!"  And the "headaches" listed are "minimum wage requirements" (HORRORS! The EVIL GOVERNMENT requires you to pay what amounts to way, way below an actual living wage to your employees, and you need to hire a manager to deal with that!) and "wrongful termination lawsuits" (HORRORS!  You went an innocently broke a contract and fired an employee, and now you've got to deal with the law!  You need to hire a manager to deal with that!)  and "Union disputes" (don't even get me started.)  In short, these commercials make running a business sound like something a very, very charitable person With A Dream wants to do but is bound to be foiled by the aforementioned evil government and it's evil, business-owner-hating rules every time.

And hiring a compliance manager?  The radio ad tells us "they're expensive- they cost Seventy Thousand Dollars a year."  As if we are talking about a piece of equipment and not a human being.  I'm sure what the commercial MEANT to say is that compliance managers CHARGE $70,000 per year for their WORK, but even this doesn't make any sense, because how is that a universal salary for compliance managers?  Are you really telling me that a compliance manager in Mobile, Alabama makes the same salary as one in San Francisco?  And again, it's so dehumanizing to refer to qualified professionals as if they are just another piece of tech the modern business needs to purchase off the shelf in order to avoid production issues.

Finally, that guy at the beginning- "I need this for my small business.  But I can't afford it.  But I can't afford not to have it..." Hey, buddy, I'll tell you what I tell every jackass who whines that they "can't afford" to pay a certain wage, "can't afford" to follow all those other rules (cleanliness, safety, tax record maintenance, etc:)  If you can't pay for those things, you can't have a business.  Sorry.  Your desire to run a business doesn't require me or anyone else to reduce standards to make that business more profitable for you.  It's not 1880 anymore, and that's a good thing.  If you can't afford what it takes to keep your doors open, then just admit you aren't ready to run a business, close your doors, and go get a job, Mr. Small Business Owner.

(Oh and BTW, don't tell me that Bambee provides an HR manager who regularly "costs" $70,000 per year for $99 a month- like she's a rental- and that HR manager is going to be as devoted to YOUR business as one you personally hired- and paid a decent wage too- would be.  That Bambee HR manager is either doing this in her spare time or your business will be one of the two dozen she's juggling every single day.   I don't own a business, but I can do math.)