BMW has recently released a commercial that never actually shows its logo within the commercial. Instead, it burns the logo into the retinas of viewers. I should say right now this isn't a health hazard. At least, not anything we're not exposed to hundreds of times a day already. Look at your television and look away, you'll see blocks of color from the same concept. Surely we do more damage to our eyes from staring at a computer screen for hours a day.
It's a question of how far is too far. The creators say that they've come up with a way to "literally get inside" the heads of the audience.
I'm reminded of an episode of Futurama where the main character Fry wakes up confused because he's had an advertisement beamed into his dreams for a pair of underwear when he has the classic "go to school in just underwear" dream. The scary thing is, I think all the big advertising agencies would love to be able to do this.
We have a responsibility as people who affect other people's lives on a daily basis to realize where the line needs to be drawn between getting our products and services out there, and being intrusive. I think burning logos into people's eyes with the sole and totally non-accidental purpose of doing so is beginning to cross that line. It's a slippery slope that's very real.
If you watch people's reactions to it, no one they showed had a negative thing to say. We don't know if anyone did, of course, they're not going to show it in a BMW promotional. But the point is people are receptive of this kind of advertising. That's pretty scary. What are they going to allow us to do to them? Should we do it?
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