Tales of the Talking Tiger

I was staggered by the amount of blatant or implied sexual content in the advertising and promotion of the products and services. Let me give you a couple of examples:

- an ad in the conference program features a pair of silky-smooth female legs with the title ‘How was your first time?’ The advertisement is for a Voice over IP provider.
- one of the booths featured large posters of a woman rather unsuccessfully attempting to cover her breasts. ‘Are you covered?’ was the tag line that tenuously linked the image with the company. Note – a t-shirt would be a much better method for covering yourself up.
- award for the least subtle approach was a large booth that featured a couple of girls wearing provocative ‘dresses’ (I use this term very loosely) that may well have been painted on earlier in the day. As visitors walked past, they asked ‘can we tempt you?’. Needless to say I kept on walking.

This common promotional approach made me angry. First of all, it’s lazy advertising that appeals to the lowest common denominator. I can just imagine the advertising agency explaining the campaign to the client – ‘just include an image of a half-naked women and everyone will come to your booth – it doesn’t even matter what your product is like!’

I was also angry that I couldn’t escape it. It seemed like every corner I turned I faced confrontation with an image of a lithe body, or even the real thing. I don’t need to see, I don’t want to see it, and I didn’t come to a technology conference to see it.

There are better ways of advertising that are more respectful of the consumer in general, and of women in particular.