I don't normally pay too much attention to adverts on TV, and I hope this is not a sort of Victor Meldrew moment, but one caught my attention and caused my jaw to drop slightly.

It was for a Philips TV which boasted a function called - I think - Amberlight.

A group of people were sat in their living room watching a football match on said TV when a pet dog put its paw on the remote.

And - wait for it - the picture switched from colour to black and white!

Is that supposed to be the main selling point of Philips' new TV? That you can watch it in black and white?

Why would anybody want to watch anything on b/w? Perhaps during a snooker match or something. I think not.

Anyway, I nominate this as the most pointless advert currently on TV.

You may agree or disagree. What do you think is the most pointless one at the moment?

Over to you...

PMSL!!:P :thumbsup: I think exactly the same everytime it comes on! What is so special about turning your picture to black & white . . . . . . . . . . . . oh hold on - sorry, it's 'Amberlight'.

I don't know about Most Pointless Ad but the most irritating is certainly anything involving Linda Barker cavorting on a sofa... or maybe that damned crazy frog!!!!

Have you seen the latest Linda Barker one where she just follows that Curry's woman around and repeats everything she says in a stupid surprised voice.

Shut up you sl%g!:rant:

Originally posted by Lestat
Have you seen the latest Linda Barker one where she just follows that Curry's woman around and repeats everything she says in a stupid surprised voice.

Shut up you sl%g!:rant:

Yep I've seen it... It makes me want to throw things at the TV... Surely not the point of the advert?! :suspect:

kinda off the mark here, but on TV ads still

The Yakult advert is amazing! It shows some guy drinking one of those little plastic bottles of Yakult, and I'm guessing it's the best shot they could get cos it's the one they use, and when he drinks it he screws his face up and looks likes he's about to puke is straight back up.

I love that advert.

I think I'm going to send an email to Philips, suggesting a money-spinning idea to them.

They make CD players don't they?

Well, how's about this.

A button on the remote that converts all your CDs into mono!

And for good measure, also adds in clicks, scrathchy sounds and other unwanted noises thay you used to get with 12in records!

That idea, along with black and white TVs, should make them a fortune.

Perhaps I should have chosen a career in marketing!

Hmmm I still prefer vinyl and I like film noire....you're my kinda marketing guy :)

Its called the Ambilight - basically the TV projects the colour of whatever the main item on the tv is onto the wall - so your eye doesnt pick up the edges of the tv so readily and tv becomes more of a piece of furniture than just a piece of LCD on the wall.

Example here

http://www.philips.co.uk/assets/Downloadablefile/Ambilight_Out_Horiz-15796-12844.pdf

Nah.

My parents bought a top-quality, very sensitive, stereo system when I was a kid in the early 1970s and I spend most of my teenage years returning records - to Virgin (at the bottom of The Moor) and Another Kind of Mushroom in Chesterfield - because it exposed lots of all the surface noise.

It was so frustrating.

And often you'd get the replacement home, and the same problems occured, because the records they had in stock were from the same pressing.

I realise now that things have changed for vinyl lovers and I appreciate that there is a certain quality to the sound and that the modern-day pressings are of a much better quality.

But, from where I'm coming from, if you have a good quality CD player, decent amp etc, remastered CDs can't be beaten.

I do, of course, stand to be corrected.

The thing is people are paid good money to make these pointless ads.:loopy:

Isn't it near impossible to advetise a telly, on telly?


I mean, if you see the ad and say "ooh, that's telly has got a nice picture quality "

Only thing it hasn't, as you are watching your own telly...



Does that make sense????? :loopy:

Has to be shredded wheat.

'Shredded wheat 'may' helps your heart'

WTF is that about?

Perhaps the ambilight gimic is a way of getting round paying your TV licence...!!??? When they come knocking, just say..."sorry mate, don't need one...i was watching in ambilight!"

I think you've missed the point, the idea is that once you've tried the ambi light, turning it off is like going back to b+w after you've tried colour.

Originally posted by dishwasher
I don't normally pay too much attention to adverts on TV, and I hope this is not a sort of Victor Meldrew moment, but one caught my attention and caused my jaw to drop slightly.

It was for a Philips TV which boasted a function called - I think - Amberlight.

A group of people were sat in their living room watching a football match on said TV when a pet dog put its paw on the remote.

And - wait for it - the picture switched from colour to black and white!

Is that supposed to be the main selling point of Philips' new TV? That you can watch it in black and white?

Why would anybody want to watch anything on b/w? Perhaps during a snooker match or something. I think not.

Anyway, I nominate this as the most pointless advert currently on TV.

You may agree or disagree. What do you think is the most pointless one at the moment?

Over to you...

Originally posted by Cyclone
I think you've missed the point, the idea is that once you've tried the ambi light, turning it off is like going back to b+w after you've tried colour. Yeh lol.

Someone doesn't understand the ad, 'ey dishwasher ?

It's a crap ad. Took me a few moments to wonder what the proposition was, and I used to work in an ad agency. Ads are (generally) supposed to be simple enough to make sense to the lowest common denominator, in this case they've failed abysmally.

Mind you, I did just see a very silly ad on TV, for Airwick air fresheners. "Every house has a natural rhythm, and Airwick's new air freshener is in tune with yours".

In tune with a rhythym?

I think the background music is in an E-flat time signature.

I think it's a great idea. We should go back to black and white. If it was good enough for 'Night Of The Hunter' and 'Psycho', it's good enough for us. And if mono was better for Brian Wilson and Wilco Johnson, it's good enough for us, too.
So yes, it's a good ad. I haven't seen it though, because I haven't got a telly. I've got lots of mono records, however, and I ride to work on a traction engine.

Fred Dibnah, I thought you were dead!

Originally posted by Lickable
Has to be shredded wheat.

'Shredded wheat 'may' helps your heart'

WTF is that about?

Exactly, utter crap, this pseudo-scientific BS realy gets my back-up.

eg.

"may lower your cholestoerol" - I want an definate promise before I waste time eating that crap every morning.

"People who have healthy hearts tend to eat more whole grains" - Yeah, they tend to not drink, not smoke and run marathons too, should I do that as well, or will the shredded wheat be enough ?

"40% reported a lifting efffect" - what happened to the other 60% ? their faces fell off or melted ?

"with nutrillium" - what, what ? WTF is Nutrillium, have they discovered a new element, is it similar to "elastium" ?

"fight the signs of ageing" - like this 15 year old model who can't even spell wrinkle

"limescale is just calcium that sticks, watch how it disolves in Cillit Bang" - yeah, just image what will happen if you spray it in your eye by accident.

the cillit bang advert is so funny.
I have to laugh when he takes the chunk of "calcium" and drops it in the cillit bang. How big would the bang be if it really was Calcium and not calcium carbonate.

PS - for those of you who've forgotten GCSE Chemistry, metallic Calcium reacts, shall we say, vigorously with water, producing heat and hydrogen.

Can any of you remember the Play Station ads with Phil Hartman promoting the joys of the stick? I remember visiting my grandparents and him ranting at the tv about how ridiculous it was and who would buy a stick!! It was easier to chuckle silently than try to explain. :D

Originally posted by Cyclone
PS - for those of you who've forgotten GCSE Chemistry, metallic Calcium reacts, shall we say, vigorously with water, producing heat and hydrogen.

It's not that spectacular unfortunately ! See here for a description by a nice chap @ University of Sheffield :thumbsup:

http://www.webelements.com/webelements/elements/text/Ca/chem.html

seems that i remember it being more vigorous than it is, but still that link you posted seems a bit anti climatic

In the following demonstration, a chunk of calcium metal is dropped into a beaker of distilled water. After a second or so, the calcium metal begins to bubble vigorously as it reacts with the water

at least that calls it vigorous.

I think I had calcium mixed up with an alkaline metal, I can't find a video of any francium, but here's a good one of sodium (http://www.theodoregray.com/PeriodicTable/Stories/011.2/Videos/SodiumLake01.MOV) (might take a minute to load).

So I've misunderstood the Philips ad all along! It's me that's in the wrong

Well, I must apologise for being so stupid and thick. Fancy, not being able to understand a simple ad on TV and missing the point!

Either that or the ad totally sucks. Whatever.

As I said at the start, I normally don't pay much attention to adverts, and I guess this was the case with this one.

However, the people at Philips have got us talking about it, even if we've no idea what Amberlight is and cannot understand their TV adverts.