ISSUE 258 : Wednesday, August 12, 2009

I find few things to be more aggravating than the interference of children in the affairs of grown-ups. For example, for the past month we have been doing a NeoAdNet field test utilizing Advertising Age and General Motors. I can't go into the details about the outcome, but I am proud to report that the tactics deployed in the field test were found to be sound. NeoAdvertising is one step closer to becoming a practice rather than just another theory.

I can say this about the field test. The response attracted by certain aspects of a test that utilized the various reader comment sections of AdAge was... interesting. In each case we were focusing the significant pass-along capabilities that can be realized by repeating a given URL in several posts across the life of an article. What we didn't count on was the resistance we would encounter from younger, less experienced members of the audience. We did not count on their resistance or their actual anger.

I was called everything from a "hater" to a "self promoter" to a downright "fool" and "goon" by my fellow readers. One went so far as to suggest, "Harry Webber works in advertising? He must be self-employed because an agency would have to be more moronic than this fool to hire him in the first place."

All of this, generated from comments that simply refuted commonly held beliefs or practices.

Now normally I rejoice at such antics. Nothing I like better than pimp slapping some freshmouth who wanders into my bar looking to rep themselves by pulling on my cape. A little blood on the floor is good for business. It brings the readers in from the street and gives them something to tweet about. "Ass Whooping at AdAge. Gatorade Aisle. Call 911 on HW Again," was how one retweet read last night. But Gatorade was in the field test, so normal rules did not apply. I had to sit on it.

And when you don't respond, the other idiots come out to feed. So there I am, in the comment pages of AdAge getting double teamed with my hands behind my back. Then something remarkable happened. I get an email from George Parker:

Harry... Brilliant comment on that "G" fuck up. I have re-posted it on AdScam, as I think it deserves the widest distribution. Cheers/George

Meanwhile, back at AdAge, people were actually coming to my defense (not that I get misty-eyed over a bit of popular support). But then I actually got a fan letter from a young ad writer who read the re-post on AdScam. Followed by this tweet "Giving GM something to stand for... great read by @harrywebber http://madisonavenew.com/currentmad.html "

Now that really screwed me up because I was all ready to eviscerate this new breed of ad person who feels the need to say things like "You old fucks are the reason that companies get horrible advertising campaigns. RETIRE ALREADY, your success at selling typewriters is no longer relevant." I was set to come down on these fools like rolling thunder. And then I thought about what happened the last time I had to exercise a bit of restraint. So perhaps a better use of this space would be to simply say thank you to the folks who had my back.

Thank you.