industry magazine | absolutely delicious Java Chip | advertising copy | media know-it-alls

Have you heard all the hoo-ha over product placement in magazine stories? Your journalism professors, your public-radio pontificators, your media know-it-alls (please excuse the lapse into industry jargon), all of them are blowing hard about the corruption of editorial content, wada wada wada.

I say, Hey … just a second while I stave off a roaring afternoon hunger with another bite of my delicious Snickers bar … where was I … oh, yes, hey, what is the big deal?

We're talking reality. People wear clothes. Perry Ellis. Pierre Cardin. But people don't just wear clothes, they wear clothes made by somebody. So what's the problem with saying whose clothes they are wearing while writing a story on your incredible new Power Mac G5 that comes with iTunes and GarageBand and Omnigraffle, whatever that is, but it is no doubt really important or they wouldn't put it in the incredible new Power Mac G5.

Ya know what I'm saying?

As I sip my absolutely delicious Java Chip Frappuccino blended coffee from Starbucks, I think it is obvious to anyone who thinks about the issue for five minutes - which is all it takes to pour a cup of the sensational Tide Coldwater into the tough-on-stains/gentle-on-clothes Maytag Neptune Washers - that dropping what amounts to advertising copy into editorial content will not make a bit of difference to the integrity of that content.

Of course, the hoity-toits don't think so. About a year ago, the industry magazine for advertisers, Ad Age, sounded the alarm with a story headlined, "Marketers Press for Product Placement in Magazine Text." It went on to say there existed a "call for [the] end of strict separation between advertising and editorial content."