I opened yesterday’s (13.5.10) Guardian newspaper to find another bout of Bono-bashing – this time slagging off his skills as a financial analist.
I’ll come clean straight off – and confess to being a U2 fan (even ‘though John Peel loathed them).
I grew up with U2 and saw them as “my band” – distinct from my older brothers musical tastes. Although they may have strayed from the path from time to time –they least managed to stick around in their original form (a miracle of inter-band relations) and still produce some interesting tracks.
But back to the bashing… I’ve been meaning to conclude this series of postings about celebrity / aid with a reference to St. Bono – and reading the Guardian article prompted me to get around to it. View Full Article »
Poor bastard… First, Craig David’s singing career is turned into a joke by “Bo Selecta” – and then, when he tries to turn things around by signing up as a UN Ambassador, Russell Howard comes along and sticks the boot in…
Funny though…
News just in: Seems David’s had the last laugh – having just been named in the UK.s top “rich list”. Read on…
According to the Sunday Times;
“Charlotte Church, Leona Lewis and Katherine Jenkins are joint number one, with an estimated £11 million in the bank.
The list was dominated by women with Joss Stone and Cheryl’s Girls Aloud bandmates also making the top 10. Craig David also made the cut with a reported £8 million in the bank”.
It’s well known that fame and stardom attract attention. So it’s not surprising that many aid organisations utilise celebrity to promote their cause. Gerry Halliwell as UN Ambassador, Geldof’s Live Aid, U2 and friends on Amnesty’s Conspiracy Of Hope tour in 1986 (more about St. Bono later) – and more recently… Lindsay Lohan travelling to India to film an expose of child labour and trafficking of women – which broadcast in April ‘10 on BBC3.
What, if anything, can the world of development learn from western advertising? Are there parallels between the two that can be exploited by NGO’s to help create more effective ways of reaching listeners?
Ever since the world’s first radio commercial was broadcast in 1922, broadcasters have searched for innovative techniques to successfully deliver sales messages to carefully defined target audiences. In order to try and define the various strengths and weaknesses of radio advertising – and whether they could be harnessed for development broadcasting – I investigated a cross section of advertising related literature.
When considering educational health messages on radio – I often wonder whether NGO’s would be justified to employ more provocative approaches to “shock” the listeners into paying attention…
Educational spot production for radio has traditionally followed a didactic style of delivery. These often feature a presenter, typically in a studio environment, reading a script to the audience. However, in western radio creative approaches are far more varied and can often challenge the listener preconceptions of “taste” in order to capture their attention.
Since there is no “free” radio in Ethiopia and the penalties for establishing Pirate shortwave radio stations are particularly high, View Full Article »
On Monday morning I’ll be driving to Lincoln University for the Transnational Radio Forum. A four day conference which gathers radio academics from around the world. I’ve been looking forward to it – but it’ll be a relief to finally get my presentation out of the way so I relax and enjoy meeting some fellow radio lecturers. I’ll be giving a presentation entitled “The Hardest Sell: Spot production in developing nations”. View Full Article »
