Monday, September 24, 2007

got ubiquity?....still?

Came across this T-shirt on a coffee-walk with the gents. Hilarity ensued. Alright, it wasn't exactly this T-shirt, it was black with white font, but the phrase was the same. And it got me thinking...

Haven't we moved beyond the "got milk?" campaign for our clever pop-cultural references at this point? It was a monumental campaign. Truly. It has forever left its mark on our culture and will be inducted in the advertising hall of fame in its first year of eligibility. But surely there must be a handful of newer references to be made, no? Certainly we can do better than slapping one half of a tagline onto a T-shirt and filling in the blank with "x" product, can't we? Maybe we can't.

The main problem with the neverending love affair with Goodby's contriubtion to the California Milk Processor Board is that it's just not:
a) old enough - it's in that middle phase where it was actually done over a decade ago, but isn't quite aged to the point where it's clever. Partly because of...

b) it has never gone away. - Since it's inception the "got milk?" campaign has had many admirers and appropriators. For a while, the mockery was somewhat clever, pointed to a phenomenon and made sense. But at this point, the use of "got ___?" puts an image in my mind of a group of dental secretaries gathered around the lunch table in Des Moines (no slight on the city, that's just where this imagination takes place) laughing over getting some T-shirts made up for the Christmas party which read "got plaque?" or "got brush?" or "got floss?"

I only ask that we harness our collective creative juices and agree to stop the derivative, redundant, old-news punnery.

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the thoughts and opinions expressed below are entirely my own, and are not necessarily shared by my friends, family, or employer. (though they very well might be...)