Even in the paparazzi gym-and-swimwear shots, Princess Diana never appeared quite like this: playing the cello clad only in bra and underpants (and regal tiara).
“Feel the romance of British royalty — Diana underwear,” reads the poster from China’s splendidly named Jealousy International brand. Inspect it closely and the woman is, of course, a lookalike.
The ad prompted censure in the UK, but it caused hardly a ripple in China, where improbable celebrity “endorsements” have a long, if not distinguished, pedigree.
Jeremy Goldkorn, who runs the Beijing-based media Web site danwei.org (a partner of the Guardian) says using images of stars on products without their knowledge has been popular since 2003, when several real estate developers claimed former US president Bill Clinton as a spokesman.
US President Barack Obama has proved no less commercially minded, apparently taking a break from governing to plug the “Blockberry Whirlwind” smartphone (not, of course, to be confused with the BlackBerry Storm).
Obama then joined forces with Bill Gates and Warren Buffett to promote the Ivy Garden apartment block in Shaanxi. Developers plastered giant images of the three across billboards around the site, until killjoy officials ordered their removal. Apparently, they were the teensiest bit suspicious that Buffett’s quote — “This is the most important investment of my life” — did not originally refer to the complex.
Entertainers are also popular choices; Kelly Brook and Mena Suvari discovered their images had been plastered across the front of Chinese condom packets.
Some may find it hard to sympathize with highly paid celebrities who miss out on a few thousand extra yuan, but the ads can hit their image — and pride — as well as their bank balances. It’s one thing to be exploited to flog apartments; another to be recruited as the face of erectile dysfunction. Sean Connery was forced to threaten legal action after learning that he was “starring” in ads for an anti-impotence drug alongside David Beckham — who was similarly furious.
The badly dubbed ads for USA Selikon featured Goldenballs and his wife with “Beckham” announcing in Chinese that the medicine was “the secret weapon with which I can satisfy Victoria.”
“I don’t think Chinese people really trust celebrity endorsements anyway — but they can make a product stand out from the crowd. That’s why companies continue to do it,” Goldkorn said.
When Chinese star Muzimei shot to fame for her graphic sex blog, entrepreneurs were swift to use her name for products without her permission. The condoms and underwear might have been predictable, but few would relish lending their name to a rat poison.
An endangered baby pygmy hippopotamus that shot to social media stardom in Thailand has become a lucrative source of income for her home zoo, quadrupling its ticket sales, the institution said Thursday. Moo Deng, whose name in Thai means “bouncy pork,” has drawn tens of thousands of visitors to Khao Kheow Open Zoo this month. The two-month-old pygmy hippo went viral on TikTok and Instagram for her cheeky antics, inspiring merchandise, memes and even craft tutorials on how to make crocheted or cake-based Moo Dengs at home. A zoo spokesperson said that ticket sales from the start of September to Wednesday reached almost
‘BARBAROUS ACTS’: The captain of the fishing vessel said that people in checkered clothes beat them with iron bars and that he fell unconscious for about an hour Ten Vietnamese fishers were violently robbed in the South China Sea, state media reported yesterday, with an official saying the attackers came from Chinese-flagged vessels. The men were reportedly beaten with iron bars and robbed of thousands of dollars of fish and equipment on Sunday off the Paracel Islands (Xisha Islands, 西沙群島), which Taiwan claims, as do Vietnam, China, Brunei, Malaysia and the Philippines. Vietnamese media did not identify the nationalities of the attackers, but Phung Ba Vuong, an official in central Quang Ngai province, told reporters: “They were Chinese, [the boats had] Chinese flags.” Four of the 10-man Vietnamese crew were rushed
Scientists yesterday announced a milestone in neurobiological research with the mapping of the entire brain of an adult fruit fly, a feat that might provide insight into the brains of other organisms and even people. The research detailed more than 50 million connections between more than 139,000 neurons — brain nerve cells — in the insect, a species whose scientific name is Drosophila melanogaster and is often used in neurobiological studies. The research sought to decipher how brains are wired and the signals underlying healthy brain functions. It could also pave the way for mapping the brains of other species. “You might
PROTESTS: A crowd near Congress waved placards that read: ‘How can we have freedom without education?’ and: ‘No peace for the government’ Argentine President Javier Milei has made good on threats to veto proposed increases to university funding, with the measure made official early yesterday after a day of major student-led protests. Thousands of people joined the demonstration on Wednesday in defense of the country’s public university system — the second large-scale protest in six months on the issue. The law, which would have guaranteed funding for universities, was criticized by Milei, a self-professed “anarcho-capitalist” who came to power vowing to take a figurative chainsaw to public spending to tame chronically high inflation and eliminate the deficit. A huge crowd packed a square outside Congress
RSS