And This Little Piggy Went Viral

from the advertising-is-content dept

Fri, Mar 2nd 2012 12:05am — Leigh Beadon

BoingBoing recently highlighted this entertaining commercial for The Guardian, which neatly captures the state of modern news by having some fun with a fairy tale:

It's a great little production, because not only does it effectively portray the potential of what is variously called open journalism, citizen journalism and participatory journalism, among other things, it also serves as a good example of a common mantra around these parts: advertising is content, and content is advertising.

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Filed Under: advertising, content, journalism, viral
Companies: guardian

28 Comments

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fairuse (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 1:00am

Good Advertising is Watchable.
I agree advertising is content. Seldom is there any thought put into making the advertisement interesting or intriguing. I like this. It is fun to watch.
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Richard (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 2:57am

Re: Good Advertising is Watchable.
MAybe it depends on where you are from. In the UK we have a long tradition of trying to make entertaining ads. The Guardian has had some good ones before.
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Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 3:52am

So what happened to the pigs?
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Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 4:02am

Not a fairy tale !!! its a Nursery rhyme (and fingerplay)
just say'in..

its the little facts that are allways missed here..
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Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 4:18am

Re:
one went to the market
one stayed at home
one ate roast beef
one ate no roast beef (unconfirmed if the one that stayed home or went to the market had any beef ?)
and went wee wee all the way home !!! (where was he to start with???)

this makes no sense at all !!!!!

on the other hand a fairy tale generally starts with "Once upon a time" and ends with "lived happily ever after".
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saulgoode (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 4:27am

Re: Not a fairy tale !!! its a Nursery rhyme (and fingerplay)
It may have originally been a nursery rhyme (though I've never seen it in that form), but it was later popularized as a fairy tale. Well, technically speaking it is an "animal tale", Type 124 under the Aarne�Thompson classification system.
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Jed (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 4:28am

Re: Not a fairy tale !!! its a Nursery rhyme (and fingerplay)
Actually, it was a Grimm's fairy tale....a very short one, but it was one, nonetheless.
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hodgy (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 4:38am

Re: Re:
this ad is based on the the three pigs/big bad wolf, not the "this little pig went to market" nursery rhyme?
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abc gum, 2 Mar 2012 @ 4:42am

So - who is going to file suit? Should we start a pool?
Certainly there is someone out there whose intellectual property has been egregiously infringed upon by this blatant piracy. Please think of the artists when you are paying the lawyers.
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Leigh Beadon (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 5:06am

Re: Not a fairy tale !!! its a Nursery rhyme (and fingerplay)
its the little facts that are allways missed here..

Like maybe the fact that while the *headline* I wrote is just a joke based on the nursery rhyme about the little piggies and their various activities, the actual video in question is based on the fairy tale of the three little pigs and the big bad wolf.
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Torg (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 6:16am

Re: Re:
Actually half the time fairy tales end with cannibalism. I suspect that one of the three little pigs ate a lot of ham.
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Another AC, 2 Mar 2012 @ 6:21am

Re:
Thats what I was thinking, dirty pirates, profiting off someone elses idea. They must owe someone lots and lots of cash, and i think some domains need to be seized.
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Some Guy..., 2 Mar 2012 @ 6:38am

Re: Re:
Once upon a time there were 5 little piggies.
This little piggy went to the market
This little piggy stayed at home
This little piggy ate roast beast
This little piggy had none
and *this* little piggy went wee wee all the way home !!!
And they all lived happily ever after.

Better?
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Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2012 @ 8:01am

Re:
Maybe Kavin Bacon knows?
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hfbs (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 9:09am

I quite enjoyed the ad when I saw it last night on TV. The only annoying thing about it is that it's for The Guardian.
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Chargone (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 10:21am

Re: Re: Re:
not really. it's a nursery rhyme, not a fairy tale. Compleatly different thing.

heh.
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Paul G, 2 Mar 2012 @ 11:42am

Went viral?
YouTube = 108,589 views. Hadley viral.
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Mike Masnick (profile), 2 Mar 2012 @ 5:14pm

Re: Went viral?
YouTube = 108,589 views. Hadley viral.

Almost all of the embeds I've seen have been the Guardian's own player. Not Youtube.

You do realize that YouTube is not all videos, right?
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Fin, 2 Mar 2012 @ 7:19pm

Re:
That said the Guardian does tend to be our friend more often than not. Compared to the major tabloids the Guardian and Telegraph seem to live in the real world more often than not when it comes to the internet
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[citation needed or GTFO], 2 Mar 2012 @ 10:43pm

Re: Not a fairy tale !!! its a Nursery rhyme (and fingerplay)
There's a big difference between This Little Piggy and Three Little Pigs

Just sayin'.

Must've missed that in preschool, huh?
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Anonymous Coward, 3 Mar 2012 @ 12:39am

Re: Re: Not a fairy tale !!! its a Nursery rhyme (and fingerplay)
where the words This Little Piggy is never mentioned right. And where are those 3 words mentions, not in grims gairly tale, but in the nursery rhyme.

again, its the little facts that are allways missed (or misconceived) here.
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Anonymous Coward, 3 Mar 2012 @ 12:43am

Re: Re: Not a fairy tale !!! its a Nursery rhyme (and fingerplay)
yes, there is, you are right, the main one being that "the three pigs" does not contain "This little piggy", what does is the nursary rhyme.

just sayin'

but if you have trouble differentiating between a nursary rhyme and a fairy tale, perhaps you missed that in preschool?
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Anonymous Coward, 3 Mar 2012 @ 12:45am

Re: Re: Went viral?
viral !!!!, bearly even an office flu.
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Anonymous Coward, 3 Mar 2012 @ 12:46am

Re: Re: Went viral?
viral !!!!, bearly even an office flu.
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Anonymous Coward, 3 Mar 2012 @ 12:47am

Re: Re: Went viral?
viral !!!!, bearly even an office flu.
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Leigh Beadon (profile), 3 Mar 2012 @ 6:26am

Re: Re: Re: Not a fairy tale !!! its a Nursery rhyme (and fingerplay)
Hahaha holy shit, you are a dumbass.

Yes, they are TWO SEPARATE STORIES. And I drew a connection between the two in order to write JOKE HEADLINE.

Is this seriously that hard for you? Are you honestly sitting there thinking "AHA! I've caught him on an egregious error! He doesn't know the difference between little piggies and three little pigs! Now I'm going to embarrass him and expose his ignorance!"

It was intentional. Just a silly little headline. Not that hard to realize that. You're kinda pathetic.
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Leigh Beadon (profile), 3 Mar 2012 @ 6:39am

Re: Re: Re: Went viral?
Viral isn't a numerical threshhold, it's a means of spreading. This is an advertisement that got posted on BoingBoing and how here, and other places, because it is entertaining. It gets shared on FB and twitter. That's a viral ad. It may not turn out to be a hugely popular viral ad, but it is still spreading in a viral fashion, as it was clearly designed to do.
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Leigh Beadon (profile), 3 Mar 2012 @ 6:51am

Re: Re: Re: Went viral?
I see you're trying to make this comment go viral, though ;)
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