| October 7, 2005 Editor’s Desk by Aaron Selbig It’s been a morbid week here at Insurgent Headquarters. 
Have you seen the new billboards?The Alaska Travel Industry Association, in a bold, daring and zesty move, has placed billboards in Seattle, Minneapolis and LA bearing a new slogan. Set against a classic yellow and blue Alaska license plate, it reads: B4UDIE Don’t feel bad if you don’t get it right away. Maybe I’m just stupid, but it took me a minute to figure it out (I failed Vanity Plate Interpretation in community college). It means “Come to Alaska before you die” (as in “cross this off your life’s ‘to do’ list now, you pathetic couch potato!”). Interesting. 
“This is edgy”, says Dave Worrell, ATIA spokesperson,
“We want people to have that ‘a-ha’ moment, like in,
‘A-ha, I do need to go there.”’But what if people have a different ‘a-ha’ moment, Dave? Like in, “a-ha, I’m gonna die soon”, or “a-ha, if I go to Alaska, I’ll die.” Did the ATIA consider the morbid connotation of their edgy new slogan? Is it wise to use death as a marketing tool? Is this some kind of vague threat on the part of disgruntled Alaskans? Come To Alaska, Or We’ll
Kill You.
Come To Alaska, Then Go Home And Die Come To Alaska And Get Your Legs Ripped Off By A Grizzly Bear Come To Alaska Before Al Qaeda Flies An Airplane Into Your Apartment Complex Sorry, I got a little carried away. Sloganeering is fun, though. Try it. I’m sure the ATIA didn’t mean for the billboards to inspire thoughts of the grave, but if the message is truly a benign one, why didn’t they put one in Manhattan ... say, at ground zero? Dave Worrell also says that this marks the first time in seventeen years that the association has marketed Alaska tourism without featuring wildlife or Alaska scenery. Now that is something to be grateful for. Here at Insurgent Headquarters (nestled deep in the heart of downtown Anchorage), we get pretty sick of looking at moose murals and oil paintings of Denali every day. As a matter of fact, if there was one thing the tourist industry could be spending money on, we’d prefer that it be dispelling some of the more egregious Alaskan ‘myths’. Instead of force-feeding a bunch of zombified tourists a diet of stuffed bears and igloo keychains, why not get ‘edgy’ with Alaska’s image? Come To Alaska: No Igloos But
Plenty Of Meth Labs
See them B4UDIE. Aaron Selbig Editor, Insurgent Media AK |
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September 30, 2005 September 23, 2005 September 16, 2005 September 9, 2005 September 2, 2005 August 26, 2005 August 19, 2005 August 12, 2005 August 5, 2005 July 29, 2005 July 22, 2005 July 15, 2005 July 8, 2005 July 1, 2005 June 24, 2005 June 17, 2005 June 10, 2005 June 3, 2005 May 27, 2005 May 20, 2005 May 13, 2005 May 6, 2005 April 28, 2005 April 21, 2005 April 14, 2005 April 7, 2005 April 1, 2005 |
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Insurgent Media.
All rights reserved. in-sur-gent (in sur'jent), n. 1. a member of a group which revolts against the policies of its leadership. |
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