Artemis ads hunting me down
That’s Artemis Investment Management, not the Greek goddess of of the hunt.
I’m thinking through the choice of cultural objects as case studies for my PhD that explores how we represent, talk about and communicate the environment. I’ll be looking at media, long form journalism, literature, poetry, and now, I think, a key contender has to be advertising. In particular, the long-term campaign and advertisements of Artemis Investment Management: The Profit Hunter.
The Profit Hunter Campaign
I’ve been incensed by these ads for a while. They’re all over the UK travel network (tube, train, bus) and, here’s a great example, on a London taxi.
The Artemis brand is moulded around this conceit of profit hunting as a mimetic analogy with profit as an animal in the natural wild, tracked down, hunted, by its investment specialists. Its advertising campaign uses a pastiche of 1930s Great Adventurers in hunting gear.
It’s not a metaphor, stupid
What astounds me is that the people behind this campaign, both client and ad agency, present the goal of capital profit gain at the metaphorical expense of the environment, when they must, surely, understand that what they are communicating is no longer, and never has been, simply a metaphor?
The animal itself, the profit, is a clever illustration that marries together a line graph profit and what looks like an extinct, or soon to be extinct, primitive bird that can’t outrun the smart investor/hunter.
I’ve been a reader of semiotics and deconstruction for some time now, and will develop the argument in detail, but in essence it’s not difficult to anticipate my position. The signification of these advertisements contributes to the cultural meaning-making that the environment is a resource for human endeavour, from which great profits will be plundered. Fair play to Artemis, they’re not exactly subtle about the evisceration of our planet by capitalism’s global financial racket, are they? In fact, any typical semiological analysis would be redundant faster than you could say “What’s that you smell boy, a profit up ahead?” But how can we address these ads as cultural objects? Read more
The cultural economy of the luxury brand
Yesterday I looked at the copy content in the launch of Standpoint, the new politics/business monthly magazine edited by former Telegraph associate editor Daniel Johnson, with launch articles from a number of neocon names and Telegraph writers that did nothing to support Johnson’s claim that it is a magazine of both the Left and Right.
The launch of Standpoint and its claims to bipartisan intellectual curiosity stirrred some thoughts around the rise of the “intellectual magazine” in the recent couple of years, and what this is saying about both the magazine market and the economic and political context in which magazines operate. My view is that the recent glut of “intellectual magazine” launches–such as Prospect, Monocle, The Economist’s Intellgent Life–is a battle for territory that has less to do with intelligence and more to do with economic prosperity and worldview dominance for its owners and advertisers. Which, of course, is nothing new in the media (see this overview), and thanks to Johnson, is neither hidden nor subtle in Standpoint’s stated goal:
to defend and celebrate Western civilisation.
That is, Johnson knows that in the time of the credit crunch, it’s not the lower and middle classes who prosper but the rich. So let’s create magazines for the ‘intellectual’ where ‘intellectual = rich, and politics = capital’.
It doesn’t take a great leap of intellect to work out that the magazines that are going to do best in this time are those that support this brand chain of command. Monocle goes from strength to strength on this model, as Vanity Fair expands across Europe, In the UK, Grazia grows onwards, and The Spectator has increased its sales, according to James Robinson reporting in The Observer, by
strengthening its financial coverage and introducing articles on luxury living, which attract a new set of advertisers.
But let’s begin with Standpoint. Read more
Men’s magazines: the intellectuals
As reported by The Observer on Sunday, today sees the launch of the much anticipated Standpoint, a new monthly magazine with a relatively unambiguous editorial position.
According to its editor, former Telegraph assoicate editor Daniel Johnson, Standpoint will “defend and celebrate Western Civilisation”. In an interview with the New Culture Forum, Johnson says that “I think there is a much larger constituency for a reassertion of western values such as free speech, the dignity of the individual and the rule of law than cynics on the Left or the Right suppose.”
Left and Right
Although he pairs cynics of the Left and Right together, for The Observer Johnson rejects the idea that Standpoint will be only for the Right. This, despite the fact that anticipation has been coming from and heralded from, specifically, the Right (for example). Indeed, Johnson suggests “the world’s changed beyond recognition. The old left/right categories don’t work any more.” As The Observer comments:
That is a familiar argument that has been played out endlessly in recent years, making unlikely allies of American neo-conservatives and European liberals, and it is a discussion that will continue on the pages of Standpoint.
Inside the magazine
So what will be on the pages of Standpoint? Will it deliver politically agnostic intellectual stimulation? Will it steal readers from The Spectator or, even the dwindling leftist magazine, the New Statesman? Johnson suggests writers such as Alain de Botton and Andrew Marr show the magazine reaches out to “anybody with an ounce of intellectual curiosity”. So who and what is in the launch issue? A sample:
- Alain de Botton on faith ["intellectual cotton candy", "a philosphical pub crawl" ]
- Jung Chang and Simon Sebag Montefiore on Mao and Stalin
- new poetry by Robert Conquest [Margaret Thatcher's speechwriter]
- Andrew Marr on the Telegraph cartoonist Matt
- Tim ‘vote UKIP’ Congdon on why we shouldn’t scapegoat the bankers [really?]
- Eton educated Telegraph columnist on Prospect’s 100 top public intellectuals
- Michael Burleigh on the war on terror [Telegraph writer, dislike for all things Islamic]
- Douglas Murray on censorship [author of Neoconservatism: Why We Need It]
- Alasdair Palmer on family courts [Better Rough Justice than another 9/11]
- Emanuele Ottolenghi on how Europe has betrayed Israel [and the Palestinians?]
So, that’s settled then: a balanced world view if ever I saw one.
Final word: will it survive?
Magforum has a great overview of the ‘intellectual’ business/politics market and the likelihood of survival for any new magazines entering the market. For Standpoint, both the ‘left’ and ‘right’ are in general agreement that Standpoint is coming along at the right time–the Cameron’s Conservative renaissance–and timing, as we know, is everything.
Well, not quite everything. What’s more interesting from The Observer article, although only touched on superficially, is the political economy (and economics) of the magazine: how ownership, control and advertising are the drivers of new magazine launches, of course, not the ‘intellectual curiosity’ of the readers. I’ll be looking at this tomorrow in the context of late capitalism’s rise of the luxury brand.
“The walls will fall”: last night’s calamity on C4
“When humans disappeared, sea levels were already on the rise.” This is not, as you might expect, the tale of house owners retreating from Brighton beach because the English Channel is swelling, caused by man-made climate change. This is a tale of the immediate disappearance of the human race (we’re not told why), and the water levels are rising because there are no longer humans to operate the pumps to clear the metro tunnels of ground water, to monitor and maintain the dams; to keep, to be precise, the dangerous forces of nature in check
Last night’s Channel 4 programme on a world without us, Life Without People, was a calamity for serious consideration of the issues facing the planet. The programme, an American documentary with American settings and predominantly American experts, with scenes of an overgrown New York reminiscent of Will Smith’s recent remake of The Omega Man, I Am Legend, showed us what Life would be like without humankind to stop it from getting out of hand. So what did we do? Read more
Development of a story: carbon credits
Good news in a way today, in environment reporting terms at least, that comes about through a story focused on a waste of environmental activity and money.
Bad news first
That is, as John Vidal writes today in the Guardian, billions are being wasted on projects funded through the UN Climate Programme. Following the work of two Stanford academics, Vidal reports:
the UN’s main offset fund [the Clean Development Mechanism] is being routinely abused by chemical, wind, gas and hydro companies who are claiming emission reduction credits for projects that should not qualify. The result is that no genuine pollution cuts are being made, undermining assurances by the UK government and others that carbon markets are dramatically reducing greenhouse gases, the researchers say.
Programmes need to be additional to planned activity or planned CO2 reductions to qualify for this programme. But as the authors of the study, by David Victor and his colleague Michael Wara, found,
nearly every new hydro, wind and natural gas-fired plant expected to be built in China in the next four years is applying for CDM credits, even though it is Chinese policy to encourage these industries. “Traders are finding ways of gaining credits that they would never have had before. You will never know accurately, but rich countries are clearly overpaying by a massive amount,” said Victor.
A silver lining in reporting
The good news is that this story has moved up from its apperance as an opinion piece, last Wednesday, written by International Rivers NGO director Patrick McCully, to today’s front page story. The issue has gained traction in the Guardian newsroom, picked up by Vidal, shifting from specialist to mainstream, and having more chance of pushing the issue–which I began following about six or seven years ago, through my work with OneWorld and then ID21–into public consciousness. It means that there is further opportunity to check the veracity of the story, and make calls to the UN and the UK government, which Vidal does. Both dispute the study by the academics.
Story development to bring about breakthrough issues
Story development is a standard practice in reporting, as is the promoting of certain stories from the specialist sections, e.g. environment, into the mainstream news agenda. Interestingly, for those of us scanning and researching, the opinion headline (’Discredited strategy’, which did not need to be specific about its subject because of appearing in the environment section) has changed to ‘Billions wasted on UN climate programme’, which means the theme is set at the headline level, not within the story. In today’s news consumption practices, this is critical (think RSS feeds, scanning online, and the time poor lunchtime executive).
A piece of research I’ve been reading recently (and writing about a fair bit) by Hargreaves, Lewis and Speers (2003, PDF), clearly identifies the importance of bringing the key themes of climate change out of the domain of science and into the mainstream, where it is more likely to connect with public opinion and public policy. Research from Neil Gavin at the University of Liverpool (to be published) also touches on the subject of the coverage of emissions trading, suggesting, in a different direction, that it is a broader European media issue. And one, I’d argue, it is important for the British intelligent press to champion.
What next?
I hope that Vidal will take the next step and keep quoting the academics, not just the new studies but also the historical research that would help keep the issue (emissions trading specifically, climate change in general) under scrutiny, where it needs to be. And get the story on the front page again when it’s not a bank holiday. A special news investigation on emissions trading impacts?
Climate reporting: good, bad, experimental: 2
Yesterday I looked at an example of bad environment reporting. Janet Raloff’s failure to apply traditional news values in reporting a flawed attack on the IPCC opened up the danger that a ’scanning’ reader of the article, on the US Science News site, could believe the attack had credibilty.
Janet picked up the story from a poorly attended press conference. Which concerned her, but not enough to handle the story in a different way, or not at all. Responding to Nick Davies’ Flat Earth News (which I’ve yet to read… I ordered it for our library, and then some other buggers researchers borrowed it before I got my hands on it), Director of the Science Media Centre Fiona Fox writes a defence of the press conference for getting science stories into the hands of journalists. What does she say? Read more
Climate reporting: good, bad, experimental: 1
A number of posts this week from Fiona Fox, Charlie Beckett and the Knight Science Tracker have gone into the writing of these two linked entries (second one tomorrow). My subject is responsible, well-researched journalism that remains aware of its power to influence its audience. Practice of this journalism is an essential part of tackling climate change.
And Janet Raloff gets it wrong
Picked up by the Knight Science Tracker earlier this week was a story written on Monday for US Science News by Janet Raloff, their science reporter. It’s a great example of the traditional inverted pyramid having value in the news reporting of environment issues.
Raloff attended a poorly attended press conference where Arthur Robinson, co-founder of the Oregon Institute of Science and Medicine in Cave Junction, put forward a spurious, flawed and baseless ‘petition’ of, he claimed, 30,000 scientists who think the IPCC has got it wrong on climate change. The petition has no credibility. The IPCC are right. Anthropogenic CO2 emissions are the main cause of dangerously accelerating climate change. Note that I am not linking to, and therefore validating, Arthur Robinson. Note, also, that I have clearly invalidated his petition. This was not Raloff’s approach: what did she do? Read more
Green capitalism and democracy
The Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) is one of three ‘flexible mechanisms’ that allows signatories of the Kyoto Protocol (all developed countries) to purchase ‘credits’ which they can then ’spend’ by investing in clean energy projects in the developing world.
On April 15th last month, the CDM approved its 1,000th project. Analysis and disclosure of its impacts is of critical importance, argued Patrick McCully in the Guardian on Wednesday, because a system intended to help reduce CO2 is instead supporting polluting and often corrupt programmes to benefit from huge pots of money.
According to McCully,
evidence is accumulating that it is increasing greenhouse gas emissions behind the guise of promoting sustainable development. The misguided mechanism is handing out billions of dollars to chemical, coal and oil corporations and the developers of destructive dams - in many cases for projects they would have built anyway.
Green Capitalism
Sociologists of the Ecological Modernization school would call emissions trading a mechanism of ‘green capitalism’, a paradigm of capitalism where “production processes are increasingly constructed using ecological criteria” (Mol and Sonnenfield, 2000: 4). As referenced by Constance Lever-Tracy in the latest issue of Current Sociology, this school was influenced by Huber’s arguments in the 1980s “that a green capitalism was both possible and desirable” (Lever-Tracy 2008: 458).
But green capitalism is failing the environment. And its mechanisms are receiving limited coverage in the media to help the public to make informed judgements on important environmental issues. Is the paucity of media coverage contributing to a lack of democratically accountability? Read more
Bloggers need awareness of law, ethics
We’re working on a new digital project at Sunderland that will give our students a great outlet to develop their skills online. One of the key issues we’re coming up against, of course, is the liability that we as a journalism department may have as publishers of student work.
A practical benefit of the new digital platform will be to show students, in practice, the requirement of an understanding of media law if they really, really want to work in media. But such an understanding, according to the latest research from global legal services organisation, DLA Piper, is significantly lacking from current internet users and publishers. The research illustrates that: Read more
A change of design
I’ve changed my blog design for the third time, but I feel this one will stick. I wasn’t happy with the centre-column format of the last design, or the black background. This new design, a heavily-modified free Revolution theme from Chicago based designer Brian Gardner, with its wide left-hand column for the main posts and its tidy two right hand columns and easily formatted style.css, is, I feel, far more professional.
In the Social Media module that I teach on at Sunderland University we debate the importance of the ‘brand-of-me’ approach to online reputation via blogs, posts, social media etc.I found Chris Brogan’s entry through a blog search, asking similar questions and turning them into practical advantage as an individual brand (he’s a social media consultant). And so I went back and had a think about what the goal of my blog was. I realised it needed to be far more ‘professional’ than it currently looked. But what did that mean? Read more
