Tuesday, May 13, 2008

What the pop papers say redux

Here's a further curiosity from this week's NME: a full-page advert for Loaded. Fair enough, they're sister publications, you might think. But what's odd is that the advert solely promotes this month's Loaded giveaway - what the advert calls "World's funniest fridge magnets."

If you go and look at Loaded in the shops, though, the fridge magnets are clearly described as "pornalike" magnets - drawn from Loaded's long-running feature where readers send in photos for flick-mags that look like famous people.

What we're trying to understand is why the NME advert doesn't mention that this is what the magnets are. Does IPC think it's inappropriate for the NME audience to print the word "pornalike" in the magazine? But if so, why is it okay for the words to appear on the front of Loaded, being displayed in Tesco for all passing boy scouts, church wardens and strict teetotalers to see? More to the point, if the word "pornalike" is considered inappropriate for the NME readership, why are you advertising the fridge magnets to them in the first place? And if you know that the content of the gift is going to be offensive to some people, shouldn't you mention that in the advert, rather than not?


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