Here we have a breaking campaign from a giant global company that's struggling to compete in a brutal market. It talks about making "decisions that help us get to the right place at the right time." Out with the old, in with the new. Reinvention. Revving a shiny new engine. But this isn't one of GM's "We're not dead yet!" spots by Deutsch (though there is car footage). No, it's introductory spot by JWT for Microsoft's Bing search engine (sorry, decision engine). Oh, I know the campaigns have vastly different purposes and can't be fairly compared, yadda yadda. It's just the similarity of the images and approach ... big-time drama by way of (mostly) stock footage. The Bing ad uses a snippet of Clockwork Orange-style wide-eyed thought-control footage—you know, where the subject is forced to keep his eyes open as images whip past on screen. That represents the chaotic state of digital information overload. A new search engine (sorry, decision engine) and a bunch of new commercials won't add to that, surely.

—Posted by David Gianatasio