Screw Nike. Buy Black Spot Sneakers. (Adbusters project)

[AP]

Yesterday I heard an interview with the founder of Adbusters, whish is a great anti-coporate hegemony magazine.

He said that the philosophy of adbusters is that corporations are way to sophisticated to fight with the old techniques -- the ragedy one-sheet and the punk rocker disorganization. They decided that, to fight corporations, you had to use techniques ever bit as sophisticated as the techniques the corporations use to control government and get you to buy things that you don't need. Here's their web site:

http://www.adbusters.org/home/

They have a new project. They said they're sick of asking companies like Nike to be better corporate citizens. So, what they're going to do is simply create products to compete with them and they're going to use the same advertising techniques Nike uses, except they're going to make it cooler to be anti-corporate irresponsibility, and anti-corporate hegemony. The idea is that only taking away markate share is going to get corporations to listen.

These sneakers are being sold right now on pre-order. They're still trying to line up a unionized factory in South Korea, or somewhere like that, to make them.

http://www.blackspotsneaker.org/ (I don't think this link works yet -- it's at the bottom of the page linked above).

I think this is a great idea.

[AP]

1. Here's the black spot/unbrand America ad. Everyone should watch it and...

...cary around a black marker and start unbranding America.

http://www.unbrandamerica.org/tv/

[LittleApple81]

5. good idea. n/t

[LittleApple81]

6. Anybody has any ideas on how you can make this "Kool" thing to do?

Use the "innovators" group to start a trend.
That is what marketers do. We should do it too.

[AP]

7. This would be another good thing to do through meetup.

I've thought about doing something like this. When you go to the supermarket, the carts have little cardboard placards advertising crap. Over the summer, I saw one advertising Fox new on mine. I thought, man, I gotta start carrying around a black magic marker so I can editorialize. I like the black spot idea just as much.

[chadm]

11. I don't think this idea ever caught on

There was a huge push around July 4th to start black-dotting, but I've yet to see one. I don't think people are too excited about vandalizm and the inherent risks. I like the idea, but for some reason I haven't done it.

[AP]

12. They just aired their first commerical on Sep 22nd, and I just heard about

it yesterday, so it seems like it's catching on right now.

[trogdor]

13. I have something you can run off on your printer.

Sorry about the image size. This is from a shopping card ad that I ripped off and scanned.

[AP]

14. I dig it.

[AP]

2. questions? comments? kicks?

???

[FDRrocks]

3. Why South Korea?

And not America?

[AP]

4. There probably aren't any sneaker factories left in America

but, he might have said they were looking in the US, he listed some places they were looking at and I only heard the last one -- S. Korea.

[GregW]

8. Nah - I'm not really into people telling me what or not to buy

It's just so ... fascist.

I like Nike shoes.

They were 'invented' in my home town.

Phil Nike is one of the largest benefactors of our university.

Nike is a major employer in my state.

Sorry I can't sign up to your anti-corporate boycott.

[AP]

9. Hello. America is all about telling you what to buy.

This is the second post today where I've read someone say, "No, I have to buy shit." ("That's how we tell them what we think!" Oh, lord.)

When we're complaining about Republicans, what is at the root of all this is guaranteed profits for corporation which are destroying the world.

You as an Oregonian, would benefit way more from a Nike which is a good corporate citizen which pays progressive tax on their income, and if we had a fairer more competitive economy.

I can't believe a Democrat's common sense stops at criticizing Bush and Iraq and you can't figure out that this is an even more important issue. This is the umbrella issue which sits over every other issue raised on DU.

Furthermore, did you read what this is about? This isn't a boycott. This is forcing Nike to do the right thing. They won't listen to requests to pay fair wages. So Adbusters is selling an alternative sneaker using the same marketing techniques, but, rather than sell something that is a cancer on society, they're going to sell the antidote to the cancer.

It's not about boycotting. It's about choice. And if you walked into an independant retailer and bought a Black Spot sneaker from an Oregon small businessperson, you'd be doing more for Oregon then you'd do by contributing to Nike's bottom line, which then goes to buying off Republican legislators who reward Nike with legislation that protects their hegemony and their profits from competition and hurts you.

Man, I guess the consumer culture, big business protection racket has warped people's critical facilities even more than I thought.

[bpilgrim]

15. many folks are new to these 'radical' ideas ;-)

remember were we live, now... so be gentle ;->

well said :toast:

peace

[stickdog]

16. Dam interesting take.

:eyes:

[chadm]

10. If anybody has never seen a copy of Adbusters magazine...

I'd HIGHLY recommend it. Even with the steep $7 price tag, it's money well spent. Because there are no advertisements, you have hours and hours of absolutely intelligent and mind-blowing entertainment.