I must have seen more television in the past two months than I have in the two years before. I haven’t missed much. The ads are the best bit.
The Garnier fairness cream made me recall something I saw in China but didn’t remember to write about in the travelogue. The Chinese buy fairness creams too. As usual, the language gap prevented me from finding out details, but it was interesting to see that the Chinese beauty ideal also places a premium on fair skin.
It’s especially interesting because China was never colonised by the British to the extent that India was, so the usual explanation of the preference for fair skin being a colonial hangover doesn’t hold that much water.
Perhaps human beings actually do have an innate, genetic preference for fair skin, for whatever reason. Of course it is not logical, but sexual selection does not have to be.
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Moving on, curly haired woomaans in the Slice and Sony Ericsson ads strongly are, so much so that they make me drop back into IIMB lingo. Is it the same girl in both the ads?
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The Tata Mutual Fund which you should pick because it has “a hedging function for maximising returns and minimising risks” is a remarkable piece of financial gobbledegook. Because, after all, only Tata’s mutual fund will try to maximise returns or minimise risks.
Secondly, how the hell does it do both? Risk and return are proportional. You can maximise returns while fixing risk, or minimise returns while fixing risk, but you have to accept a tradeoff somewhere.
And finally, how, oh how, does a hedging function maximise returns? A hedge is done specifically to fix risk at an acceptable level. Returns don’t enter the picture.
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Finally, the Frankfinn ad is one of the worst made ones I have had the privelege of seeing. Despite that, it is remarkable for another reason. It is the first ad I have ever seen which pitches a product as an alternative to marriage instead of as an aid to it. In remarkable opposition to stuff like Fair and Lovely and LIC.
You are serious about the Tata ad ? Haven’t seen that one.
I have seen the Tata Mutal Fund ad, it sounds silly. I think they are targetting the segment which doesn’t ask such intelligent questions.
You can maximise returns while fixing risk, or minimise returns while fixing risk, but you have to accept a tradeoff somewhere.
So this is the uncertainty principle of the financial world, then?