Yesterday I took a GE Star Trek ad to task for not noticing that the drilling rig technology they were advertising not only wouldn’t help the Enterprise through the crisis we’re watching it go through in the ad, but worse, the plot of the Star Trek movie from 2009 had a villainous Romulan almost destroy Earth with a drilling rig, which makes me think of the GE drilling rig more in terms of destroying the Earth than energy production. But I suppose they could say: “Okay, smarty pants, how would you make a Star Trek GE ad?” And I’d say: “Like this:”
The Star Trek Enterprise is in a battle for its life with an enemy ship, and as is usual, they begin to lose power to their shields and phasers. But this time Scotty isn’t panicking, so Captain Kirk says, over the comm: “Scotty, We’re losing power! How come you’re not saying you’re ‘giving it all she’s got’, and ‘she can’t take much more of this’, and so forth, like you usually do?” And so Scotty says: “I’m not worried because we just installed some GE backup generators, and I’m about to start them up!” And so Scotty starts up the GE generators, and the Enterprise is at full power and beyond, and they blast the enemy ship, disabling it, and the Enterprise warps out of there to safety. And then, after the fight, Captain Kirk visits Scotty in Engineering, and he says: “Thanks, Scotty: You got us out of a close shave again!” And Scotty says: “Don’t thank me, thank GE: It was their generators that saved us!” And then the announcer says: “The power you need at warp speed, from the powerful machines of GE!”
Now, in this case, the GE machinery would actually help the Enterprise out of the crisis we’re watching, and without any mixed message distractions like thinking about destroying the Earth, which is kind of a problem in an ad for energy technology. (Or at least I think so.)
(BTW: I know I am not advertising the same thing in this proposed spot as the original GE Star Trek ad, but that is by design. Because after all, why would GE even want people to know that they are involved in oil drilling anyway? I would think it would be better to keep everyone in the dark about that end of their business, wouldn’t you? Fossil fuels are not nearly so hip as they used to be, especially with global warming and such. So why not skirt that issue completely in the GE energy ads, and only address products people will like?)
(BTW: I know I am not advertising the same thing in this proposed spot as the original GE Star Trek ad, but that is by design. Because after all, why would GE even want people to know that they are involved in oil drilling anyway? I would think it would be better to keep everyone in the dark about that end of their business, wouldn’t you? Fossil fuels are not nearly so hip as they used to be, especially with global warming and such. So why not skirt that issue completely in the GE energy ads, and only address products people will like?)
