Media Blog #3: More is better?

 

In this commercial for AT&T, the obvious message they want to get across is that "More is better." It starts off with the little girl explaining to the man why "more is better." She goes on rambling why more is better, and it honestly isn't getting to the point at all. Once she is done, that's when the commercial simply says "It's not complicated. More is better." You really wouldn't know it's an AT&T commercial until they add in the very last bit at the end talking about AT&T.

This commercial did not particularly appeal to me. The little girl's rambling on why more is better in a way makes sense, but after a while it just sounds like a bunch of nonsense. The little girl rambles on for a good 15 seconds, and you start to lose the point she is trying to make as she continues to ramble on. That is very common with little kids though. They don't exactly know how to express themselves, so they often just have little bursts of words or they ramble on. However, the cuteness of the little girl did attract my attention, and that brings us the to appeal "Need for attention."

Whenever I see a little kid, my attention is grabbed because a little kid is usually cuter than a normal adult. Even if the girl was rambling on and on,I still find her little voice to be cute and the face of the little girl is just adorable. Another part of the "need for attention" is her outfit. The little girl is dressed in a dress with a sweater over it, tights underneath, and some cute little flats. All the other kids however, are just dressed in a normal shirt and pants. She has the typical little girl outfit on, and our attention is drawn to her. I am always just particularly drawn to AT&T commercials because I like to see what technique they are going to use to get a simple point across.

The last thing I want to comment on about this commercial is the phrase they use: "It's not complicated. More is better." This uses the advertising technique "weasel words" and "simple solutions." The weasel word is "more." AT&T is saying that "more is better", but more what? You have nothing to compare more to in the commercial. They are just saying that AT&T has the nation's largest 4G network, but how we can not even prove that just by watching this commercial. Also, is more always better? Not necessarily. Also, what exactly does better mean in the commercial. Usually you should have something else to compare something to in order to say it is better. This is also an example of simple solutions because after the  little girl made the word "more" so complicated, they go on to say that it's not complicated, and more is better. The commercial just leaves it at that and it is the only solution. In reality though, more is not always better, and it could become complicated.

Overall, I did not particularly like the commercial very much, but it is still quite effective. I think in general, people love to hear all these weasel words, such as more and better. The little girl is very cute in the video, and helps with the point AT&T is trying to make, which is "More is better." however, there is nothing else to compare AT&T to though, so you are basically just accepting everything the commercial says without any credibility. The commercial is very good in attracting the attention of the audience, but I am not sure if it would be a positive effect for all people.