Marketing In A Good Cause

I talked a while back about how marketing can sometimes cross the line and become illegal, as in astroturfing or when you litter the sidewalks with sticky fliers. On the opposite side, sometimes marketing can do some good in the world, as in this case where McCann Erickson is trying to help lower the suicide rate in Serbia. Serbia's got a huge suicide problem, so for their Suicide Prevention Office McCann set up this projector underneath Serbia's highest bridge. It projects the phrase "You are not alone" and the suicide prevention number on the water; you can only see the projection when you are looking down from the bridge.

Very targeted advertising in a good cause. I hope it works; it would be nice to hear in a few months whether the suicide rate has dropped.

If only we had some examples of games marketed to help people. Sure, there are more and more games aimed at education, and some even aimed at fighting cancer. I'm afraid, though, that the standard game marketing in the videogame console business tends to appeal to the lowest common denominators. It assumes, for one thing, that their target audience is male teenagers (of all ages, I guess) with overactive hormones. Perhaps it's true, but it would be nice to see more efforts that presume some intelligence and discernment on the part of the audience.

I guess that would requires games that do the same...