Yesterday, Audi Xiaoman advertisement was accused of plagiarism and was denounced by the whole network. It was only one day that more netizens plagiarized the car. In August 2021, BMW released the advertisement "liangcang x new BMW 8 series", which was pointed out by netizens that it was suspected of plagiarizing a song from singer Sohn's album "Rennen" on January 13, 2017, called "hard liquor". It can be seen from the picture that the tone and composition are almost one-to-one. Coincidentally, the director of the advertisement is the same person as the Audi "Xiaoman" advertisement.
Video screenshot of the comparison between liangcang x new BMW 8 series advertising film and foreign MV. In addition, an advertisement of Honda was also accused of stealing the experience of others. The heroine in the advertisement sat in front of the camera and told her business story, but the real party said that the advertisement stole her experience and original words, "feeling that life was stolen". On the morning of May 23, the company concerned issued a public apology letter to apologize to Ms. Ning yuan and her team.
This case after case shows that the "wind of reference" in the advertising industry has been quite common. In the past, people were used to novel plagiarism and film and television drama plagiarism. With the efforts of the whole society for many years, some people won the lawsuit, some people were expelled from the industry, and people gathered a consensus against plagiarism.
However, advertising plagiarism has become a new topic of public opinion. I'm afraid people don't fully understand the "independent value" of advertising. Is this an independent original work or a part of enterprise publicity? Is this a creation with personal style or a task to meet the needs of Party A? From the current situation, many people's views are probably biased towards the latter.
For example, after the Audi "Xiaoman" video swiped the screen, there was a very interesting scene: the director and copywriter of the advertisement shared their creative experience on the social platform, were content with the presentation effect of the work, and did not realize that it was plagiarism. This reflects a kind of subconsciousness: it is good to complete the task and achieve the effect. It is not so important to strictly abide by the creative norms of the work.
The advertising industry (including Party A) does not pay enough attention to originality, copywriting, mirror operation, composition and other original elements, which is also a footnote to our understanding of similar events. An online blogger disclosed on the Internet that a major brand once asked him to write a 200 word copy to "summarize his family's investment and research system and style for brand, channel, recruitment and other occasions", and gave him 2000 yuan of royalties. He cried and laughed: "the annual management fee alone is more than 300 million. Such an important copy only wants to spend 2000."
In fact, it is not just car companies. The popularity of "reference" in the advertising field is reflected in many places. Today, with the rising awareness of intellectual property rights, people can't tolerate plagiarism, even instrumental advertising. This is a great alarm for the advertising industry. The reckless reference and even plagiarism in the past will no longer work. It will not only be claimed by Party A, but also suffer a huge rebound in public opinion, and will also suffer a reputation earthquake in the industry.
Brands and advertisers should re straighten out business logic and business norms, and can no longer despise the creative elements in advertising design. Advertising is a commercial accessory, but we should also abide by the basic creative norms and pay attention to the original value. These are the bottom line.
At the same time, the protection of advertising works also needs careful combing and keeping pace with the times at the level of the rule of law. At least from the recent cases, it suggests a lot of ideas, such as short video copywriting, the explanation logic of public knowledge, the personal experience of the parties, how to protect and how to judge plagiarism, which has a lot of room for discussion. These need to have legal implementation standards, not just stay in the "one case, one discussion" of public opinion exposure.
In addition, we should also find ways to lower the threshold of safeguarding rights. Judging from the judicial process of plagiarism cases, it often takes a long time. This is not a small threshold for advertising rights protection. For example, it takes a lot of trouble to fight a lawsuit just for a poster. The cost and income do not match, which undoubtedly reduces the willingness to protect rights. These institutional improvements should also be brought into the field of vision as soon as possible.
In short, the copyright awareness of the whole society has reached today's water level, and the relevant parties can no longer indulge the plagiarism of advertising. The so-called "reference" must not become a "trade rule".