New Zealand Advertising Standards Authority: Department of Advertising Standards and Regulations Website

The Advertising Standards Authority is New Zealand’s industry body which oversees public complaints into ads.

The only time most industry folk deal with them is when facing complaints about their ads.

The ASA relies on industry support for funding so requested a campaign to counteract negative perceptions.

BC&F invented the fictitious Department of Advertising Standards and Regulations as an example of the governmental alternative to the ASA.

Letters were sent to 150 leading agency figures listing supposed infringements of one of their ads and directing them to dasr.org.nz.

At the website were ten examples of well-known NZ ads and a list of facile complaints about them. i.e. the ad was too long, traffic rules had been infringed, the music used was annoying etc. Have a look, they’re pretty funny.

If anyone went to appeal the fines they were frustrated by a moving button.

Finally a screen appeared informing the viewer of the hoax: The ASA might not be perfect, but it was at least better than the alternative.

So far more people have visited the site that work in the industry and feedback has been great:

http://twitter.com/#!/search/dasr.org.nz