Originality is an effectiveness issue

Every now and again you hear about how some famous piece of advertising or marketing work has actually been directly 'inspired' (or copied) from something else that previously existed. Notable recent examples include Honda's 'cog', Sony 'bunnies', the road safety basketball one and that Aero one with skateboarders in the swimming pool. In fact it is now the fun game du j0ur to see if people can spot the artistic or cultural references that spawned the commercial.

It is particularly important to creatives, the people paid, and are often under pressure to develop ideas, who prize the creation of something totally new so highly. Somehow, to be directly influenced by something that has gone before is cheating. However we are here to make money, not art and the end point of the journey is not the glittering diamond we release onto a virgin and untrammelled world, it is a change in the business fortunes of our clients, ultimately (dare I say it) sales.That is not to say by any means that originality isn't  important in the development of creative ideas. To create a difference between you and the competition, as David Ogilvy put it - “the burr of singularity” is vital. We humans delight in the novel, think on the truism that you and I are basically living inside the bodies of cavemen, we are always looking for the colour of a tasty new fruit, or the red flash of danger in the forest. The sea of green blends into the background. To create something new and different screams to our psyche, and that is why we as marketing people need to do it.

Bill Bernbach agreed,  “In communications, familiarity breeds apathy”

So while I agree that distinctiveness is vital (the Trifecta of Ogilvy, Bernbach and Law cannot be disputed), it is not necessarily that case that total originality is required, simply rather that the majority of the people you are exposing the work to consider it to be different enough to warrant attention.

Now we live in a recombinant age, but as pedants the world over write, was it ever thus. John Webster was well know for taking inspiration from situations in the street, other art work or references in culture. Who cares? William Shakespeare nicked all sorts of things including the whole idea of a number of his stories, as well as passages, characters from the classics and contemporaries. They used to have a name for it, it was called the renaissance. It is worthwile noting that there has never been a successful court case for plagiarism in advertising in the UK, and that is because, contrary to popular belief, copyright does NOT extend to ideas. Copyright applies to a tangible work, not to the idea behind it, so if you use a similar idea, but execute it in a different way (ie. Not a direct remake), no copyright infringement exists.

The point is not that there is nothing original any more, it is that whether it is completely original or not is not important.. The important question is whether the majority of the target audience will consider it to be a novel stimulus, if they do, it is original enough, and we should then content ourselves with evaluating is the work itself effective at its stated aim. Stat.