To prevent kids from purchasing cigarettes at automated vending machines, the techno-geniuses in Japan are rolling out machines with face recognition technology, which aims to age verify a buyer to make sure he's of age. To circumvent the technology, kids who want to purchase cigarettes at automated vending machines can simply hold up a photo of someone that's of age. [PT]
How does a tobacco company – which gets hated on even by its own clients – attempt to convince America, and its lawmakers, that legislation currently moving through Congress is bad news? With a very carefully constructed ad campaign.
Should your elected officials vote for the bill in front of them, Congress and the Senate would empower the Food and Drug Administration to regulate the tobacco industry.
THIS IS BAD!, screams Camel brand owner Reynolds. The FDA is already overwhelmed with tasks, and it barely can perform the functions it's currently charged with, goes the argument. What if their responsibility to keep heart medication from ruining your liver and ground beef from making you go crazy person were sidelined by their needless desire to keep cigarettes as legally lethal as possible?
So Reynolds has an ad campaign going, on TV and in print, targeting Washington lawmakers. (Interestingly, rival Phillip Morris is fine with the legislation; with the FDA involved, it'll be the government's fault if you die!)
So is it working? Congressman G. K. Butterfield, the congressman from Reynolds' home state of North Carolina, has been a target of the ads.
So far, his office has received two calls.
Editorial Director
