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L.A. billboard owners squash 'Land of the Lost' anti-smoking ads  

But what the New York Times' Brooks Barnes reveals online today is that L.A. billboard owners, already enormously unpopular for shamelessly installing an ever-growing assortment of hideous video billboards, refused to accept ads from the AMAA publicly calling out the studio for its on-screen promotion of smoking. The AMAA had previously announced that the studio "found to be the biggest smoking offender would be publicly shamed on nearby billboards." But when the AMAA went to buy billboard space, every local billboard vendor refused to sell.

According to the AMAA, the billboard vendors, who take in a huge amount of revenue from (surprise!) movie industry advertising, weren't going to let their favorite clients be embarrassed in such a public way from an anti-smoking organization. It's yet another black eye for L.A., which has allowed billboard pollution to run rampant without even putting up a fight.

But let me give the last word to AMAA President Nancy Kyler, who says: "It's a sad day when movie studios can promote smoking to youth, but public health advocates cannot find a billboard in the whole city of Los Angeles that will run an ad to alert the public about the problem."

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• ‘Land of the Lost’ Haunts Universal in Unexpected Way  

"Land of the Lost" is the gift that just keeps on taking for Universal Pictures.

The American Medical Association Alliance, a volunteer arm of the powerful health organization that focuses on family issues, on Friday released its scorecard for the depiction of smoking in mass-appeal summer movies. Universal was the biggest offender because of "Land of the Lost," the big-budget failure that helped cost the co-chairmen of the studio their jobs this month.

The alliance said it counted 18 shots of Will Ferrell smoking a pipe in the movie, resulting in about 124 million tobacco impressions. (The industry generally calculates an "impression" by multiplying the number of incidences by the film's total gross, then dividing by the average ticket price.)

" 'Land of the Lost' wasn't just a flop at the box office, it was also a real loser for public health," said Nancy Kyler, president of the American Medical Association Alliance.

The group did not name the second- and third-place offenders. A Universal spokeswoman declined to comment.

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Tobacco Industry Marketing at Point of Purchase After the 1998 MSA Billboard Advertising Ban  

In conclusion, evidence suggests that point-of-purchase advertising and promotions have increased since implementation of the MSA billboard tobacco advertising ban. These increases, at least in part, are likely to have resulted from the shifting of resources once spent on billboard advertising to other marketing efforts. As a result of this shift, the intended effect of the billboard advertising ban may not be realized, because overall exposure to advertising and promotions may not be reduced. Further research is needed to examine the impact of the billboard ban and other MSA restrictions on tobacco company marketing strategies and on youth and adult smoking.

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Dear President Obama 

Dear President Obama,

As a former smoker I completely understand the difficulty of quitting smoking. Now that you are the Commander in Chief we need to be assured that you are and will remain in perfect health, not only for the country but also your family and ultimately yourself. There is a new way with The Safe Cig. We have helped over 4000 people start living a healthier lifestyle in the last 60 days since we have launched our retail locations. Throughout the last year you have given our country hope and today we want to give you hope with The Safe Cig.

President Obama we challenge you to try a free starter kit and start living a healthier lifestyle with The Safe Cig. All you have to do is tell your staff to contact us and we will gladly mail or even drive the starter kit out to you. We will keep pushing you either until you try a starter kit or completely quit smoking on your own. We are doing this because we care about this wonderful country of ours and its new leader.

And by the way President Obama..."Yes You Can"

All the best from our family!!!

Billboard Located on I95 in the heart of Philadelphia near the Eagles Football Stadium

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The Smoking Camel Man New York 1964 

Some old 8mm footage of the famous Camel Billboard in New York

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• Anti-smoking billboards draw fire 

As a debate rages in Cheyenne over statewide smoke-free legislation, opponents are questioning the timing of a state-sponsored billboard campaign targeting second-hand smoke.

Top Department of Health officials, meanwhile, insist that the billboard campaign and an accompanying print advertising blitz are appropriate, and were not purposely timed to influence the vote.

"This is part of our mission is to educate the public on the dangers of tobacco use and second-hand smoke," said Department of Health Deputy Director Roger McDaniel.

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• Geographical Information Systems as a Tool for Monitoring Tobacco Industry Advertising 

Background: Although the use of Geographical Information Systems (GIS) approach is usually applied to epidemiological disease outbreaks and environmental exposure mapping, it has significant potential as a tobacco control research tool in monitoring POP tobacco advertising. . . .

Results: The GIS approach identified 133 POP and 44 billboards within 300m of the school gates of Heraklion schools. On average 13 POP (range: 4 - 21) and 4.4 billboards (range: 1 - 9) were located per school, and all had at least one POP within 20m of the school gate. On average 9 ± 6 tobacco advertisements per POP (range: 0 - 25) were noted, and 80% of them were below child’s height. The GIS protocol identified that kiosks, that were excepted from the Greek ban on tobacco advertising, in comparison to other POP were found not only to be closer and visible from the school gates (44.1% vs. 10.8%, p<0.001) but were also found to have more external advertisements (8 ± 5 vs. 5 ± 3, p<0.001).

Conclusions: This study demonstrates the effectiveness of a GIS system in monitoring tobacco industry advertising on a large population based scale and implies its use as a standardised method for monitoring tobacco industry strategies and tobacco control efforts.

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• Remembering Ron Davis 

Ronald Davis, MD, aged 52, passed away on 6 November 2008 after a courageous 10-month battle with pancreatic cancer. Ron’s star shone very brightly, albeit too briefly in the medical community. . . .

At the world conference in Perth in April 1990, Ron convened a meeting of 25 leaders in tobacco control, from a variety of countries, where the concept for a new scientific journal devoted solely to tobacco control was hatched.1 Ron and others helped pitch the idea to the British Medical Journal Publishing Group which accepted the concept idea and later appointed Ron as the founding editor of Tobacco Control: an International Journal. Ron served as the editor of Tobacco Control between 1992 and 1998. . . .

During his career, Ron served as an expert witness to Congress on public health issues and in litigation against the tobacco industry. His encyclopaedic mind made him a perfect editor and spokesperson on medical and public health issues. Ron had the ability to recall virtually everything in tobacco control, often producing obscure forgotten facts and papers that would perfectly frame an issue. As just one example of Ron’s uncanny ability to illuminate the obvious before the rest of us had seen it, he conducted a study to test whether people could read the warnings on tobacco advertisements shown on billboards littering the highway.4 Of course, they couldn’t as they were speeding by, which only helped to illustrate the stupidity of the government policy that permitted tobacco companies to advertise on billboards. We will surely miss his insight and vision. . . .

Ron’s legacy is much deeper than can ever be expressed in the many prestigious awards that chronicle his career accomplishments. As one of his many friends noted, Ron, in Buddhist terminology was a bodhisattva, an enlightened being who sacrificed his own ultimate nirvana for the benefits of others. Ron’s legacy is the example he set for all of us to follow through the strength of his character, impeccable integrity, graciousness and style, and his dedication to serve his fellow man.

On behalf of all whose lives you’ve touched, Ron, all we can say is we love you, and we thank you for allowing us to share your life’s journey. It’s been a privilege. You graced this earth.

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'Love China' ads slammed  

SHANGHAI - CHINA'S love-hate relationship with tobacco is flaring up in Shanghai, where local lawmakers are considering banning patriotic billboards advertising cigarettes.

The billboards, carrying the expression 'Love China', are a play on one variation of the word China in Chinese, 'Chunghwa', which is also the name of a top cigarette brand made by Shanghai Tobacco (Group).

The Chinese characters for both are identical.

The scarlet 'Love China' billboards and posters feature a gleaming golden picture of Beijing's historic Tiananmen Gate, the entrance to the Forbidden City, but no images of cigarettes.

They also carry the warning: 'Smoking can damage your health' - signaling that the slogan refers both to China and to the cigarette brand.

The topic cropped up last week during the annual session of the local legislature, when some lawmakers proposed that the billboards be banned, the state-run newspaper Shanghai Daily and other reports said.

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LETTER: Are billboards useful or a blight on vistas? 

As I drive, I observe billboards with anti-smoking messages, anti-drug messages, political messages, religious messages and public-interest messages. Even billboards advertising restaurants and hotels are usually much more informative and helpful than the useless state signs telling you that the next exit has the inevitable McDonalds.

Your concern with keeping the state pristine seems to be misplaced.

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Antismoking ad replaced / Some say billboard promoted tobacco 

"We had a handful of people who complained about them," said Geralyn Lasher, spokeswoman for the state Department of Community Health, which sponsored the ads. . . The ad, one of five designed for the antismoking campaign that began in April, featured a youngster with a cigarette jutting jauntily from his lips.

Above him, the billboard reads: "Your little brother thinks everything you do is cool." Below him are the words: "Smoking stinks."

The ad was targeted at 9- to 14-year-olds and played very well with them when tested, Lasher said.

But some callers said the ads appeared to be promoting smoking, not attacking it.

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Missouri, Illinois Use Old Tobacco Billboards for Anti-Smoking Ads 

The latest attention-grabbers to pop up on U.S. Highway 40, Interstate 44 and other main roads in the St. Louis area show a stylishly drawn couple who have sneaked off to a corner at a party.

"Mind if I smoke?" the man asks.

"Care if I die?" the woman responds.

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ZORN: State's Anti-smoking Billboards Become The Butt Of Jokes 

"When you get your message wrong, you become a laughingstock among the audience you really need to reach," said Peter Zollo, president of Teenage Research Unlimited, a Northbrook firm that studied the effectiveness of anti-smoking campaigns in four states.

Zollo said campaigns like "Butts are gross," and "It looks just as stupid . . ." are effective only with grammar school students, who are still in the uncritical "parroting" stage when it comes to lifestyle lessons. . . That the approach is childish is not surprising given that the designs were the winners of a statewide competition among children grades 4 through 6. . . Never mind butts. Frittering away a real opportunity to attack this deadly problem--and not spending a significant chunk of the state's tobacco settlement on the fight in the coming years--now that would be gross.

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O'NEILL: Youths may miss 'Butts' message 

It's been a long time since I was a 13-year-old boy, but I'm guessing I'd be more intrigued than repulsed by a teen-ager wearing an oversized cigarette butt on his noggin, as "Butt Head" does.

Ditto for the freaky chick with the horn rims that is "Butt Ugly," and the pair of choppers clenching a cancer stick in "Butt Munch." As for the two ads supposedly dramatizing the real dangers of smoking -- a cigarette transformed into a bullet, and another combined with a syringe -- I think the operative adolescent response would be "cool!" . . Maybe this is why the tobacco companies caved, taking down all their billboards this spring. Some genius in Richmond or Winston-Salem must have realized that any mention of cigarettes, in any context, can't hurt.

We should have saved the 200 Gs and left the damned signs blank.

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Anti-smoking billboards win mixed reviews 

Davey said the billboards play on teens' desire to belong, and criticism has been limited to just one phone call and a handful of letters to the attorney general's office. . . One of the critical letters came from Joyce Lee, chairwoman of the executive committee of the Child and Family Health Consortium of Cuyahoga County. Lee said she thinks the ads' creators could have taken a lesson from cigarette makers.

``Tobacco companies don't have a negative approach,'' she said. ``They make using their product seem popular, sexy.''

She said the ads tell teens they're losers and ``teens have enough problems without calling them losers.''

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