Adobe’s B.S.

Full-page ad from Adobe Document Cloud in the business section of today’s New York Times:

 

“THIS IS BULL SHEET.” Note that bull is slightly obscured by the folds in the paper.

 

“Bull sheet” is defined in the small type as “tedious paperwork”; sheet is meant to be a punning reference to paper. The clenched fists provide the emotional backstory.

As I’ve noted many times over the last few years, advertisers have lately been embracing near-profanity with the zeal of 9-year-olds who have just learned their first dirty joke. (See “F-Plus,” “Half-Fast, Whole F-Word,” “Reflexive Fun,” and other posts in my Profanity category.) What’s unusual about the Adobe ad is the business-to-business angle: ads in the business section usually favor buzzwords over swear words.

“Bull sheet” is the third of three sequential full-page Adobe ads in today’s Times. The other two avoid double entendres but compensate with double exclamation points:

“INITIAL THIS!!”

 

“JAM IT!! JAM IT!! JAM IT!!”

 

None of this fury carries over to the Adobe Document Cloud website, which is all about technology’s favorite trope: changing the world.

 

“Hello, Document Cloud.”

 

But I hold out hope for a series of Adobe Document Cloud TV spots. In a perfect world, they’d feature Isiah Whitlock as Clay Davis from “The Wire.”