‘Dexter’ campaign gets away with murder

It’s not just kids who are freaked out by Showtime’s advertising for Dexter, the program about a forensics expert who moonlights as a serial killer. A new viral campaign is scaring the bejeezus out of plenty of adults. Those with a macabre sense of humor should visit SliceoflifeTV.com, where you can enter a friend’s name and a few other details. Soon enough, the friend gets an e-mail link to a video news report that makes it look like he or she has been targeted by a serial killer. Of course, the most successful virals are often the ones that either humiliate or terrify (see the old Ring Two viral from the U.K.). For the easily gullible, this Dexter effort more than fits the bill, as New York Times ad writer Louise Story found out when she sent it to a few friends and family (some of whom may have stopped speaking to her). The campaign was produced by London-based digital agency Ralph, which happily reports that in the U.K. it “proved so controversial that Ralph received calls of complaint from the public and London’s Scotland Yard Police.”

AdFreak