From the obvious attempts of the french connection campaign (fcuk off, too busy to fcuk etc) to recently this "stupid" campaign for DIESEL.
I think brands have been acquiring tunnel vision in "edginess" and focused on outdoing eachother that they are really forgetting about the message they are sending.
Here are some examples of advertising from Diesel's campaign:
and the irony in this one is great:
in effect, Diesel is calling their target market stupid. And if they truly embrace their own message then they are calling themselves stupid. Nothing that really makes me want to buy their products. But nothing I didn't expect from a label that I already thought was stupid.
today I saw this:
and this after they had to recall those gun and sword shaped umbrellas, it seems like their management staff just doesn't want good PR. (http://www.theage.com.au/victoria/police-descend-on-umbrella-gunman-20110517-1er0z.html)
Diesel should buy them
