The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) has reportedly received a complaint against Honda's new Speed Reading commercial creator Weiden & Kennedy London. The ad called 'keep up' first appeared on television way back in February and as per new directive from Advertising Standards Authority, it must not be shown again in its current form.
The ASA noted, “While the ad did not include realistic depictions of the vehicles being driven in a dangerous manner, we considered, when taken altogether, the fast changing on-screen text, references to "pushing yourself" and "going faster", the scenes of the cars, sound effects and accompanying sound track was likely to leave viewers with the impression that speed was the central message of the ad.”
As per Honda, the commercial was aimed to inspire people to push their perceived limitations via the speed-reading technique. However, ASA noted that viewers were unlikely to interpret the fast changing text changing speed as a speed-reading challenge. The primary idea behind the ban has been that speed must not be the main message of the commercial.
