Did I hear that right?

What next? Disney touting parent-free cruises to Amsterdam?

Everyone that has kids wants to limit the iPhone. The fact that Sprint uses the image of a kid playing on a phone to promote their unlimited data plans tells me that they kind of don’t get it. A feeling that is only enhanced when I look at the parental controls they offer. While they do not charge for their suite of controls (props for that), they offer fewer features than the more robust offerings from ATT and Verizon. No time limits, no text budgeting. Sometimes limits are a good thing, or didn’t your parents teach you that, Sprint?

Some of the biggest challenges parents face when putting limits on kids with iPhones have nothing to do with the carrier. Let’s take the kid in the commercial as an example. He’s obviously playing with mom or dad’s (can’t really tell who has their back turned) iPhone 4S. What’s to stop him from crashing around, altering contacts, making international calls, editing documents and shooting a few videos all in an effort to launch Jetpack Joyride?

For many moms and dads, their phones are repositories, or at least gateways, to our most valuable and mission critical information. Yet, sooner or later, we all hand that thing over to the kid. How to keep your digital info safe and the kid occupied in the waiting room of the doctor’s office?

The good news is that there’s an app for that. When launched, Sandbox (from Austin’s own Famigo) creates a kid-safe environment of apps and content that simultaneously keeps the grown-up’s stuff safe.

The bad news is that it’s only available on Droid devices. Some API issue that is way over my head prevents them from offering an iPhone app. Hey, Apple! Free Famigo! (Watch our video profiling their app.)

And as long as we’re dreaming, why not allow the creation of multiple user accounts for each iPhone — the way you can with an iMac? One account could be unrestricted, the other would not screen YouTube, be allowed to change settings, to download inappropriate content, etc.

In the meanwhile, I’ve put all the games my kids can play in one folder. I ask them not to leave that folder without asking me. That keeps them from accidentally altering some essential setting — which they still somehow manage to do. Every time.

What issues have you encountered when handing back your iPhone?

I recently was informed about a new Clorox video that any parent will enjoy and best of all I get the chance to share it with you and potentially win a prize by doing so… But even if I was not in the running for a prize, I would still share this as it is a great commercial and I think you will think so as well… (I could see this one running during the super bowl)… So please come and watch this before September 16 if you can and share the below link with your friends as well, as they will love it also!

To ensure compliance with FTC guidelines, we recommend to all of our partner bloggers that they clearly disclose the arereceiving promotional incentive from Clorox Service Company (“Sponsor”) and Big Fuel Communication, LLC (“Administrator”) for telling moms in their network about  Clorox 2 Mommy Blogger Challenge (“the Promotion”) especially if you include any personal editorial copy other than facts related to the Promotion or the Sponsor or Administrator of the Promotion. 

IRN BRU is pretty much the national drink in Scotland … it seems Scottish babies start early with their Irn Bru habit.

Enjoy,

Stef

Image © Anheuser-Busch, Inc.

If the numbers are true, 106.5 million people in the U.S. watched Super Bowl XLIV this past Sunday, making it the most-watched program in American history. It stands to reason, therefore, that a lot of geeks were among the audience: some watching for the game, some for the ads, and some for both.

There were no epic, brilliant ads like the iconic “1984″ Apple commercial, but there were some memorable bits nonetheless. The ads, at least, were generally more entertaining than The Who were, though someone commented — on Twitter, I think, but I’m not sure — that it was appropriate that The Who were playing at halftime, since they were only half of The Who, anyway.

Without further ado, here are the top ten things we learned from the ads during the Super Bowl:

10. Danica Patrick, despite making a career out of being a woman in what has traditionally been a men-only sport (or activity, depending on your feelings about auto racing), and despite having won a 2008 Kids’ Choice Award and thus obviously being a role model for some kids, has no problem appearing in commercials, airing during an event watched by thousands of kids, in which women are treated like nothing more than sex objects.

9. Universal Orlando’s Wizarding World of Harry Potter looks — pardon the technical term  — freakin’ awesome. It won’t be as great as it looks, of course, unless they have actually figured out how to get brooms to fly. It is also sort of amusing that they would pay a (presumably) exorbitant amount of money to get Daniel Radcliffe to appear in the commercial, and then have him say just one line in about 1.5 seconds of screen time.

8. NBC is desperate enough to rehabilitate Jay Leno’s public image after the recent debacle that they’ll let him be in a commercial for CBS. This was a seriously surprising ad: I’d be willing to bet that nobody who didn’t know about the commercial beforehand thought Leno would be there.

7. Whoever had the bright idea to put two ads back-to-back (one for CareerBuilder.com and one for Dockers) that featured out-of-shape guys (and some women, but mostly guys) not wearing pants (or, in the first one, shirts) deserves to be flogged. Or maybe forced to watch the commercials over and over again until he goes crazy. If I want to see an out-of-shape guy without pants, all I need is a mirror, thank you very much.

6. Tim Burton’s Alice in Wonderland looks freakishly strange and somewhat disturbing. In other words, like virtually every other Tim Burton movie ever. And, is it just me, or does Johnny Depp’s performance as the Mad Hatter look uncomfortably similar to his performance as Willy Wonka?

5. The word “spine” can be used on broadcast TV as a euphemism for the word “balls.”

4. Betty White is awesome. This is not news, but it bears repeating. The only problem I have with the commercial is that I get the feeling that White, despite being 88 years old, would probably have kicked those guys’ butts if the ad hadn’t been scripted otherwise. As fun as it was, especially with Abe Vigoda showing up at the end, I would have liked it better if the Snickers bar had turned one of the guys into Betty White instead of vice-versa.

3. Google’s simpler-is-better design philosophy translates very well to a TV commercial. It’s nice to see they have a sentimental side, and it’s refreshing to see a commercial that tells a story in a memorable way, but without huge-budget effects or celebrities.

2. The folks at Dodge have evidently abandoned all pretense that any guy is going to buy the Charger as anything other than a way to combat perceived emasculation by their significant others.

1. The folks at Anheuser-Busch went to huge lengths and likely spent a ton of money to make a commercial that was a clever parody of Lost. But putting Bud Light cans instead of glass bottles (which aren’t allowed in passenger cabins of airplanes, for obvious reasons) in the beverage cart for the sake of verisimilitude would, evidently, have been too much trouble.

We men took more than our usual bashing during the 60 or so commercials played during SuperBowl Sunday. We deserved some of the mocking but come on already, Madison Avenue. It’s time to give us men a little more credit, don’t you think? Still, I enjoyed the funny ones as much as the next guy. Here’s one of my favorites. Please share you favorites in the comments.

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I just watched this 88-second spot and it really got thru to me…loud and clear. Thanks to Zane Aveton (aka @zaneology on Twitter) for sharing this tonight. I hope it impacts all of you the same way it has for me. What a powerful reminder.

Find more videos like this on AdGabber

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