Ram's ad features a speech Paul Harvey made to the Future Farmers of America in 1978, just like an earlier video made by Farms.com.
Ram's Keep Plowing site clearly links to Farms.com, although neither mentions the original video.
Getting lost in the hubbub is the fact that Ram and their agency, The Richards Group, have a nice social component about donating a million dollars to the FFA.@silvercuellar3 Curious. Does the fact that the video's maker is featured on the Ram site make you feel any better at all? #rememberwhazzup?
— John January (@americopywriter) February 4, 2013
RT @amyealtman: I am proud to support @nationalffa. Share your badge to donate. #KeepPlowing 2013 — Year of the Farmer ramtrucks.com/keepplowing— National FFA (@nationalffa) February 4, 2013
Watch our new commercial " The Year of the Farmer" to help @ramtrucks raise money for @nationalffa. #KeepPlowing bit.ly/VDUvIk
— RamTrucks (@RamTrucks) February 4, 2013
#YearOfTheFarmer Watch & share to help raise money for @nationalffa bit.ly/WjPUro #KeepPlowing @ramtrucks
— The Richards Group (@RichardsGroup) February 4, 2013
Could they have done a better job anticipating and reacting to the charges of plagiarism? Sure. Should they have called out the original on their site? Maybe. But did they actually do anything wrong? I don't think so.
If you want to dig a bit deeper, there's a good recap of the scandal as it unfolded at adland.tv.
@slate, FYI ... @ramtrucks partnered with @farmsmedia, go to ramtrucks.com/keepplowing it's not a rip, it's keeping the idea alive. @chrysler
— Ryan Nagode (@RNagode) February 4, 2013
It's also worth noting that The Farms.com video is not the only other time Paul Harvey's speech has been put to a slideshow.
"Happy Monday, everyone. I would like to introduce Meganloberg1 as our new ECD." youtube.com/watch?v=j3GtXA…
— Tim Geoghegan (@timogeo) February 4, 2013
An idea doesn't have to original for an execution to be great.
I still think it was the best Super Bowl spot this year.
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