Screamer: Difference between revisions

Before the emergence of screamer videos, several public service announcements were broadcasted with the intention of shocking viewers with disturbing imagery to raise awareness about various issues. One early example is the Faroe Islands (WDC) PSA which depicted the slaughter of dolphins by islanders. In addition to public service announcements, screamers were also utilized as a means of advertising. However, the use of screamers in advertising is not without controversy. While some argue that it is an effective means of capturing the viewer's attention. Perhaps the most well-known example of advertising screamers is the controversial "Wide Awake" campaign launched in April 2005 by the German beverage company [[K-fee]]. The campaign consisted of nine 20-second television commercials that portrayed peaceful scenes which were abruptly interrupted by the appearance of a zombie or a gargoyle screaming at the camera, followed by the company's slogan and product. The advertisements were criticized for being uncommercial and upsetting, with many viewers complaining to K-fee, which subsequently took the commercials off the air. Although it is rumoured that a warning message was displayed before the advertisement was played, this has not been proven. The K-Fee Car commercial was featured on several TV shows, including ''[[Wikipedia:The Tonight Show with Jay Leno|The Tonight Show with Jay Leno]]'', K-Fee's official website, Tarrant on TV, and [[America's Funniest Home Videos]]. The "Auto" commercial was uploaded to [[YouTube]] with the name of "Ghost Car" which gained 38 million views since its upload.<ref><nowiki>https://www.denofgeek.com/culture/forgotten-era-of-internet-jump-scares/</nowiki></ref> [[Count The Snow Bunnies|Count the Snow Bunnies]] was also aired and uses the sample of where the viewer search for something.

Various other types of screamers involve staring at a dot or finding the difference between two pictures. One notable example is the 2001 screamer called "[[What's Wrong With This Picture?]]" or simply "What's Wrong?" The screamer, which pretends to be a still image, begins with a normal stock photo of a dining room and asks the viewer to find something wrong with it. After 30 seconds, the image suddenly changes to an eyeless woman with a wide open mouth putting her hands around the side of her face, accompanied by a loud scream. This screamer gained significant popularity and was even featured in ''[[wikipedia:The New York Times|The New York Times]]'' on April 22, 2002. The creator of the animation, Jaybill, stated that he made the screamer "exclusively for the purpose of scaring my girlfriend."<ref>https://www.nytimes.com/2002/04/22/business/compressed-data-why-is-this-room-so-popular-shh-you-re-about-to-find-out.html?searchResultPosition=1</ref> The screamer also inspired the "[[When you see it|When you see it, you will shitbrix]]" memes where it pretends to be an image (which is a .gif itself) before an animated image appears on the screen.<ref>https://web.archive.org/web/20101016212629/http://www.urlesque.com/2010/10/13/screamers-the-history-of-the-scary-maze-prank/</ref>