Goldfish ad aims at plastic pollution

Get ready to meet "Kai," a real goldfish that is the centerpiece of a social media-focused ad campaign designed to raise awareness of plastic marine debris. The campaign, on behalf of Project Kaisei, a non-profit ocean cleanup initiative, was created by advertising agency Cohn & Wolfe. The plan? They're putting "Kai" (pronounced KÄ«) in a fish tank filled with plastic trash. Starting today, for the next 30 days, the sponsors will stream live video of the tank on the "Kai's Home" Facebook page. In order to "Save Kai" and remove plastic from his tank, Facebook friends can make donations to the project. As donations increase, plastic debris will be removed. Does this remind anyone else of the iconic National Lampoon cover from January 1973, "If you don't buy this magazine, we'll kill this dog?" "With this campaign we want to help people around the world to understand the impact of plastic pollution in the ocean and rethink our use of materials that end up there as debris," said Doug Woodring, co-founder of Project Kaisei. Cohn & Wolfe prepared the campaign as part of a pro-bono partnership with Project Kaisei -- the goal was to create a project that would cost just $1,000, be orchestrated in 30 days, and raise 10 times that amount to help fund Project Kaisei's next ocean expedition. "This was a creative exercise to push our people's thinking to the outer limits, giving them almost no money or time to design a program that would accomplish something rewarding. Who knew the idea would center on a single goldfish? We know people will donate to help save Kai," said Cohn & Wolfe Chief Creative Catalyst Jeremy Baka.