Rules Creative Taipei creates a fake language to make people face smartphone addiction

Imagine the future communication: If people keep “phubbing” each other, will communication be shorter or easier? Or will people communicate without words or eye contact?

Rules Creative, an independent digital agency based in Taipei, have come up with the answer with a new marketing campaign called Mobilish.

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Mobilish is a fake language created to make people face smartphone addiction. The language is based on the insight that people usually take interjections like “Uh-huh” or “Hmm” as answers while they are busy checking their smartphones. These words are exaggerated as the vowels of Mobilish. The main message of the campaign is that though these words are meaningless, they still hurt. People should pay attention to their words and behaviors when they are on mobiles.

Instead of telling people to put down their smartphones, they created a language center called Mobilish School and designed a whole language system. Aiming to show how effective Mobilish is, they released a commercial with the title: “The longest language school commercial ever”. In a 2 hour long opening, you see a communication predicament where a husband is trying hard to explain his affair but in vain, because of the language he speaks. You can skip the video through a fake “Skip AD” button to see a totally different situation in Mobilish.