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I don’t have the answers, but it’s evolving, quickly, and education is a great starting point. As in the original, the creatures are still stealing socks and annoying Canadian pets. "We found pockets of communities all over the country — from all kinds of different age groups as well, and different backgrounds — who were still reminiscing about the hippo," said MediaSmarts executive director Kathryn Ann Hill.
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Two decades ago, the Concerned Children's Advertisers created a fake infomercial about the fictional critters in order to raise awareness about the importance of media literacy. In 1999, the Canadian House Hippo ad captured the hearts of viewers with its clever message about critical thinking and media literacy. The House Hippo may not have been real, but the science behind the commercials was very real. The House Hippo commercials were created using a technique called forced perspective, which is a visual illusion that makes objects appear larger or smaller than they actually are.
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But what happens when it feels like we live in an age where everything is like the house hippo? Misinformation is running rampant online, and with the advancements of AI, images and text can be faked. The one minute long commercial, which was the subject of a television public service announcement, was produced in the style of Hinterland Who’s Who, the Canadian educational series that ran in the 1960s and 1970s. It describes the House Hippo as being found across Canada and in parts of the eastern United States, while showing the creature in a typical Canadian home.
The Impact of the House Hippo on Canadian Culture
They’re small creatures - only about the size of a hamster, and chances most Canadians have one living in their household and don’t even know it. They’re nocturnal and make their nests in bedroom closets using lost mittens, dryer lint, bits of string and anything soft really, as they sleep around 16 hours a day. The commercial was created in order to educate children about critical thinking, to teach them not to accept everything that they see on television and to question what they see. Hill believes that the house hippo still resonates with most Canadians today — and in some ways, the hippo's message has never been so relevant. "I think Malcolm [Roberts] said, 'How about a tiny animal that lives in your house?'" Dempsey told Freshdaily.
House hippos remind us to check the facts
"He had a young son at the time and thought it might be kind of magical." The Canadian house hippo commercial has gained a cult following over the years, with thousands of people across the country still paying tribute to the mythical house pet that appeared on our screens in 1999. "We might be wondering why we're using so much data overnight when we're in bed sleeping and it turns out that hippos, like us, love to use our devices at night and play games, surf the net, check things out online," said Hill. The new ad is part of a media literacy campaign called Break the Fake.
The North American house hippo is back — and ready to tackle fake news
The House Hippo also became a beloved icon of Canadian culture, with many people still fondly remembering the commercials today. The House Hippo has been referenced in popular culture, and it has even inspired fan art and merchandise. The House Hippo is a reminder of a simpler time in Canadian culture and a symbol of the power of creativity and responsible advertising.
Two teams, one from New Jersey, and one from Montreal met on a beautiful spring day in New Jersey in 1946 to open their baseball season... "It was a labour of love to get it made for almost nothing, and we loved it personally, but we had no idea it would be so beloved." It is a priority for CBC to create products that are accessible to all in Canada including people with visual, hearing, motor and cognitive challenges. "It's playful and it's cute and magical. And I think it speaks to the children in all of us."
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Having open conversations with our kids about what everyone is seeing online can help, but it’s not just our children who are being duped. We need to be mindful of what we consume and the sources of our information. And while the house hippo is a good reminder not to trust everything we see, we also need to learn – and to teach our kids – how to identify information that is true and sources that can be trusted. "There's misinformation, false information, accusations of fake news that may be true or not true," said Hill. "And so we think the house hippo is more important than ever, and that's why we brought them back."
The House Hippo has also inspired TikToks, it has a page on Urban Dictionary and there is even a band called House Hippo that honours the animal that we all loved, and all hoped was real enough to find in our own homes. The House Hippo commercials first aired in 1999 and were an instant hit. The commercials featured footage of real hippos, which were then edited to make them appear tiny enough to fit in a Canadian home. In the late 1990s, a strange and adorable creature made its way into Canadian homes through a series of television commercials. The creature was the Canadian House Hippo, a tiny hippopotamus that lived in the walls and under the furniture of Canadian homes. The House Hippo was meant to be a reminder to children that not everything they saw on television was real, and that they should always question what they see.
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Non-members can add the privileges at checkout through our 30 day free trial, cancellable at anytime. In February, my kids and I got to experience the Los Angeles Zoo’s new behind the scenes Hippo Encounter. Here we got some of our most pequilar questions about hippopotamuses answered by the hippo’s care takers and staff.
The message was simple - don't believe everything you see on television. MediaSmarts is launching the campaign ahead of Media Literacy Week (October 7-11), a national event that includes over a 100 media literacy activities across Canada. Canadians will also have access to free Break the Fake resources including a workshop, tip sheets, educational videos, lesson plans for teachers and more, for use during Media Literacy Week and beyond.
"I have not met a single person who knows the house hippo and who isn't thrilled about it," she said. "The hippo was just the funniest animal we could think of, and yet somehow the most plausible. A giraffe or moose just seemed too fake somehow." Well, it was a mash-up of Canadian wildlife commercials and a lightning bolt moment, according to Siobhan Dempsey, one of the writers behind the original PSA. The house hippo came back in 2019, thanks to MediaSmarts, and even recently showed up as the star of an April Fools’ Day joke along with the Canadian Museum of Nature.
"Manipulating content has existed since media was created," she said. "What's different for us now is the volume and speed. We just have to post something online." Hill added that Canadians always get excited when she brings up the house hippo. Hill credits Canadians' fascination with the house hippo to a mixture of childhood nostalgia and an ongoing obsession with cute, miniature things (hello, teacup pigs).
As Canadians enjoy unprecedented access to information through our internet-connected devices, Hill believes the need for media literacy is more essential than ever. But as technology has evolved since 1999, so too has the house hippo. A zoo in Japan has confirmed that a hippopotamus thought for seven years to be a he is, in fact, a she. If you’re curious and want to learn more about this domestic night dweller, you can watch this video for more information. The North American House Hippo is officially listed as being “found across Canada and the Northeastern United States”, though it’s a well known fact that they primarily live up here in the True North.
The House Hippo also had a significant impact on the advertising industry. The commercials were praised for their creativity and effectiveness, and they won numerous awards, including a Gold Lion at the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity. The House Hippo set a new standard for responsible advertising to children and inspired other organizations to create similar campaigns.
"It didn't receive a ton of attention at the time, it didn't win industry accolades and it didn't make us famous. It's only now that the kids who saw that ad are online and in advertising that we're getting the impact of it." All of it pays homage to the original public broadcast, which shows the sweet little hippo scavenging for crumbs of peanut butter toast and running away from a house cat. It was amazing to watch that as the caretaker grabbed a handful of veggies, the mama hippo opened her mouth wide to receive the food. They are incredibly shy, so unless they’re really craving PB toast crumbs, or you’re up in the middle of the night, you’ll likely go your whole life without ever seeing one. They are generally pretty timid, but they will protect themselves if provoked by you pet cat or dog, or whatever else is lurking in your house at night.
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