Line #17 BlandNameProduct/Literature


1	!!By Author:
2	* Creator/ChristopherBrookmyre's IntrepidReporter Jack Parlabane works for the Scottish broadsheet ''The Saltire'', and its sister paper ''Saltire on Sunday'', which are clearly ''The Scotsman'' and ''Scotland on Sunday''.
3	* One of Creator/HarryTurtledove's AlternateHistory series has the most popular soft drink in the Confederate States of America being "Doctor Hopper". Also the popular Confederate comic book "Hyperman." In both cases, characters occasionally think about the "Damnyankee drink/hero with a similar name."
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5	!!By Title:
6	* {{Lampshade\|Hanging}}d to an extent in ''Film/TwoThousandOneASpaceOdyssey'' and its many sequels. HAL's designer patently denies any relation between the computer and Creator/{{IBM}} - whose initials are all one letter after H-A-L.
7	** WordOfGod states that had he realized the connection, he would have changed HAL's name, as IBM helped them make the film.
8	** Whereas other product placement is depicted quite normally, although many of the then-contemporary companies had ceased to exist by 2001. There still isn't a "Creator/{{BBC}} 13", though.
9	* In ''[[Literature/AboutTheBnaiBagels About the B'nai Bagels]]'', protagonist Mark keeps a copy of a ''Magazine/{{Playboy}}''-like magazine under his mattress called ''Playgirl''. Another boy's mother actually gets him a subscription. Later editions changed it to ''Playboy''. (The book and ''Playgirl'' magazine were first published the same year, 1973; E.L. Konigsberg had no way of knowing that a real magazine of that name would exist.) [[note]] Pre-1973, "Playgirl" is an obvious veiled reference to a well-known girlie magazine and hiding one under your bed says something about you. ''Post''-1973, "Playgirl" is an obvious reference to the actual magazine of that name, and hiding one under your bed says something ''considerably different'' about you. (''Playgirl'' features naked men, as opposed to ''Playboy'''s naked women.) [[/note]]
10	* In ''Literature/TheBalancedSword'', one character has a "[=LumiTainment=] Portable" gaming device, with a game called "[[VideoGame/ChronoTrigger Chrono Victory]]".
11	* Zig-zagged in the Australian children's book ''Literature/BarebumBilly'', where the ending shows an adult Billy Bottom and his wife Millie watching a video of his childhood naked antics on a website called "[=YouNude=]" rather than "[=YouTube=]", but also mentions Time Magazine and other social media sites such as Facebook, Twitter and [=TikTok=] by their actual names.
12	* In ''Literature/TheBerenstainBears'', a popular handheld video game device among cubs is the Game Bear.
13	* The comic strip depicting the "snake in the fur coat" UL in ''The Big Book of Urban Legends'' takes place at J-Mart.
14	* Creator/NealStephenson's ''Literature/{{Cryptonomicon}}'' features the heroes using a Platform/{{UNIX}}-like operating system developed in Finland, called... "Finux". Supposedly, this is because Neal knew a lot about the inner workings of Linux, but wanted to have a little bit more freedom on what was possible. This book also features the Electric Till Company (ETC) instead of NCR (National Cash Register).
15	* In a book in the children's series ''Literature/DiaryOfAWimpyKid'', the kids in the narrator, Greg's, school love to read the ''Spinetinglers'' series of children's horror books. That horror series is clearly a fictional copy of the ''Literature/{{Goosebumps}}'' series. The Swedish translation of ''Diary of a Wimpy Kid'' doesn't bother with this trope, though, and instead uses the actual, official title of the ''Goosebumps'' books. (To be clear: The Swedish text translates the phrase "Spinetinglers" into "Kalla Kårar", which is what the ''Goosebumps'' book series is called in Swedish.)
16	* ''The ComicStrip/{{Dilbert}} Principle'' tells advertisers to take advantage of their customers' stupidity to confuse competitors' products with their own "[[ShoddyKnockoffProduct eerily similar but much worse]]" products. The suggested product names include "Honduh Accord," "Porch 911," and "Popsi Cola."
17	* Most Literature/{{Discworld}} businesses have names that don't directly suggest any specific Roundworld counterpart, or do so very obliquely, but [[Creator/TerryPratchett Sir Terry]] sometimes used this for throwaway references, if he just needed to convey "the Discworld counterpart to..." quickly. For instance, in ''Literature/{{Thud}}'', the ingredients of a Screaming Orgasm include Almonte and Wahlulu, standing in for Amaretto and Khalua.
18	* ''Literature/DorkDiaries'' has "Tic Toc Breath Mints", a brand of [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin breath mints]] which show up in a few illustrations. It's unusual for the series to do this though as they usually don't have a problem using the names of real-life brands and companies.
19	* ''Literature/{{Dracula}}'' has the ''Dailygraph'' newspaper (''Daily Telegraph'') and Kingstead Cemetary (Highgate Cemetary, near Hampstead).
20	* John Collier's ''Evening Primrose'' takes place at Bracey's, but also mentions actual department stores like Wanamaker's and Bloomingdale's.
21	* ''Literature/GoodOmens'' gave us the "Burger Lord" chain.
22	* ''The Daily Prophet'' of ''Literature/HarryPotter'' is totally not the [[UsefulNotes/BritishNewspapers Daily Mail]]. [[BlatantLies Totally not.]]
23	* ''Literature/{{Horrorstor}}'' is based around ghosts in a BlandNameProduct version of IKEA. IKEA actually also exists in the book, and it's commented on that even ''they'' think the rip-off is awful.
24	* ''Literature/IJedi'': When the dual-phase modification on his lightsaber fails, Corran discovers the diamond he'd used for it was, in fact, a synthetic "Kubaz xurconia" that couldn't hold up under the strain of being a lightsaber focusing crystal.
25	* ''Literature/TheKaneChronicles'': In the graphic novel of ''The Red Pyramid'', Khufu eats "[=HappyOs=]," which was probably done because they actually show the box, whereas the original book merely mentions "Cheerios." The box, though, looks almost exactly like a regular box of Cheerios, right down to the stylized "G" that is the General Mills logo.
26	* Creator/IsaacAsimov's ''Literature/KidStuff'': Jan Prentiss submits stories to ''Farfetched Fantasy Fiction'' rather than ''Magazine/BeyondFantasyFiction'' (which is where this story first appeared).
27	* In "The Man Who Sold the Moon" by Creator/RobertAHeinlein, the title character at one point takes advantage of a rivalry between soft drink manufacturers "Moka-Coka" and "6+".
28	* Don't be surprised if you start seeing shoddy ripoff of every popular brand ever known while visiting the neurologically parallel universe of ''Literature/{{MARZENA}}''. A parallel universe where Picosoft and Axar merged to form Spartan Soft, and where Gogool is actually spelled correctly.
29	* Creator/IsabelAllende's ''Literature/MemoriesOfTheEagleAndTheJaguar'', including the stories ''City of the Beasts'' and ''The Kingdom of the Golden Dragon'', center around trips a teenage boy takes with his aunt, an intrepid correspondent for the noted magazine... International Geographic.
30	* ''Literature/ModernVillainess'' has Lehthan Sisters, for Lehman Brothers.
31	* The story ''Literature/{{Parallels}}'' by Creator/JenniHill in the Literature/SherlockHolmes AU collection ''[[Literature/TwoHundredAndTwentyOneBakerStreets Two Hundred and Twenty-One Baker Streets]]'' is about a teenage girl who writes AU Johnlock stories (yes, it's very meta). One of them is a crossover with the space opera ''[[Franchise/StarTrek Star Force]]'', in which Sherlock is a member of the famously logical Hephaestan race, and the villains are Krangons. ''Star Force'' is confirmed as a real show in-universe later, with a reference to [[Film/StarTrek2009 the new movies with all the lens-flare]].
32	* In the novel ''The Perfectionists'' by Sara Shepard, there's a brief scene where Caitlin's boyfriend Josh invites her out for a bite at "Dirk's", a local burger joint. Given that the story is set in UsefulNotes/{{Seattle}}, this is likely WritingAroundTrademarks to Dick's Drive-In. This is particularly jarring, as other local Seattle businesses get mentioned (including Caffe Vita, a brewery).
33	* In ''Literature/TheScumVillainsSelfSavingSystemRenZhaFanpaiZijiuXitong'', ''Proud Immortal Demon Way'' is serialized on a website called Zhongdian Literature. This is a spoof of [[http://www.qidian.com/ Qidian]], one of China's major WebSerialNovel hosts. For those who are not familiar with Chinese, "Qidian" means "starting point," and "Zhongdian" means "finishing point."
34	* In the ''Literature/ShadowOps'' book ''Fortress Frontier'', the search engine/free email site ''Yippee.com'' is used as a contact point for some of the protagonists.
35	* Creator/ScottWesterfeld's novel ''Literature/SoYesterday'' not only censors out brandnames with asterisks but, as the entire plot deals with consumer culture, {{lampshade\|Hanging}}s it by having characters refer to a certain brand as "the client" and the {{narrator}} explaining exactly why.
36	* One of the images from ''Literature/SpectralShadows'' features Vicki Anderson drinking a soft drink described as "Cozi Cola." In addition, there's the main Operating System in Serial 11, "Doors", and the virtual reality game [[Videogame/SecondLife "Another Life"]].
37	* ''Literature/AStudyInCharlotte'': The email addresses end with @dmail.com, an obvious stand-in for Google Mail.
38	* In the ''Literature/TommyAndTuppence'' collection ''Literature/PartnersInCrime'', the couple sometimes have dinner at the Blitz Hotel, standing in for the Ritz.
39	* In ''[[Literature/{{Touch 2017}} Touch]],'' the card game that James and his friends play isn't named, though WordOfGod jokes that it's called ''[[TabletopGame/MagicTheGathering Gather: The Magicking]].'' There's also the anime ''Spacefighter X,'' which (based on the space politics) seems to be based on ''Franchise/{{Gundam}}'' and its imitators.
40	* ''Literature/TheUltraViolets'' is full of these, such as ''Smashface,'' the premiere social networking site, ''Furi,'' Cheri's helpful voiced assistant, built into her phone, and Iris's tablet, the ''iCan.''
41	* In ''Literature/VoidMoon'', Cassie Black robs a room at an Egyptian-themed Las Vegas casino called the Cleopatra. It's an obvious stand-in for the RealLife Luxor.
42	* Paul Quarrington's novel ''Literature/WhaleMusic'' has an unusual example involving a real brand name but a fake product; main character Desmond Howl owns a powerful synthesizer/sequencer called the Yamaha 666 that stands in for the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fairlight_CMI Fairlight]] or the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synclavier Synclavier]]; in real life, the Yamaha 666 was a model of ''French horn''.
43	* Creator/PaulCornell's ''Literature/WildCards'' short stories "[[https://www.tor.com/2013/05/29/the-elephant-in-the-room/ The Elephant in the Room]]" and "[[https://www.wildcardsworld.com/i-have-no-voice-and-i-must-zoom-meeting/ I Have No Voice and I Must Zoom Meeting]]" mention a fast food restaurant called White Palace and an audio drama company called [[Creator/BigFinish Best Fiction]] respectively.
44	* ''Zombies For Zombies'' has dozens, such as [=PutriSystem=].

Context BlandNameProduct / Literature