NEW MEDIA: SPOTLIGHT ON VODKA - Do TV viewers care enough to interact with the advertising? Clare Conley reports on the latest brand-building idea: narrative interactive TV ads.(Brief Article)

Vodka can get you emotional. This may not come as a big surprise to anyone who has had one Seabreeze too many and discovered how much they like that work colleague they'd always hated so much in the sober light of day.

In this instance, though, it's the spirit of charity which Publicis hopes to move using its new Video on Demand Kind of Advertising (VODKA). Viewers will be able to choose the narrative ending of an ad using their remote control in what the agency claims is a global first. And the idea is that dictating the storyline will lead to closer emotional engagement.

The ad, for the homelessness charity Depaul Trust, will be aired during Inspector Morse in the Granada region on 16 August.

After the first ten seconds of the two-minute ad, subscribers to Kingston Interactive Television (KIT) will have the opportunity to choose between four different narratives showing the choices facing a homeless boy. A default ad will run for the remaining Granada viewers and all the ads end by cutting back to the first scene to show that all those routes lead back to the same place.

In another first in advertising, viewers can simply press a button at the end of the ad to make a pounds 10 donation, which will be added on to their monthly KIT bill using the same payment system as pay-per-view films.

Publicis will create banner ads to run as teasers on the front page of KIT's broadband video-on-demand (VOD) service, which airs films, music videos and TV programmes. The ad will be available via a dedicated website and CD-Rom too.

Jon Williams, the creative director of Publicis Networks, has spent two years developing the VODKA technique.