Ashley Madison tries to win back users with first-ever TV commercials

Like a cheating lover begging for forgiveness, infidelity-themed dating service Ashley Madison is trying to win back people's hearts with a new ad campaign.

The site, previously billed as a way to coordinate extramarital affairs, became infamous last summer when a massive hack revealed personal information belonging to 32 million of its users.

Since then, the company and its owner, Avid Life Media (which just renamed itself 'Ruby' in an attempt to sound more feminine), have shuffled in new executives and dialed down the service's blunt, devil-on-your-shoulder brand -- its infamous tagline, "Life's short. Have an affair," is long gone -- with an eye on a fresh start.

"It's going to take a lot of work," Ruby CEO Rob Segal told Mashable. "This is the start of a journey. We feel like we're setting the right tone here, but we're hoping to build trust in the long-term."

The new look is debuting to the public in a series of television commercials -- the brand's first-ever -- set to air this week.

The three minute-long spots show people gazing longingly and flirtatiously at one other in a hotel, a subway and -- in one titled "Polyamory" -- in the presence of another partner. A gentle indie rock soundtrack attempts to set the scene for a seemingly mellower version of the fevered trysts the company once trafficked in.

But in case you couldn't tell from that last ad, Ashley Madison's identity as a refuge for cheaters hasn't been lost in all the rebranding and corporate rejiggering.

When asked whether the site still encourages infidelity, neither Segal nor Ruby's new president, James Millership, denied that it did. Instead, they talked at length about "open-minded experiences" and "exploring moments" -- a much more public relations-friendly, positive way to talk about cheating and open relationships.

There are some other big differences between the overhauled site and its wilder former self. It now wants to try harder to advertise to women, who have always been heavily outnumbered on the site. And, of course, the company can't stress enough how much stronger its new security regimen is.

But even aside from the lingering notoriety of the brand, the headaches from last year's scandal aren't over for Ashley Madison. In the face of a probe from the Federal Trade Commission, the company admitted last week that it had used so-called "fem-bots," which posed as real women in an attempt to offset the site's five-to-one male-female ratio. The company claims the practice was ended late last year.

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