The new forums will be named Coin Return (based on the most recent vote)! You can check on the status and timeline of the transition to the new forums here.
The Guiding Principles and New Rules document is now in effect.
Advertising gives us nothing
hesthefastest
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
One of the most formative experiences for me was working my first couple of jobs. It was enlightening for me to realize how much work it took to make EVERYTHING. It was also incredibly rewarding to come home at the end of a hard day's work and feel like I'd contributed in some small way to how our society works. It made me appreciate the jobs that every person does, from the lowly janitor on up, and how they fulfill needs.
Yet, when I think about advertising, I see an entire industry designed to CREATE need rather that fulfill it. How far removed is modern advertising from the goal of simply informing the public concerning goods and services? All I see, in all forms of media, is attempts to trick, deceive and play on humanity's weaker nature in order to get more demand for less good.
The prime candidate for my unrelenting anger on this issue is the 'Peer into a soul' ad campaign by the ... company. I dont even know what company does it because they dont say. All the ads show is various people gazing mysteriously back through the television screen at what is presumably the object of our innermost desire, which can be discovered at the mentioned website. (I beg you not to search for this, dont allow yourself to be manipulated) What do these ads do but create a need to discover what is being gazed at and to ultimately waste time searching for what they most likely have to need for?
The point remains that the advertising that we are surrounded by does not do anything for us. It is a deliberate attempt to sway our needs and those of our whole society away from what is best for all towards what is best for some. Needless to say, when I become King, the advertisers will be first against the wall.
Do you agree with my examination of advertising?
Yet, when I think about advertising, I see an entire industry designed to CREATE need rather that fulfill it. How far removed is modern advertising from the goal of simply informing the public concerning goods and services? All I see, in all forms of media, is attempts to trick, deceive and play on humanity's weaker nature in order to get more demand for less good.
The prime candidate for my unrelenting anger on this issue is the 'Peer into a soul' ad campaign by the ... company. I dont even know what company does it because they dont say. All the ads show is various people gazing mysteriously back through the television screen at what is presumably the object of our innermost desire, which can be discovered at the mentioned website. (I beg you not to search for this, dont allow yourself to be manipulated) What do these ads do but create a need to discover what is being gazed at and to ultimately waste time searching for what they most likely have to need for?
The point remains that the advertising that we are surrounded by does not do anything for us. It is a deliberate attempt to sway our needs and those of our whole society away from what is best for all towards what is best for some. Needless to say, when I become King, the advertisers will be first against the wall.
Do you agree with my examination of advertising?
hesthefastest on
0
Posts
And then I felt bad because it's like I was living out a meme.
Santa Clause wasn't red and black until Coca Cola got ahold of him.
The Pepsi Challenge was almost assured of a win, because the Pepsi formula at the time had more sugar so in a single sip taste test it always came out on top.
I can't call it advertising, it's marketing. You are not making your product known because it fills a need. You're making a need and offering a product.
Frito-Lay has hundreds of millions invested in China right now trying to convince them to snack on fatty chips and cracker-snacks, instead of the dry fruit and vegetables that are considered common snack foods.
The biggest offender to my mind are drug companies who give vague notions of happiness had by taking their product, which they can't actually talk about treating any particular illness without being required to then list side-effects in dizzying small print in the same ad.
"Tell your doctor...."
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
Edward Bernays
His tobacco work was in the 20's, not the 60's. Glad I checked, I hadn't read the short in a while.
y'all might be interested in the Gruen Transfer, a show with a semi-critical take on the ad industry in Aus/NZ. It does rather humanise the ad execs on the show, but they're pretty clearly handpicked non-bastards.
Well it does make me feel better to think he'd look mean in green, and never really liking that story.
Coca Cola using the overweight American-style santa doesn't help either; Scandinavian culture has its own view of santa that doesn't have much in common with the commercialized santa apart from a red hat and a beard.
- "Proving once again the deadliest animal of all ... is the Zoo Keeper" - Philip J Fry
Of course not. It's a long list of overbroad generalizations and oversimplifications and failures to grasp the notion that ad companies pay for a lot of shit that the public consumes for free. Do you really think your cable fee covers the cost of Venture Bros., BSG, and all of everything what goes on the teevee? And, honestly, a lot of the internet. The British government certainly didn't fund Futurama.
Edit: Oh and I hear some of you like newspapers? Yeah, you guys want more advertising, otherwise your archaic media dies in the next ten years.
I think advertising is really damaging to our culture. How many classic songs are now associated in your mind with commercial products and companies due to incessantly repeated commercials? It butchers the free association thinking that is needed to properly enjoy art.
Furthermore, all those ad mail flyers and ad pages in magazines add up to a terrible burden on the environment for something so frivolous. I think unsolicited ad mailings should be flat out banned, not just opt-out.
Plus what ViolentChemistry said...I remember when I was a kid I had alot of trouble figuring out how television was free. This was before cable. When you sit down to watch G.I.Joe or whatever, you don't pay anyone anything. Eventually I figure out how commercials work. Without advertising, no TV, no magazines, no newspapers. And, though all those things often suck horribly, they are also hugely important sources of information.
Now, one could easily argue that modern advertising is a pit of despair fueled by the tears of virgins. It promotes unhealthy and unsustainable lifestyles and rampant consumption. But it also promotes competition and innovation, as companies need to work harder to make their products stand out in the marketplace, and this (at least often) leads to better products.
IOS Game Center ID: Isotope-X
Airborne! comes to mind, as do a lot of the creams and self-improvement devices.
Advertising will stop having terrible consequences when we fix corporate capitalism, so....good luck with that.
On at least two different levels. META!
IOS Game Center ID: Isotope-X
We are deep.
But it was interesting to see how much more refined advertising had become since then. Almost every advertisement in the magazine had a tone in it's copy of a stuffy old british man Informing You About The Benefits Of The Product. Advertisements now are much more about instant impressions that you can research later, or were really only concerned about the demographic they were attempting to reach and no one else.
Is it bad that advertisers can tailor a message to me much more directly? Is it beneficial that I can easily spot messages that aren't going to interest me and forget them almost as soon as I'm exposed to them? Is it unnatural that I can spot an ad that's for me because they use a particular typeface? I'm not sure.
I don't believe advertising creates needs, but it certainly plays upon the human capacity for unlimited desires though. You could always look fitter, stronger, happier, younger, wealthier, more care free, more serious, more business-like, more important, sexier, unsexier, whatever. When our basic needs are taken care of, isn't it natural that we start wishing our hair had more volume, or our razors gave a smoother, less irritating shave? I think it is.
Besides, I don't see who is being hurt by the fact I bought that cologne because I was struck by the advertising before I smelt it. Sure, everything about the product appealed to some baser element of who I am. But I think denying my response to these attractive things is unnatural. Who is being hurt when a businesses puts up their hand and says 'we make a product that will make you look more successful. If you're shallow enough to buy in to that, please give us your money'? Me? Them? The ten or twenty or thirty people employed along the chain that led to me being so convinced that I just had to hand over a wad of money for it?
I studied advertising at university and was pretty good at it. :P
but they're listening to every word I say
Advertising also ensures that we have the good stuff on television too.
The crappy reality crap on TV is more of less the result of network execs trying to get the highest possible ratings with the lowest possible cost.
Advertisers aren't who decides what gets watched, man. You are assigning blame in a way that doesn't make sense. And there's also the underlying assumption here that all advertisements are targeting the entire audience of television simultaneously.
Ah yes, the Honda Fitta and its incredibly rapid renaming to the Honda Fit after being informed that "fitta" is Swedish for "pussy". And not of the feline kind.
Fitta's a pretty stupid name, regardless.
Quality and quantity both have a place in my cholesterol encrusted heart.
And? I understand that no one is invulnerable to advertising but at the same time it achieves a certain amount of good such as picking up a good portion of the tab for cable, movies, radio, newspapers, magazines, and the like. The best way to prevent spending mindlessly is to use your rational brain instead of your emotional brain to optimize your dollars.
I'm glad there are advertisements in my newspaper. It keeps the cost of getting one around $1.75 and subscriptions low. On top of that it gives me my grocery store advert so I can take advantage of certain sales at certain stores by making meal plans ahead of time and seeing any other store sales if I'm looking for a deal on a certain product. Advertisement does have some deviate practices but that does not make it an absolute evil.
A key skill that everyone should develop is to filter advertisements and make use of whats available in them. Ignore the rhetoric and ignore their techniques. Don't take what they say at face value. Sometimes you have to ignore the whole thing, but at the same time, like my example above, they can be beneficial.
I don't read through every advertisement, I don't watch every commercial, and I don't click on every banner. I don't believe everything that I am told. Neither should you.
the very landscape of consumerism is determined by marketing. the rational standards by which you evaluate products are created and managed by marketing. it is inescapable. a smart consumer is still a consumer.
No, they will simply continue to not buy things they've never heard of.
Forgive a bit of hyperbole: Nobody really needs a washer or dryer. We got by just fine when the "woman of the house" spent hours each week carefully hand-washing garments -- and clothes lasted longer, too! It was only consumer demand (fueled by advertising and a need to keep up with the Joneses) that brought many appliances into the household, and as women found themselves spending less and less time on housework, they were more and more liberated to, y'know, have careers.
Advertising has created a demand for a lot of things we didn't really "need" at the time (and still don't really "need" today) like personal computers, automobiles, and soap. I'm glad we have all of that stuff, though, and it couldn't have caught on without advertising.
TV, Radio, Websites, Professional Sports, and more.
Penny Arcade, for instance, is probably quite fiscally reliant on advertising.
That said, most of it is a load of hogwash that tries to dumb women down into diamond craving whores and men into slobbering neanderthals. But then again, we do live in a service economy and people have to find ways to make money somehow.
Our first game is now available for free on Google Play: Frontier: Isle of the Seven Gods
This is overly rosy. Advertising often works to subtly (and sometimes humorously overtly) influence people that they need products without justification. Ever seen those "Axe" ads? Plus they consistently reinforce the idea that consumerism is the cultivation of the American dream.
Of course, there is still some pragmatic advertising out there, particularly for entrepreneurs. But in the mass media it's usually a load of crap.
Our first game is now available for free on Google Play: Frontier: Isle of the Seven Gods
Do you enjoy sitting in traffic and paying $Texas$ for gas?
I'll admit, regulation is needed in advertising. I find adds for prescription meds probably the most disturbing...