I have many friends who work in the advertising industry. Individually, these are bright, funny, engaging and thoughtful people -- they'd have to be; they wouldn't be my friends otherwise.
That's individually. Collectively, they (and, it must be said, the journalists who cover them) are stupider than a fucking box of hair.
17 comments:
Hmm...stupider than a fucking box of hair...
Might make a good Mac vs. Windows spot.
Funny... When I clicked on that link, that article's page had a pop-up ad, which my pop-up blocker dutifully nixed and then informed me of it's having done so!
BSWG: I told my popup blocker not even to bother telling me....
EOTM: Avoid ads, the nerve Yeah, but it's just part of the media cartel's basic sense of entitlement. "We control the horizontal...". Since advertising is their own livelihood, they can't deal with the idea that some people don't want to be subjected to their "creativity" 24/7. They probably think that without their efforts, everybody would starve for lack of being told what to eat, freeze for not knowing what to wear, etc. ad nauseum.
Since advertising is their own livelihood, they can't deal with the idea that some people don't want to be subjected to their "creativity" 24/7.
Yeah, let's not forget these are the people who regularly get together and give each other awards for thinking up new ways to shove the Coca-Cola brand onto the gas-pump -- not the pump itself, mind you, but the part at the end of the hose that you stick in your car. What's the over/under on how long before they beam ads onto the surface of the moon with lasers?
Oh, forgot to mention -- product placements in TV ads! Notice those yet? I saw a spot not long ago, somebody building himself a new Nissan Fuckwagon online, and the computer he's using is a shiny new iMac. That's creative!
Some ads create 'avoiders.' Here's a study I would like to see: How often do people flip channels when confronted with an annoying, embarrassing, noisy or otherwise revolting ad? I mean, I'll sit through some just because I'm too lazy to pick up the remote, but there are others that are so off-puting that I would do almost anything to escape (one omnipresent, loudmouthed local car dealer comes particularly to mind). If I was buying ad time, I would insist that my ad never follow one of those. Who's left watching?
Go out drinking sometime with the copywriters and art directors. They would totally agree with you, Jeddie. They're the coolest people. Well, the good ones are, anyway.
It's the Account Execs and Teh Clients who muck it all up! It is! I swear!
I swear by it so much that I'd like to put that sentiment in the middle of a big, huge, ugly process yellow starburst at the top of the next bad ad I'm forced to do because a client thought he/she was as better writer. With Larry Tate standing there saying, Oh! Good idea! You're so brilliant!
Sorry, I'm rambing. It's 10:30 and I'm over here working ON ADVERTISING!
I'm dying! Dying, I tell ya.
:)
"Is this easy? No."
Well, duh.
They've left out an entire class, I'm thinking we should call them The Destroyers. They use applications that block ALL ads from their browsers, they TIVO their television programming and skip the ads, change the radio station when the local Toyota spokesperson starts yelling about Factory-to-Dealer Incentives, etc. These people go out of their way to remove advertising from their "content." How can we bombard these Destroyers more effectively?
uumjbf: The initial sound of protest, immediately and effectively muzzled by having "information" crammed down the throat.
Sunny Jim greets all Neddie bloggers and goes over the top with his solution for annoying ads: CANCEL the damn cable subscription! Throw open the window and tell the world: I'm TIRED as hell and I'm not going to take any more! Out the door goes the old man and his vacuum cleaners. Good riddance and never again to the screwfaces with the kitchen knives and the real estate kits. The overcaffeinated dork with the 'alternative' medicine books gets a kick in the ass as he's shown the door. And a sweet deliverance (Yes, Jesus!) from those goddamned TV preachers, one after the other, and their infomercials for Christ. Never again to darken!
Creative people in the business get all wet over a chance to do an ad for an insurance company or golf ball manufacturer that might appear on the Superbowl. It's sad, because they see this expenditure of talent as somehow personally worthwhile. All we can do is hope the copywriters and art directors wake up some day and say, "hey, I could be using my brain to make art -- or to do some other entertaining and/or worthwhile thing."
ack! i've been profiled!
What most companies think of as branding,
we users think of as wasting our time
and maybe as insulting our intelligence.
David Weinberger
"Get Over It!"
_Darwin_Magazine_, March 2001
I've worked in corp. comm rather than advertising, but the cycle is the same:
1) Pitch to client: "Look at all the message types out there: A,B,C...N. You need to hire us to do X!!! to cut through the clutter."
[Five years pass.]
2) Pitch to client: Look at A,B,C...X. You need Y!!! and Z!!! to cut through the clutter."
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Oh good God. I am an "ad-avoider." I thought all this time that I could fly under the radar- muting the TV when the commercials come on, but NO, they're on to me!! Now I keep looking over my shoulder, expecting to see someone tattooing a Pepsi logo on my ass while whistling the Enzyte Natural Male Enhancement jingle.
Talk about burying the lede...The way I read this, 85% of the 17-35s are cool with seeing lots of advertising. Eighty-five percent.
Jesus, Mary and Joseph, has the Earth passed through a comet's tail made of stupid gas? How did this number get so high?
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