Advertising is a cancer on society, just 'cause it's sometimes nice to look at doesn't really change that. IMHO of course.
I truly don't understand the idea of praising a commercial that exists solely to sell you something we could probably, reasonably, be making and selling a lot less of. We only keep going "because growth". When's enough? This is gross.
Edit: And after watching the video, it's extra jarring to me to feel the warm fuzzies it gives you, and then realize, "It's not asking me to be a good person or do something that's gonna match the feeling this commercial is giving me, it just wants me to buy something it's gonna want me to replace eventually". Ick. Get the fuck out of my emotions like that.
Commercials are interesting as they are a way to support artists financially. Many artists make a living in commercials while also getting a chance to exercise a creative profession.
Conceptually it isn't that much different than church commissions during the Renaissance.
It’s a pattern I’ve noticed with Americans, this bundling up art with the capitalism. Commercial/Ad work can be a lot of fun and a good living for any artist, but it’s just not fucking art. It’s such a cringey pattern - that somehow makes commercial work into chivalrous patronage.
That being said - cool ad! Fun to make and probably good money! Would love to work on something like that! But. Not. Art.
My spouse is doing artwork for a beer company right now and she would throw the chair at me like in that Orange Country TV Show meme if I tried to insinuate that this is her “art”. It’s not art it’s artwork, it’s labor, it’s a job, it’s for a boss.
This is where the ick is from - nice artwork can be commissioned, can be labor intensive and require talent. But it’s not truly the distillation of the artists process that art is.
Any arbiter of the arts will find that these handy guidelines readily facilitate the elimination and/or downsizing of unnecessary galleries and other non-art collections.
See, that’s the thing about this POV that the term “art” is placed on some sort of pedestal and then all the other forms are then compared against it. “How dare you say [other thing requiring effort] is not art!”
Art !== artwork
An element of art is that it functions for its own relationship between artist-work and maybe somewhat the viewer or participant. It’s neither better or worse, it’s just something separate from all of those ideologies. It just is, they just make it. They place it in museums so we don’t have to bump into each others’ egos.
I will reiterate my belief: it’s foolish to wrap up art with corporate, religious or institutional patronage.
On the music side, we'd have to dismiss The Beatles, Bach, Mozart, and probably most of the greatest composers and musicians of all time.
They are doing marketing to get me to buy things. You are doing marketing to get me to NOT buy something.
The iPhone enabled everyone to see consumer buying cycles in that most people don't go buy the 11-12-13-14-15-16, they go 11-16 and 13-17 and the like. It's the same with all products. Most people don't buy every single new model, unless they are an enthusiast, in which case who are you to say what someone's hobbies are?
If that were all it is, there wouldn't be much problem.
Marketing is also creating a demand where there wasn't one before and exploiting psychological weaknesses to prompt actions not necessarily in a person's best interest.
"exploiting psychological weaknesses to prompt actions not necessarily in a person's best interest" This is any sort of communication with malintent.
He's talking about a couple million roadside billboards, ads on busses, ads in TV services you pay for, drug companies spending more on advertising than R&D, political machines driven by 24 hours news cycles that are funded from ragebait, social media companies that have us literally addicted to our screens due to their advertising-based revenue models. It goes on... ad infinitum indeed.
It's a fucking cancer and it truly is the root of so many of our problems and we are running out of time to start thinking clearly about the damage the industrial advertising complex causes.
I hate to say "go touch grass" because it sounds condescending. But please, go outside and have some fun! The dumb billboard isn't stopping that.
See, I'd contend that the business models and businesses enabled by advertising, and the combined social impact of ads plus those business models very much are one of the world's top problems.
I'd be curious to see this Top 100 list.
>Advertising might be annoying, but not even on the top 100 list of major world problems.
Hard disagree. Advertising, in some form, is likely the root or primary facilitator of probably 25 or more of those top 100.
>because it sounds condescending.
Your comment is condescending, yes.
Billboards, on the other hand, are awful as your eyes are drawn to it as you drive down the freeway.
ps i also hate ads and attention economy.
(In general, it's a good rule of thumb to assume that the widespread existence of something suggests there's a reason for it, and to be inquisitive as to what that reason might be.)
When I want to know what kind of neat electronics I can play with my raspberry Pi, I don't sit around and wait for Youtube to show me ads, I browse the fucking store.
When my dad wanted to start a pressure washing business in the early 2000s, he didn't wait for an ad on the radio, or see a billboard, he ordered a catalog from some pressure washing companies and browsed their offerings at his leisure
In the 60s, if you ran a electronics lab, and you needed a new instrument to calibrate your new atomic clock, you would order an HP catalog and flip through their offerings, which included a basic description, a picture sometimes, and some specs.
Notably, the old way primarily required you to start from a point of dissatisfaction, intentionally seek out information, and purchase a solution to an actual problem you have.
The current days, advertising is all about convincing us with evolutionary brain tricks that we actually have so many problems. I'm tired of it.
If adverts were for my benefit I would be able to choose them, rather than have to block them.
> People are taking the piss out of you everyday. They butt into your life, take a cheap shot at you and then disappear. They leer at you from tall buildings and make you feel small. They make flippant comments from buses that imply you’re not sexy enough and that all the fun is happening somewhere else. They are on TV making your girlfriend feel inadequate. They have access to the most sophisticated technology the world has ever seen and they bully you with it. They are The Advertisers and they are laughing at you. (…)
https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/461383-people-are-taking-th...
I'm perfectly fine doing that without 2005 Sony Bravia advertisement tyvm.
Is it that you don't want an interruption? Because for the information to be out there, someone had to pay for it and at some point, it was pushed on someone who didn't care.
I don't think I understand how any sort of commerce or awareness happens without advertising.
What I object to is the practice of tricking people into wanting things they otherwise felt no desire for by putting advertisements for them in places they will be seen while the victim is trying to do something else. Billboards are a blight, radio and TV ads are an intrusion, web banners are a nuisance. I filter them all out of my life as hard as I can, because I don't want people getting into my head and making me desire things I don't need. Ye olde hedonic treadmill never stops spinning, you know? Making a living by telling people to feel less satisfied with their lives, so they will want to fill the lack with whatever you are selling, does not seem very honorable.
Advertising is part of that trade.
I’m happy it exists.
Unabated capitalism has more poverty than capitalism with social programs. Social programs save people from poverty.
Also, capitalism can exist without advertising.
You meant the EXACT opposite, right? :)