Am I alone in finding the irony in...
Be IN
start a fad
...the ad next to the article?
Be IN
start a fad
...the ad next to the article?
This isn't a dig at Nimoy's advice - it's damn good advice. But it doesn't sell compared to You're worthless unless you buy our stuff. The only reason why they can print Nimoy's advice is that the "Be a FAD" ad is right next to it. And not only that, the earnest advice itself is often packaged and cynically sold, right alongside the "OBEY CONFORM CONSUME" message!
One of the most recent examples of this is a song I keep hearing on the radio - "Try," by Colbie Caillat.[1] The message of the song is pretty simple - it's that people work their asses off to be liked, but they're still not happy because they're straying from being true to themselves.
But it's a manufactured product explicitly created to appeal to people who are feeling lost, confused, and frustrated with being popular. And they have a beautiful woman, who is already an enormous success, singing this song that's specifically saying, "Stop worrying about what other people think about you" when her entire career is based on what other people think of her.
I'm a much bigger fan of Tool's Hooker With a Penis.[2] At least Keenan is frank about it.
All you read and wear or see and hear on TV is a product
Begging for your fatass dirty dollar
So shut up and buy, buy, buy, my new record
"Revolution has already been televised. Revolution has been merchandised. Revolution is a commodity, a packaged lifestyle, available at your local mall. $19.95 gets you the black mask, the spray can, the "Crush the Fascists" protest sign, and access to your blog where you can write about the police brutality you suffered when you chained yourself to a fire hydrant.
Capitalism has learned how to sell anti-capitalism."
From [0], found when reading [1].
[0] - http://journalism.berkeley.edu/projects/biplog/archive/00074...
[1] http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guerrilla_War_(video_game)
I'm not bothered about the term free thinker and wouldn't necessarily have linked it with atheism.
Anyway, if you don't think 'freethinker' is linked to atheism, throw the word into google and skim the results.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=uCEeAn6_QJo
This is the kind of music I work to.
About five years ago, I was looking up something related to bulimia. Low and behold, I ended up on a site that had advice for young people with this disorder, and the keyword ads on the right of the page included a bunch of "Lose weight fast using this pill" type ads. I was quite horrified (and reported the ads to the ad network).
In any case, while I have no doubt that people have and will continue to make such decisions, I doubt they will become the norm - they're too prone to lawsuits, and too inefficient. Instead, Google et all will continue to develop algorithms that detect and exploit those correlations from raw data, so that no one will be able to tell why your profile was selected to be shown diet pills. Which is much more insidious, since it diffuses the moral responsibility.
Jerry Mander, Four Arguments for the Elimination of Television
Niel Postman, Amusing Ourselves to Death and Technopoly.
Gill Scott-Heron: "The Revolution Will Not be Televised"