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This blog contains effusive rhetoric and profligate diatribes. Read at your own risk.

Sunday, April 20, 2014

Advertising: What Does And Doesn't Work

In my attempts to build some sort of egalitarian utopia atop the rubble of our currently-crumbling plutocratic thugocracy, I generally try not to think about how anything gets paid for; it's just depressing.  But today, let's tackle it.

I spend a lot of time on YouTube these days, mostly listening to music videos (and I do mean "listening" for the most part, although the option to actually watch them is always there and appreciated on a theoretical level, no matter how seldom I choose to do so).  And while I'm doing so, what advertisements pop up on every third video?  The vast majority of the time, they are advertisements for Chevrolet trucks, various brands of beer, Progressive or Farmers insurance, and a few other things that I am virtually guaranteed never to buy.  Yes, the content that YT provides to me is very valuable, and I get that as things currently stand in our society, someone has to pay the bills.  But why THIS particular someone?  Why am I not advertised to by someone whose guts I DON'T hate, someone whose product I DON'T consider irrelevant at best (the insurance), and a more likely a hugely destructive influence on society (cars have their upside, but at serious cost, and alcohol is completely irredeemable IMO).

I want to be able to contact YT somehow and tell them to take me off these advertisers' lists, so that I can stop having them force their nonsense down my throat, and instead have them fund my usage by showing me ads for things I actually like, ads that might someday tempt me to buy the product....and for now, while I have no money to spare, they can at least build brand loyalty by entertaining me with commercials I'll appreciate.  For crying out loud, I've actually searched for certain commercials after seeing them, added them to my playlists, and then never gotten that ad again AS an ad.  Why is it that, after I've watched a video entitled "Funny Condom Commercial" or something to the point, I don't get other funny condom commercials?  (Granted, I have occasionally searched up "World's Sexiest/Funniest beer commercials", and so Budweiser and Stella Artois and such could be forgiven for mistaking me for a potential customer - but the ads they pay to show me are neither funny nor sexy, and so they're just wasting their money, along with my patience.)

If there must be advertisements for the media to exist, then we as a society need to seriously re-evaluate the effectiveness of current distribution models.  Because what we have right now is the equivalent of trying to woo a woman by breaking into her house at midnight, shouting "LOVE ME GODDAMMIT!" into her ear, and then repeating this nightly for ten years.  Except that in the case of advertising, she can't get a restraining order to make this treatment stop.  Budweiser, Chevrolet, Progressive...please realize that your relationship with me is abusive, and needs to end.  Your financial leverage over me is not a valid excuse; there are plenty of other companies who can be funding my leisure activities, and who I'll actually appreciate.  So knock it off already.

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