Advertising 'misses'

I'm off on another tear about advertising. Sorry. I can't help myself. Some things just need to be said.

The Super Bowl ad with the rejected car-manufacturing robot committing suicide was almost the last straw. And the perpetual parade of cleaning and cooking products sold in the 'formula' ad that just inserts a new name, feature and function into the same old script, volume and price ("But wait! That's not all!! Order now and you'll receive this ___ absolutely free!!! A $100 value, all for only $19.95!!!!") is enough to make anyone mad. Or the 'personifying' of things such as soap scum and phlegm just so we have yet another thing to KILL as if there isn’t enough violence in our lives already... Well, I could go on and on.

We’ve started receiving text messages on our cell phones that are nothing more than ads – and we are probably paying the cell phone company for the privilege of getting them besides. And several TV channels now run ads during their regular shows and over top of the scheduled program, for other programs – covering up the bottom quarter of the screen, or more. Infuriating. Telemarketing isn’t dead yet either, as we are not safe from the political or ‘charitable organization’ sectors. Particularly ‘not-dead’ is the ubiquitous Recorded Message technique. (My mother said she felt guilty for hanging up on The President several times during the last election season but he really had no call to bother her relentlessly with his political statements while she was trying to eat breakfast or read her book. He just wouldn’t stop talking.)

We have a whole sector of the economy hell-bent on annoying us with both their ‘in your face’ advertising and their ‘subtle’ product placement strategies, and then another whole sector trying to help us rid our lives of their constant intrusion. We have TIVO and pop-up blockers and ‘phish-filters’ and, yes, even psychologists on the one side and, seemingly, all of Big Media on the other. (Or actually I’d guess that there is a lot of crossover, as I think there might be in computer virus makers and computer virus fixers.) Why can’t they all just find a way to not be so obnoxious?

And who was it who decided that ‘obnoxious’ sells in the first place? I’d like to think they are missing the mark. Surely the school of thought that ‘any publicity is good publicity’ is overrated. There are many products that I simply will not buy because of the advertising. But I’m guessing that there are also many high-priced ads that I hate but can’t remember what they are advertising at all – and I probably buy those products anyway. Obnoxious it may be. But if it wasn't effective, they probably wouldn't keep doing it.

It’s not going to change, is it?

(And actually, that didn't NEED to be said. I just thought I would.)