This is some sort of reply to Adam's post about the Sky Movies advert and to the common pre-conceived idea of advertising as a negative issue. Still being mentally 17, I am predisposed to disagree and in this case I don't think S.Paulo's decision to ban billboard advertising is anything to praise.
I don't know the numbers but I would wonder where the city council is finding the money to replace the lost advertising revenue. Either schools, public transportation, etc are getting less money or taxes have to be raised. Interestingly the same argument applies to Sky Movies, I know very few people that have and watch Sky Movies, but most people I know watch FilmFour. The reason is simple, Sky Movies has no advertising and therefore you have pay, FilmFour has adverts and is free.
A lot of people voice their discontent with advertising but very few are actually willing to pay more for an ad free world. Similar to this is advertising in public transportation, and almost no one would be willing to pay 30p or so more to have adverts removed from the tube or bus.
In conclusion, compared to other sources of revenue, advertising seems to be a rather harmless one. Yeah, some people get brainwashed into buying crap, but the solution for that is having more informed consumers not necessarily ban advertising. By the way, this rant applies to consenting adults, Nike sponsored school gyms and Ronald McDonald are a different story and one that is wrong, as involves the pure and naive minds of our beloved children being preyed upon by evil corporations.
Finally, Wired's Chris Anderson has just written a book called Free and has a preview article which deals, among many things, with what I'm talking about in relation to advertising. He is also the author of The Long Tail about another very interesting idea.
Anyhow, I finish with an unrelated lovely new story by Daniel Clowes (Ghost World, Art School Confidential) which is now online at the New York Times website. Coincidentally, if this was a year or so ago, the story would be a premium service exclusive to paying customers. Through the wonders of advertising is now free.
Enjoy.
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adam k.
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1 comment:
hey! this is a really great post. it's worth remembering that most of the revenue generated by outdoor advertising goes to the companies which own the billboards, but yes, lots of jobs and tax money and the poor children and so on.
i guess the point for me, is that i think there is a little too much advertising, and it's a bit annoying, and i would like it if it was a bit more regulated (think metro do porto for example). obviously the ideal thing is to have a compromise. i don't think a total ban was necessary or wise, but on the other hand, i like the boldness of the gesture, and some of the images are amazing.
adverts are like pop music. generally bland and ignorable, sometimes irritating, sometimes amusing, occasionally brilliant.
do you fancy doing a collaborative post on premier league pop culture by the way? i'm thinking concept and examples.
well done for the post. and the smug example at the end is clever (smug).
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