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So I've been producing ads for a couple of decades, and I agree that they're basically psychological warfare. I justify it to myself because I usually get to m

by gAI 3y ago

So I've been producing ads for a couple of decades, and I agree that they're basically psychological warfare. I justify it to myself because I usually get to make ads for products that help people, but the war over mindshare is absolutely depraved. That said, there does need to be a place for people to access information about products and services. I'd just prefer it be a place that people go to intentionally learn about products and services, rather than something ingrained in every aspect of modern life.

roenxi 3y ago
So I suppose where you are coming from is that you're using dirty tricks to convince people who don't need a product to buy it. Which is not ideal. But I've seen a lot of software engineers write code that is unreliable and causes their users a lot of suffering. Most people do a bit of harm on the margins because their job is part of messy reality instead of some imaginary pure world. On average the amount of trickery in advertising will cancel out and decisions still get made based on the quality and usefulness of the products. It is just much easier to sell something useful with sneaky advertising than selling advertising in a vacuum. People not knowing about their options is one of the bigger problems in modern life. There are a lot of things I'd spend money on to change and I'm just not sure how to do it. As far as I can tell that is normal. "I'd just prefer it be a place that people go to intentionally learn about products and services" - when I see people doing that I'll believe it is an option. Most people sit there until told to do something. Even when doing the thing is in their own interests.
- gAI 3y ago
  It's not so much about any particular ad or product, but the attention that ads steal. Most peoples' heads are FULL of ad jingles they never wanted there.
- polygamous_bat 3y ago
  > On average the amount of trickery in advertising will cancel out and decisions still get made based on the quality and usefulness of the products. How? Take the examples from above about selling beauty products to teenagers, where is the ad saying "you're perfect as you are, no need to drop hundreds of dollars on any of this bullshit"? All the ads in existence will try to extract money from them by playing up body image issues, so the noise WILL NOT cancel out on their own. > Most people sit there until told to do something. Even when doing the thing is in their own interests. To think that you know what's better for people than they know for themselves... Tell me, are you an advertising professional? Because your thought process is just as obnoxious.
  - roenxi 3y ago
    > To think that you know what's better for people than they know for themselves... Easy mistake, I suppose. But if you read closely, you'll notice that isn't what I said or implied. People often know what is in their own best interests, they just don't act on it. Consider, for example, how hard it is for most people to get to the gym even after taking out gym membership. I had a running buddy once solely because the gentleman knew he wouldn't go running unless he had someone else to remind him. People usually need a little push before they do the sensible thing. That is one of the things advertisers tap in to and why they are so valuable to a business.
    - Jochim 3y ago
      Advertisers never push people to do the sensible thing though. There's a reason that "vice" advertising has so much money poured into it. The gym advertising its memberships would rather you never set foot on their premises. Beauty products want you to feel good about yourself, but only while you're wearing their products. McDonalds and Coca Cola do not want you to eat healthier, or enjoy their products only occasionally. It's actually shocking to see someone frame advertisers as pushing people towards making good decisions for themselves, when we've had to explicitly ban tobacco companies from advertising how sexy and popular smoking would make you.
      - gAI 3y ago
        I agree that way more advertising is aimed at encouraging poor decisions for profit. There's just more money in it. But there absolutely are ads (not just PSAs) that try to get people to help themselves. Profit is still made, but the exchange is much more equitable (or there's no better option).
        TeMPOraL 3y ago
        > But there absolutely are ads (not just PSAs) that try to get people to help themselves. Name three.
- TeMPOraL 3y ago
  > On average the amount of trickery in advertising will cancel out and decisions still get made based on the quality and usefulness of the products. That, in general sense, violates second law of thermodynamics. More specifically, it also feels like going against some physical law with Shannon's signature on it, though its formulation escapes me. Point being: even in cases where this "cancelling out" happens, it's not a free process. It uses energy, it uses natural resources, it uses victims' attention, it generates entropy. The more advertisers scale it, the more waste it creates. As for "made based on the quality and usefulness of the products", that's actually the first victim of advertising - all real information gets lost in the sea of lies, while victims' attention is saturated, so they have very little headspace to evaluate competing offers.
- kahnclusions 3y ago
  > On average the amount of trickery in advertising will cancel out and decisions still get made based on the quality and usefulness of the products. Sorry, what? This sounds like wishful thinking not grounded in reality or data…
nobody9999 3y ago
>So I've been producing ads for a couple of decades, and I agree that they're basically psychological warfare. I justify it to myself because I usually get to make ads for products that help people, but the war over mindshare is absolutely depraved. That said, there does need to be a place for people to access information about products and services. I'd just prefer it be a place that people go to intentionally learn about products and services, rather than something ingrained in every aspect of modern life. I spent a number of years doing market research for advertising, and I couldn't agree more. Data analysis is primarily focused on increasing "top of mind" and "unaided" awareness and linking positively-perceived properties and emotions to the product being flogged. I got out before "social media" convinced everyone to share everything about their lives with advertisers and their enablers, but back in the day, ad agencies and the marketing departments of large consumer product companies each spend millions every year (cf. BSB Global Scan[0] as an example) collecting a tiny subset of that data. Given the enormous amount of data available today, I imagine that the levels of manipulation have increased exponentially. And more's the pity. [0] https://www.proquest.com/openview/46f87cae3614d373064294a43b922c1b/1?pq-origsite=gscholar&cbl=31079 https://www.proquest.com/openview/46f87cae3614d373064294a43b...

by gAI 3y ago

roenxi 3y ago

So I suppose where you are coming from is that you're using dirty tricks to convince people who don't need a product to buy it. Which is not ideal. But I've seen a lot of software engineers write code that is unreliable and causes their users a lot of suffering. Most people do a bit of harm on the margins because their job is part of messy reality instead of some imaginary pure world. On average the amount of trickery in advertising will cancel out and decisions still get made based on the quality and usefulness of the products. It is just much easier to sell something useful with sneaky advertising than selling advertising in a vacuum. People not knowing about their options is one of the bigger problems in modern life. There are a lot of things I'd spend money on to change and I'm just not sure how to do it. As far as I can tell that is normal. "I'd just prefer it be a place that people go to intentionally learn about products and services" - when I see people doing that I'll believe it is an option. Most people sit there until told to do something. Even when doing the thing is in their own interests.

gAI 3y ago
It's not so much about any particular ad or product, but the attention that ads steal. Most peoples' heads are FULL of ad jingles they never wanted there.
polygamous_bat 3y ago
> On average the amount of trickery in advertising will cancel out and decisions still get made based on the quality and usefulness of the products. How? Take the examples from above about selling beauty products to teenagers, where is the ad saying "you're perfect as you are, no need to drop hundreds of dollars on any of this bullshit"? All the ads in existence will try to extract money from them by playing up body image issues, so the noise WILL NOT cancel out on their own. > Most people sit there until told to do something. Even when doing the thing is in their own interests. To think that you know what's better for people than they know for themselves... Tell me, are you an advertising professional? Because your thought process is just as obnoxious.
- roenxi 3y ago
  > To think that you know what's better for people than they know for themselves... Easy mistake, I suppose. But if you read closely, you'll notice that isn't what I said or implied. People often know what is in their own best interests, they just don't act on it. Consider, for example, how hard it is for most people to get to the gym even after taking out gym membership. I had a running buddy once solely because the gentleman knew he wouldn't go running unless he had someone else to remind him. People usually need a little push before they do the sensible thing. That is one of the things advertisers tap in to and why they are so valuable to a business.
  - Jochim 3y ago
    Advertisers never push people to do the sensible thing though. There's a reason that "vice" advertising has so much money poured into it. The gym advertising its memberships would rather you never set foot on their premises. Beauty products want you to feel good about yourself, but only while you're wearing their products. McDonalds and Coca Cola do not want you to eat healthier, or enjoy their products only occasionally. It's actually shocking to see someone frame advertisers as pushing people towards making good decisions for themselves, when we've had to explicitly ban tobacco companies from advertising how sexy and popular smoking would make you.
    - gAI 3y ago
      I agree that way more advertising is aimed at encouraging poor decisions for profit. There's just more money in it. But there absolutely are ads (not just PSAs) that try to get people to help themselves. Profit is still made, but the exchange is much more equitable (or there's no better option).
      - TeMPOraL 3y ago
        > But there absolutely are ads (not just PSAs) that try to get people to help themselves. Name three.
TeMPOraL 3y ago
> On average the amount of trickery in advertising will cancel out and decisions still get made based on the quality and usefulness of the products. That, in general sense, violates second law of thermodynamics. More specifically, it also feels like going against some physical law with Shannon's signature on it, though its formulation escapes me. Point being: even in cases where this "cancelling out" happens, it's not a free process. It uses energy, it uses natural resources, it uses victims' attention, it generates entropy. The more advertisers scale it, the more waste it creates. As for "made based on the quality and usefulness of the products", that's actually the first victim of advertising - all real information gets lost in the sea of lies, while victims' attention is saturated, so they have very little headspace to evaluate competing offers.
kahnclusions 3y ago
> On average the amount of trickery in advertising will cancel out and decisions still get made based on the quality and usefulness of the products. Sorry, what? This sounds like wishful thinking not grounded in reality or data…

nobody9999 3y ago

>So I've been producing ads for a couple of decades, and I agree that they're basically psychological warfare. I justify it to myself because I usually get to make ads for products that help people, but the war over mindshare is absolutely depraved. That said, there does need to be a place for people to access information about products and services. I'd just prefer it be a place that people go to intentionally learn about products and services, rather than something ingrained in every aspect of modern life. I spent a number of years doing market research for advertising, and I couldn't agree more. Data analysis is primarily focused on increasing "top of mind" and "unaided" awareness and linking positively-perceived properties and emotions to the product being flogged. I got out before "social media" convinced everyone to share everything about their lives with advertisers and their enablers, but back in the day, ad agencies and the marketing departments of large consumer product companies each spend millions every year (cf. BSB Global Scan[0] as an example) collecting a tiny subset of that data. Given the enormous amount of data available today, I imagine that the levels of manipulation have increased exponentially. And more's the pity. [0] https://www.proquest.com/openview/46f87cae3614d373064294a43b922c1b/1?pq-origsite=gscholar&cbl=31079 https://www.proquest.com/openview/46f87cae3614d373064294a43b...