4 ms·

If you grew up in Europe, I promise that when you visit the US for the first time, you will be SHOCKED by America's advertising standards (or lack of them.) Ad

If you grew up in Europe, I promise that when you visit the US for the first time, you will be SHOCKED by America's advertising standards (or lack of them.) Advertising is everywhere, everywhere, everywhere, everywhere, to an extent far beyond what you're used to from home. Posters, billboards, fliers, TV commercials, product placement, celebrity endorsements - you can barely step outside without being bombarded by yet another obnoxious advertisement. And "obnoxious" is an understatement: American adverts are noticeably more loud, garish, cheesy, repetitive and attention-grabbing. It's really quite something. And it's exhausting.

blueflow 2y ago
Experience it yourself: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D6QUsx68DCA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D6QUsx68DCA
- arrowsmith 2y ago
  Amazing. Reminds me of a joke from an old South Park episode. The boys are watching something tragic and awful on the news, then it cuts to a ridiculous commercial that completely trivialises the tragedy. I can't remember the details (does anyone know what episode I'm talking about? Got the clip?) but it's a hilarious satire of how the news media operates. That CNN clip is basically South Park in real life.
ChrisMarshallNY 2y ago
> American adverts are noticeably more loud, garish, cheesy, repetitive and attention-grabbing. I take it that you have not been to Tokyo or Seoul, then?
- xandrius 2y ago
  I have unlocked understanding Japanese and it blew my mind how pervasive advertisements are. Most foreign people would just gloss over them but even most temples (say in Kyoto) have the names of companies which donated money plastered all over the place. Even the famous tori gates at inari have cool looking Japanese text which basically says "Applebees", "Yamato Metal Industries", and so on.
- arrowsmith 2y ago
  Nope!
  - ChrisMarshallNY 2y ago
    Their ads make the American advertisers look like teetotalers. Some of my faves: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XRLe826lyao https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XRLe826lyao
    - arrowsmith 2y ago
      So you're saying the fake advert in Friends wasn't far off: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uOy2lrJqKGY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uOy2lrJqKGY
tossandthrow 2y ago
I have been to the US on numerous occasions - and do like it! My main curiosity was about the legal classification of product placement etc.
ratherbefuddled 2y ago
Sometimes I end up watching US TV with US ads on some stream. They are horrifying and amusing all at once. The idea that prescription medication is marketed to the general public on TV is entirely foreign to me, the descriptions of conditions that 99% of people wouldn't have heard of make me wonder just who they are connecting with. Then you get to the "side affects may include headaches, vomiting, diarrhoea, haemorrhaging, spontaneous combustion, exploding eyeballs, bubonic plague and instant death - do not take this drug if you are a living breathing human being" bit and you can't help but laugh. Who goes to their doctor after watching one of these? And "Dude Wipes" - I mean is that a spoof?
- zmgsabst 2y ago
  The pharma ads are bribes to news stations not to report on them (via being a major funding source for their parent conglomerate).
mgraczyk 2y ago
You get used to it in a few days, and it's part of the reason why businesses grow so much faster in the US (especially online). People who want your product find out about it much faster. For example I buy SaaS, and the way I hear about most tools are ads. I choose what to buy via references and evaluation, but ads are often how to get things on my radar. Without Ads, I would have bought worse software in the past
- tolciho 2y ago
  You got used to blocking all ads back in the "punch the monkey" days, while also wondering about the externalities of flyers put under car windshield wipers, many of such flyers ending up in the drains and gutters as you walked around the unwalkable America. Perhaps America would be less a miserable place with fewer ads? You remarked to a coworker that it would be a great justice if a Porta Potty truck overturned onto a spammer, and you respond to your coworker —good, hit them with another. Alas that karma does not work that way. You forgot when the modern web got so bad—indeed, has only continued to, well, you have a term for it now, "enshittification"—as you do not recall the moment of souring. Was it a decade ago, or more like two? You is here used in the Hindu sense of you being divided from you, as that is a good way to explain you being both a great fan of ads and you holding them in extremely low regard. You may also recall that you sometimes make "you're either with us, or against us" pronouncements.
  - mgraczyk 2y ago
    I don't understand what you're trying to say here
- int_19h 2y ago
  Why do you need ads for that? Why doesn't your research for things that you buy not start with looking up the list of all prominent contenders in that niche?
  - mgraczyk 2y ago
    Where is the list? And what if I don't know the category exists?
sofixa 2y ago
And also, all of their ads are THE BEST something. Even if it's showing some greasy microwaved slop billed as food.

blueflow 2y ago

Experience it yourself: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D6QUsx68DCA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D6QUsx68DCA

arrowsmith 2y ago
Amazing. Reminds me of a joke from an old South Park episode. The boys are watching something tragic and awful on the news, then it cuts to a ridiculous commercial that completely trivialises the tragedy. I can't remember the details (does anyone know what episode I'm talking about? Got the clip?) but it's a hilarious satire of how the news media operates. That CNN clip is basically South Park in real life.

ChrisMarshallNY 2y ago

> American adverts are noticeably more loud, garish, cheesy, repetitive and attention-grabbing. I take it that you have not been to Tokyo or Seoul, then?

xandrius 2y ago
I have unlocked understanding Japanese and it blew my mind how pervasive advertisements are. Most foreign people would just gloss over them but even most temples (say in Kyoto) have the names of companies which donated money plastered all over the place. Even the famous tori gates at inari have cool looking Japanese text which basically says "Applebees", "Yamato Metal Industries", and so on.
arrowsmith 2y ago
Nope!
- ChrisMarshallNY 2y ago
  Their ads make the American advertisers look like teetotalers. Some of my faves: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XRLe826lyao https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XRLe826lyao
  - arrowsmith 2y ago
    So you're saying the fake advert in Friends wasn't far off: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uOy2lrJqKGY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uOy2lrJqKGY

tossandthrow 2y ago

I have been to the US on numerous occasions - and do like it! My main curiosity was about the legal classification of product placement etc.

ratherbefuddled 2y ago

Sometimes I end up watching US TV with US ads on some stream. They are horrifying and amusing all at once. The idea that prescription medication is marketed to the general public on TV is entirely foreign to me, the descriptions of conditions that 99% of people wouldn't have heard of make me wonder just who they are connecting with. Then you get to the "side affects may include headaches, vomiting, diarrhoea, haemorrhaging, spontaneous combustion, exploding eyeballs, bubonic plague and instant death - do not take this drug if you are a living breathing human being" bit and you can't help but laugh. Who goes to their doctor after watching one of these? And "Dude Wipes" - I mean is that a spoof?

zmgsabst 2y ago
The pharma ads are bribes to news stations not to report on them (via being a major funding source for their parent conglomerate).

mgraczyk 2y ago

You get used to it in a few days, and it's part of the reason why businesses grow so much faster in the US (especially online). People who want your product find out about it much faster. For example I buy SaaS, and the way I hear about most tools are ads. I choose what to buy via references and evaluation, but ads are often how to get things on my radar. Without Ads, I would have bought worse software in the past

tolciho 2y ago
You got used to blocking all ads back in the "punch the monkey" days, while also wondering about the externalities of flyers put under car windshield wipers, many of such flyers ending up in the drains and gutters as you walked around the unwalkable America. Perhaps America would be less a miserable place with fewer ads? You remarked to a coworker that it would be a great justice if a Porta Potty truck overturned onto a spammer, and you respond to your coworker —good, hit them with another. Alas that karma does not work that way. You forgot when the modern web got so bad—indeed, has only continued to, well, you have a term for it now, "enshittification"—as you do not recall the moment of souring. Was it a decade ago, or more like two? You is here used in the Hindu sense of you being divided from you, as that is a good way to explain you being both a great fan of ads and you holding them in extremely low regard. You may also recall that you sometimes make "you're either with us, or against us" pronouncements.
- mgraczyk 2y ago
  I don't understand what you're trying to say here
int_19h 2y ago
Why do you need ads for that? Why doesn't your research for things that you buy not start with looking up the list of all prominent contenders in that niche?
- mgraczyk 2y ago
  Where is the list? And what if I don't know the category exists?

sofixa 2y ago

And also, all of their ads are THE BEST something. Even if it's showing some greasy microwaved slop billed as food.