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Advertising as a source of dissatisfaction: cross-national evidence

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Re: Advertising as a source of dissatisfaction: cross-national evidence

#401

Post by kortilla »

rexpop wrote: post #371
Chathamization wrote: post #334

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It seems like a larger and larger percentage of our economy is being taken up by parasitic sectors that have a net negative value for society. Advertising, soda, highly processed food, credit cards, car dealerships, (most) sales people, etc. We'd probably be better of as a society paying these people to do nothing than to do what they do now; we'd be even better off if we paid them to do something actually productive…

You'd be smart to accuse me, here, of throwing out the baby with the bathwater, but the core parasite is Capital, which siphons value from the labor of mankind in a Byzantine labyrinth of social games meant to obscure this essential truth.

The core parasite is government, which siphons value from private citizens under the threat of violence.

Re: Advertising as a source of dissatisfaction: cross-national evidence

#402

Post by anoncake »

cm2012 wrote: post #291
anoncake wrote: post #273

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Uninterested. Plumber magazines or sites? Very low traffic - no way to scale. That means plumbers don't care about plumbing news, including your app. You have no right to disrespect their choice by spamming them anyway. In a world without ads, not subscribing to plumbing news would be a weird choice anyway. Refusing to learn about new ways to increase productivity – like your app – means giving your competition an…

Not subscribing to plumbing magaxines just means the signal to noise ratio in them is bad. For the value part: What if plumbers use Facebook (which they do) and when they see your FB ad, they buy your product. Wouldnt that indicate they do care about your app?

If plumbers aren't satisfied with the signal to noise ratio of magazines they don't want to see ads either.

Re: Advertising as a source of dissatisfaction: cross-national evidence

#403

Post by A2017U1 »

zdragnar wrote: post #348
mayniac wrote: post #237

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I formed the opinion a while ago that we should go a step further: ban advertising entirely (not exactly a new idea, Bill Hicks came first [1]). Billboards, TV ads, newspaper ads, paid-for articles, promoted Instagram content, all internet ads, everything. One of the main tenants of capitalism is that it naturally produces a meritocracy. Products which are of a higher quality or cheaper than their competitors should,…

Unfortunately, I think your solution would effectively destroy democracy at any level other than mayor and dog-catcher in tiny cities. Televised presidential debates? Those are advertising for party-sponsored candidates to the disadvantage of write-in candidates. If all publicity is good publicity, then the same holds true for all news articles about candidates running for any office. How is a newspaper editorial pro…

All democracy should be grassroots. I find the concept that you simply can't win an election or a candidacy without a large warchest to be abhorrent.

We live in an age where media dissemination costs essentially zero. All politicians should have volunteers and not be able to raise donations nor spend a cent on advertising. Easier said than done yes, but still a far better outcome for democracy.

Let the best ideas flourish by themselves.

Re: Advertising as a source of dissatisfaction: cross-national evidence

#404

Post by kortilla »

jcora wrote: post #400
Mirioron wrote: post #384

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But capital through markets is how we get around the "labyrinth" that is the economic calculation problem. I think it's like complaining about how you lose power when you transfer electricity over wires. It's true, but there's always going to be a transmission cost.

There is no economic calculation problem: http://flowing.systems/economy/politics/2017/08/16/calculati...

>The Mises Institute has put it up for free, which is surely off-message but whatever.

Ah, a clearly well-rationed article is at foot. Here’s a hint, if someone isn’t able to model free things in their understanding of capitalist systems, they don’t understand them enough to critique them.

Anyway, the rest of that “critique” isn’t actually a critique. It’s just goal post shifting to the point where it assumes socialist systems by nature have perfect demand discovery mechanisms (none of which are alluded to) and can never produce a surplus. Conveniently, it follows that clearly socialist systems are perfectly efficient and do not allow surpluses because they have this neat built in mechanism of perfect demand discovery.

So it’s “not true socialism” if there are any inefficiencies in food production, energy production, etc because “true socialism” has a mechanism by which everyone gets exactly what they need.

Did someone inform the author of this that such a mechanism has never existed and the most efficient mechanism we have discovered so far is markets?

Re: Advertising as a source of dissatisfaction: cross-national evidence

#405

Post by anoncake »

taffer wrote: post #279
cwkoss wrote: post #270

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is fallacious thinking. If you had an app that would increase plumber productivity by 50%, plumbers would be lining up to get into the Beta. Find any plumbing supplier or trade group, and if the effects are actually that good, they'll tell their members at no-charge because that knowledge would be a service to them. Plumbers would be cold-calling other plumbers trying to get a beta invite. All you need is a marg…

> If you had an app that would increase plumber productivity by 50%, plumbers would be lining up to get into the Beta. How would plumbers know about the app without advertising? > Find any plumbing supplier [...] they'll tell their members at no-charge In other words: They would advertise it.

> In other words: They would advertise it.

It's quite clear we are talking about paid advertising, not the broader concept of people saying things.

Re: Advertising as a source of dissatisfaction: cross-national evidence

#406

Post by InternetUser »

DoreenMichele wrote: post #166
lordnacho wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well like it says there's two kinds. One is "Hey, did you know this thing exists? Check it out! Here are all the tests it passed, realistic cost of ownership, and locations where it is in stock". The other is "Look at this woman, isn't she fascinating? People like her will desire you more if you buy the thing she's lying on top of. Actual woman not included." Unfortunately, people have discovered type 2 is effective…

I'm not a copywriter in the sense of "person who writes adverts," but I am someone who writes copy for website content. One of the problems is that it isn't even good communication to say (for example) "This device has a 7 inch screen." That's mostly useless information for most people. It's much more genuinely helpful to tell people something like "You can easily read our large screen even in bright sunlight." Most…

Do you not naturally do the same thing in your own life? If you're hanging out with some friends and want to recommend a certain drink or food, do you say something like "Oh my god, you've gotta try this, it taste so good," or do you pick up the packaging and read off some of the ingredients list and nutritional facts? Would you first say some cookies should be tried because they're "delicious," or that they are worth trying because of the measurements and other particular properties? Or, going to the extreme, would you say I should try something because of certain gustatory and digestive processes afforded therefrom, which create a positively stimulating sensation, as transmitted by the parietal lobe of the cerebral cortex?

Re: Advertising as a source of dissatisfaction: cross-national evidence

#407

Post by butteroverflow »

InternetUser wrote: post #394
enlyth wrote: post #15

To me, it is worrying how much human effort we're investing into advertising as a whole. The top minds of our generations, backed by billions of dollars in funding, are working on increasingly manipulative ways to capture people's attention and use it to generate profit. We're constantly getting better at it; who knows what path this will lead us down. I suspect it might not be the one we had wished for.

Lol, we're already incredibly far down that path. Have you been using the same smartphone since 2008? I ask seriously: how many have you owned since then?

Well, if you want to use a smartphone, you pretty much have to buy a new one every few years. They don't exactly have great upgrade-ability, do they?

If course, it doesn't excuse all the Apple fanatics (among others) who go through one every single year.

I am still using a cheapo Asus from 2012. It was relatively powerful when it was released, but its performance drives me nuts nowadays. Thankfully, my smartphone needs are pretty modest, but I can see why a more "advanced" user wouldn't want to use such old hardware.

Re: Advertising as a source of dissatisfaction: cross-national evidence

#409

Post by chrisseaton »

Chathamization wrote: post #334
enlyth wrote: post #15

To me, it is worrying how much human effort we're investing into advertising as a whole. The top minds of our generations, backed by billions of dollars in funding, are working on increasingly manipulative ways to capture people's attention and use it to generate profit. We're constantly getting better at it; who knows what path this will lead us down. I suspect it might not be the one we had wished for.

It seems like a larger and larger percentage of our economy is being taken up by parasitic sectors that have a net negative value for society. Advertising, soda, highly processed food, credit cards, car dealerships, (most) sales people, etc. We'd probably be better of as a society paying these people to do nothing than to do what they do now; we'd be even better off if we paid them to do something actually productive…

This is such a hugely snobby attitude.

The value of soda for example is that some people like the taste and sensation. It brings them a little bit of joy. Not everything has to be coldly utilitarian.

Re: Advertising as a source of dissatisfaction: cross-national evidence

#410

Post by kavalg »

foldingmoney wrote: post #372
r00fus wrote: post #368

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Almost correct. Governments have a strong say in what is incentivized and what is not through taxation and monetary policy. The people running government are (in most places) elected by the people but that is affected by political manipulation, gerrymandering and politicians often represent the moneyed interests that got them into power.

Okay, explain to me how the government is incentivising 'advertising, soda, highly processed food, credit cards, car dealerships, (most) sales people, etc.' through taxation and monetary policy.

Wrt soda, and highly processed food, I think that FDA and similar agencies could make an effort to evaluate the consequences of prolonged consumption of such food and figure out what quantities are safe. They could require proper labeling and not allow children to buy such foods (as with cigarettes and alcohol).

For credit cards, maybe he meant that in some countries, where individuals cannot default, banks are comfortable taking too much risk and advertise credits aggressively. I have personally witnessed several victims of this (yes, people can be dumb).

Wrt "car dealerships and (most) sales people", it is probably not affecting the individual so much, but if you look closer at "enterprise sales" and government spending, you will certainly notice some "interesting" practices. However, I think that this is a lot harder to solve than the other case above, because it is not so directly aimed at the masses.

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