the door knock analogy isn’t meant to trivialize the craft of advertising, advertising done right is hard...it’s just a way to strip it down to its core: you’re paying for the chance to initiate a conversation with someone who might be interested in what you have to offer. Whether you’re literally knocking on a door or placing a targeted online ad, the fundamental idea remains the same, you're buying an opportunity to engage with someone for some reason (market research, sales, whatever). modern digital advertising leverages data to target audiences, that evolution doesn’t change the basic mechanics of the process. I am old enough to remember door to door sales people, my older sister worked at DNBNB in the UK in the 90s and did demographics by sitting in cars on streets. Go back even further, baby stroller/pram salesperson would pick neighborhoods where their product is most needed, they're not going to retirement homes (although maybe they are, grandkids spcecial!) - digital advertisers use data to identify and approach likely buyers. The issues raised about privacy and oversight are valid, but they’re problems of regulation and ethics, not of the underlying competitive nature of advertising. Also like I said, ads can be used for many different things, (I wonder how many woman who like blue live in this city, lets spend $250k to find out) sometimes a team will run $500k of ads into a segement to see how it responds before they run $5MM of ads for the quarter, that's when you get ads for weird stuff that makes no sense and you don't click it, someone is trying to look at your non-click as well as the clicks (the door opens or the door slams)
Claim that advertising suppresses customer choice is hard when you consider the flip side: in a competitive market, effective advertising compels companies to innovate and differentiate their offerings. Yes, the massive budgets of giants like Pepsi and Coke can sometimes make it seem like smaller players are edged out, but actually that isn't what happens, it’s the pressure to capture consumer attention that drives these companies to continually refine their messaging and, by extension, their products. Competition in advertising forces all players to up their game, trust me, there is an annoying savvy 26 year old junior marketing manager out there causing problems for someone in a brand bigger than them, that is often the job in fact. Also, the more targeted you get the CHEAPER your advertising often becomes, I can't run $50MM ads a year against "men in america" because I can outspend Nike and Toyota, but I can spend $500mth on men between 18-26 who like tennis and live in the zipcode 90210.
sure, the medium has chaned from literl knocking on physical doors to digital but still advertising is a tool when used effectively both informs customers and drives competition. could should and will debate the ethics and side effects of current practices but dismissing advertising as a cancer on society is silly, take aim at capitalism then.
(edit: per the comment above above, I just went down to the bodega to get a drink, there are SOOO many new soda's I've never heard of before, heck I'm standing in front of a kombucha coffee infused soda, made in Canada too the advert tells me, I think I'll try it, go Canada!)