Advertisers are People Too

Open for business.

Well, everyone, the school year is wrapping up. And this will be the last required post I make for my new media writing class, but I do plan to continue updating this as a form of anti-retail therapy. Hopefully, some of you will continue to read.

This blog has been a study in why I can't watch TV anymore, why I can't listen to the radio anymore, why I sometimes buy the crappy off-brand version of a product simply because I remember the mainstream version's unbearable ad, why I boycott many news websites because of their drop-down, beat-you-in-the-face ads. Thank God for Netflix, Sirius, Equate, and NPR.

I'm not sure why I've taken this angry-old-man approach to advertising. Maybe it's a mechanism my mind has invented to keep me from breaking the bank on a stone cold wall of other people's capitalist pursuits. Maybe I'm just a jackass. But, whatever the reason, I know it hasn't helped me that much.

I try to put up this facade of someone who is legitimately not affected by the underhanded meddling of advertisers. I'm not. I can admit this now. Having put my annoyances into words this semester has helped me to see that simply noticing these things doesn't mean I'm immune to them.

Jingles get stuck in my head. I can't look away from the bizarre Starburst and Skittles commercials. I do wonder sometimes if I really was the one-millionth visitor and if I really won that all-inclusive cruise.

What if you really are THE one-millionth visitor and you pass up a Caribbean cruise? I should click it just to be sure.

That's the problem: If I'm not thinking about it, these ads play me exactly as they were intended to. And there are plenty of times when I'm not thinking.

So, what I'm wondering is, has this blog simply articulated things everyone notices about advertising and just chooses to ignore or forget about, or have I pointed out something new?

I'm thinking it's the former.

Why? Because--as much as I hate to admit it--advertisers are people too.

Any one of us could go get a degree in advertising or marketing and start manipulating the masses in four years or less. We'd still be us, right?

The conclusion I've come to is that these annoying ads aren't evil--they're just annoying. Can't say they won't still make my blood boil sometimes, but I'm going to try to accept them for what they are.

Annoying. Loud. Invasive. And, sometimes, effective.

Thanks for a good semester, fellow classmates.