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This puts an actual smile on my face:
Media companies, including Time Warner Inc., 21st Century Fox Inc. and Viacom Inc., have started cutting back on commercials after years of squeezing in as many ads as possible.
The new strategy is an attempt to appeal to younger viewers, who are more accustomed to watching shows ad-free on online streaming services like Netflix Inc., and to advertisers concerned their messages are being ignored amid all the commercial clutter.
Time Warner's truTV will cut its ad load in half for prime-time original shows starting late next year, Chief Executive Officer Jeff Bewkes said last week on an earnings call. Viacom has recently slashed commercial minutes at its networks, which include Comedy Central and MTV. Earlier this month, Fox said it will offer viewers of its shows on Hulu the option to watch a 30-second interactive ad instead of a typical 2 1/2-minute commercial break. Fox says the shorter ads, which require viewers to engage with them online, are more effective because they guarantee the audience's full attention.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Runaway1956 on Thursday November 12 2015, @05:11PM
It is true that newspapers ran advertising almost from the earliest days of typesetting and moveable print. But, the advertising was static, non-obtrusive, and generally interesting enough to the intended audience. A newspaper serving an audience in a rural area, consisting of mostly farmers, loggers, maybe some miners, ran advertisements for equipment used by these people, along side clothing and family needs. Stuff that actually interested people.
Then, along came World Wars One and Two. The US and almost every other nation with a dog in the fight created propaganda forces. Some of those propagandists were very highly successful. They swayed the opinions of vast populations around the world.
WW2 finally comes to an end, and what do the propagandists do? Go back to the farm? Go back to the tin, iron, or bronze mills? Go back down into some deep, dark mine to wrest a living from the rock? No way, Jose! They are propagandists! They've discovered that there's an easier way to make a living! Just find someone to pay them for lying to the public! Swaying public opinion is just so EASY, we can sell refigerators to the Eskimo and Aleut.
Jump higher with Keds.
You meet the nicest people on a Honda.
Double your pleasure, double your fun.
All bullshit, but what does the public know? All we need to do is milk that gullible public for cash. All lies, but such PROFITABLE LIES!
(Score: 2) by geb on Friday November 13 2015, @12:24PM
Advertising had already jumped off the deep end even during WW1. Have you ever seen the lists of products made to be sent as gifts to soldiers in the trenches? There were posters piling on the guilt and obligation has hard as they could, trying to convince wives back home that their brave husbands deserved beard wax, cakes, portable gramophones, barbed wire cutting tools, half a dozen different types of boots or jackets, and so on. The message was generally "The army doesn't provide the gear they need, step in to support your family and your country!" or something similar. The same message used whether it's a marginally useful tool, or complete crap.
This wasn't propogandists looking for work. It was manufacturers of pointless shit trying to find ways to sell their pointless shit.