11 Comments

Lebowitz is a massive hypocrite then.
TREVOR
2008-11-25 13:54:24

I want to live in a post-advertising world too!!!!

PS. http://www.framedink.com or not it's up to you, wait if you like find it in your own time....

PPS. I ll give you Free Stuff!!!

PPPS. Please look....
framedink
2008-11-25 18:14:21

Let me get this straight- say I work real hard in a job in a in a factory that makes sports wear to support my family and feed my kids, but the company that I work for is getting flak for working too hard to promote the end results of my hard labour and therefore isn't doing so well and I get canned. Where in the world is the justice then?
James Warrington
2008-11-25 21:13:54

James: The hypothetical scenario you lay out doesn't stand up logically. I understand where the anger comes from though. Justice in this world is in scarce supply.

What I see from this article is an industry that finally realises the part it has played in the current world crisis, kowtowing to businesses with no moral or social imperatives other than shareholder profits and insane bonus schemes. And helping creating a consumer culture where people are nothing more than their net worth, marketing code or perceived social status.

I doubt if the people in the article above have lost jobs or houses because of the mess they've helped create. From what I see around me at the moment, advertising has helped to make this society shit on so many levels.

And as for "We don't do advertising", if you pimp shit for companies, you do advertising. But hey, whatever helps you sleep at night...
Kernit the Font
2008-11-26 16:03:57

Why do recessions happen under Capitalism? Because on the one hand firms must hold down wages to keep their profits up, (profit being the difference between the wealth as a worker you make and what you actually get in wages) and yet produce more and more stuff, meaning in the end that there is too much stuff (not if we lived in a sane world, but 'too much' to make a profit from), the market is glutted and there aren't enough workers with enough cash to buy stuff. During the 30s one of the gluts was in pigs, so as people starved to death, pigs were being burnt to get rid of them–and of course this recession will also see the worlds wealth being destroyed till it gets to the point where the few big Capitalists left, can start making profits again.

So for the last 20 years or so, the difference between what people earn and what thewy can buy has been bridged by allowing people access to cheap credit, which we now see falling down around our ears.

This is a major crisis of the system, that is, it is how Capitalism 'works' hopefully this will mean that in design circles and beyond in wider society there will become more demand to do things that actually meet the needs of people and the environment, though of course this will mean a different economic system. Can we do it? Who knows, but we won't survive if we don't.

Advertising is necessary under Capitalism to get people to spend their wages on things that other workers have made, because none of us own the products of our labour. This is the gap it feeds off, our lack of control, our alienation from the means of living. And yet, we do need urgently need people with strong visual and communication skills to address the real problems of the world, so it would be good to think that just as we could, given the right political circumstances, retrain car workers to stop making more polluting cars and use their skills to make environmentally friendly transport, ad agencies could use their skills to inform people of the many things we need to know to get us safely into the future, it's not out of the realms of possibility, but as I said before it would require political and social movements and the will to do it. It cannot be done under Capitalism.
Noel Douglas
2008-11-26 17:28:12

Don't know if any one saw this but it was very funny...

Charlie Brooker's Screenwipe: Series 4: Episode 2
http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00fqq3t/Charlie_Brookers_Screenwipe_Series_4_Episode_2/

I personally would love to see advertising have a moral or social conscience and I am currently working on a secondary project that aims to bring exactly that to clients, whether they go for it or not is a different matter, if they don't I would like to say that I would look for clients that do want to make a difference but in the current financial climate it is hard enough to find clients, never mind find ones that don't want to shout please buy my products!
framedink
2008-11-26 21:12:06

It's interesting to see this anti-consumerism/capitalism trend emerging here and there. People in the West start to realise more and more this system needs some serious alterations in order to be sustainable and our life to make sense. Advertising reflects all that in some respects, I think.
Aleksander Lenart
2008-11-27 11:54:35

Your right Alexsander, call me a cynic but I think Advertising knows it has to change direction as it faces its toughest challenges yet with credit being crunched/financial doom and recession.
Sustainable, anti consumerism, anti capitalist and social/political awareness was used for advertising charities in the past but it seems to be now moving onto mainstream agencies and brands with consciences, but I suppose what ever the end gains it has to be better than than that of selfish consumerism! Its times like these that maybe we should look at ourselves in the developed world and think about it, we are complaining that times are hard, when people all around the world don't even have the basics we take for granted like food!
framedink
2008-11-28 11:06:21

YEAH DAMN STRAIGHT.

Well, people do talk to each other. A good thing is a thing worth sharing. The new comms tech will surely replace advertising. Blog blog blog twitter twitter twitter, let the truth be thrashed out online.

An end to spam.

ow spam is bigger than your inbox. It's bigger than you think. Spam is a large and evil force in society today. Your church is addicted to the stuff. The TV spews the shit. Politicians and businessmen are singing themselves to sleep with the catchy tune of "spam spam spam". That's right. Filthy spambots. Chewing up meagre quantities of nourishment, blending and mushing it with lots of bloated excess, schmaltz, and the rest, and then spewing it out all over the shop and telling people "have some of this, it's GREAT". Pay me.

Spam is the criminal's cover story. Spam is Hitler's posters selling a better future. Spam is going to make you a better person without you having to think about it. Spam is too good to be true. Spam is shit fucking art with nothing to say selling for house prices. Spam has an easy and uncompromised moral judgement. Spam will save your soul. Spam gives personal promises. Spam is a failure of society, it is the breakdown of sanity as a group. Spam is the hijacker on the plane. Nirvana covers bands are Spam. Busted are spam. Mariah Carey has had her entire life surgically filled with a couple of lipo-spam injections. Spam is terribly disappointing. Spam isn't even funny. Seriously, if I woke you up with a tin of the stuff, you wouldn't be laughing. Spam is frankly scary. You have no idea how evil spam really is. The visions of god that told the serial killer to chop them up and eat their pituitary gland, that was Spam right there. It wasn't satan, it was a spambot with a tin marked "right-on bruv". Spam is the final solution. 9 out of 10 cats prefer spam. Spambots are like zombies. The zombie horde. Invariably when an internet bot-net, or for that matter sick and mental cult is going on a significant spam spree, all indoctrinated and blaring and zombie like yelling spam spam spam, there's a zombie master, a witchdoctor spin doctor baron or master behind them. Spam barons are actually in it for the money. The girls. The power, the glory. They won't be found subsisting on this bullshit that they call an offering, oh no, they're getting the real deal in triple helpings with their fraudulently acquired gains. Oh yes indeed they will. No spam for them, pure steak, but the stench of the factory won't leave them, it'll never taste right, no matter how much they wash. Spam is slavery, it is wanton exploitation. Those guys selling ad space? They're selling your eyes. Spam is an act of intellectual cannibalism. Hell, in a tin of Spam, it could be your grandmother you're eating, except that she'd probably taste better. Spam is non descript, Spam disguises its source. Spam isn't dealing with you straight up. Oh no. Spam excuses, hides and sweeps under the cupboard that which is horrible. Spam will kill you softly, slowly, and quietly. Spam will make it look like an accident, a clogged artery, a little forgotten bit of info there. Spam won't get caught, except en-masse. Spam is quite frankly anti-social. My friend Ben got given some spam which was disguised as a court order requesting that he stop spamming. It turned out that he'd been sent an email as spam by a guy who selected his spam filter, and sent out a chain-letter of spam, having read the fraudulent claim that he could actually pursue spammers for thousands of pounds worth of damages. He'd actually been spammed, and had become a bit of a spam bot. It had formed into a spam network, a chorus of spam spam spam like bloody indoctrinated vikings, aliens, speaking some other bloody language and thinking alien things which cannot be reckoned with. SPAM babylon. the tower of SPAM. With Spam, you might as well be dead already for all they care. Just give us the bloody gold. For spam has the lethal and legendary midas touch, and breeds in people like AIDS. Spam, like lice, is only something that recent levels of technology, education and awareness can safely stave off with absolute surety. But yet Spam, like the devil, or the shadow of reason, has the ability to turn that which is good into that which is utterly shit. Simply by mincing, fuzzing, bloating, and diluting a good thing until it is pretty much not good at all, and then mass-ramming it at people with an ulterior intention to exploit them by hiding behind this.

You see that which is any good at all in fashion or culture or zeitgeist is driven by the pursuit from Spam. In small towns, it wasn't a problem, the elders could handle small rural upstart spamming, and generally, they had a bit stashed for themselves. But once you get 20th century consumer, then it can become epidemic. Entire populations of new, home grown authentic culture can be devalued and laid waste to by a horde of spambots like hyenas there to put the image on the tin and start selling reprocessed dogshit, or even vacuum, but sprinkled with a snippet of a brand new and authentic flavour.

Lies. Oh yes we can spot 'em. But quality and well crafted honesty, a sensible truth, impossible to outmaneuver, this is a much scarcer commodity. Spam is New and Improved. Spam II, return of the lie of omission. Spam is low-fat, diluted, spam lite, spam diet. Splenda... spam. You've seen the rest, now try Spam. Spam looks sort of like meat, smells sort of like meat, tastes sort of like meat. It resembles the authentic. Lies resemble truth and are constructed of words which stem from real things that people can sense the sense in. That connect people with each other and the things that make them tick. Spam is technically made of food, but it doesn't have the right ingredients for a well balanced diet. It is not good for you, it will not make you happy. Spam is your lover saying I love you, but... Spam is the lottery, spam is everybody is a winner, spam is a priest, spam is the promised land. Spam is the consolation prize, the white lie, the willful deception of the social by the individual. Spam will always get caught. Spam is almost worse than the sorry truth of how poor you really are. Spam is poor quality. Spam is happy but cheating. Spam destroys your soul. Spam will indoctrinate you, and will make you run on conveyer belt rails, robot like, monotonous all the way to your grave, like the donkey chasing the carrot on the fishing rod. Spam is totally bogus dude, morally. Spam is a relative term. If you don't know the truth, if you aren't alive, if you can't taste and smell and feel, then spam will do. Spam leaves a nasty taste in your mouth. You never wanted spam. The spam is in the spin, the expectation and the delivery. Spam catches you napping. Spam is a dream, Spam is a feeling, spam is spur of the moment and wafts like a butterfly. Spam Spam spam spa...

spam is not advertising. spam is false advertising. spam acts single but is married. spam is the gay man's cock pumping the straight rent boy's ass. spam is an addiction.

Inside those hungry offal fed american lard-asses, there's a poor starving human being, with tiny muscles, screaming, just screaming for some real nourishment, just a little vitamin. Ravenous they descend upon another dose of springer, oprah, yet another dose of the solution to a problem they didn't know they had. Yet another spam injection. Still hungry, so hungry, so lonely. You can meet 1000 people in one day, and meet none of them for real, just walk in any glitzy star studded shopping street, anything with a versace store with your bristling wallet open. They'll kiss you lovingly with mouths chowing down balls of spam. Spambots. Some are part time, some are full-time career fakes. Christian rock is packed with nourishing spam. Spam is the opposite of that which is is to be human, possessing broca's region or otherwise, it defies language. Hello says the spam, Hello my friend. But yet, this is no human voice, this is the voice of spam. Spam is a cunning replica, a fake, a fraud, a lie, attempting to thieve you of your will and your reason. Spam says you shouldn't doubt, you should trust Spam. Spam is what you want. New low-fat, no truth or batteries required, just follow the yellow brick road over the rainbow to the pot of spam. Spam is far nicer than real life, spam is a whole virtual reality which you can buy for £XX.XXs. Spam has been sanitised for your benefit. Spam isn't dicey, or debatable. Spam isn't challenging. It's easy. And friendly. Spam is your best friend. Spam was made by an expert with only your best interests at heart. And censorship GUARANTEES spam, especially when it comes to art. Because Spam will protect you from yourself, spam will take control. Spam always knows best. And Spam is the moral at the end of the story. The moral of this story is Spam.
da bishop
2008-12-04 13:44:39

Comedians, the lot of ya!

It's amazing how our egos require that we need to make our industry/job sound more important than it really is.

Creative Directors are not Politicians, choose your play pen and make the most of it, if you don't like it, or the ramifications of your day job weigh too heavy on your soul, get out.

Who wouldn't want their agency handed a huge global account tomorrow (even though they stood for everything you despise about the world)?

Hands up
Charlie
2008-12-05 11:59:02

Da Bishop - I take it you don't like spam then!

Charlie at no point did I say I don't need money to exist nor would I turn down a large corporate cheque but I would still stay true to what I believe and that was my point, that I think that instead of pushing carol vorderman selling loans down our necks, choose another option, someone will always take those accounts all I am saying is that maybe people who do take them will start to take another approach to them.

I have infact posted on this in the past on here and have said yeah who doesnt want to get paid and get recognition within the area we have all worked long and hard in! As to say the ego's make our jobs sound more important than it is shows a lack of passion for that said industry and a lack of respect for it as communication and advertising is a very important aspect of modern day society, which plays a large part in everyday life.

Creative directors arent politicians thank god! What politician tells the truth these days or follows through on promises...so maybe just maybe the advertising industry which communicates with people on a day to day basis whether you think it effects you or not my point was that why not communicate positivity and promote a more social aware form of advertising. And Iam sure that was the reason for this Post to discuss the state of play not have a pop at people for expressing an opinion, that shows a lack of respect and a massive ego, who unlike you charlie wouldnt put his conscience in the cupboard when it came to handling a global account because it paid for his champagne lifestyle...
Framedink
2008-12-08 16:53:45

Tell us what you think

Your comment: What happens with my feedback?

What happens with my feedback?

We no longer require you to register and have a password in order to comment, simply fill in the form below. All comments are moderated so you may experience a short delay before your comment appears. CR encourages comments to be short and to the point. As a general rule, they should not run longer than the original post. Comments should show a courteous regard for the presence of other voices in the discussion. We reserve the right to edit or delete comments that do not adhere to this standard.

Name: (required)

Title:

e-Mail: (required)

URL