jay> Advertising....is a socially-acceptable form of lying.
eva> ...opinions about [advertising] being a XXX waste, not to mention
eva> being a form of social engineering of suitable and trouble-free
eva> markets.
jay> Advertising is innate -- even frogs advertise.
The contemporary, canonical notion of advertising is any action
intended to induce a subset of the hominid biomass to behave in a way
desirable to the advertiser. Typically, that behaviour is a matter of
giving money to the advertiser in a context in which it can be
regarded, in a narrow legal sense, as a legitimate market
transaction. In this sense, advertising is on an axis orthogonal to
veracity, deception or the state of things as they are.
Today my wife passed an establishment in front of which there stood a
brick the size of a two-hole outhouse. Here there be bricks. This is
closer to what a frog does but, whatever it may be like to be a
frog, cognitively and semiotically very different.
Compare with this endearing email I recently received:
Dear Potential Client,
Are you an Accountant, are you a Lawyer, are
you one of those Professional people such as Doctors,
Technicians, Architects, and StockBrokers. You know
those people in the HIGHER THAN AVERAGE tax
brackets! Are you interested in offshore investing? Are
you an opportunity seeker? Are you involved in MLM.
Do you want to become involved MLM. Are you your own boss,
Do you want to be your own boss. If you answered yes
to any of them then we have the answer for you.
[blah blah blah]
Everyone who makes a lot of money, or wants to
make more money can benefit from this powerful
information booklet.
- Mike
--
Michael Spencer
[EMAIL PROTECTED] Nova Scotia, Canada
URL: http://www.mit.edu:8001/people/mspencer/home.html
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