The Sci Fi Singularity : Advertising

You know what I’m sick of?

I’m sick of hearing people go on about this clip from Minority Report

being the future of Advertising, because it’s not.

Don’t you get it? You people are finished.

What this clip is, is an example of more and more and more and more advertising money being thrown at a more and more media-savvy, cynical and indifferent audience… we’re not going to be narrow-casted to like this because the only people we listen to are our friends. Our spending decisions are based upon feedback we get from our networks… our 2 degrees of separation.

Billboards with embedded retina-scanners that ID passers-by and hit a database for likely buying choices, which they then shout out loud to whoever happens to be near by ARE going to be made… because they were on Minority Report… and sooner or later, everything in a Sci Fi movie gets made. It’s part of the culture… there’s something in human nature that is hell-bent on fulfilling prophecy.

So these billboards will be made, but they’re not going to be used for advertising because they whole floor is going to be swept by crowd-sourced recommendations… and that is a party that “The Industry” is specifically and systemically not invited to.

Here’s an example of a DIY advert that someone has made for the little felt camera covers that she makes on Etsy.

Now that is effective advertising… why? Because it will get cited. It will get linked to. That is what it’s all about now.

Think of it as a giant Artificial-Intelligence experiment (because that is exactly what it is). If you don’t get linked to… (get this RIAA) if you can’t inspire people to evangelise about you by copying your memetic content… then you don’t get seen.