So there I am in the middle of some work on the computer and Bang! an ad pops up offering me the secret to get rid of unwanted ads.
Apparently the irony here never occurred to Those Who Create Stupid Ads.
That *is* an unwanted ad. Hello! Duh!!
For me, that is another company now I shall never do business with, as my quiet and subtle punishment for the insult, whether it was intended or not.
Let me offer you the *real* way to prevent unwanted ads. It’s very simple. It costs you nothing. I’m not even selling it. Here it is:
Stop responding to ads. Period.
That’s really all there is to it. We have to put up with increasing numbers of and increasingly insulting content of ads because you (you-all, not you the specific reader right now — though, come to think of it, you too!) keep responding to them!
Shame on you. I get all this stuff in my face and it’s Your Fault! (That’s sarcasm, by the way.)
So stop it. Right now.
The only problem here is that after hundred’s of years of BS marketing(1), dramatically accelerated since the advent of the Internet, almost all advertising is the sort that should be punitively ignored. Fined, even, except that the “truth in advertising” laws were repealed some time back. Some ads are honest enough, not really very few, by percentage.
Tactical flashlight?
Have hair by morning?
Lose 50 pounds this week?
Sexual enhancers?
They are coming to get your guns?
Anti-surveillance wallet for your too-fancy credit cards?
Gimme a break…
Let me pick on “food” for a moment. Most “food ads” are not even advertising actual Food, but food-like substances(2). This dove-tails very nicely with the “lose 20 pounds [or more] by morning” ads. The food-like stuff puts the heavy, heavy overweight on you, the snake-oil salesmen can then offer you ways to lose it again. Only the first part actually works, though, while ruining your health.
Frankly, stop responding to ads at all.
If you want something, go in search of it.
(“If I ever need that, I’ll let you know.”)
Otherwise, you are letting your actions be controlled by someone who is not the least bit interested in you, only in your money and in further developing compulsive behaviors in you.
Pavlov’s Perfect Consumers. And, by the way, you didn’t volunteer for that; it was done to you.
It’s been a rule of mine since I was an older teenager that the more irritating an ad is, the more I will boycott that company, not just the particular product. If enough people did that, ads would have to shape up, and actually convince instead of compel.
Oddly enough, that applies to political races as well.
Isn’t that an interesting idea?
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(1) Yes. really. BS marketing has been going on at least for 100’s of years. Possibly for 1,000’s. I have no idea what tactics folks selling bread outside the Coliseum might have used in the days of Rome. Any where in history where there was an economy, there was probably advertising, hording, lending money at interest, theft, taxation and all the rest of it. Makes you wonder about the value of coinage, doesn’t it?
(2) Food-like products taking over more and more of the food supply are the number one cause of debilitating disease, destructive aging, shortened life-spans, reduced quality of life and all sorts of health difficulties. They are also — oddly enough — the number one cause of Big Profits for Big Pharma. Are you happy with that idea?