Tim's Blog

After reading Alexandra’s blog post about using sex/explicit advertisements to sell a good, I could not agree more. Alexandra used the example of a Calvin Klein advertisement where one women, who was topless, was being advanced on by three men. Does the sexual explicit content end just with this advertisement, magazine covers, or the internet? I think that these kind of explicit advertisements do reflect back on to society, if society thinks that being “sexy” is reflective of the advertisements of the clothes we wear it will drip down into other facets of our lives. For example, teens today see those ads and it may have affect on how proactive they are in terms of sex. Teenagers are naive and very susceptible to what they see in their favourite magazines or on the television show they are watching. Closer to home, for example, the string of sexual assaults on campus has been extremely disturbing but those events could also have been influenced by society. Society itself is what we make of it, and advertisements for clothes are in a way promoting this kind of behaviour in society. I know that is somewhat of a stretch but to a naive or deranged individual this could be a stepping stone for them to rationalize that society is promoting this kind of behaviour. Advertisements now a day are on the verge of turning in to extremely explicit ways to get someone to buy something. I agree completely with what Alexandra had said on her take of the image, and I hope marketers in the future start to tone things down a bit. I know that some of my ideas and thoughts are stretches to stay the least but I do think they have some role in what is happening to society in this day and age. What do you think?

Alexandra’s Blog

https://blogs.ubc.ca/alexmeisner/

MIley Cyrus and Justin Bieber, two child stars turned in to very rich, wreck less young adults? Or two marketing geniuses? Miley Cryus and Justin Bieber a few years ago were very innocent teen stars, yet over the past several months to a year they have turned in to an extremely different set of individuals. Many are fixated on their new attitudes, family problems, etc., yet the underlying fact is that everyone knows who they are and their product, music. Miley and Justin in my opinion have marketed themselves, maybe not in the most positive way, but have done so and now everybody knows about them and with that their music. Some may say that it is just a phase they are going through, young adults with loads of disposable income of, but I believe that it was a marketing scheme. Miley, for example, was an innocent teen singer whose music was not as well known as it is now. After some time and “publicity” stunts she is on the cover of magazines, playing in front on millions, on music videos, tabloids, everywhere. Justin Bieber followed a very similar path as well, going from an innocent singer, to an even more famous young adult, through his questionable actions that were broadcasted for the world to see. I believe that Justin and Miley are more than just artists but have marketed themselves into a household name, appearing in all facets of our media, and at the end of the day for the celebrities the more people that know about them the better. What do you think?

I watched a news clip (link is at the bottom) from ABC about a retail store in San Francisco that was using camera’s in its stores to gather information on its customers. The camera would be placed strategically in mannequins to gauge the facial expression from the customer, if they liked the clothing and anything else that could be read from that. It goes even further than that, the cameras also record the age of the customers that entered the store, what they bought, etc. Sounding a little intrusive? It gets a little more invasive, in my opinion. At the cash register the store records a photo of the consumer with a little bio of their customer including: age group, what they bought, how long they were in store and any other information that was gathered from their trip in to the store. As was mentioned in the video, the software and programs used in that particular store are extremely cheap and can and most likely will, be implemented into stores across the U.S. and most likely will follow suite in many other countries. In a matter of years stores will have a telephone book of its customers and this information will be passed around to other stores in the city, region, or even passed on to different countries. I do see the value in this for the producer and marketer, they are gathering information on the clientele and looking at ways of improving their marketing techniques and in developing future products. Where is the line in privacy, let alone ones personal space? I think that this is crossing the line, companies are gathering information on me then passing it around like a business card. I think this technology is going too far, what do you think?

http://abclocal.go.com/kgo/story?section=news/assignment_7&id=9131638

Someone is always creeping