Tuesday 22 December 2009

Adverts

I hated a list program the other day that was the 50 "iconic" tv adverts of the decade or somesuch. Instead of only highlighting some especially funny or clever ads, they chose to intersperse them with the many of the most ubiquitous and annoying ones (e.g. Howard from the Halifax). A mistake I think. Just because some company has a daft budget and no taste, doesn't make its adverts worth watching. This was not a TV program, just a one hour long ad break. And that's not good TV.

Murdoch-spawn Sky+ is roaringly successful because most people object to their viewing pleasure being interrupted by some venal, grasping tosser trying to get them to buy stuff (ironic non?). The contempt aroused is only ameliorated if the importuning is done with some wit and flair for entertainment. Or perhaps if genuine added value is being offered to you that you would otherwise have been totally unaware of (though this is rarely the case).

The program started me off on a proper rant (that the flu-stuffed Mrs really didn't appreciate) about Advertising: "the least useful contribution western society had made to the world at large; decadent, navel gazing, unsustainable, fruitless, self indulgent, tiresome, needy, keening, superfluous".

My mate the Ad Exec would have lost it here, in an orgy of self justification. (The Mrs didn't hear me anyway as she was all bunged up, she tends to agree with me out of expediency). But shouldn't the internet make advertising obsolete and usher in a new era of freedom of choice? We should be able to find what we want and procure it instantly, without interruption from anyone we don't know. (Another irony is how much of the web is paid for by advertising as Mr Ad Exec would no doubt have pointed out)

The reason the idea of an ad-free world is appealing is because there are so many people out there - politicians, estate agents, car salesman - apparently trying to influence (or even deceive) you. How much better to be the complete master of your own will and decide, based on an appraisal of the true facts of the matter, where to live, what to drive and who to vote for. Utopia for me is no one telling me what to buy; just me revelling in an orgy of well-informed choice.

Of course you need advice. A trustworthy and knowledgeable advisor is a gift from heaven. There isn't even a big problem with paying someone for advice (although almost all my experience of consultants thus far has lead me to believe I am paying a dog and still barking myself). What about advice that is paid for by the person who stands most to gain from it though, whilst you adopt a passive role in the relationship? Choice has been eliminated; only one option is presented. That's not good. That's not freedom. What about two or three options competing for your attention? Flattering maybe, but all of a sudden you are in the midst of a cacophony of hectoring and pleading. That's not true choice. You can only choose the best presented, the best marketed, the best designed to appeal to your demographic, not the best per se.

Gordon, David and Whatsisname will be testing how free you really are by choosing to engage in a live televised debate before the next general election. It will be interesting to see the results (although not as interesting as some might think. These guys face each other over the despatch box all the time. It could just be PMQT without the hecklers on green leather sofas; imagine Jerry Springer with no studio audience). I desperately hope the effect of this exercise in "democracy" is minimal, especially on the result of the actual election. Despite TV-led telephone voting being discredited as more corrupt than the Zimbabwean elections (though somewhat more lucrative), the technology available to vote on single issues is fairly well proven. Let's face it, the trudge to the local school or village hall to use a pen and paper to register a vote in anachronistic. There is also stronger detectable anarchistic - in the philosophical sense of the word - tendency in us these days as a result of the MP's expenses scandal; we are curious about the idea of the abolition of the "representative" in representative democracy. What would it be like?

My own view (and I've come a long way from reading Robert Paul Wolff's In Defence of Anarchism when I was 19) is that representatives - despite the way they have eroded our trust this year of all years - are there to balance the interests of consitutents and weigh them in the balance. They are the essential barrier against a tyranny of the majority. Capital punishment and equal rights would never have been enshrined in the law of this land if a popular vote alone had been used as the mechanism to introduce them to the statute books.

Were elections to be replaced by some Cowellesque public TV husting, democracy would die. The reason is simple and we have, in the now concluded race for a Christmas a good example. Neither Climb nor Killing in the Name are anyones actual favourite songs (except for a handful of aging skate punks). Rage Against The Machine's tune was not the Christmas No.1 we all wanted. It was just the opposite of a song people didn't want. You don't get to vote on X Factor for any of the following: the end of X Factor as we know it, the ritual disembowelling of Simon Cowell, Sony BMG to be taxed 100% on the sale of any record in December, Dannii Minogue (shame: I'd vote yes). You only get to vote for what they offer you. X Factor limits your choice dramatically; down to a handful of chosen tweeny hopefuls warbling bad cover versions of R&B ballads. The only reason it is more popular than the product it is actually offering you - tweeny hopefuls warbling bad cover versions of R&B ballads - is "water cooler angst"; the fear of rejection embodied in the idea that people might be leaving you out of a conversation.

What we want might be more choice than the current system of party politics. What we will get will be more hype and less verifiable information; a clamour for your vote from vested interests, manipulation and subterfuge, cajoling and wheedling. There would be no "none of the above" box for you to tick. In fact voter apathy is truly the only anarchism we have left. The X Factor is not the wholesale model to re-engage us eitehr. Only the technology to register our vote more easily is needed, not the razzmatazz and bullshit that goes with it. And it would seem that not one of the TV programs made with a voting element can avoid suspenseful pauses, manipulated voting systems, decolletage or gushing congratulation (of others, self or just the format - you know something is rotten when a TV shows keeps telling you how good it thinks it is).

The Reithian doctrine still holds true - I want to be informed and educated as well as entertained, and TV is a great way of doing this. How notable that the BBC is more popular than ever - despite its wearing such commercial attire. This is mainly because of iPlayer, where the viewer can just choose what to watch and when. All of a sudden Radio 4 has loads more listeners than ever and demand for factual, news, political and documentary programs is on the rise. Surely, with the wealth of information the web has arrayed before us, the public has shown an appetite for truth and fact, a broad interest in a variety of subjects, and demonstrated that they value a reliable and trustworthy adviser to deliver it; one that is not burdened (too much) by conflicting commercial imperatives? Why is this welcome development - and not the popularity of voting shows - not being trumpeted by social commentators? Simon Cowell, they have decided, and not John Humphries, shall be our guide! Mary on a motorbike!

Rebuilding trust (and the government could learn from this) begins with education not obfuscation. When you are being educated you have the opportunity to test your assertions against reality and find them to be true and your confidence grows in the world around you and in your guide. Obfuscation, which is what the present government has been so good at, diminishes trust. It treats you like a child and says "there are things you can't know. If you search for them we will complicate them to a hellishly labynthine extent that you will become demoralised and give up". Strenuous efforts to show the public only what they want them to see has lead to a complete breakdown in our relationship with authority and it is this that has made our anarchic streak come to the fore. Start being frank, Westminster (starting with the iraq war enquiry). That's the way to get us back.

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