As seen on 'Firefly'

POSTED BY: whozit
UPDATED: Sunday, August 23, 2009 05:03
VIEWED: 2001
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WHOZIT

Wednesday, August 19, 2009 10:52 PM

Joss thought of this 1st.

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/5cd04e14-8cf4-11de-a540-00144feabdc0.html

FREMDFIRMA

Thursday, August 20, 2009 2:36 AM

As if the damned things weren't offensive enough on the internet.

I use some really serious and intricate ad-blocking software to remove them from my surfing - I don't MIND a decent little content related banner with no animation, given I found a really good bargain on Rozen Maiden Season One that way - but I DO mind flashy spinny eye-searing aggravating crap that either tries to take over by shoving itself under my cursor, covering the screen with an overlay, taking over my speakers and SCREAMING at me *hissss* or otherwise "attacking" my PC and/or invading my personal time in a hostile manner I associate with Malware and Scumware.

All of which is rooted in the source of said slimy behavior, the pay-per-click system, something I see as a purely destructive influence.

They wanted to invest in something that would be novel and non offensive, I did have a suggestion for that - I did NOT mind the in-game advertisements in Need for Speed: Underground and felt they actually added a bit to the experience, but the technology at the time was a bit lacking.

You know what woulda been REALLY cool with that ?
Being able to drive INTO the burger king and download coupons, or into the best buy and browse their website, without leaving the game itself!

Toss in some of those auto parts manufacturers as well, with proper disclaimers, and even the few sales they'd get out of it would more than pay back the effort, since it would be a much lower ad-to-sale ratio as the budget items are higher in price, but still...

Or how bout being able to drive up, and load MP3s to your game and I-pod when you need a dose of audible thrash to go with that bling ?

But adverting companies seem to be generally stupid people, and don't seem to realize that the backlash effect of annoy-vertisement offsets any gain they could make - and in one rare case, IMHO needlessly endangers the public - there's a flasy-spinny animated billboard on the southbound lane of I-275 north of the airport which aggravates the HELL out of me cause while I have the focus to ignore it, the effect it has in distracting the other drivers is very annoying and potentially dangerous.

I dunno how many folk react like me about it, but if your advert pisses me off, I *will* remember your product, and make damn sure to never, EVER give you any of my money - and I am pretty sure I ain't the only one cause running the same commercial every five minutes for a month wound up bankrupting the local Gander Mountain.

Is NOT the reaction you want to your adverts, no matter what the ad agencies might tell ya.

Wow, cool! - on the other hand, is.

-Frem

It cannot be said enough, those who do not learn from history, are doomed to endlessly repeat it

RIPWASH

Thursday, August 20, 2009 2:10 PM

Gotta agree with ya, Frem. Annoying ads only get me to completely avoid whatever product they were trying to sell.

On the other hand, I do tend to reward companies and advertisers for ads that make me pay attention or that make me laugh . . . really hard.

When we had a dog, I bought Beggin' Strips only because of the first commercial I ever saw for the product. The dog's eye view of a dog looking for where the smell of bacon is coming from. He finally finds it:
"Bacon, bacon, bacon . . . there! What's it say? . . . . . I CAN'T READ!!!!!"

If I didn't have a bias against Apple computers I'd buy one only because of the "I'm a Mac, I'm a PC" commercials. Innovative and they crack me up every single time.

*********************************************

"It's okay! I'm a leaf on the wind!!!"
"What does that mean?!?!?!"

KWICKO

Thursday, August 20, 2009 2:52 PM

A bias AGAINST Apple computers?

That's a new one on me...

Never heard of anyone having a bias against good design or ease of use.

Mike

ANTHONYT

Thursday, August 20, 2009 2:52 PM

Hello,

I remember some years ago there was talk about orbital advertising. Inflatable satellites that would deploy a massive space billboard with a company logo.

I remember thinking, "How thoughtful. I can look up into the sky at night and instantly identify the next company that will go out of business."

--Anthony

"Liberty must not be purchased at the cost of Humanity." --Captain Robert Henner

ANTHONYT

Thursday, August 20, 2009 2:59 PM

Hello,

Macintosh suffers from the same problem today that they suffered from in the 90's.

PC's are ubiquitous, Windows is ubiquitous, and almost all the non-productivity applications (read: games) on the market are built for PC's.

It's not that I primarily use my PC for games. I really don't, purchasing and playing only 2-3 games per year.

But the idea that I could want a game, and be either unable to play it, or be able to play it only via performance-crippling emulation, cancels any ideas I have about switching over.

A good Mac/PC commercial would run like this:

Mac- "I'm the computer from the future."

PC- "Yup, and in the future, you can have fun on a Mac. Or you can play Fallout 3 with me right now."

--Anthony

"Liberty must not be purchased at the cost of Humanity." --Captain Robert Henner

RIPWASH

Thursday, August 20, 2009 3:00 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by Kwicko:
A bias AGAINST Apple computers?

That's a new one on me...

Never heard of anyone having a bias against good design or ease of use.

Mike

I have a good friend who is very knowlegable about this kind of thing and he says Apple is really no better than other computers and that Apples actually have a lot of problems that aren't really widely talked about.

I don't know if "bias" was the right word to use there. I just don't care for them.

*********************************************

"It's okay! I'm a leaf on the wind!!!"
"What does that mean?!?!?!"

NIKI2

Thursday, August 20, 2009 5:24 PM

I had a Mac once...sigh...but couldn't afford to replace it when it was outdated. I miss it to this day. I hate PCs, but they took over te market and have been the baseline ever since, so I'm stuck with one. But give me a Mac any day--I don't play games, but am into graphics, which probably explains it. And NOT into glitches, which are a daily occurrence, it seems, with every PC I've ever owned.

As to advertising, don't get me started. That new method sickens me--especially if it starts on its own, which it sounds like it does!!! I agree with everything negative everyone's said about them; was DISGUSTED when they started showing up DVDs...

KWICKO

Thursday, August 20, 2009 5:42 PM

I went with Mac early on because I was doing graphics, and it was THE computer for that. I remember a friend who went to work doing layout for Corel Magazine - the magazine that was supposed to convince people that CorelDraw for the PC was really as good as Illustrator and FreeHand for the Mac.

You know the funniest part? The entire magazine layout and paste-up was done on Macs.

I'll stick with my Macs for graphics and music; my PC friends tell me they think the iTunes store is a nightmare, and when they show me what they have to go through with their PCs to use the store, I agree with 'em. Me, I just open it, search, click and download. Done. My Mac integrates perfectly with my iPod, and if I decide to go with an iPhone, it will integrate perfectly with that, too.

For games, I go with a dedicated gaming platform like a PS3, Wii, or XBox 360.

Hell, if I'm just bumping around on the internet, I'll choose my Mac every time. No pesky viruses to worry about. Also, no Microsoft Internet Explorer, either, with all its cludginess and buggy vulnerabilities.

Macs are for people who just want to USE their computers. PCs are for people who want to BUILD their computers. Nothing wrong with either kind of person or format, but I've never once had the urge to build my own computer.

'Course, nowadays, won't the newer Macs run Windows natively? So couldn't you load up your PC games on your Mac and play them "on a PC" while still being on your Mac? And I don't think they're Windows *emulators*, but the machines actually run full versions of Microsoft Windows, if I heard correctly. Never been tempted to try it on mine, though; seems like inviting extra bugginess and vulnerability to me, and for no payoff...

As for price... Well, I did consider a Dell a few years back, so I went comparing, feature-for-feature. The iMac I was looking at ran $1800. To build a comparable Dell at the time, I was looking at $3700 - and that didn't include the SuperDrive CD/DVD burner. Sure, that Dell is cheaper now, but so is that iMac. I picked up my last MacBook for something like $800, and it's still going strong some 3 years later. I've also got a "volleyball" iMac and even an old lime-greem first-gen iMac that are still up and running. Lost the hard drive on one of them once, and that sucked big-time, because I hadn't backed anything up, so away went over 30 gigabytes of music - more than 21 straight days worth, if I hit "Play" and "No repeats". Still trying to rebuild that collection.

Mike

STORYMARK

Thursday, August 20, 2009 5:44 PM

Ive never seen a DVD with an add, other than for movies.

"I thoroughly disapprove of duels. If a man should challenge me, I would take him kindly and forgivingly by the hand and lead him to a quiet place and kill him."

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