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The idea feels like sci-fi because you're so used to it, imagining ads gone feels like asking to outlaw gravity. But humanity had been free of current forms of advertising for 99.9% of its existence. Word-of-mouth and community networks worked just fine. First-party websites and online communities would now improve on that.

The traditional argument pro-advertising—that it provides consumers with necessary information—hasn't been valid for decades.

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[-] sommerset@thelemmy.club 0 points 6 months ago

Tons of companies rely on ad revenue. Netflix, Google etc will go under.

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[-] RowRowRowYourBot@sh.itjust.works 0 points 6 months ago

It would make promoting new art and events downright difficult.

[-] CarbonatedPastaSauce@lemmy.world -1 points 6 months ago

What's wrong with making a societal shift where people learn to go out and look for what they want? It's not like you can't have a website with a schedule of all the activities for your ________. And if people want to see or do ________ they can come find out when and where instead of the constant barrage of shit they aren't interested in anyway.

There are better ways.

[-] RowRowRowYourBot@sh.itjust.works 0 points 6 months ago

And you know about this website how exactly?

Seriously advertisements have been used for thousands of years because they solve a very real problem namely how do you get people interested in the extra stuff you have?

[-] CarbonatedPastaSauce@lemmy.world -1 points 6 months ago

You must be in marketing. Go watch a Bill Hicks video, thanks.

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[-] Goun@lemmy.ml 0 points 6 months ago

Yes yes yes, this!

I always joke w my gf, that when I'm president, I'll ban marketing. It's ugly, wasteful, useless (from the consumer's pov,) annoying, etc. I can't believe it's not hyper-regulated and taxed into oblivion.

[-] douglasg14b@lemmy.world -1 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago)

How....Would you do that?

You do know that that marketing or advertising is far FAR more fundamental right? Yeah, there is a lot of BS these days, for sure.

But the concept of trying to find someone to sell something you made too cannot be banned. Unless you have a solution to the entire concept of "selling" anything, and turn society into one without needs?

It's 5000 BC and I just made a pot with a lip that pours water easier. I tell someone about this in hopes they might want one too so i can survive on my work <----- that's advertising.

It's 2000 BC and I discovered a new spice and am trying to sell it for cooking. I demonstrate how it smells <----- that's advertising.

....etc Apply this to almost everything anyone has made that they try to sell to someone else. They advertise and market it.

right now, your own post, marketing what you might do as president.... Is a form of marketing.

It's deeply engrained in every single society, and has been for thousands (tens of thousands?) of years. It's a fundamental concept for humans and humans society.

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[-] daepicgamerbro69@lemmy.world 0 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago)

then you would have illegal advertising edit: people giving down votes as if i am wrong. lmaoing @ u all

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[-] intensely_human@lemm.ee 0 points 6 months ago

Then we’d have a centrally-planned economy I guess. I don’t really see how a free market would work without advertising.

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[-] Prime_Minister_Keyes@lemm.ee -1 points 6 months ago

It blew my mind when I read that snacking wasn't a thing until rather recently. In the past, there were three meals a day, if you were lucky.
Nowadays, we all are constantly told by advertising to "take a break" and stuff ourselves. Take a break from what? Sitting in an office chair? Who is really tilling the soil from dawn to dusk anymore? And then they wonder about the worldwide obesity epidemic. A big mystery, indeed.

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[-] n7gifmdn@lemmy.ca -2 points 6 months ago

You'd put a lot of people out of work.

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this post was submitted on 06 Apr 2025
614 points (97.5% liked)

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