The Super Bowl Ads

We all watched the Super Bowl last night. Some of us cried, others lost large amounts of money, and at least one person in New England was happy with the outcome. But, for those of us that do not enjoy sports all that much, the advertisements that happen during the game are extremely fun, and motivate us to join in on the game time action. The ads were as funny as ever last night, my personal favorite being a Pepsi one that featured a diadem donned Elton John and Flavor-Flav at the very end. But this article, Puppies and Nostalgia will Always Sell, was about much more than just the highly over-priced articles, it was about the need for instant gratification in the American culture these days. "But now, in a hyper-accelerated world where 4G is just waiting for 5G to supplant it, the speed of light is too slow, and even the sense of immediacy somehow feels inadequate; we prefer to experience our events, particularly the enormous ones, well before they happen." I cannot agree with this more. Our culture is based a lot on who can get it done first, with the best cost efficiency  of course. This is true even for things like the Super Bowl ads, where they have teaser trailers on TV and YouTube out weeks before the game happens. The real question here is how our society got this way. Is it a uber need for control in an unstable economic environment that causes us to want to predict the future? Or perhaps we want to know what's going to happen so we can try to "improve" it. In any case, nothing can happen fast enough, and patience is becoming a thing of the past.
This article was more of a rant than anything else. Othmer, the author, imposed humor and quick wit to get across his point: the ads are " are a reflection of a desperate media reality and the degree to which advertisers and their agencies are asked to exceed the massive expectations of an increasingly brand-savvy, post-ironic culture that is almost impossible to surprise." 


The article here.