Archive for August, 2008
Friday, August 22nd, 2008
Hara-Kiri You Can Believe In
Joseph Robofucking Biden? Are you kidding me? The lamest, stalest, office-squatting stuffed shirt in Congress, the busted plagiarist gasbag from the corporate haven of Delaware, the Iraq Invasion yes-voter? That’s fucking “change?” Stunning, even by Dembot standards of relentless, blundering false advertising and mega-betrayal.
This thing is so over, friends. Toast. Piss down the drain. History of the worst, most farcical kind.
Let’s just hope this astounding sword-dive will finally drive liberals and leftists out the front door of the sinking, stinking, election-throwing “Democratic Party” facade-half of the Business Junta’s adjoining mansions.
Friday, August 22nd, 2008
The Biodiesel Cop-Out
As our market totalitarian society careens between serial boondoggles and disasters on its way to imperial collapse, the signs of how well-propagandized and hence ill-informed we Americans are are becoming even more flamboyant and egregious.
Consider this smug car-back I spied this morning while waiting to pick my son up from an appointment.
Beneath the “Got Hope?”/Obama sticker (good luck with that!), this tail-end sneers “Yes, it’s a diesel.” Still lower, it touts the biodiesel industry’s bogus claims that their snake-oil is “clean,” “renewable,” and “domestic.”
The truth is that biodiesel, like all other biofuels, is none of the above. More energy goes into making it than comes out as biodiesel. Making biodiesel produces huge amounts of agricultural waste products. Making biodiesel eats up valuable water and farmland.
The “domestic” claim is particularly ignorant and galling. Like hydrocarbons, food is bought and sold on world markets, so even if it were true (which it isn’t) that all biofuels used in the USA were going to be produced within the USA, that would still have immense effects on the price of food around the world, hurting the 1/2 of the human race that exists in scandalous, abject poverty today, 500+ years after the launch of the supposedly history-ending capitalist system. In fact, even at this early date in the unfolding overclass drive to keep cars-first transport alive by running scams like biofuels on the comfortably numb and under-informed, there is already a major problem in this area.
So what we see in the above photo is not a brave soul educating others, but merely somebody who’s feeling high and mighty and clean while being used as a vector of serious evil and disinformation.
The simple truth is that the corporate capitalist project of selling automobiles in perpetuity was and is a huge pipe-dream. Earth simply cannot accommodate it for much longer, whatever the fuel source. Using finite energy to move two tons of highly-processed metal and plastic for almost every mundane trip around town is like slicing bread with a chainsaw. Technology is not going to change that. Neither is pipe-dreaming.
Thursday, August 21st, 2008
“Maintaining Control”: The Richistanis’ DVR Crisis
One of the advantages of bothering to read big business marketing’s professional literature is that it very efficiently disabuses you of sponsored illusions about the “freedom” part of the so-called “free market.”
Consider the alarm expressed over the spread of digital video recorders (DVRs) in this week’s issue of Advertising Age:
By letting viewers skip ads, that pesky DVR has already gnawed away at the system media conglomerates have used for decades to score billions of dollars in ad revenue. Now it’s primed to become a phenomenon on the order of a locust — with an ability to multiply rapidly and do even more significant damage.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for New York last week overturned a ruling that had blocked Cablevision — and by extension, other cable providers — from making use of a “network DVR” that would allow it to run a massive video-storing operation from a single location rather than installing individual DVRs in each subscriber’s home. Using the technology, consumers can record programs through their remote control without a new set-top box, conceivably turning every TV in the house into a machine that records TV shows — and can skip past the ads that support them.
“With the stroke of a pen, the U.S. Court of Appeals has opened the door to a massive increase in the penetration of DVR capabilities,” wrote Bernstein Research analyst Craig Moffett in an Aug. 4 research note. “In short order, effective DVR penetration could now jump to north of 60% of cable households (that is, all digital cable subscribers) with an even larger increase in DVR outlets per home,” Mr. Moffett added.
Ad Age makes no bones about what this gnawing locust infestation means: It is a threat to corporate capacities for “Maintaining Control” over prospective cutomers’ off-the-job activities:
By letting viewers skip ads, that pesky DVR has already gnawed away at the system media conglomerates have used for decades to score billions of dollars in ad revenue. Now it’s primed to become a phenomenon on the order of a locust — with an ability to multiply rapidly and do even more significant damage.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for New York last week overturned a ruling that had blocked Cablevision — and by extension, other cable providers — from making use of a “network DVR” that would allow it to run a massive video-storing operation from a single location rather than installing individual DVRs in each subscriber’s home. Using the technology, consumers can record programs through their remote control without a new set-top box, conceivably turning every TV in the house into a machine that records TV shows — and can skip past the ads that support them.
“With the stroke of a pen, the U.S. Court of Appeals has opened the door to a massive increase in the penetration of DVR capabilities,” wrote Bernstein Research analyst Craig Moffett in an Aug. 4 research note. “In short order, effective DVR penetration could now jump to north of 60% of cable households (that is, all digital cable subscribers) with an even larger increase in DVR outlets per home,” Mr. Moffett added.
All this, of course, means that the underlying purpose of commercial television — attracting eyeballs and eardrums to corporate capitalist behavior modification campaigns, a.k.a. “advertising” — is being undermined by a rare opening for democratic preference.
No bones are made about what must be done in response:
The media companies’ objection to Cablevision’s video-storage technology is that they believe it infringes on their exclusive rights to air and reproduce the content in question. Those companies that create the content want to maintain a level of control over when and how it is viewed, in order to be able to monetize it by selling advertising against it. The networks have been reluctant to make their content available for new-media venues such as streaming online until they have the ability to have some sort of control over getting consumers to watch ads.
The media conglomerates have tried everything to keep the paradigm-shifting DVR technology from worming its way further into consumer life. Walt Disney’s ABC has made hit shows like “Desperate Housewives” available for cable providers’ video-on-demand offerings, but only in exchange for the cable company disabling viewers’ ability to fast-forward. Time Warner Cable has introduced features that let viewers “start over” a favorite show but the trade-off is they must watch the ads that accompany it.
None of this has weaned consumers, now accustomed to watching shows as they wish, from their ad-skipping addiction. “They don’t want to watch commercials, but they won’t pay to not watch commercials,” said John Senior, a partner-media and entertainment practice at Oliver Wyman.
In other words, here comes another big business blitzkrieg: Expect massive new efforts to block, favorably redesign, and/or sidestep DVRs, plus a redoubling of already intense ongoing efforts to insert advertising elements even more deeply and widely into all media “content” on all “platforms,” especially including the thing that was once quaintly known as the “information superhighway.”
Wednesday, August 20th, 2008
Capitalist Greens Take Flying, Lying Cliff Jump
Sitting in my dentist’s chair this morning, I heard the new ad campaign from “SaveOurEnvironment.org, A National Coalition for the Environment,” a.k.a. the big mainstream green lobbying groups.
In standard political marketing procedure, the ad, titled “Get Working with Clean Energy,” failed to disclose who its sponsors were.
Much worse, however, is that, if you happen to know the first thing about reality, the ad signals the death-by-suicide of mainstream environmental politics:
Clean energy sources not only provide real solutions to today’s energy mess, they also are essential to solving global warming and will create millions of jobs. Reducing global warming emissions from today’s energy industry will require a substantial shift in investments from the polluting, insecure energy sources of the past to the clean, sustainable energy sources of the 21st Century. That investment not only holds the potential for reduced energy costs and will reduce global warming emissions, but it will spur huge growth in green jobs—making the new cars we need, insulating homes, building a smart power grid and new power sources like wind turbines, and producing clean fuels from America’s heartland.
Fortunately, many of the technologies we need to transition into our clean energy future already exist, and deploying them can build a stronger economy. In fact, achieving a clean energy economy through green solutions and industries such as wind power, solar power, building retrofitting, mass transit, fuel-efficient automobiles, and cellulosic biomass fuels will create high demand for jobs, in addition to those that already exist.
This is a huge shitpot of lies and extremely wishful thoughts. What clean fuels of the 21st century? What cellulosic biofuels? What fuel-efficient automobiles?
“Clean fuels” do not exist on anything like a scale and a geothermal efficiency level sufficient to replace even a fraction of the petroleum, natural gas, and coal we now use.
Cellulosic biofuels remain an early and expensive laboratory experiment, and are commercially unavailable.
Driving cars — i.e. 2,000+ pounds of highly processed metals and plastics — as the primary means of getting around town is like slicing bread with a chainsaw. “Fuel-efficient automobiles” is an oxymoron.
Growing corn to make moonshine to replace gasoline is as hopeless as it is recklessly wasteful of Earth’s remaining supplies of water and agricultural land.
Nonetheless, here’s come the corporate greens, peddling this disgusting, sad, predictable raft of fictions.
Conclusion? Goodbye to the sponsors:
Earthjustice
Environment America
Environmental Defense Fund
League of Conservation Voters
National Audubon Society
National Wildlife Federation
Natural Resources Defense Council
Pew Environment Group
Sierra Club
Union of Concerned Scientists
You are now unequivocally part of the problem.
Tuesday, August 19th, 2008
We’re #28!
As the Olympics perform their core task of worsening the disease of nationalism, one might ask: What medal does the United States of America win when it comes to what really matters — the empirical quality of life inside this, human history’s richest, most powerful, most capitalist society? Is it true, as our overclass has long claimed and as the Olympics reinforce, that a collectively wealthy nirvana of minimally restrained corporate money-making also yields the best of all possible social worlds? Does the flagship of big business society really prove the truth of Adam Smith’s famous claim that
by directing that industry in such a manner as its produce may be of the greatest value, [the capitalist] intends only his [or her] own gain, and he [or she] is in this, as in many other cases, led by an invisible hand to promote an end which was no part of his intention. Nor is it always the worse for the society that it was not part of it. By pursuing his [or her] own interest he [or she]…promotes that of the society more effectually than when he really intends to promote it.
For those actually willing to investigate and answer this question, the evidence is clear: Check out Mercer Consultants’ 2008 quality of life and personal safety survey results.
Mercer, which describes itself as “a global leader for trusted HR and related financial advice, products and services” that “has more than 18,000 employees serving clients in over 180 cities and 40 countries and territories worldwide,” finds that the top US city in its quality-of-life index is:
Meanwhile, even more astounding (from the perspective of ideology, rather than street knowledge) is this:
ZERO US cities are ranked in the top 50 in the area of personal safety!
Meanwhile, Business Week reports on the steady advance of the obesity/Type II diabetes epidemic in the USA:
Despite the many public efforts to promote physical activity and good nutrition in recent years, despite the constant warnings about the obesity crisis, Americans just keep getting fatter. According to an annual state-by-state look at the problem, adult obesity rates increased in 37 states in the past year, and only the District of Columbia saw a decrease—down a mere 0.1%. More than 25% of adults are now obese in 28 states, up from 19 states last year.
In 1991 no state had an obesity rate above 20%. Today more than 20% of adults are obese in every state except Colorado, where the number stands at 18.4%, according to the survey by two nonprofits, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and Trust for America’s Health. Mississippi, the worst performer of all 51 on the list (which includes the District of Columbia), stands at 31.7%. Similarly disturbing increases were found in the percentage of adults with Type 2 diabetes, a weight-related disease. The survey found higher incidence of diabetes in 26 states. Four states are above 10%.
Overall, adult obesity rates have doubled since 1980, from 15% to 30%, and two-thirds of U.S. adults are now considered overweight or obese. The national rate for diabetes in adults has grown from 5.2% in 1980 to more than 8% now, and one in three Americans has hypertension—often weight-related. The report estimates that the direct health-care costs of obesity exceed $61 billion annually.
Of course, the massively obvious and overwhelming primary cause of all this disaster — corporate capitalism and its marketing juggernaut — cannot be mentioned. Hence, Business Week conveys the confounded confusion of the worried “experts”:
The U.S. “is not treating the obesity crisis with the seriousness it deserves,” said Jeff Levi, executive director of Trust for America’s Health at a press conference. He complained that while obesity rates keep climbing, federal funding for programs to address the problem has been steadily reduced over the last several years. “The only thing going down is the money spent to prevent this epidemic.”
And all this is much worse when you remember that the distribution of wealth and power in the United States is also extremely pyramid-shaped. Those Mercer rankings are by and for the pampered business consultants Mercer sends around the globe. Imagine how much less happy and safe life is for the ordinary mortals seeking, rather than downsizing, jobs in the cities Mercer ranks!
And, as Business Week reports, like all other major diseases, obesity/Type II diabetes is tightly and inversely correlated with individuals’ social class situations. To wit:
7 of the 10 [US] states with the highest obesity rates [are] also in the top 10 for poverty rates.
Reality could hardly be simpler: Unrestrained corporate capitalism leads to market totalitarianism, a social order in which the priorities of the investing class invade and increasingly dominate all three spheres of modern life — work/economy, politics, and personal life/civil society.
The plain logical fact is that letting corporate investors select our macro-options for us means that we were destined to live as we now do in the United States, where cars, television, and highly processed foods and products literally dictate the ways we move, think and feel. It’s all as bad for our health and happiness as it is profitable to the Richistanis among/above us.
The Emperor has no clothes, and Adam Smith is deader than a doornail. So, crank up the band and let our ruling class mount the stand and wave as they accept the medal they deserve for the kind of competition they’ve run…it’s the dog-shit medal.
Friday, August 15th, 2008
Market Totalitarianism Primer: “Place-Based Media”
Quividi’s insertion of spy cameras on telescreens on behalf of marketers, which I briefed yesterday, is but one aspect of the ongoing explosion of what big business marketers call “place-based media.”
Today, The New York Times‘ Stuart Elliott files a report on this important aspect of market totalitarianism. Elliott reports:
The ardor to reach consumers outside the home — and outside the realm of traditional media like television — continues to grow among marketers.
Out-of-home media was once commonly known as outdoor media, reflecting its roots in billboards, posters and signs. The term has been changed to reflect the expansion into places like airports, offices, malls, schools and health clubs, where the ads are inside but not inside the home.
That has also inspired another advertising term, place-based media. The new places for ads — as well as the addition of digital and video capabilities to signs, bus shelters, phone kiosks and other sites — are among the reasons ad spending in the out-of-home category are second only to online advertising in growth.
The goal is to engage consumers “during the course of their daily lives in places they go on a frequent basis,” said Rick Sirvaitis, president at StoreBoard Media in New York, which puts ads on the security pedestals at the entrances and exits of retail outlets like drug stores.
“In 36 years in advertising, for the first time I can look people in the eye and guarantee every consumer will be exposed to the message,” Mr. Sirvaitis said, referring to a StoreBoard sign, “because you can’t miss it.”
“We’re always looking for places where ads are not expected,” said Greg Corradetti, director for account services at Serino Coyne in New York, an agency owned by the Omnicom Group.
In other words, as this doomed system continues its suicidal “development,” it becomes less and less tolerant of any and all still-uncommercialized off-the-job space, the existence of which stands as a threat to further profits for the overclass.
