Friday, March 11, 2011

                         My opinions on Ads and commercials

Today I am doing an article on ads yes that’s right I’m reviewing an ad.
In these times ads are being used not simply to get you to buy a certain product but to make you think you need a product.  They also pressure you; if don’t buy it now the deal will disappear, like on TV commercials: “call in the next 24 hours to take advantage of this limited time offer!” But when you think about it, the next week the same commercial is still on the TV/Radio/Computer. What’s up with that?! Well that’s propaganda, companies selling the product or generating the idea that appeals to desire or emotion such as: saving money, your sense of adventure, pleasure, and nationalism. These ads target people of all ages for an older person it may be means of transportation for a kid it may be a toy or video game. Did you know that we are the only country that rents garages to store our “extra” stuff? WHY?  Because Americans (a nation of consumers), buy things just because they are on sale or if they want something in the heat of the moment regardless of whether they need it or not.
                Now I am going to focus on a specific ad, the Uncle Sam wants YOU poster
This specific poster was generally aimed towards younger people that still hadn’t chosen what they wanted to do with their lives or didn’t have a job yet. All throughout the country during the world wars the message “Uncle Sam wants YOU” was out drawing young men out to “join up” and fight for their country and to rid the world of the “communist threat” and YOU were needed to be a part of that, so they all joined with the idea that they were doing their part to save the world. The poster depicts an older stern looking man who is wearing a stars and stripes suit. To me that say it’s the American thing to do. The poster is designed to make it seem like you are special and that you are specifically wanted, therefore they are appealing to your emotions not your rationalism.
                My opinion is that people need to be intelligent enough to look at all sides of the story not just the ones  that sound good like how much you save or just the idea of something being cool, people might make a choice without having all the information.


J. M. Flagg's 1917 poster, based on the original British
Lord Kitchener poster of three years earlier, was used to recruit soldiers for both World War I and World War II. Flagg used a modified version of his own face for Uncle Sam,
 and veteran Walter Botts provided the pose.  

5 comments:

  1. Mrs. Holly I realize and apologize for not making it to 750 words but I couldn't. this is also not very structured. I feel that I proved my points though.

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  2. Well painter, you start out fairly strong here with your discussion of how ads operate and our unfortunate susceptibility to them, but your analysis of the ad you chose is rather brief. It seems a little odd too that after choosing to introduce your post with the idea that we let ads persuade us too easily and as a result buy too much junk, you chose to analyze an ad that's not selling anything per se. It's recruiting and selling an idea, but you specifically mention our country's unique need for storage space -- so you would have done better to choose an ad for a specific product. It would also probably give you more specific details to analyze. Look around a bit more and check out the link I sent out today for some strong print ads. Keep your intro, but choose an ad to analyze in more detail.

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  3. HI PAINTER!
    You have a good start, but this is a hard ad to do. It isn't selling more then an idea, so it's probably why you didn't make it to the seven fifty word finish line. Since the ad only has a dude in a funky outfit pointing, it doesn't have a lot to advertise for you to point out. Your intro was good, but you should use an ad with more analysis possibilities.
    Charlotte

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  4. First paragraph was really good but then it just went down hill sorry try a different ad!

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  5. You made some really great points! In your introduction, you made a good point about Americans needing storage... but the paper ended up being about a historical/political ad (which was also cool). You just need to pick one or the other.

    Good job :)

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