May You Live In Interesting Times
I was having a chat with a couple of creatives this afternoon.
One said that ads might soon get very interesting because of the oncoming recession. It’s been said a few times, but the lack of budgets might force us all to think more laterally to make the most of the limited resources we have.
The other said that the rise of new media, as evidenced in this week’s news that the heart is being ripped out of commercial TV, will be the real catalyst for a positive change in the way companies communicate with the public.
I said that they were both wrong: it would be the tipping point of value-added communication that would have the most ameliorating effect. We will no longer be able to chuck stuff out there without it being inherently interesting, or it will be mercilessly ignored.
Then a thought occurred: perhaps it will be a perfect-storm confluence of all of the above.
Perhaps we are about to enter the greatest era of advertising the world has ever known.
There will be a gigantic collision of communication and entertainment that will make Playstation Mountain look like Cilit Bang. We will simply not be allowed to do anything substandard because it will be like waving a flag in space. Russell Davies’s prediction that adspend will be 100% production and 0% media will come gloriously true. The agencies that think they can get along with anonymous dross will go under in the time it takes a beam of light to pass across an atom. Our industry will no longer be a by-word for morally bankrupt hucksterism. Instead it will become a beacon for all that is good and warm and right – even the stuff that is depraved and caustic and foetid. For it shall all make us sit up, learn and be changed.
Interesting times are just ahead, but don’t forget to steer in their direction.
Like this does (thanks D2):