RE: When marketeers lie

["Alex Eckelberry" <AlexE () sunbelt-software com>]

What most people don't know is that a) it was never outlawed and b) it's currently practiced, such as in shopping malls 
("do not steal, do not steal") and so on. 

________________________________

From: funsec-bounces () linuxbox org [mailto:funsec-bounces () linuxbox org] On Behalf Of rms () computerbytesman com
Sent: Monday, November 05, 2007 9:11 AM
To: funsec () linuxbox org
Subject: [funsec] When marketeers lie



An amusing story from today's Wall Street Journal:

 

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB119422046839181941.html?mod=todays_us_marketplace

 


For a Time in the '50s, A Huckster Fanned Fears of Ad 'Hypnosis' November 5, 2007


At a New York press conference 50 years ago, a market researcher, James Vicary, announced he had invented a way to make 
people buy things whether they wanted them or not. It was called subliminal advertising.

He had tested the process at a New Jersey movie theater, he said, where he had flashed the words "Eat Popcorn" or 
"Coca-Cola" on the screen every five seconds as the films played. The words came and went so fast -- in 
three-thousandths of a second -- that the audience didn't know they'd seen them. Yet sales of popcorn and Coke 
increased significantly.

"Subliminal Messages -- Friend or Foe?" a newspaper headline asked in early 1959, and the public took sides. Critics 
called subliminal advertising "merchandising hypnosis" and "remote control of national thought." Rep. William A. Dawson 
(R., Utah) called it "S.P." or "sneak pitch." "Contemplate, if you will," Mr. Dawson said, "the effect of an invisible 
but effective appeal to 'drink more beer' being poured into the subconscious of teenage viewers."

All three television networks vowed they wouldn't permit subliminal advertising in their broadcasts. Several state 
legislatures considered bills outlawing it.

In 1958, an independent Los Angeles TV station announced it would begin transmitting subliminal ads, starting with 
public-service messages, such as "Drive Safely" or "Join the Army." The station was deluged with letters, phone calls 
and petitions from people who were afraid they would be persuaded to do or buy things against their will. The station 
canceled its test.

Brainwashing was a very real fear in the late 1950s. A few dozen American prisoners of the Korean War, indoctrinated by 
their Chinese jailers, had publicly defected to communism. Meanwhile, people were spending more time staring at 
screens, exposed to new kinds of ads based on motivational research. Vance Packard's best-selling exposé, "The Hidden 
Persuaders," published in 1957, had warned people of the "mass psychoanalysis" that was turning them into "Pavlov's 
conditioned dog."

A newspaper columnist, George Dixon, wrote, only partly in jest, "We might be made to unconsciously absorb the 
suggestion that it is always Christmas and normal to be flat broke." It didn't take long before rationality reasserted 
control of the national brain. People began trying to replicate Mr. Vicary's experiment.

The Canadian Broadcasting Corp. flashed the message "Telephone now" 352 times on a 30-minute program. Of the more than 
500 viewers who responded to a follow-up survey, 51% said they felt compelled to "do something" after watching the 
show. Many said they felt like having something to eat or drink. Only one said she felt like making a phone call.

In another test in San Francisco, 150 viewers, most of them television and radio broadcasters, watched a 25-minute film 
with an advertising message flashed every five seconds. The viewers then got a ballot with nine product names from 
which to identify the advertiser. Only 14 people chose the right name, a soft drink. More than twice as many chose a 
brand of chewing gum.

The Federal Communications Commission ordered Mr. Vicary to demonstrate his device in Washington before a panel of 
government officials. The message "Eat Popcorn" was transmitted during an episode of "The Grey Ghost." Sen. Charles E. 
Potter (R., Mich.) was heard saying to a colleague, "I think I want a hot dog."

The advertising industry's trade publication, Printer's Ink, observed, "Having gone to see something that is not 
supposed to be seen, and having not seen it, as forecast, the FCC and Congress seemed satisfied."

Subliminal ads, supporters assured people, were strictly "reminder" ads. "They might move you to do something you like 
doing, but they'll never make a Democrat out of a solid Republican, and they'll never make a Scotch drinker out of a 
teetotaler," one advocate told Gay Talese of the New York Times.

In 1962, Mr. Vicary, in an interview, admitted that he had fabricated the results of the popcorn test to drum up 
business for his market-research firm. Subliminal ads were tossed into the invention junkyard.

"All I accomplished," he said, "was to put a new word into common usage."

Write to Cynthia Crossen at cynthia.crossen () wsj com

 

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