Outfoxed

Outfoxed is a documentary film by filmmaker Robert Grennwald. In this film he criticizes the Fox New Channel and its owner Ruper Murdoch by giving examples and showing past clips of news that clearly show that the news channels views are biased towards the right-wing and they sell these biased views to the audience.

Media is our source of knowing what’s happening in the world around us. It is supposed to be the unbiased reporter of news to the public, a mere communicator or transporter of the news. Yet, unethical practices have crept into this system, and now it has become a moneymaking business.

In this documentary, we see that the Fox News Channel portrays its news in a very biased way, favoring the right party. They manipulate their news while presenting it to swing the news in favor of the Republicans. For instance, during a panel discussion, they would call more prominent Republican leaders than prominent Democrat leaders, while ensuring that the total number of representatives in the panel from both sides is equal. This shifts the discussion in the favor of Republicans, as they have an edge with higher number of influential people in the panel, while the Fox channel can still claim an unbiased behavior on its part.

This documentary also makes us question the media at large, beyond just this one channel. Media has become a business now, and the only news that every new channel presents, is the news that will sell, the news that will bring more number of viewers, the news that will bring profits. So what if you were the first one in your neighborhood to be nominated for a noble prize, the local news channel has better things to cover. 

Branding at the UIC Campus

UIC is one of the most diverse campuses in Illinois. We have people from different ethnicities, different races, different religions and different social backgrounds. It’s amazing that in spite of these differences, there are a lot of commonalities between the students in their style of dressing or the Brands that they wear.

In the current winter months, the most common brand to be seen around campus is North Face. I feel that most people wear North Face to be part of the big community that accepts North Face as a reputed producer of quality winter wear. Also, a lot of students are seen wearing UIC merchandize, sharing their identity as a UIC Student with pride. Wearing UIC merchandize is also an attempt of people to become a part of the community of students here. It’s like sending a message that says – “I am proud to be here and to be a part of this University’s community. Therefore, accept me as your own.”

Some other trends that we can observe on the Campus are that most people wear either jeans or sweat pants. It’s a part of the casual identity of a college going student that is represented through this. It’s again a factor that makes the students naturally blend in the crowd.

Even though the backgrounds of all the students are very diverse, the common age group plays a huge role in this commonality in dressing. As a young adult going to college, each one of us wants to look cool, casually yet prettily dressed and be a part of the student group by just the way we look.

Apple Marketing

Apple is one of the leading brands today. We all know that Apple products are very highly priced. In spite of these high prices, Apple continues to launch new products in the market and manages to successfully sell them to a huge audience. What is it really about Apple that makes it, well, “Apple”? Let us go deeper into the Apple products and see how they are marketed.

Apple has very aesthetically appealing products for all kinds of age groups. Apple products are not explicitly targeted at a particular age group, although some features are designed keeping in mind the larger chunk of the audience. For instance, the Apple iPods come out in various colors, and we all know that colored gadgets are mostly a thing of the youth. On the other hand we have more sophisticated looking Apple computers and laptops, which would make them appropriate for use in offices and schools. Apple sends out the message “Apple is for everyone” through its designs. This definitely helps it capture a much larger audience.

Apple also uses brand recognition through its products, and uses it more visually than other brands. While most brands have some written material on their products, Apple just has its logo – an Apple, far easier to catch the eye. Not just the logo, but also the designs of Apple products are unique. Think of all the times you’ve seen someone with Apple headphones in their ears and known that they are ‘Apple’ and every time you’ve seen someone use a MacBook and known even from a long distance, sometimes even without seeing the Apple logo, that it’s a ‘MacBook’. And all those times you’ve made out someone’s phone is an iPhone by just looking at that one button! We don’t even realize it, but we all know Apple products with just a single glance.

Apple products are also designed in such a manner that they appear to be easy to use. In today’s times, we’ll probably find other phones that are capable of doing all that an Apple iPhone does, but Apple presents it in a manner that looks so simple that anyone could do it. Take for instance the Personal Assistant ‘Siri’; an Android phone can probably do all that Siri is capable of doing, but you’ll have to press more buttons, open different apps and it’ll probably take more time. Apple on the other hand puts it all in one place, and markets it as a single simple use tool.

We all know Apple has a great fan following and Apple utilizes these Fanboys optimally to market its products. Every time Apple is about to come out with a new launch, everyone is talking about it, EXCEPT Apple itself. This creates curiosity and ambiguity in the minds of the audience, and Apple happily lets them play the guessing game. It also adds to the mischief by coming out with limited number of products immediately after the launch, making it an exclusive product at that point. The human psyche is such that you want to know what you don’t know and you want to have what you can’t have. Apple uses this aspect to its benefit all the time.

Some critics of Apple are, however, bold enough to say that Apple has this standing only because of its marketing and has no substance. That’s not true. Apple does have substance, and it optimally utilizes that substance and markets its products. Every brand that has a fan following has to meet the expectations of the fans, otherwise the fan base would disintegrate. For almost a decade we’ve seen Apple at the top, maintaining that position very stably. Recently, however, with the launch of iPhone 5, we can see that Apple’s status has begun to wobble. It’s because of the unmet expectations of the consumer market that this is happening. This is clear testimony that the other Apple products have not just been successful because of marketing, but because of marketing of what has been good in them.

Resources

http://www.businessweek.com/stories/2007-08-16/teen-marketing-apples-the-masterbusinessweek-business-news-stock-market-and-financial-advice

Dictated at the hands of Marketing Tycoons, or are we?

Are we doomed to be at the mercy of marketers, like the marketing system is a form of cultural dictatorship, or do we actually have the freedom to escape it (or at least remain outside of its grip)?

Persuaders is a Frontline documentary film by ‘David’ Rushkoff’. In this film, he talks about how marketers are trying to grab the attention of the consumers through new and innovative ways, so they can avoid the clutter of advertisements that they have created. This film also talks about how we have moved from marketing inter-product differences to marketing of identities and beliefs.

After watching the Frontline documentary ‘The Persuaders’, this question is something that comes very naturally to the mind. We live in a world where we are attacked with advertisements from all sides. We have become part of a system where we are being wooed constantly; whether we know it or not. Sometimes, we are just so fed up of it, that we just want to escape it. But can we escape this bombardment if we really want to – altogether?

It is important to first understand the concept of ‘Advertising’. Wikipedia defines Advertising as a form of communication for marketing and is used to encourage, persuade, or manipulate an audience. Some of the common marketing mediums today include TV and Radio commercials, print ads, poster and banners, Internet advertisements, product placement, media and our own peers. Today with techniques like media marketing, product placements and especially informal social marketing, advertising is nearly impossible to avoid.

In an article by Dan Hersam, about ‘How to avoid Marketing’, he talks about how we can avoid a lot of commercial ads by avoiding elements of mass media such as TV and radio.  But in reality, the TV and Radio contribute to a relatively smaller portion of advertising. There is a huge chunk of advertising that we are affected by beyond these traditional methods. In today’s capitalist economy, we can merely reduce the exposure to advertising, but it’s nearly impossible to avoid it completely.

But does not being able to avoid advertisements mean that we are being subjected to a form of cultural dictatorship? It is important to understand the concept of dictatorship before going on further. Wikipedia says, “in contemporary usage, dictatorship refers to an autocratic form of absolute rule by leadership unrestricted by law, constitutions, or other social and political factors within the state.” So in layman’s terms, we can say that it is when the people being affected have no say in what is happening around them.

Let us see how this can apply to advertising and marketing. Although marketing is a fairly new concept introduced only in the 1900s (Wikipedia), advertising has been in practice ever since man started trading. It thus means, that we are being wooed to buy things for as long as we have had the capacity to buy. Every time we interact with one another, we are selling each other different kinds of ideas and ideologies. Thus, advertising and marketing are extensions of the basic concept  – “Man is a social animal”. Communication is necessary for us humans as it is a part of our inherent behavior, and advertising, like defined earlier, is a form of communication.

Today, the concept of advertising has been largely commercialized and so we can consciously see that it has become unavoidable. It is because of this that we feel that we are being dictated by its terms. But the truth is that advertising at its very basic form is – communication; and that has always been a part of us humans at an individualistic level. It is true that we don’t really have the freedom to escape this, but the truth is that we have never had and we have never wanted to have. Not because we are being dictated by some bunch of commercial kings and we have no choice; but because it originates from within us.

Sources

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_marketing

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dictatorship

http://dan.hersam.com/2007/02/20/how-to-avoid-advertising/

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/persuaders/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Advertising