Product Placement

My wife and I have a game we like to play while watching our favorite shows.  Basically, when we see something within the show that identifies a brand name item (phone, car, restaurant, etc.), the first one to call out, “PRODUCT PLACEMENT!” gets a point.  At the end of the show, the person with the most points wins.  The game came about when we realized that the extra money and effort we spend to ‘DVR’ our favorite shows does not shield us from the relentless onslaught of advertisement on television.  Companies will do just about anything to get their product in front of you and show you how much you need it.

I like stuff; I won’t deny that.  I especially like to be able to examine my options when I am looking for a particular item or service to fill a need.  For instance, if I need a watch, or a special battery, or snow removal, I like having the ability to research my options and then choose the best one for me at that time.  The internet has made this method of sales much more common and accessible (thanks Al Gore).  This method obviously has a major flaw in that there are lots of businesses out there that want very badly to sell me stuff that they know I don’t need, don’t want, and that is probably not very good for me.  Of course, it would be hard to fairly isolate the good from the bad. 

One answer to the problem is to outlaw all persuasive advertising.  Informative advertising would still be allowed, but would only be permitted to communicate facts such as price, features, availability, etc.  Any attempts to actively convince someone that a given product is better through flashy, fast moving images, sexy spokes-persons, or catchy jingles would result in stiff fines and mandatory jail time to the evil perpetrators.  In some cases, these actions could result in businesses being shut down, but it would all be for the good of society.

Like so many other great ideas, this one is also deeply flawed on many levels – too many to discuss here. 

By exposing ourselves to the magic box of television, we are agreeing to play their game by their rules.  But who will win the game is the question.  Ultimately, the responsibility of recognizing, understanding, and dealing with persuasive advertising sits with each individual, and we must see advertising by its true nature, which is a sort of mind control.  So as you are sitting down to watch your favorite show tonight, look that monster in the eye and repeat after me, “Your Jedi mind tricks won’t work on me!” 

OH, PRODUCT PLACEMENT!  Now go buy that Star Wars DVD before they’re all gone.

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Why I want to earn my MBA

Freedom awaited me.  It was a beautiful summer day in 1996, and I had just finished sharing with my last Commanding Officer my plans for success when my Navy enlistment ended.  They included ideas such as earning my bachelor’s degree, becoming an officer in the Air Force, and improving my standard of living.  With a most sincere and knowing look, he offered me his best wisdom, “You should probably just reenlist and stay until retirement; it’s likely you really aren’t going to do all those things you say you will”. 

Fortunately, he was wrong; I have gone on to accomplish all of these things and more.  Unfortunately, I do not believe I have actually ‘achieved’ success as I originally thought I would either.  I have come to believe that success and failure are just as much paths on which we travel, as they are destinations we reach.  However, as Morpheus states in The Matrix (1999), “…there's a difference between knowing the path and walking the path”.  I have known for years the benefits of earning my MBA, but have only now decided to follow the path to do it. 

Having my MBA will afford me better options for a hopeful future, and better choices and opportunities in life.  I do not have illusions of grandeur that earning my MBA will somehow be the crowning victory in my life or be a panacea for all the trouble life throws at me.  I expect it will more likely resemble many of the other moments in the past where I could pause to reflect back on my most recent achievement, what I had learned, and the lives that I affected along the way.  It will mean having less to overcome when adversity strikes as it has for so many of my friends and family who lost jobs (and more) in the recent recession.  

More importantly, I expect to find that earning my MBA will better prepare me for the next opportunity for which I would be otherwise been unprepared.  To me, that seems like freedom.  And who doesn’t want to be free?

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