Examples?

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Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Elon, Tulsi, and Don

Almost all food I buy since I avoid pretty much any chain restaurant and have fast food about twice a month. Pretty much any furniture I've purchased. The house I purchased.

Now, there are obviously many purchases that I have seen advertisements for, but if I take an inventory of everything I've bought in the past month a majority of my purchases I've never seen an advertisement for unless you count there being a sign on a business.

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You do not talk to me like that! I work too hard to deal with this stuff! I work too hard! I'm an important member of the CSFMB! I drive a Dodge Stratus!

Food and shelter are the basic human necessities that I was referring to.

Something like a cellphone is in itself a product of advertising. People survived forever without them but now everyone "needs" one. Whether you buy an Android or an iPhone may be based upon a specific ad, but the very fact that someone believes they "need" the product was created by advertisers.

_________________
Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Elon, Tulsi, and Don

Cell phones are a terrible example here. Communication has existed and improved as civilization has advanced. Cell phones are simply better versions of telegraphs.

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You do not talk to me like that! I work too hard to deal with this stuff! I work too hard! I'm an important member of the CSFMB! I drive a Dodge Stratus!

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That's true, but convincing people to use new tech is the work of advertisers.

_________________
Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Elon, Tulsi, and Don

Advertising reflects changing society though. If advertisers had the power that you think, they'd be able to convince people to use pay phones and land lines since companies were losing huge money due to the lost revenue from those being made obsolete.

The amount of failed technology out there indicates that people aren't just buying technology because television told them to(outside of the Apple zombies).

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You do not talk to me like that! I work too hard to deal with this stuff! I work too hard! I'm an important member of the CSFMB! I drive a Dodge Stratus!

I buy Barilla pasta on account of this guy:

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Sex isn't dirty, sex isn't a crime. It's a loving act between two or more consenting adults.

-Hank Kingsley

At some point consumers are going to adopt that which they believe makes their lives easier. On the surface cellphones provide greater efficiency. In practice that may not be true as it seems the killer app of mobile tech is little Johnny texting little Suzy every two seconds. It's likely the smartphone has simply given us more diversions along with making it customary for many businesses to subtly shift back to an 80+ hour work week.

_________________
Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Elon, Tulsi, and Don

Unrelated related thought: is Derrick Rose the most uncharismatic superstar in sports? I don't mean he's a jerk (he's not, at least from what I've heard). Even in his commercials it's pretty much people dancing and doing things around him, or him exercising.

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Fire Phil Emery

yes. he's a good guy but he is completely unflattering.

I do like to argue, but you are crazy if you think you can draw me into a "Are cell phones better than landlines?" argument.

_________________
You do not talk to me like that! I work too hard to deal with this stuff! I work too hard! I'm an important member of the CSFMB! I drive a Dodge Stratus!

_________________
Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Elon, Tulsi, and Don