First contact with outside world...
March 29, 2014
The business of advertising has evolved with meteoric speed in the past 180 years but does not yet circle the globe.
In 1833 the New York Sun boasted 30,000 subscribers making it the largest newspaper in the world. Volney Palmer, recognized as the first advertising agency, opened in Philadelphia in 1843. The growth of advertising as a business is due to its astonishing durability, adapting to new technologies of mass communication to the point where today, it is easy to conclude that the seven billion people on our planet have had at least some exposure at some point to consumer branding.
Tell that to the frightened group of tribespeople in Brazil's far western Amazon who brandished spears at a low-flying plane that took aerial photographs of their settlement last week. http://bit.ly/1hq9Y8T
According to the department in the Brazilian government responsible for indigenous peoples, there may be up to 84 uncontacted groups in the country.
The perception in the first world holds that advertising is so pervasive, everyone must be exposed to it in some form. The business of advertising has developed its own brand of self-promotion over time, perpetuating itself by portraying advertising as a type of knowledge, providing information to be considered and acted upon. This argument holds that anyone unwilling to expose themselves to branded messaging must be closed-minded. Shifting attitudes toward advertising reinforce this reasoning. Contrary to opinions a decade ago, more Americans today say that they like rather than dislike advertising and tend to find advertising generally informative and useful in guiding their own decision-making. http://bit.ly/1e8TlO1
Technically, the frightened tribe under the thatched hut is not defined as 'undiscovered.' Logging and encroaching industrialization of their traditional areas cannot be avoided by these people. They choose isolation. No metal tools. No contact with people who use them. No Elvis. They know there is an outside world. They reject it. They are primitive people, yet they are very aware. They are extremely remote, but they don't want the remote.
There are moments after my daily bombardment from targeted messages and mass advertising that I smile knowing that these uncontacted peoples are still out there.
