this post was submitted on 08 Feb 2025
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[–] [email protected] 96 points 2 weeks ago (3 children)

They pretty much feel like regular ads now. Doesn't help that they go on to run them elsewhere afterwards too so they aren't even exclusive anymore.

Feels weird to be reminiscing about ads, but they really did use to be entertaining.

[–] [email protected] 56 points 2 weeks ago

it used to be an opportunity for creatives to spread their wings with a larger budget. but the "optimization" of capitalism removes all the magic

[–] [email protected] 30 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

just like 'black friday'. once it hit mainstream with lots of media and news coverage, it went to shit.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago)

"Black Friday" was just a day well-established as a popular shopping day, due to it being a day off industrial and office workers had in the run-up to Christmas.

The "Black Friday / Cyber Monday Sale" was always a clearance sale. The stuff you were getting "for cheap" was inevitably products that the store needed off the shelves before they pulled out the next line of high-demand kitche. So you could get clothes a year out of fashion or electronics a step behind the curve. But the store wouldn't restock this stuff because it was inevitably the last bits they still had in inventory.

This - combined with hypersensational news coverage of "Incredible Unbelievable DEALS!" - sparked a slew of deadly crowd crushes that created the impression of sales so amazing people would die for them. But it was always just clearance sales, with the occasional scam or flim-flam thrown in. Once savvy consumers started to notice the degraded state of the merchandise and more conservative retail shoppers saw the crowd crush as a scary hazard rather than a bandwagon to climb aboard, the sensationalist news coverage dimmed and the marketing strategies changed.

But the rise and fall of "Black Friday" was never actually about it going to shit. It was always shit. It just took time for retail shoppers to notice.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 2 weeks ago

Doesn’t help that they go on to run them elsewhere afterwards too so they aren’t even exclusive anymore.

If you watch the playoffs (or sometimes even the late season), most of the commercials are also aired during that. It's like an additional penalty for the folks who actually follow the game.

[–] [email protected] 51 points 2 weeks ago (3 children)
[–] [email protected] 9 points 2 weeks ago

Superb ones.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

I’m surprised no one has used this old reddit / lemmy joke in an actual Super Bowl ad yet. I kind of feel like they have?

[–] [email protected] 8 points 2 weeks ago

It was also used in a TV show, "What We Do in the Shadows" - although I haven't seen it myself yet.

[–] [email protected] 30 points 2 weeks ago (2 children)

At this point, if I see or come across any commercial and I can't turn them off with ad blockers or any other method ..... I use the MUTE BUTTON.

I always used to do that with cable TV in the 90s, now I'm using this more often again.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

Also serial muter... I call commercials "ear cancer".

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 weeks ago

I wish someone could come up with a 'commercial silencer button' ... a mute button that would mute the audio but also dim the video by 50% ... then when you unmuted, audio comes back and so does full brightness.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 weeks ago

Yes, and I pull up the TV settings menu to cover most of the screen so my kids can't watch muted commercials, either.

[–] [email protected] 28 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

Oh is the superbowl coming up? I've seen more than one meme about it

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Yes. It's about a year away

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 week ago

Damn thats really close I didn't know

[–] [email protected] 8 points 2 weeks ago