The problem with modern advertising

Most people - especially those who work in the media industrial complex - have no idea what advertising means let alone how it works.

Advertising is not meant to interrupt and annoy people. Sadly, that’s how small-minded media networks and social platforms think advertising works. That wedging advertisements in between the content people are watching or reading or listening to is how to gain attention.

That’s not advertising, that’s interrupting. Advertising comes from the verb advertise which is derived from the Latin advertere ‘to direct one’s attention to, give heed’ - literally ‘to turn toward,’ from ad ‘to, toward’ + vertere ‘to turn’.

Turn towards and connect. Not incessantly interrupt and disconnect. It’s bizarre to live in a world where the entire corporate mediascape actively misses the point of one of its chief messaging systems.

We live in a world where people desperately want to connect and business seems intent on disconnecting them in every way possible.

Why not design advertising systems that connect with and through audiences rather than drive them apart?

Why not create advertising that brings people together?