Today’s TOI, Jan 17th has been taken over by
Apple. Vodafone has taken Front – front inside, back-back inside. Bangalore
Times has Apple MacBook – full page ad. So we had iPhone 6 staring at us from
TOI & MacBook staring at us from Bangalore Times.
I am sure the marketing & sales team would be waiting
for the sales number to come in on Monday, later in the year - the media agency
will gleefully wait in an award function for a media innovation award and TOI
revenues would have gone up drastically.
What about the reader?
I am one of those 40+ who cannot yet adapt to the online
newspaper reading. I need to feel the newspaper in my hand to call it reading,
same goes with books, I would rather lug around a 100 page Murakami across
airports than read it in Kindle. Let that be an aside.
Does it shows in a way the crass commercialization of a
basic thing like newspaper. The fundamental objective of a newspaper is the
news which is inserted somewhere between the ad’s. Also the nature of
advertising has shifted from informing about the product to informing about the
offers – especially with the e-commerce sites brandishing there discounted
products in front pages, thanks to the millions they have raised from venture
funds.
As a father I am worried about the impact the same has on a
child’s mind – how would a 10 or 14 year old react to the offers? It’s obvious
– Let’s buy them. Buy them now. Let’s buy one more – the offer won’t last. Ever
aspiring for something new!! It’s ok to waste or have more than 1 jean or shoes
because I am getting 2 at the price of one. There is a fundamental shift in
their mind from scarcity to having more choices. Having too many choices is a
larger problem. From ‘’which jean”, to ‘’which offer’’ to offline or online or
mobile!!!! They are sifting through all these information in addition to the
maths, physics & chem.
I know there is too much at stake for Apple & Times of
India & the media agencies so I have decided to stop the TOI.
Written on 17th Jan 2015
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