Lies and Spies

We are constantly being conned by advertising, however savvy we think we are about such things. Whether it is the latest must-have gadget or the game that everyone is playing or some new fad or other that a year ago we wouldn’t have been seen dead in/with, but now the Jo Celeb has endorsed it, we must have one too. Yes, we are all suckered in to that herd mentality of believing the hype somewhere along the line. I don’t give a stuff about celebrity endorsement (I don’t even know who half of them are anyway) and if everyone is wearing/doing it, I’d rather not be, so I do not fall for such things. So how did I get caught, you ask? Simply this: believing that buying bags for a vacuum cleaner was an inconvenience, at least, a greater inconvenience than getting covered in dust every time I have to empty a bagless one.

Ok, so if I didn’t change the bag often enough in my old Hoover ,it would explode and I’d get covered in dust anyway, but I long for the days when emptying the vacuum was a matter of removing the full bag, dropping it in the bin and installing a new one. These days it takes a good 10 minutes to empty the vacuum only to discover that most of it has felted around the outer filter, which then needs to be cleaned. Of course that’s just the bigger bits, all the actual dust is lurking in the folds of the inner filter and needs to be shaken out with a vigour that guarantees it all ending up all over you.* Although this operation is done outside, you can be sure that a fair bit of the dust cloud will find its way back indoors. So, vacuum emptied, you then need to spend almost as long cleaning the dust off yourself (without the aid of a vacuum, as that would be a never-ending cycle worthy of hell) as you did cleaning the floor in the first place. They don’t tell you that in the ads.

*If you are wondering how bad can the dust be, know that I have an open fire, so it’s bad. Of course, I mostly use a dustpan to clean that as hoovering it out would be hell.

Advertising is almost entirely balderdash at best, at worst it is merely feculent tripe to be ignored. Very occasionally, there is an exception, an ad with some artistic merit, humour or entertainment value, but even these are pointless since one never remembers what they are supposed to be trying to sell you. In most media it is possible to simply mentally filter such things out and ignore them, but with the increasing degree of tracking of our online activity, the rise of targeted advertising is really quite alarming. It’s bad enough to be bombarded with ads for wrinkle treatments, but it is not in the least comfortable to have an advert pop up at the side of your screen including your specific age or location. One doesn’t think: “Oh great! They really know me so this must be relevant, best I click on in and buy whatever they are selling.” No, one thinks: “Oh shit! I’m being spied on, get me out of here!” This is why I have installed anti-tracking plugins and am lying about my age. Take note Facebook, if I say I don’t want to display my age, I do not expect to see ads in my sidebar announcing that they are aware of it. This is sensitive information, not because I particularly care that people know how old I am, but my date of birth is one of those bits of personal information that unscrupulous people can use to steal my identity or hack into my accounts and I do not appreciate you casually hand it out to all and sundry.