Reebok and Marketing Bullshit
As agreed to in a settlement with the FTC over deceptive advertising, Reebok will refund $25 million to suckers people who bought their EasyTone and RunTone "toning" shoes. The only thing that surprises me about this is that only Reebok was fined. People -- get with the program. ALL MARKETING IS BULLSHIT.
If Nike advertised that Reebok's toning shoes worked, I might pay attention. But when Reebok does it, it is an essentially worthless claim because Reebok is biased about their own products. All marketers are biased about their products because they are paid to be so biased, therefore ALL MARKETING IS BULLSHIT.
As a consumer, you may safely ignore any claims made from a biased source. A biased source can be a paid reviewer, or anyone who may profit from the generally positive claims made for a product. And who can most profit from said positive claims -- the manufacturer. The manufacturer pays the marketing people. Therefore, ALL MARKETING IS BULLSHIT.
In a Dilbert comic, the evil boss says that the following departments are all staffed with professional liars: marketing, sales, public relations, finance, and legal. In a rare instance, Dilbert agrees. I'll agree with the boss about the marketing department. However I'll give the others a pass simply because of the scale of the lies put out by marketers compared to the others. The others may be still lying, but compared to marketing, they are saints.
So how can you get accurate information about a product. It's difficult, but you can be sure that the biased information provided by the marketing firm that was hired by the manufacturer should be on the bottom of the list.
Remember: ALL MARKETING IS BULLSHIT.
(Advertising ... is an example of a scientifically immoral description of the products. - Richard P. Feynman)
JLF
.
If Nike advertised that Reebok's toning shoes worked, I might pay attention. But when Reebok does it, it is an essentially worthless claim because Reebok is biased about their own products. All marketers are biased about their products because they are paid to be so biased, therefore ALL MARKETING IS BULLSHIT.
As a consumer, you may safely ignore any claims made from a biased source. A biased source can be a paid reviewer, or anyone who may profit from the generally positive claims made for a product. And who can most profit from said positive claims -- the manufacturer. The manufacturer pays the marketing people. Therefore, ALL MARKETING IS BULLSHIT.
In a Dilbert comic, the evil boss says that the following departments are all staffed with professional liars: marketing, sales, public relations, finance, and legal. In a rare instance, Dilbert agrees. I'll agree with the boss about the marketing department. However I'll give the others a pass simply because of the scale of the lies put out by marketers compared to the others. The others may be still lying, but compared to marketing, they are saints.
So how can you get accurate information about a product. It's difficult, but you can be sure that the biased information provided by the marketing firm that was hired by the manufacturer should be on the bottom of the list.
Remember: ALL MARKETING IS BULLSHIT.
(Advertising ... is an example of a scientifically immoral description of the products. - Richard P. Feynman)
JLF
.
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