Repeated advertisement broadcasting, especially via TV and radio, is more than just for the hope of influencing buying decisions… it’s for defining “normal”… defining “reality” to the point of exclusion of alternatives, as time and attention are limited.

It also defines attitude. Imitation… learning how to act based on what we observe of those around us… is a very powerful behavioral force. Even if we don’t exactly see others using another product, if we believe others use the product, we are more likely to follow suit and think this is normal.

The wiki defacement and spam are probably a result of a particular cost/benefit trade-off. Social norms present in meat space don’t hold as much behavioral influence due to the anonymity it affords, whereas the cost of producing and transmitting those messages is minimal. This has the potential to change as the popularity of social networks grow. Perhaps as the phenomenon spreads, it could be useful for building reputations, but even that could be gamed and is not a silver bullet solution.

I think, though, that the sentiment, growing among marketers, of, “What can we do to take advantage of these new modalities and media?” is going to rapidly be replaced by, “Oh shit. We’re dead. Anybody can do what we do.”

I suppose that I’m feeling drawn to cause, in my own predictable way, the disintermediation of broadcasting advertisers and marketers. To accelerate the race to the bottom.

The three people I sit with at the coffee shop every Wednesday morning can create better, more beautiful, more effective branding and marketing and advertising campaigns—for the cost of one beer—than any of the marketing companies I know of here in town. We have all the equipage: analytics, design sensibility, communication tools. Expansive, diverse, and remarkably influential social networks.

Imagine what we might do if somebody paid us… 10%? 25%? of what the old guard charge. And if we really gave a damn. And if we had a real chip on our shoulders.

It’s not just me, surely. There must be thousands out there who aren’t just ignoring the most egregious abuses of public commons. So there’s a Tragedy of the Commons pointing its barrels straight at the wallets of traditional marketing and advertising: their only possible future is word of mouth, of building some kind of authentic reputation.

But even if one could sap all the meaning and value (and profit) out of direct and broadcast marketing and advertising, there remains the thing I’m concerned with: brand.

I wonder what it would take to make “brand” an insult, the derogatory supercilious term it may well deserve to be. I wonder what social engineering might be done to make not just one, but all branding a joke.

Thinking now….