Are we a virus? A society that only seeks to consume all it sees with the goal to just make money and gain all we can and conquer.
Sadly I believe we are, recently I was browsing the web, doing my usual search for electronic items and supposedly must need things at the end of which I gave in to logic and closed my browser.Then, after a couple of days I noticed something, it didn't come as surprise but was impactful none the less. The side bars and pop-up boxes that now appeared on websites were directed to me, somehow knowing that I wanted a 32 inch LCD television. Yelling and screaming "buy, buy, buy," sad but true, this is what have become a society that focuses on taking. We work and yes the world is constructed in a way that man must toil to achieve his goals and yes, free will is owned by all. But this constant push of advertising and marketing has become ridiculous, it almost feels like an invasion of privacy.
It has somewhat evolved as well, now they vibrate, float, somersault cross your webpage offering things you don't need, that only crossed your mind on a whim one day while browsing.In 2007 the independent marketing company eMarketer indicated that U.S. Internet companies were spending $21.4 billion in 2007 on online ads.
Websites today are way more advanced than most people think; they track clicks, browsing and user attention span, and collect information like a government tax form. Then advertising brokers create a comprehensive profile of site visitors and use it to serve ads targeted to appeal to an individual's particular tastes. They basically know what you eat, drink, wear and love, know your thoughts pretty much.
Where is the line drawn, I do admit this technology serves its purpose with the unethical of our society, more specifically the pedophiles of our world. Being able to know if "Tom" the friendly guy across the street is really sadistic creep is great with such tracking technology.
But to have these ads constantly knocking at our screens is ridiculous but I am looking at the bigger picture here. Is it that our concept of economy and how to attain money warped? In ancient Babylonia or present day Iraq the earliest system of economics was developed. One could find everything as we know it today in terms of rules, laws on debt, contracts and codes relating to business practices, and private property.
But at the end of the day things were much simpler and the goal was still to make money yes, but coupled with sustaining life in the simplest way possible. This is the same today, but survival in terms of maintaining our lifestyle has become a way conglomerates key into the society and suck all they can from us.
Almost hypnotizing the society with marketing schemes and campaigns which thier only goal is to take our hard earned cash. Offering up things we don't need or behaving similarly to snake-oil man of the old West. As we marvel at our own success as human beings and the progression we have made in technology and thought process. There comes a time in life when we must revert to aspects of the old ways of living and inject simplicity into our lives. Somehow reassessing the goals of our society and address instances where we have gone wrong. The ideology of constant selling to maintain our well being can in my opinion be tweaked. The world can be an unbalanced place, there are thousands of people across the world starving, living in deplorable conditions but governments and private institutions can find countless amounts of funds to fly into space. A bit off tangent I know but I believe it somehow applies to the world's priorities and what we value in life. People create these ads because they need to survive caring less about your needs or mine. Everything boils down to money and that's the reality of the world. We have made advancement in technology and in some cases the way we think. But can't we improve our economic system, having some worldwide communal system that truly represents survival and eliminates the fight for money. This may be unrealistic I know but there has to be a way. Maybe life's complexities is getting the better of me and this is my way venting my frustrations, I'm not sure but when will the next phases of human progression happen. Every couple of decades we see something that influences generations to come, there was WWII, the Civil Rights Movement and the birth of the internet, what will come next that will move us past money. For centuries the world's nations have been interested in power and money, having an ulterior motive even in the kindest of situations. Well, maybe it's a mindset that needs to be changed and sadly sometimes that takes centuries.
