Timewaster's Guide Archive
Departments => Movies and TV => Topic started by: fuzzyoctopus on November 20, 2003, 02:45:01 AM
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What IS it about infomercials that makes them so goofy, yet I can sit and watch them for an entire afternoon?
Why? Why?
Also, where and when did the name infomercials orginate?
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I've never found Tele Shopping Network programs interesting. The only information that they share is doctored to generate more revenue for the products on sale.
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infomercials = intellectual morphine.
Watch out, Fuzz. It's addictive!
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The only information that they share is doctored to generate more revenue for the products on sale.
No kidding. What on TV isn't?
Anyway, I totally dig infomercials, and I've even bought something from one (the SuperChop. It was a piece of crap).
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When I was a kid I used to wonder where they got all these people so absorbed in an apparent culture surrounding a new product no one else had ever heard of for the audiences. But then I guess that's the illusion the shows are trying to generate
On that note, I also wonderred how they had footage of football teams playing when the "live" game was yet to take place. It took me a while to figure out TV.
But since I'm already digressing, I'll take a few more steps:
I remember the very first time I saw a commercial for Transformers. OH yeah, they had me hooked. I couldn't tell if it was a movie or a TV show or a toy they were advertising, but that idea kicked a lot of major butt. They had me hooked from moment 1.
Which brings me to my last digression. Now that I"m a dad, i'm noticing that the toys on sale today are EXACTLY the toys they were trying to sell to my parents when I was a kid:
GI Joe, Star Wars, Transformers, He-Man (and for girls: Strawberry Shortcake, My LIttle Pony, Care Bears, and Cabbage Patch Kids). The only real progression are the superhero toys, but there were a few Secret Wars things on sale back then too, so they're not all that new.
My explanation for this is that my peers and I are now collecting these toys, so the adult market carries over. But if you make it appeal to kids, you've got a HUGE target for all your product line. They're geniuses. ANd it works. I buy it. They should put them all into infomercials (there, I brought it back to the original topic.)
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You know. That's sort of true.
The other day I screamed in fear at my husband because they played a My Little Pony commercial, followed by a Cabbage Patch kid commercial, followed by a Strawberry Shortcake commercial, all of these things were popular when I was a kid. My childhood is coming back to haunt me!
Worst of all, I'm old!
But now that Saint says that, I have to agree. I am more likely to buy Strawberry Shortcake for my kids (when I actually have some) because I liked it, than I am to buy them "Bratz" figurines. Marketing genius.
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Speaking of disturbing things, There's a girl who rides the bus I take who looks exactly like one of those Bratz dolls.
Hand on the Bible, she's about 5 inches around, and has a huge head with these freaking huge eyes.
I don't know whether to hate her or feel sorry for her.
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Feel sorry for her. She must have horrible back problems.
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All of the 80s stuff is coming back because the kids who used to be addicted to it now have kids of our own. We've already started giving Audrey care bears, because Dawn loves them. There's a built-in audience.
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You must buy a copy of Care Bears in Wonderland for her too.
That's the best kids movie ever made.