OT: Advertising

[Bill]

It occurred to me that "newsgroup reading" is one of the (few) things I do in my spare time where I am not advertised at (at least not directly).

On the radio in the car--floods almost every channel!

On sports--it's inseparable, and that's not including the commercials!

On most web pages--it's ubiquitous. They are becoming more "in your face" all the time. Plenty of spam.

In the news--virtually everyone who has anything to say has a vested-interest (and there are a lot of people being downright "deceptive" in the business news).

Many of the OTA television broadcasts are religious (which I have no problem with--except when I feel someone is trying to "sell me something").

I"m sure I've left out PLENTY. Thank goodness for peace from all this--wherever you can find it! Maybe that's one of the nice features of "work"! : )

Gas prices (Lew) don't bother me as much as the cumulative effect from all of the above. I like to think I "own" my thoughts--but that ain't an easy game to play these days (think about it)!

I hope this helps to explain the source of my first post on this topic.

Bill

[Ed Pawlowski]

Foe the past four years I've has Sirius/XM in my cars. I'd never go back to regular OTA and the commercials again. I spend enough time in the car to justify the cost.

[Leon]

Damn fine fellows, brutally handsome too.

As boring as watching tennis except for the occasional crash.

[Leon]

I have had satellite radio in two cars in the last 10 years. I think a dollar or two a month would be a good deal for us... We prefer pandora which costs nothing with the occasional ad.. I can't remember the last time I heard an ad on pandora. What I really like about pandora is being able to tweak the station and to skip a song if I don't like it.

[Lew Hodgett]

----------------------------------------------------------- I have three (3) NPR stations programmed into the buttons.

Which ever one that is NOT begging for money, I listen to that day.

Lew

[Leon]

Not handsome, brutally handsome.

[woodchucker]

I think the brutally part fits :-)

[Larry Blanchard]

I too hate all the advertising that I see everywhere, but for some reason I seem to be able to filter it out when I watch NASCAR. I just tried to think who was sponsoring a few of my favorite drivers, and I could only come up with one sponsor of one driver - it's hard to ignore that big target on Montoya's car :-).

I find myself watching less and less though as the sport changes. The super speedways are boring, all the rules are boring. The only good change I've seen is the added safety features.

Now flat track motorcycle racing - that's something else. But there's very little of that around here.

[krw]

Pit Bulls are brutally handsome.

[krw]

I have Sirius in my two vehicles, at least for now. It's free for a while longer and I'll probably renew it for my wife's car. I hate switching stations constantly when driving long distances. We usually listen to a book, though. The biggest drawback of Sirius/XM (Sirius is worse) is that the music is compressed to shit. Not so bad for rock (it's pre-compressed) but horrible for other genre.

Pandora over cell is way too expensive. You can really eat up GB when streaming anything. There are also too many dead zones. Listen to Internet radio at home. It's free and quite good. The appliances are cheap, now, too.

[Doug Miller]

Bill wrote in news: [e-mail]:

Use Firefox with AdBlock Plus -- most ads vanish.

[Bill]

Thanks, I do use that (among other browsers). I've been more proactive today--changing my home page, throwing away some mail without reading it, deleting email faster, and switching from radio to CD. As I was driving down the road I happen to notice plenty of advertising on both sides of the street too--I believe they call it commerce or similar. Several businesses even pay people to carry signs out in front to draw ones attention. Throw in a few blinking lights, and I call it pollution.

[Leon]

I have unlimited data.

[Larry Blanchard]

I think you're thinking of road racing. The flat track I'm talking about is the old dirt track steel shoe version. Heat races, semi-finals, and the main event. Lots of races in one evening. Take a look at:

[krw]

Dirt? Too easy:

I just can't get into watching vehicles go 'round-y-'round for more than a few minutes. Tennis is the same. Worth doing but not worth watching.

[krw]

Until you hit the brick wall. Even those plans are going the way of the DoDo. Streaming data is the cell companies worst nightmare. Once that changes, all sorts of new gadgets are going to crop up. Say goodbye to cable TV and Internet. There just isn't the bandwidth available for it, though.

[Larry Blanchard]

A friend of mine did a little of that long ago in LA. His favorite story was about the time he couldn't make a turn and was headed for the fence. He remembered the stunt guys hitting a wooden fence right in the middle of a board so it would split, and hopefully carry a few neighboring boards with it to open a hole. He says he had nothing to lose so he might as well try it. Worked like a charm. Unfortunately, what was on the other side of the fence was a parked car! Luckily only minor injuries.

[Bill]

Please explain. Your post piques my interest, but I don't understand it.

Bill

[krw]

I can't even pretend to imagine all of the possibilities but even small kids carry iPads around these days. The problem is getting information to the tablet. WiFi doesn't cut it for a truly mobile device. Now take that into a car. DVDs are dead but video isn't. Cell is the perfect way to "broadcast" into cars (the US digital broadcast standards don't work). Lotsa stuff there. Big bux being spent in this area but the big problem is the infrastructure.

[Bill]

Thanks. G4 is the new "mobile way" (at least according to Amazon's Kindle device), is it not. Doesn't that make the most sense?