| The irritation of product placement is as nothing compared to the burning rash of
pop-up TV banner adverts,
which are apparently slouching towards cable television as we speak. They're being trialled because
"audience defense against commercials is exceeding
the advertisers' ability to hold
on to the eyeballs" - we've evolved the
evasive technique of flipping channels or making tea during commercial breaks, so
the adverts are fighting back by jumping up and down in front of the programmes
we're trying to watch. Awful idea.
In a way I admire the stupid guilelessness of it, but it's only a matter of time
before digital broadcasting becomes clever enough to implant product placement on
the fly, pasting paid-for logos over billboards in films, planting soft-drink
cans on the grid-references of flat surfaces. Different every time, depending on
which advertiser paid the most.
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