What is the irony of being human? 


Simply put, humanity itself is a contradiction, a vessel of constantly conflicting thoughts and beliefs. Always agreeing, but not fully; Disagreeing, but not wholly. 


A thousand and million things can be said about this irony, but I will briefly touch on one aspect: value, or rather, the value in terms of advertising.


Personally, I'll admit that I'm an avid fan of advertising. Its always been my pleasure and goal, even, to watch, and predict how advertising feeds on the basic human emotion, and how better advertising can do so in much more subtle yet effective ways. 


Advertising is about communication; but also mainly, in the common eye, it is selling. I believe it is a two-pronged approach: Communication is, according to Harold Lasswell, a simple theory of "who says what to whom in what channel with what effect," Advertising is basically similar in that sense, in which it reaches out to its targeted audience using certain medium(s), and communicates a certain message. In many examples, advertising seeks to inform and excite the audience about a certain product or idea or service that they would like to promote. That is the basic theory of advertising.


But the truth is, that is not the essence of effective advertising. That is why I adore watching amateurs go about their way, advertising in the worst possible ways. 


In order to sell something, you must let the audience know why they need it. Also, they must have the knowledge that yours is the best. But what if what I'm selling is not something that everybody wants? 


This is where the main topic of this article comes in: value.


Humans run on values: driven by, and driven for their values in life. They work hard for these values, and once having obtained them, they will keep wanting more of these values. This is the essence of basic human greed. This greed is the driving force behind many things, advertising being one such thing. Some might say this is an ethical issue, as it targets the weakness in people. Some would even go to the extent to say that advertising creates a hollow, distorted truth about the product and tricks the consumers into buying stuff they do not actually need. 


But I see it differently. It is the basic principle of advertising to provide something for consumption, and the basic principle of a consumer is, well, to consume. So, if a consumer is to buy something that they do not actually need, whose fault is this, really?


Since everyone has values embedded within them, it is the job of the advertisers to empower their products and services with such value. If a product can be given value, in the perspective of the consumer, it will be sought after. Of course, not all things need to be "given" value; only the products that do not have it on first glance. Everything has value, its merely the case of which products has a higher value to a consumer. 


More on this will come. That's it for now.