Asking the Wrong Questions

Re:Asking the Wrong Questions by elric on Sunday September 08, 2024 @04:07AM (#41478941)

By the time Alien came out, corporate evil was certainly well established. Everything on the space ship had Weyland branding, and the corporation treating its employees as expendable was par for the course.

I'm struggling to come up with an older example of prominent ads in sci fi, but I'm drawing a blank.

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Re:Asking the Wrong Questions by GJim on Sunday September 08, 2024 @05:13AM (#41479175)

So what you are saying is... "even the most dystopian Sci-Fi didn't predict modern Silicon Valley led advertising & surveillance capitalism"!

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Re:Asking the Wrong Questions by elric on Sunday September 08, 2024 @07:40AM (#41479812)

I guess we as a species (and sci-fi writers) underestimate the banality of evil and its cumulative effect. Nearly 25 years ago, I ran a couple of banner ads on my website to help pay for the hosting costs. Back then it didn't cross my mind that such a trivial bit of HTML would eventually lead to surveillance capitalism. I wonder if any sci-fi writers predicted where this could/would lead...

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Re:Asking the Wrong Questions by dleeftink on Sunday September 08, 2024 @06:10AM (#41479447)

"Tuesday is Soylent Green day.."

And not to forget how "colors of the real world only seem really real when you viddy them on screen.."

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Re:Asking the Wrong Questions by MrVandemar on Sunday September 08, 2024 @07:27PM (#41484139)

1984 has a fair few advertising concepts IIRC, not least everything was "Victory" branded, and the ubiquitious Big Brother.

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