Advertising

Entry updated 19 August 2024. Tagged: Theme.

There is a long sf tradition, often tinged withSatire, of speculation about future advertising. RudyardKipling'sWith the Night Mail (November 1905McClure's; rev1909 chap) includes sedately conventional ads forAirships and their trappings, supposedly from a magazine of the story's year 2000. More often, the latestTechnology is subverted for advertising purposes: electric light, for example, is used to project slogans on to the night sky inVilliers de L'Isle-Adam's "Celestial Publicity" (inContes Cruels, coll1883; trans Robert Baldick asCruel Tales1963). More plausibly and semi-prophetically, the future world of H GWells'sWhen the Sleeper Wakes (1899; rev vtThe Sleeper Awakes1910) is dense with advertising, from an early mention of the white cliffs of Dover (and all England's other cliffs) being plastered with four-colour-process posters a mere twenty years hence, while further in the future the omnipresent sales pressure includes "great fleets of advertisement balloons and kites" and much more. Robert AHeinlein'sSpace Cadet (1948) opens in a railway car whose "telescreen" alternately displays travel information and live-action ads for such products as Sorkin's SuperStellar Soap. A kind of super-skywriting involving fireworks and cloud projection delivers the old-fashioned message SMITH BROS. COUGH DROPS in E ESmith'sFirst Lensman (1950).

Skywriting was quickly extrapolated to space-borne advertising, as in George AllanEngland's "The Lunar Advertising Co, Ltd" (August 1906The Gray Goose; vt "A Message from the Moon: The Story of a Great Coup", April 1907Pearson's), in which ads are projected on to theMoon. Similarly, Robert A Heinlein's "The Man Who Sold the Moon" (inThe Man Who Sold the Moon, coll1950) proposes that soft-drink ads might be written in carbon black across the face of the Moon; Arthur CClarke's "Watch This Space" (28 May 1956Evening Standard) features a Moon-based scientific experiment to create a luminous sodium-vapour cloud visible from Earth, which thanks to a secretly inserted stencil becomes a vast Coca-Cola ad; further ads are projected on to our satellite in DavidMitchell'sCloud Atlas (2004). JackVance's "The Unspeakable McInch" (November 1948Startling) mentions a failed advertising venture: "sky-writing with luminescent gases across interplanetary space".Aliens acquireJupiter as a gigantic billboard in IsaacAsimov's "Buy Jupiter!" (May 1958Venture). FredricBrown outdoes these publicity efforts with a device that rearranges the apparent positions of stars to advertise Snively's Soap in "Pi in the Sky" (Winter 1945Thrilling Wonder). In theRed Dwarf (1988-current) spinoff novelRed Dwarf: Infinity Welcomes Careful Drivers (1989) by GrantNaylor, stars are deliberately detonated to create a pattern of supernovae spelling out a Coke ad in Earth's sky.

Such relatively naive visions of bigger and better advertising contrast with the darkerSatire ofThe Space Merchants (July-August 1952Galaxy as "Gravy Planet"; rev and cut1953) by FrederikPohl and C MKornbluth, in which ruthless ad agencies dominate the world and techniques of mental manipulation are augmented by physically addictive products. The sf dream ofColonization of Other Worlds (hereVenus) is no longer seen as desirable in itself, but must be vigorously promoted via television commercials. J BPriestley's creation of the term "Admass" to describe a world married to and defined by advertising followed in 1955. Consistent with his vision, the ad business has increasingly permeated theArts: inThe Space Merchants, "grand old masterpieces" in theNew York Metropolitan Museum of Art include the classic "I Dreamed I was Ice-Fishing in My Maidenform Bra". Advertising is also the satirical target of Sam JLundwall'sKing Kong Blues (1974; trans by author asAD 2018, or The King Kong Blues1975), and ofThe Merchants' War (1984), FrederikPohl's inferior solo sequel toThe Space Merchants.

Experimental ad campaigns in FrederikPohl's solo "The Tunnel Under the World" (January 1955Galaxy) are inflicted on a miniature, simulated human community whose reactions to outrages – like the unforgettably brutal, bullying promotion of Feckle Freezers – are carefully observed. A similar butComputer-generatedVirtual Reality created for market research is central to Daniel FGalouye'sCounterfeit World (1964; vtSimulacron-31964).

First Lensman, as above, additionally speculates onAlien advertising (EAT TEEGMEE'S FOOD!): the ability to tune out intrusive roadside ads while driving becomes an unlikely cultural link between humans and Rigellians. In Ann Warren Griffith's "Captive Audience" (August 1953F&SF), packaging contains tiny radio receivers that loudly announce the product's virtues in aNear Future USA where earplugs have been ruled unconstitutional. RobertSheckley makes comic play with promotional packaging (VIGROOM! FILL ALL YOUR STOMACHS, AND FILL THEM RIGHT!) in theAlien warehouse of "One Man's Poison" (December 1953Galaxy; vt "Untouched by Human Hands", title story of coll1954), where the clearest fact about its mysterious creators is that "they wrote a lot of lousy advertising copy" – which also has resonance as a possible epitaph for humanity. Writing such copy has become a lost art in the 2337 of LloydBiggle Jr's "... On the Dotted Line" (June 1957If), until the banning ofHypnosis as a sales technique leads to its rediscovery and the twenty-fourth century's first tentative shoe advert: "Looking shabby? Worn out? Buy a glimmering new pair of EXCONS!" JohnSladek'sWholly Smokes: The Rise and Fall of the GST Tobacco Empire (2003), tracing the history of the titular tobacco company, includes some mordant sarcasm about cigarette ads. Mysterious universal panaceas orMcGuffins promoted in recurring spoof ads include Snibbo in many of J BMorton's humorousBeachcomber columns; Ubik in Philip KDick's novelUbik (1969), the only clear statement about this protean product being that it is "Safe when taken as directed."; and Q.R.V. in EdwardGorey'sQ.R.V. (graph1989; vtThe Universal Solvent1990), whose entire text consists of cod advertising jingles.

Hypnotic, mind-controlling television advertising features in the filmLooker (1981), while the "blipverts" ofMax Headroom (1985) can cause fatal physical damage. Sinisterly mendacious ads, baited withSex, promote the attractions of a literal Hell in PiersAnthony'sScience FantasyOn a Pale Horse (1983), and lure hapless innocents to the hell of mind-possession in Peter FHamilton'sNight's Dawn trilogy. EchoingThe Space Merchants (though unsatirically), impressiveVirtual-Reality Theme Park techniques advertiseSpace Flight and theTerraforming ofMars inThe Barsoom Project (1989) by LarryNiven and StevenBarnes.