The video, The Merchants of Cool, tells how corporate America are always in search of what is "cool". This is the largest generation of teenagers ever. They are the demographic that spends the most money by either influencing what their parents buy or by using the "guilt money" that have received from their parents. Parents give their teenagers money many times because they feel guilty for not spending more time with them. Also, many parents want to keep their teenagers happy and at home so they spend money on items like game systems and the games to go along with them as an incentive not to find entertainment somewhere else. Teenagers are growing up in "a world of marketing". Marketing is everywhere and most of it is geared towards them. Marketers go "cool hunting" to search for a certain kind of personality, someone that influences others and has the respect and admiration of their friends. Culture spies look for trendsetters, early adopters, forward thinkers, and/or leaders in their own groups to try to catch a trend before someone else does. They want to find a trend while it is still underground, because as soon as it is discovered and used it is not "cool" anymore.Viacom is one of the "coolest" companies out there right now. One program they own is MTV. MTV is a cross promotional free-for-all machine that caters to the teenage demographic. The media watches kids and then sells them an image of themselves. The kids watch those images and aspire to be that "Mook" (a character portraying rude and crude behavior that is supposed to be typical of most teenage boys) or a "Midriff" (a teenage girl who is prematurely adult and that is very aware of her sexuality and how to use it to get what she wants) on TV. It is a media loop, because then the media watches them and so on. Some say that the kids of today are influenced by the media and others say that the media is a mirror image of society. This kind of reminds me of the famous question- "Which came first, the chicken or the egg?".
No comments:
Post a Comment