There's Tufsyn, and Retsyn, and Acrylan too, and Marfac and Melmac and what else is new?

[austin_dern]

I've got some quirk to my personality that makes it hard for me to notice an advertisement even when I'm going out of my way to notice them, so even though for a rare change I actually did see most of the Super Bowl -- man, I must have seen like twenty fumbles and turnovers returned for touchdowns, unless that was just instant replays -- I didn't actually notice any of the commercials. In particular despite the news radio going wild talking about the idea that rank amateurs with no background or experience in marketing might be able to come up with an advertising approach at least as brilliant as Goya Beans's old ``Goya. Oh Boya'', only for free. But I did catch some news channel or other this morning, as my dad (I'm guessing) ratcheted up the volume in the hopes of getting me to wake up. Apparently everyone in the world was fairly bored with this set of Super Bowl ads, and a reporter was commenting on that, mentioning that it was surprising to have a lackluster bunch of commercials since this was, after all, ``like the Super Bowl of ads.''

I'm glad that not everything I say is doomed to be written down, pointed at, and laughed about online. Not that I'd sound so very bright if you listened to what I actually said. It's just the reporter broke that slender line separating metaphor from tautology.

Were you aware that Daylight Saving Time in the United States starts a couple of weeks earlier this year than it has in previous years? I remember some mention of it and I wasn't much worried about it since I generally like Daylight Saving Time but don't see that it needs much of my attention. (I'd mentioned that while in Singapore I was either on perpetual or never on Daylight Saving Time, depending on how you want to view things.) News radio 88 was really harping on this today, though, that older computers might have the change-of-time hard-coded in and they wouldn't adjust the two or three weeks (whatever it is) earlier, and this could ... cause ... inconveniences. They had a guy from Rutgers whose name sounded vaguely familiar on to reassure that this probably wouldn't bring about the death of civilization, but the afternoon anchor was noticeably more worked up about it than the noon anchor was. Me, I've left my computer on Singapore time for absolutely no good reason except it baffles my bank's online banking system.

Trivia: In 1880 Proctor & Gamble lead the United States in national magazine advertising with a budget of under $12,000. Source: Advertising and the Transformation of American Society, 1865 - 1920, James D Norris.

Currently Reading: Project Solar Sail, Edited by Arthur C Clarke.

Comments

[dakhun.livejournal.com]

while in Singapore I was either on perpetual or never on Daylight Saving Time, depending on how you want to view things

Saskatchewan is the same way. It is always on "standard" time, yet the Solar noon is around 1PM (especially in the western parts of the province). And yet every year, the radio talk shows discuss adopting daylight savings. That of course would then make Solar noon be at 2PM, at which point why bother keeping time that has any relation to the Sun at all? ;-)

[austin-dern.livejournal.com]

Why there's any particular need to match the hours with sunlight is an interesting question -- what would be the harm in having sunrise at 11 ``am'' and sunset at 1 `am', after all, apart from changing the hours posted on storefront signs? -- but all things considered I'd rather have evening sun than morning sun, since morning sun just encourages people getting up in the mornings.

[c-eagle.livejournal.com]

I had heard our daylight is going up, yup! *wags*

[austin-dern.livejournal.com]

It's fine by me, but I'm still acclimated to sunset at 7:05 pm and no arguing the fact.

Time zones and adjustments

[lexomatic.livejournal.com]

:::Were you aware that Daylight Saving Time in the United States starts a couple of weeks earlier this year than it has in previous years?

Yes. In my job, I collect time-sensitive economic releases from around the world, so I need to adjust my local calendar (we've got a whole custom database to track these things) to compensate for DST in each location. (The fancy custom database doesn't do that.)

For instance: Santiago, Chile, is on the western coast of South America, but that's actually one zone east of the eastern coast of North America.

Time zones and DST definitions are recorded, among much other useful summary information, in the CIA World Factbook (https://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/).

Super Bowl ads vs. brains

[lexomatic.livejournal.com]

:::Apparently everyone in the world was fairly bored with this set of Super Bowl ads.

And brain scans confirm it! According to this 5 February article by Reuters (http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070205/sc_nm/nfl_super_advertising_scans_dc_4),

"Researchers at the University of California Los Angeles scanned the brains of five men and five women between the ages of 18 and 34 as they watched Super Bowl ads to measure the emotional impact. Participants viewed the commercials through goggles as they lay inside a donut-shaped machine called a functional magnetic resonance imaging, or fMRI, machine."

Many of the ads produced anxiety (not good). One Honda ad was actually less stimulating than a blank screen. (We can finally measure whether something is "less fun than watching paint dry.")