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-- Subliminal Messages....


Posted by oDrori on Mar-27-2003 21:10:

Idea Subliminal Messages....

How do they work... In music or writing, I can't really understand how would it work on me...


Posted by DrUg_Tit0 on Mar-27-2003 23:52:

Well, basically, your brain gets a message without you realizing it did. Your brain monitors more than you notice it does, but most of the information it gets is immediately discarded from your consciousness. That information is however often stored and registered without you noticing it, and may change your opinion without you knowing it. Take this for an example. During 50s or 60s, Coca Cola offered cinemas to insert a Coca Cola bottle picture every few frames. Most people didn't notice anything when they got out of the cinema, but Coca Cola sales went up about 25-50%. That didn't last long because soon it was forbidden to advertise in such a way.


Posted by Tranex02 on Mar-27-2003 23:58:

Interesting!!!!!

I wonder how much this process could influence ppl's opinions or reactions to certain things....

Odrori, where did u hear about subliminal messages????


Posted by AnotherWay83 on Mar-28-2003 00:20:

search google with 'subliminal messages', tons of hits will pop up...theres sum pretty amazing pages out there


Posted by occrider on Mar-28-2003 00:27:

quote:
Originally posted by DrUg_Tit0
Well, basically, your brain gets a message without you realizing it did. Your brain monitors more than you notice it does, but most of the information it gets is immediately discarded from your consciousness. That information is however often stored and registered without you noticing it, and may change your opinion without you knowing it. Take this for an example. During 50s or 60s, Coca Cola offered cinemas to insert a Coca Cola bottle picture every few frames. Most people didn't notice anything when they got out of the cinema, but Coca Cola sales went up about 25-50%. That didn't last long because soon it was forbidden to advertise in such a way.


Too good to be true for companies

quote:

Claim: An early experiment in subliminal advertising at a movie theater resulted in tremendously increased sales of popcorn and Coke.
Status: False.

Origins: Public awareness of what we now term "subliminal advertising" began with the 1957 publication of Vance Packard's book The Hidden Persuaders. Although Packard did not use the term "subliminal advertising," he did describe many of the new "motivational research" marketing techniques being employed to sell products in the burgeoning post-war American market. Advertisements that focused on consumers' hopes, fears, guilt, and sexuality were designed to persuade them to buy products they'd never realized they needed. Marketers who could reach into the hearts and minds of American consumers soon found consumers' wallets to be within easy grasp as well.

It was James Vicary who coined the term "subliminal advertising." Vicary had conducted a variety of unusual studies of female shopping habits, discovering (among other things) that women's eye-blink rates dropped significantly in supermarkets, that "psychological spring" lasts more than twice as long as "psychological winter," and that "the experience of a woman baking a cake could be likened to a woman giving birth." Vicary's studies were largely forgettable, save for one experiment he conducted at a Ft. Lee, New Jersey movie theater during the summer of 1957. Vicary placed a tachistoscope in the theater's projection booth, and all throughout the playing of the film Picnic, he flashed a couple of different messages on the screen every five seconds. The messages each displayed for only 1/3000th of a second at a time, far below the viewers' threshold of conscious perceptibility. The result of displaying these imperceptible suggestions -- "Drink Coca-Cola" and "Hungry? Eat Popcorn" -- was an amazing 18.1% increase in Coca-Cola sales, and a whopping 57.8% jump in popcorn purchases. Thus was demonstrated the awesome power of "subliminal advertising" to coerce unwary buyers into making purchases they would not otherwise have considered.

Or so goes the legend that has retained its potency for more than forty years. So potent a legend, in fact, that the Federal Communications Commission banned "subliminal advertising" from radio and television airwaves in 1974, despite that fact that no studies have ever shown it to be effective, and even though its alleged efficacy was based on a fraud.

You see, Vicary lied about the results of his experiment. When he was challenged to repeat the test by the president of the Psychological Corporation, Dr. Henry Link, Vicary's duplication of his original experiment produced no significant increase in popcorn or Coca-Cola sales. Eventually Vicary confessed that he had falsified the data from his first experiments, and some critics have since expressed doubts that he actually conducted his infamous Ft. Lee experiment at all.

As usual, the media (and thereby the public) paid attention only to the sensational original story, and the scant coverage given to Vicary's later confession was ignored or quickly forgotten. Radio and television stations began airing subliminal commercials, leading to two congressional bills to ban the practice being introduced in 1958 and 1959 (both of which died before being voted upon). In 1973, Dr. Wilson B. Key picked up where Vicary left off, publishing Subliminal Seduction, an indictment of modern advertisements filled with hidden messages and secret symbols -- messages and symbols that only Dr. Key could discern (including the notorious example of the word "S-E-X" spelled out in the ice cubes pictured in a liquor advertisement). The old "subliminal advertising" controversy was stirred up again by Dr. Key's book, leading to the 24 January 1974 announcement by the FCC that subliminal techniques, "whether effective or not," were "contrary to the public interest," and that any station employing them risked losing its broadcast license.

For neither the first nor the last time, a great deal of time and money and effort was expended on "protecting" the public from something that posed no danger to them. As numerous studies over the last few decades have demonstrated, subliminal advertising doesn't work; in fact, it never worked, and the whole premise was based on a lie from the very beginning. James Vicary's legacy was to ensure that a great many people will never be convinced otherwise, however.

Sightings: The "subliminal cut spurs popcorn sales" is not only explicitly mentioned in a 1973 Columbo movie (Double Exposure) but the acceptance of its principle as fact forms the basis of the episode.

Last updated: 18 August 2002


www.snopes.com


Posted by Ashelon on Mar-28-2003 01:48:

If you're alert, it certainly won't work on you. It might influence you a little bit if you're not very awake. The best way to have consumers buy your product is attaching emotional values to them like mother, death, sex and such. That works a lot better than trying to trick people into buying it. Subliminal messaging is bound to be discovered by someone and then the company gets negative feedback. Nothing to be scared about.


Posted by oDrori on Mar-28-2003 14:44:

Heh, that's what I was thinking... I mean, in writing, say a reporter makes it so that the capital letters in his article could be stringed toghether to form the sentence "Buy A New Oven" ... The either I don't notice it and I've practically just read another article, or I do notice it and say "Cool!Pathetic! The capitals spell 'Buy A New Oven'!" - Which doesn't seem to make me convinced I should buy one...


Posted by Ashelon on Mar-28-2003 21:30:

Very true. It makes much more sense to tell somebody out front why they need your product so badly and can't live a single day longer without it. Why force products onto people when you can convert them to loyal buyers for the rest of their lives?


Posted by JM on Mar-28-2003 23:31:

i wouldnt mind having something such as the innocent coca cola thing to try out. i really wonder if i'd buy more coca cola, of course if they later said that they only did it as a test...and stopped

i give consent for 2 month test on me

>JM<


Posted by DarkFall01 on Mar-29-2003 02:37:

Dude, check this page out http://www.subliminalworld.com/indexsma.htm

It's amazing some of the things they do and u dont realize them. I did a paper on that topic last quarter and that page helped me out alot.


Posted by oDrori on Mar-29-2003 10:24:

quote:
Originally posted by DarkFall01
Dude, check this page out http://www.subliminalworld.com/indexsma.htm

It's amazing some of the things they do and u dont realize them. I did a paper on that topic last quarter and that page helped me out alot.


Thanks I'll be off to check it


Posted by DrUg_Tit0 on Mar-29-2003 10:58:

quote:
You see, Vicary lied about the results of his experiment. When he was challenged to repeat the test by the president of the Psychological Corporation, Dr. Henry Link, Vicary's duplication of his original experiment produced no significant increase in popcorn or Coca-Cola sales. Eventually Vicary confessed that he had falsified the data from his first experiments, and some critics have since expressed doubts that he actually conducted his infamous Ft. Lee experiment at all.

As usual, the media (and thereby the public) paid attention only to the sensational original story, and the scant coverage given to Vicary's later confession was ignored or quickly forgotten. Radio and television stations began airing subliminal commercials, leading to two congressional bills to ban the practice being introduced in 1958 and 1959 (both of which died before being voted upon). In 1973, Dr. Wilson B. Key picked up where Vicary left off, publishing Subliminal Seduction, an indictment of modern advertisements filled with hidden messages and secret symbols -- messages and symbols that only Dr. Key could discern (including the notorious example of the word "S-E-X" spelled out in the ice cubes pictured in a liquor advertisement). The old "subliminal advertising" controversy was stirred up again by Dr. Key's book, leading to the 24 January 1974 announcement by the FCC that subliminal techniques, "whether effective or not," were "contrary to the public interest," and that any station employing them risked losing its broadcast license.

For neither the first nor the last time, a great deal of time and money and effort was expended on "protecting" the public from something that posed no danger to them. As numerous studies over the last few decades have demonstrated, subliminal advertising doesn't work; in fact, it never worked, and the whole premise was based on a lie from the very beginning. James Vicary's legacy was to ensure that a great many people will never be convinced otherwise, however.


Heh, never heard about that part. I guess it's just one of those cases where a controversial idea gets all the media coverage, and then when it's proven false, it doesn't get nearly as much of it, so many people still think it's true.


Posted by Konijn on Mar-29-2003 18:51:

Last year, the New York Times published an article on subliminal messages unearthed using the "reverse-speech" technologies of an Australian professor.

It was an interesting article (for those of you who can access NYT archives through a university here's the info:

The Arts/Cultural Desk | April 18, 2002, Thursday
THE POP LIFE; When Speech Does a 180
By Neil Strauss (NYT) 917 words


The website www.reversespeech.com was referred to in the article.


Posted by malek on Mar-29-2003 20:59:

quote:
Originally posted by DarkFall01
Dude, check this page out http://www.subliminalworld.com/indexsma.htm

It's amazing some of the things they do and u dont realize them. I did a paper on that topic last quarter and that page helped me out alot.


damn I've been one hour on this site and I still can't find a single item that they describe in those pictures


Posted by malek on Mar-29-2003 21:05:





quote:
In this ad, the 'face' would seem to be related to homosexual activities. It is looking directly towards the crotch of the cowboy in the centre of the ad. Perhaps other interpretations can be placed on such a configuration of elements. If so, the author would like to hear of them.



I don't get it, that guy must be so high to see these things...


Posted by Ashelon on Mar-29-2003 22:34:

Yeah. Way too far-fetched. In that case clouds pretty much entice you to buy anything.


Posted by malek on Mar-29-2003 22:40:

I wasted another hour reading on his site and still I can't find anything he's describing...


Posted by malek on Mar-29-2003 23:17:

hehe finally something





quote:
The Bodyform ad has a shape superimposed on the dress of the model as is flows over her right thigh. It is partly obscured by the back of the chair of the young girl on the left. The shape on her dress is the same shape as the Bodyform pad as illustrated on the pack. Further embedded in the Bodyform shape is the outline of a fish. The fishy shape is presumably intended to trigger thoughts (worries) about possible BO during the menstrual period.


Posted by Ashelon on Mar-29-2003 23:58:

I don't see the connection between a fish and bleeding a couple of days; just looks like a photograph with bad lighting to me. Shouldn't they associate nice things with their product instead of negative shit?


Posted by malek on Mar-30-2003 00:04:

Fish = bad smell...

what will happen to you if you don't use their product... bleh


Posted by Ashelon on Mar-30-2003 07:27:

I hope you're a gynaecology major, otherwise I wouldn't like to know why you're doing sniffing menstruation liquid


Posted by malek on Mar-30-2003 08:16:

haha its not me who says it, its on the webpage. But my girl tells me the odour is nasty, I believe her and I don't need any proof


Posted by Ashelon on Mar-30-2003 08:32:

I'll take her word for it. It sounds logical, it's human waste in a sense.
I still think those people putting fish in pad commercials are slightly deranged. Seriously, what's the use? It conveys a more negative than positive image if it smells bad.



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