Comments on: The future of TV advertising

By: neil christie

neil christie — Mon, 01 Aug 2005 05:59:08 +0000

Here in London, England most people, regardless of their economic status, and despite the bombs, get around by public transport. And anyway, people in the UK are, I think, much more prepared to use public transport even if they own a car. So you’ll find things like video screens on newer buses and trains, and big LCD screens on major railway stations and platforms. I’ve also been in one taxi-cab that had a screen in the back showing some sort of special in-cab news and advertising channel.But often the medium is not a real replacment for TV as there tends to be no sound, or inaudible sound. (Other than on the Heathrow Express where sound and vision both work well on what is a quiet, modern train.)So it’s more like a moving poster.

By: cm

cm — Sat, 23 Jul 2005 09:31:18 +0000

They have video screens in some subway stations here in Toronto, with a little bit of news and a lot of ads. Here’s an editorial from one of our free weeklies about them: http://eye.net/eye/issue/issue_01.27.05/op/editorial.html

By: Arthur

Arthur — Tue, 19 Jul 2005 17:27:18 +0000

This is a great idea. Regardless of the perceived lack of “convenience” and “efficacy” when compared to the car, public transit will always get more riders by reducing the price. Owning a car is not cheap, especially when $1 buys a trip across town on a bus. Sure, it may be more inconvenient for some people, but the there will always exist a demographic for which the private car is still preferred.
If additional advertising in public transit helped to fund improvements in infrastructure and reduced fares, it could definitely be a win-win situation for everybody.

On the other hand, this model has been tried in other modes. Consider NetZero, who offered cheaper Internet access in exchange for screen real estate. Successful? They are still around. Effective? I am not sure.

By: Steve Portigal

Steve Portigal — Tue, 19 Jul 2005 10:42:26 +0000

About six months ago we saw an interesting project highlighted on the blogosphere in which a team of guerilla artists snuck into various NYC subway trains or stations late at night and filmed themselves replacing all the advertisements with specially designed and printed art posters.

My Google-fu is failing me and I can’t find any mention of the site right now. It was pretty interesting to watch and consider.

I think I read about it on core77 but I am pretty sure someone else blogged it there, not me. Hmm.

By: Johnn Ballard

Johnn Ballard — Tue, 19 Jul 2005 06:59:18 +0000

Hey, I don’t think it’s a crazy idea. The merits of public transportation are clear. Besides, there will always be a bigger population in suburbia than in town simply because of the arithmetic of geometry: more area around the circumference of a circle than in the middle. If you’re gonna have a vibrant city, commuting is a price to be paid.

I heard somewhere that the big amusement parks were first built by railroads because rails were going unused at the end of the line. A destination at the end of the line created more rail traffic. Attracting a captive audience to be targeted for advertising purposes is not much different.

By: Matt

Matt — Tue, 19 Jul 2005 02:19:15 +0000

Few American cities are built in such a way that public transit is ever going to be viable.

Seriously…until the bus and the train are so good that you can give up your car, you have to have a car. And if you have a car, why wait for the bus?

Public transit only works when there’s a critical mass of people who work in a place where land is scarce enough that parking is expensive. Like…well, those cities you mentioned. For the exurb-dominated rest of the country, the best you’re ever going to get is a bus system that serves too little, runs too seldom, starts too late, stops too early, costs too much, and doesn’t get enough use to be self-sustaining. Advertising isn’t going to change that one way or the other.

FWIW, I live in a city with great public transit and am happy to do so. I’d love it if the rest of America felt the same way. But I accept that most of them don’t.

By: JohnO

JohnO — Mon, 18 Jul 2005 21:13:18 +0000

Oops.. email me if you reply… chances are I won’t remember to check back tomorrow… always interested in discussion

By: JohnO

JohnO — Mon, 18 Jul 2005 21:12:42 +0000

Well, I hope that public transit keeps it’s first goal of lessening traffic jams, and make rush hours smaller. But if they can offset the increase in cost (of course, it sits on a logorithmic curver, 90% more effort to get 10% more results, etc.) through advertising, great.

Honestly though only first-tier cities have widely used public transit systems. The effort needs to be spent on getting people to use it. Because, people won’t use it when it gets plastered by ads (just like every other corner of our life).

First-tier cities:
Chicago
San-Francisco
Philadelphia
Boston
and, best of all New York

Outside of these cities, a large enough part of the population doesn’t ride the transit. While advertising does already exist on transit, it is still in the 40′s and 50′s – paper and glue, so I do agree with you on this point, it can certainly be explored as an alternative.