Sexuality in gaming, your stance?

[Insanely Asinine]

I think if you're trying to get a sexual sensation from video games, you should google the word "Porn".

Porn games also exist. All for PC though. Example active dolls.

 

[UberPubert]

I conceded that the actual work of designing is not done by the publisher, sure. But that has nothing to do with publishers mandating what what designs a character has.

My point is, publishers can choose, only artists can create. I don't think we can lay blame (as if that's even necessary) fully at the feet of publishers when more than a little of the designs we see are mostly made from input by the original artist, who are unique cases in and of themselves. The line is blurred to the point where it is factually incorrect to assume publishers are meaningfully contributing to the work.

A confrontational environment is one that makes conflict more likely. Gender-binary restrooms qualify because many people have a hard time accepting non-binary gender identities, and lash out. The idea is that by implementing less binary spaces, transgendered people as a whole are more visible in society.

Lashing out seems statistically improbable. Confusion I could definitely understand, violence or even verbal abuse seems unlikely, and while I understand the worthiness of granting equal rights, I don't think it will increase visibility (the first thing I thought of was co-ed/unisex facilities at colleges and universities, not really a new idea).

Someone isn't excluded only and only if they are actually deterred from participating; it simply means that it's more difficult or more negative for them to participate. If you don't like using "exclusion" for that, then we can use another word, but that doesn't match the definition I've paraphrased from the social justice classes and lectures I've experienced.

My only continued issue with your use of the word excluded is that most definitions actually include the subject being prevented - as, this person has been effectively kept out of this thing, they have been "excluded", definitely barred from access. I don't have a word for what you describe, but the feeling of being not included, but not excluded either, is the one I'd attribute to the kind of marketing we're seeing. Again, all signs may point to boy's interests, but there's no explicit mention of "No Girls Allowed".

That's debatable. By the time someone is an adult, even if they're old enough to "think for themselves", by that time they also have enough social baggage and social coding to see only in a gender binary.

But that seems like a rather large assumption to make, right? By all means, I was exposed to the exact same commercials, ate the same brand cereal, played with the same toys as every other boy my age and I avoid much of what is today aimed at my age group as "macho" like the plague. I didn't take any gender studies course, I wasn't enlightened in college, I just got to an age where the easter bunny wasn't real, santa claus wasn't the one bringing presents on christmas, and I could finally start thinking and making decisions about what I liked for myself. And I'm far from alone on this, obviously, so what power does marketing really have if the success rate is somewhere between checkered and arguable?

For a non-game example of a product aimed at people old enough to "know better", let's take tampons. http://www.ar15.com/forums/t_1_5/1332306_10_survival_uses_for_a_tampon.html Their ability to absorb water and expand has great uses as survival and first aid gear. But, most men don't know about this, or are squeamish about it because tampons are "for women".

As an aside, I learned you could use tampons to staunch bleeding gunshot wounds from Army of Two, the supposed bro-game to end all bro-games. It turns out the developers were more interested in making a video game based on mercenaries than fainting at the sight of feminine hygiene products.

Well, to start, what do you mean by "wrong"? I need more context.

Wrong in any sense of the word. If the market bubble for male-targeted gaming was so temporary as to become unsustainable, or had such a chicken and egg effect, why does the retrieved data from back before then reflect the same market we see today?

Well, then, that's a different discussion. Just agreeing that improvements can be made and should be made is what I was getting at. What improvements are needed, and what data supports them, can be hashed out like we're doing above.

Half-agree, not quite with you: "Need" is simply not a word that I think belongs in the discussion, "want" is a good one, so are ones like "desire", and even "request" is on the table, I think. It's this "deserve" and "entitle", I take issue with. As soon as the paradigm of the discussion shifts from "What we could do" to "What we should do", I see immediate red flags.

 

[King Zeal]

My point is, publishers can choose, only artists can create. I don't think we can lay blame (as if that's even necessary) fully at the feet of publishers when more than a little of the designs we see are mostly made from input by the original artist, who are unique cases in and of themselves. The line is blurred to the point where it is factually incorrect to assume publishers are meaningfully contributing to the work.

If the line is blurred, then it can't be "factually incorrect". A blurred line means that it's difficult to tell where one ends and the other begins.

Lashing out seems statistically improbable. Confusion I could definitely understand, violence or even verbal abuse seems unlikely.

Why? At the very least, a quick google search turns up several reports of incidents. You can judge their credibility on their own merits, if you like, but there's a lot of examples.

https://www.google.com/search?q=Transgender+assault+restroom&oq=Transgender+assault+restroom&aqs=chrome..69i57j0.6321j0j4&sourceid=chrome&espv=210&es_sm=93&ie=UTF-8

My only continued issue with your use of the word excluded is that most definitions actually include the subject being prevented - as, this person has been effectively kept out of this thing, they have been "excluded", definitely barred from access. I don't have a word for what you describe, but the feeling of being not included, but not excluded either, is the one I'd attribute to the kind of marketing we're seeing. Again, all signs may point to boy's interests, but there's no explicit mention of "No Girls Allowed".

Then like I said, you and I can settle on a new term, or we can agree to disagree.

But that seems like a rather large assumption to make, right? By all means, I was exposed to the exact same commercials, ate the same brand cereal, played with the same toys as every other boy my age and I avoid much of what is today aimed at my age group as "macho" like the plague. I didn't take any gender studies course, I wasn't enlightened in college, I just got to an age where the easter bunny wasn't real, santa claus wasn't the one bringing presents on christmas, and I could finally start thinking and making decisions about what I liked for myself. And I'm far from alone on this, obviously, so what power does marketing really have if the success rate is somewhere between checkered and arguable?

I don't have anything but your word for it on that, though. It also goes against the science of marketing. Again, having taken classes on this, and having actually worked in the industry, one of the main points of marketing is to make people want something without even knowing WHY they want it, and making them think they came to the decision all on their own.

Wrong in any sense of the word. If the market bubble for male-targeted gaming was so temporary as to become unsustainable, or had such a chicken and egg effect, why does the retrieved data from back before then reflect the same market we see today?

Because it doesn't. That's why Nintendo created the Wii. If you can find their Investor Report from 2005, they explicitly state that they were in major trouble if they continued marketing to that same demographic. Nintendo was very worried that with the way the market bubble was heading that the gaming industry bubble would collapse, even though games themselves were seeming to make more money than ever. This was also why the Wii was considered the breakaway winner of the 7th-Gen console wars, despite not being developed with the core gamer market in mind.

Incidentally, they repeated the same concern in their 2012 report, as well, but we'll see how that turns out.

Half-agree, not quite with you: "Need" is simply not a word that I think belongs in the discussion, "want" is a good one, so are ones like "desire", and even "request" is on the table, I think. It's this "deserve" and "entitle", I take issue with. As soon as the paradigm of the discussion shifts from "What we could do" to "What we should do", I see immediate red flags.

Well, again. You're entitled to your opinion, but I clearly don't agree.

 

[King Zeal]

Anyway this entire conversation is apple and oranges, despite popular belief a man's penis aren't the equivalent of a woman's breast,

Says who?

Every romance novel cover ... ever?

But again, is that descriptive or prescriptive? Chicken or egg? Does that stereotype exist because people assume it's true? Or is there actual research, done in a cultural vacuum, that proves it's true?

 

[King Zeal]

But again, is that descriptive or prescriptive?

Yes, the sheer number of romance cover artists attempting to cater to men is mind boggling.

That...doesn't answer the question.

Hey, you're the one claiming that a flash of penis = flash of breasts (the conversations you get into on the internet ....); burden of redonculous proof on claimant.

No, Islandbuffilo is the one claiming that it isn't. I just asked him "says who".

If penis = breast, then what equals vagina?

What kind of logic are you using here? I'm having a hard time following it.

 

[UberPubert]

If the line is blurred, then it can't be "factually incorrect". A blurred line means that it's difficult to tell where one ends and the other begins.

Well, wrong order. I said the line is blurred, the assumptions being made were incorrect, because we've established they are. If we can't even tell where artist conception begins and publisher influence ends then how can you definitively say it's the publisher's fault?

Why? At the very least, a quick google search turns up several reports of incidents. You can judge their credibility on their own merits, if you like, but there's a lot of examples.

Oh come on, you can link me to the search but you can't bother to pick one out after telling me how easy it was? I looked at the page and the are 1.) Conservative blogs/news sites saying that transgendered bathrooms are an attack on their communities. Gwoss. 2.) Pro Transgendered blogs/news sites petitioning on the basis of surveys with no cited reports, and 3.) One actual news story about a transgendered being harassed...with a little more of an interesting story than I'd bargained for: http://www.dnainfo.com/new-york/20120925/greenwich-village/family-of-alleged-anti-lgbt-mcdonalds-slasher-disputes-bias-charge.

More or less, the assault was more of a fight between a transgendered woman's boyfriend and a mentally ill, formerly homeless middle aged obese man...and the transgender girlfriend of the alleged victim is a convicted felon of armed robbery. Yikes. This is far from a clear-cut case and not really indicative of any kind of societal norm.

I don't have anything but your word for it on that, though. It also goes against the science of marketing. Again, having taken classes on this, and having actually worked in the industry, one of the main points of marketing is to make people want something without even knowing WHY they want it, and making them think they came to the decision all on their own.

Driving that line of thinking to it's logical conclusion, could we not apply that to the above topic of transgenders? These people are, very likely, told and held to the same standards as everyone to fit into the gender they're perceived as being born with, with a force far more pervasive than marketing, and yet they're adamant that they're not that gender. There is a force of personality so powerful in that person's psyche that they can deny even their own body as being indicative of what gender they really are. Is it so incredible to believe that other adults are also not so easily manipulated?

It doesn't. That's why Nintendo created the Wii.

Which would be relevant if Nintendo was the only one marketing games today. They changed, the market didn't. This chicken and egg thing started with the assumption that the video game industry was only attracting males because it only marketed to males, but we know in the past that males were still the majority demographic, fast-forward a few decades and they are still the majority demographic, and the reasons stated in the polygon article still hold true today. The more I read of it, the less I'm convinced the marketing shift had any real effect. Besides what they started advertising, obviously.

 

[King Zeal]

Well, wrong order. I said the line is blurred, the assumptions being made were incorrect, because we've established they are. If we can't even tell where artist conception begins and publisher influence ends then how can you definitively say it's the publisher's fault?

By default, being unable to tell means it's NOT established. It means just what you said...that we can't tell. At best, it means it's inconclusive.

Oh come on, you can link me to the search but you can't bother to pick one out after telling me how easy it was? I looked at the page and the are 1.) Conservative blogs/news sites saying that transgendered bathrooms are an attack on their communities. Gwoss. 2.) Pro Transgendered blogs/news sites petitioning on the basis of surveys with no cited reports, and 3.) One actual news story about a transgendered being harassed...with a little more of an interesting story than I'd bargained for: http://www.dnainfo.com/new-york/20120925/greenwich-village/family-of-alleged-anti-lgbt-mcdonalds-slasher-disputes-bias-charge.

More or less, the assault was more of a fight between a transgendered woman's boyfriend and a mentally ill, formerly homeless middle aged obese man...and the transgender girlfriend of the alleged victim is a convicted felon of armed robbery. Yikes. This is far from a clear-cut case and not really indicative of any kind of societal norm.

There were a lot more examples than that. http://transequality.org/PDFs/Executive_Summary.pdf This study found that 61% of transgender people reported being assaulted.

My point being, though, I'm asking you why you think it's "unlikely".

Driving that line of thinking to it's logical conclusion, could we not apply that to the above topic of transgenders? These people are, very likely, told and held to the same standards as everyone to fit into the gender they're perceived as being born with, with a force far more pervasive than marketing, and yet they're adamant that they're not that gender. There is a force of personality so powerful in that person's psyche that they can deny even their own body as being indicative of what gender they really are. Is it so incredible to believe that other adults are also not so easily manipulated?

Yes. Because many transgender people still adhere to gender norms for their assigned genders. Transgender girls want to wear dresses and play with Barbies. Transgender boys still want to play rugby and slick their hair back. If you're arguing that gender binary isn't ingrained in culture, then transgender aren't a good control group, because they're subject to the same binary ideas that we are, just inverted.

Which would be relevant if Nintendo was the only one marketing games today. They changed, the market didn't.

The market DID change though, if what you're using sales as your basis for determining change. Not only did the Wii nearly sell more than the PS3 and 360 combined, but it appealed more to women. That means that women were extremely major contributors to market success. According to "Increasing The Bottom Line: Women's Market Share", women accounted for 25 percent of console sales in 2004, and over the past decade, women have continued to be the fastest-growing demographic. Again, this is because Nintendo, and social gaming, began developing games with them in mind. However, there's still a long way to go before the AAA industry recognizes them as a market.

http://www.geekwire.com/2013/dudes-38-xbox-users-female-51-kids/
http://www.toydirectory.com/monthly/article.asp?id=3350
http://gamerinvestments.com/video-game-stocks/wp-content/uploads/2010/06/sony-nintendo-microsoft-market-share-2010.jpg

Missed this one before:

As an aside, I learned you could use tampons to staunch bleeding gunshot wounds from Army of Two, the supposed bro-game to end all bro-games. It turns out the developers were more interested in making a video game based on mercenaries than fainting at the sight of feminine hygiene products.

Okay? That doesn't change the fact the men see tampons as womens' products. In fact, didn't they cut that out of the final game?

 

[UberPubert]

By default, being unable to tell means it's NOT established. It means just what you said...that we can't tell. At best, it means it's inconclusive.

Fine, established as inconclusive, the same point holds.

"There were a lot more examples than that. http://transequality.org/PDFs/Executive_Summary.pdf This study found that 61% of transgender people reported being assaulted.

My point being, though, I'm asking you why you think it's "unlikely".

That's a general survey though, not a news report. It asks if people have been harassed or discriminated against without asking them to prove it or even file a police report. I can't take the claims seriously if they're not willing to seriously pursue legal action, and while I wouldn't go so far as to say they're outright lying I'd be more than a little surprised if they were completely right.

And the reason I think it's unlikely is this: More often than not, in today's first world nations, people are shown as being non-confrontational. Heated debates in personal relationships can quickly grow ugly, but perceived alterations between complete strangers usually ends with one or both parties backing down, either to escape and find help or simply flee the scene. This seems like it'd be especially pertinent to the setting of a public bathroom for several reasons: 1.) Lots of witnesses, as this is presumably during business hours 2.) Assuming this isn't the owner or security, they have no vested interest in who goes into the bathroom, or alternatively 3.) They are the building owner or security, probably have some minimal training to deal with these kinds of situations, and are more likely to come to a rational agreement. Also, from personal experience? I've never seen or heard of anyone caring about who goes into who's bathroom, though some people have felt really embarrassed about going into the wrong bathroom, even though there were no real repercussions.

Because many transgender people still adhere to gender norms for their assigned genders. Transgender girls want to wear dresses and play with Barbies. Transgender boys still want to play rugby and slick their hair back. If you're arguing that gender binary isn't ingrained in culture, then transgender aren't a good control group, because they're subject to the same binary ideas that we are, just inverted.

If a transgender person adhered to gender norms and are convinced that they came to the conclusion of doing so by themselves, then how are they still transgendered? If they've come to accept and abide by the norms expected of their born gender and think it is completely of their own volition, how would anyone know they were actually transgendered? This is really just an extension of my general dismissal of marketing power, but the core of it is this: If people were so malleable, so standardized, so easy to manipulate, then how come in these advertisement and marketing saturated cultures we cannot even begin to account for the vast number of exceptions? How can a four year old girl rant at a toy aisle but your studies assume a grown adult can't see what's happening or decide for themselves?

The market DID change though, if what you're using sales as your basis for determining change. Not only did the Wii nearly sell more than the PS3 and 360 combined, but it appealed more to women. That means that women were extremely major contributors to market success.

Hold on, I only said men were the majority of customers, and according to the toydirectory article (or the gender profile graph, specifically) that is still the case. Women bought many more Wiis, yes, but the amount of men that bought the Wii and the other two consoles still overshadowed the women by four percent, with the helpful reminder that in the population women outnumber men by two percent. So despite women having a numerical advantage, men still bought double that much more, and as close as the numbers are, it's still a male majority. Just like Nintendo calculated decades prior.

 

[generals3]

I don't have anything but your word for it on that, though. It also goes against the science of marketing. Again, having taken classes on this, and having actually worked in the industry, one of the main points of marketing is to make people want something without even knowing WHY they want it, and making them think they came to the decision all on their own.

Hold on right there. I can't let something like that just slide by. Marketing is all about digging after what people are seeking for and than convincing them their product/service is indeed what they've been looking for. If what you say is true why would a large part of my marketing classes involve techniques to get to know what consumers want? Why did I even conduct a large market research for a company to know what were the interests of young adults? Marketeers are followers, they don't create desires out of thin air, no they actively seek out what people may want or need and than it's all about placing their product or service as being the answer to said needs.

 

[King Zeal]

Yeah, they do. It's called "Creating Demand"

http://womeninbusiness.about.com/od/marketingstrategiestips/a/Marketing-Tips-How-To-Create-Demand-For-Products-Services.htm

Market research is used to show trends, mostly why people buy and what they're buying. A marketing plan is created based on these trends, but the plan doesn't necessarily need to follow those trends. What that means is, you can do research showing that 90% of your customers are Black Christians, but Black Christians only account for 50% of the market share. That doesn't mean you market exclusively to that group; it means you also figure out what you're doing wrong for the other 50%.

 

[generals3]

Yeah, they do. It's called "Creating Demand"

http://womeninbusiness.about.com/od/marketingstrategiestips/a/Marketing-Tips-How-To-Create-Demand-For-Products-Services.htm

Market research is used to show trends, mostly why people buy and what they're buying. A marketing plan is created based on these trends, but the plan doesn't necessarily need to follow those trends. What that means is, you can do research showing that 90% of your customers are Black Christians, but Black Christians only account for 50% of the market share. That doesn't mean you market exclusively to that group; it means you also figure out what you're doing wrong for the other 50%.

Yet that doesn't describes what you were referring to. All these marketeers did was look at how people behave/what they thought and found needs to fill. People want to feel exclusive? let's make it so only members can purchase our goods. This "creating demand" concept is nothing more than finding out what people want/need and give it to them in order to sell more. Nestlé found out housewives didn't want their instant coffee because it was sold as being "easy" which made em feel like "bad housewives" so all they did was switch the message from "easy coffee" to "good coffee". Bam they "created demand". But at the end all they did was look at what people thought and were looking for and give it to them. So at the end marketeers are nothing more than followers. But following is in itself a very tricky business as one has to understand what he's actually "following".

 

[King Zeal]

Fine, established as inconclusive, the same point holds.

No it doesn't. Inconclusive means absence of evidence, not evidence of absence.

That's a general survey though, not a news report. It asks if people have been harassed or discriminated against without asking them to prove it or even file a police report. I can't take the claims seriously if they're not willing to seriously pursue legal action, and while I wouldn't go so far as to say they're outright lying I'd be more than a little surprised if they were completely right.

Except news nor police reports aren't conclusive proof, either. If a group is being discriminated against, a lack of official reporting and a lot of anecdotal data can mean (but doesn't always mean) there is discrimination on the official level, too. For example, the documentary "Very Young Girls" detailed the underreporting of underage girls of color, aged thirteen and below, who are abducted, turned into prostitutes, and given criminal records instead of being treated as victims of sexual assault.

And the reason I think it's unlikely is this: More often than not, in today's first world nations, people are shown as being non-confrontational. Heated debates in personal relationships can quickly grow ugly, but perceived alterations between complete strangers usually ends with one or both parties backing down, either to escape and find help or simply flee the scene. This seems like it'd be especially pertinent to the setting of a public bathroom for several reasons: 1.) Lots of witnesses, as this is presumably during business hours 2.) Assuming this isn't the owner or security, they have no vested interest in who goes into the bathroom, or alternatively 3.) They are the building owner or security, probably have some minimal training to deal with these kinds of situations, and are more likely to come to a rational agreement. Also, from personal experience? I've never seen or heard of anyone caring about who goes into who's bathroom, though some people have felt really embarrassed about going into the wrong bathroom, even though there were no real repercussions.

Citation needed.

If a transgender person adhered to gender norms and are convinced that they came to the conclusion of doing so by themselves, then how are they still transgendered? If they've come to accept and abide by the norms expected of their born gender and think it is completely of their own volition, how would anyone know they were actually transgendered?

They know they're transgendered because they adhere to the norms of the gender they see themselves as. A child starts showing signs of understanding gender expectations at a very early age, but those roles are shaped by the people around them. Remember, a transgender person does not see THEMSELVES as a boy or girl; they aren't "fighting" gender norms because to them, it's not a fight. They simply see themselves as one gender, and that gender happens not to match biological sex.

http://gozips.uakron.edu/~susan8/parinf.htm

This is really just an extension of my general dismissal of marketing power, but the core of it is this: If people were so malleable, so standardized, so easy to manipulate, then how come in these advertisement and marketing saturated cultures we cannot even begin to account for the vast number of exceptions? How can a four year old girl rant at a toy aisle but your studies assume a grown adult can't see what's happening or decide for themselves?

Exceptions are just that: exceptions. A person born paraplegic or blind doesn't suddenly disprove that humans can walk or see. Likewise, a person who actively FIGHTS gender norms does not disprove people who follow them.

Furthermore, there are no people who completely fight gender norms. Even if they reject one thing (like a four year old in a toy aisle), they may accept others (her hair, for example, was very un-boy-like, and I don't see her protesting salons).

Hold on, I only said men were the majority of customers, and according to the toydirectory article (or the gender profile graph, specifically) that is still the case. Women bought many more Wiis, yes, but the amount of men that bought the Wii and the other two consoles still overshadowed the women by four percent, with the helpful reminder that in the population women outnumber men by two percent. So despite women having a numerical advantage, men still bought double that much more, and as close as the numbers are, it's still a male majority. Just like Nintendo calculated decades prior.

But that has nothing to do with market growth. Men have been such a huge majority over the years that it's not something that's going to change just because the market itself did. The lesson of the day here is that, when Nintendo advertised its console and games for girls, girls became major consumers. You asked why the market "hasn't changed", when it has. And it's still changing now. The entire point to talking about more "gender-inclusive" marketing and content is to continue this change.

AAA market knows women are a market force but that is dependent on platform, genre, scene, and brand recognition. Some of the genres such as point and click adventure games, puzzles and simulations tends to be female dominate. Platforms such as mobile's, tablets, or even PC gaming on the social side is dominated by female. Sims, just dance, and some of the wii fits, and party games are dominated by female. AAA gaming markets to females and the dominate several areas within it, but they don't dominate all nor do they appeal to all. It's false, and it is the same type of argument that was being said about the game industry not appealing to women, not catering to women, and that turned out to be false just as well.

But the point is that the markets the women began to "dominate" in are the ones that were marketed toward them. That doesn't mean certain genres are "for men" or that they're "for women". It means that if you market toward women, they maybe start buying something.

The problem with that is there already exist alternatives who's main function is like your survival usage of tampons.

I don't see what that has to do with the point I made.

 

[King Zeal]

Yeah, they do. It's called "Creating Demand"

http://womeninbusiness.about.com/od/marketingstrategiestips/a/Marketing-Tips-How-To-Create-Demand-For-Products-Services.htm

Market research is used to show trends, mostly why people buy and what they're buying. A marketing plan is created based on these trends, but the plan doesn't necessarily need to follow those trends. What that means is, you can do research showing that 90% of your customers are Black Christians, but Black Christians only account for 50% of the market share. That doesn't mean you market exclusively to that group; it means you also figure out what you're doing wrong for the other 50%.

Yet that doesn't describes what you were referring to. All these marketeers did was look at how people behave/what they thought and found needs to fill. People want to feel exclusive? let's make it so only members can purchase our goods. This "creating demand" concept is nothing more than finding out what people want/need and give it to them in order to sell more. Nestlé found out housewives didn't want their instant coffee because it was sold as being "easy" which made em feel like "bad housewives" so all they did was switch the message from "easy coffee" to "good coffee". Bam they "created demand". But at the end all they did was look at what people thought and were looking for and give it to them. So at the end marketeers are nothing more than followers. But following is in itself a very tricky business as one has to understand what he's actually "following".

I don't understand what you are calling "following". At first, my understanding is that "following" (by the way you were using it) meant advertising to people already buying the product, but now you're saying that it means is that they convince people to buy it? In that case, we're just arguing semantics. My entire point is that marketing is all about telling people what they want while hiding the fact that that's what you're doing. As I said, it's all about finding out why people aren't buying your product and getting them to do it, and using market research to find out what the problem is. The point is, marketing isn't just saying "only these people buy this product". Marketing is also about "only these people buy this product, and here's a plan to change that".

 

[generals3]

I don't understand what you are calling "following". At first, my understanding is that "following" (by the way you were using it) meant advertising to people already buying the product, but now you're saying that it means is that they convince people to buy it? In that case, we're just arguing semantics. My entire point is that marketing is all about telling people what they want while hiding the fact that that's what you're doing. As I said, it's all about finding out why people aren't buying your product and getting them to do it, and using market research to find out what the problem is. The point is, marketing isn't just saying "only these people buy this product". Marketing is also about "only these people buy this product, and here's a plan to change that".

Well i guess it was a semantics issue. Because the way i understood your initial statement is that marketeers created desires/needs out of thin air, which isn't really the case. What they do is look for desires and/or needs and than position their product/service as fulfilling those desires/needs.

 

[King Zeal]

That is correct, but marketing firms actually will often create desire where there was none.

For example, the Streetcar Conspiracy, in which General Motors, Standard Oil, Firestone Tires, and other companies all worked together to buy public transportation systems. They were afraid that cars would fall out of use with the public, so they pooled their resources and bought their main competition and then dismantled it in order to create a demand for cars. I use this as an example of creating demand out of thin air because this had nothing to do with catering to the needs and desires of people and instead enforcing them on people.

One of the reasons America is still considered an "automobile nation" was because of this.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Motors_streetcar_conspiracy

 

[generals3]

That is correct, but marketing firms actually will often create desire where there was none.

For example, the Streetcar Conspiracy, in which General Motors, Standard Oil, Firestone Tires, and other companies all worked together to buy public transportation systems. They were afraid that cars would fall out of use with the public, so they pooled their resources and bought their main competition and then dismantled it in order to create a demand for cars. I use this as an example of creating demand out of thin air because this had nothing to do with catering to the needs and desires of people and instead enforcing them on people.

One of the reasons America is still considered an "automobile nation" was because of this.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Motors_streetcar_conspiracy

Well I think we're thinking of different things. I had a more psychological spectrum in mind while this is pure market-based. But indeed if you remove a competitor you directly inflate the demand for your own product.

 

[King Zeal]

Well, there's also the combined efforts of the fashion and cigarette industries in the 1920s. Prior to the 20s, being overweight was considered the sexiest body type for a woman, and women usually got their clothing custom-tailored to fit their unique dimensions, but when clothing started becoming mass-produced, these companies found it cheaper to make clothes for thin women instead of tailoring for unique body shapes. So, all of their advertising emphasized thinness as sex appeal. At about the same time, cigarettes began marketing themselves as an appetite suppressant and exclusively marketed toward women to synchronize their efforts with the textile industry. It's worthy to note that, at first, cigarettes had strictly marketed that smoking was not socially acceptable for women.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cigarette_smoking_for_weight_loss#History_of_cigarette_smoking_for_weight_loss_in_advertising

http://blogs.lt.vt.edu/rslabach/2012/03/02/womens-self-worth-body-image-in-the-1920s/