Minority Report: We don't have to wait 'til 2037 for invasive, personalized ads in public space! Whew. We're so relieved the change is already at hand. Looking at generic billboards instead of ones that target each of us specifically was starting to become suuuch a drag. Find out how the trend in this clip from Minority Report is becoming a reality; read "The Democratization of Surveillance."



So have a happy thanksgiving. And don't let that turkey look you in the eye; he may be rocking a secret camera!

What the F gives the company the right to force people to wear a stupid sticker every day? What part of this sticker gets in the way of his duties as an employee?
The stupid things, companies in the US, force their employees to do astounds me.

If I was at a job, and I was forced to wear this kind of crap, I'd have walked out on the first day - It's demeaning and it makes my blood boil just thinking about it. A name tag which identifies you when you may see people in your job who may not know you is one thing, but a safety sticker? I'm sure there are more important things to worry about in here. Put the sticker on the wall.

People are not your personal billboards just because you employ them.
(*Sorry, having a bad morning...)

VS needs a giant size billboard. How about a Super Bowl ad.?

@Jinx

I don't think using the WBC as an advert for atheism would really work out.

Pretty much everyone hates them, including mainstream catholics and Fox News. Using them as some sort of example of why it's bad to believe in a god would surely fail because when push comes to shove, I don't really think the WBC give a flying fuck what god thinks. Their hatred of homosexuality is their only religion. It's far too easy for mainstream catholics to distance themslves from WBC-nutbaggery.

You want to promote Atheism? Stop being douchebags with stupid billboard signs and just...be the better person. That's all you really need to do. Demonstrate on a daily basis that Catholics can't claim the moral high ground as they often think they can.

I've lost count of how many time's I've seen supposedly "moral" Christians do despicable things. They're the ones that came up with the 10 commandments, but they're the ones that seem to have a hard time actually following it. Hell, come up with an Atheist 10 Commandments. 10 basic rules of living a life that positively contributes to society that doesn't involve getting on your knees and praying to an imaginary friend. Really shouldn't be that hard. Do what religion refuses to do and periodically update and revise these rules to get rid of outdated and obsolete ideas and inject new truths into it.

Religion isn't inherently good or bad..It's what you do with religion that is good or bad.

I always go back to evolution.

Humans have, since the beginning, striven to "understand." We evolved over the thousands of years with this "defect."

I think it isn't a defect. I think it gave us an evolutionary advantage somehow. Otherwise, it would have gone the way of the appendix.

Doesn't make me like it, but it also means there is no point in trying to argue someone out of their beliefs. It is a waste of effort. They've got some gene, or brain structure, or something, that makes them susceptible to needing this kind of structure in their lives to make sense of it "all."

I like what the atheists are doing with their billboards and TV appearances -- concentrate on GENERAL education. Get the 'rational' word out there, as a life line to those poor folks born into households of faith and don't know that there is an alternative.

An It Gets Better project for non-believers, if you will.



In reply to this comment by Phreezdryd:
>> ^bareboards2:

@<a rel="nofollow" href="http://videosift.com/member/Phreezdryd" title="member since October 17th, 2010" class="profilelink">Phreezdryd, I read your comment (and agree wholeheartedly!). You underestimated my ability to skip over certain loooooooooong back and forths.

I tried to read a lot of the above.

Mormonism starts with a known con artist. Scientology starts with an apparently well medicated science fiction author, and possibly on a bet. Christianity didn't exactly begin in the friendliest of climates, and we may never know who actually started it, besides what the text claims. The list goes on of course across the planet.

Not to mention all the "cults" that have ended badly, or still skirt the edges of society today. Even the people who just believe in their personal psychic or tarot cards, astrology, etc.

The mind boggles at this effort throughout history to answer things possibly unknowable. And that's evidence enough for me to think none of them have a clue.

I'm so embarrassed when my grandfather does this. Couldn't he just buy a billboard like normal grandpas?

>> ^soulmonarch:

"Rich people are not the CAUSE of a robust economy, they are the RESULT of a robust economy."
Fantastic quote.


QFT

This should be on a billboard.

It's all starting to make sense now. >> ^blankfist:

BWAHAHAHA! The capitalist wins again! Gather around my dearest children and let uncle blankfist tell you of the time he promoted a shitty comment into infamy!
I realized early on that my comment here wouldn't be enough to win this contest on its own. Maybe it would get 15 votes, maybe a bit more, but I knew I wasn't smart enough nor witty enough to win this without promoting that video a lot. And by a lot I mean 13 times.
See? I invested my capital to increase my comment's visibility. In this instance, the power points were my capital. Think of how marketers manipulate you into buying their shitty products by plastering billboards of it everywhere. It's called brand reinforcement. You see it enough, you want it. And you all must've really wanted my comment to win. So I thank each and every one of you.

BWAHAHAHA! The capitalist wins again! Gather around my dearest children and let uncle blankfist tell you of the time he promoted a shitty comment into infamy!

I realized early on that my comment here wouldn't be enough to win this contest on its own. Maybe it would get 15 votes, maybe a bit more, but I knew I wasn't smart enough nor witty enough to win this without promoting that video a lot. And by a lot I mean 13 times.

See? I invested my capital to increase my comment's visibility. In this instance, the power points were my capital. Think of how marketers manipulate you into buying their shitty products by plastering billboards of it everywhere. It's called brand reinforcement. You see it enough, you want it. And you all must've really wanted my comment to win. So I thank each and every one of you.

Earworm's incredible, but recently he's been cramming as many tracks into the one song as he could. It's an amazing demonstration of skill, and his end of year "United State Of Pop 20xx" mashups (mashing up the Billboard Magazine top 25 tracks that year) are a great idea, but his simpler tracks beat them hands down.

The king of all mashups has to be his no one takes your freedom (video link seems broken).

Every action has some form of motivation, even a psycho's mass murdering spree; it's all good and fine to look for it, but in the meanwhile it's the protective action that counts, something the police force in GB took ages to do. As for the "bonehead militias", most of them were simply groups of neighbours and friends trying their best to protect their livelihoods. Most of them were immigrants who had worked hard to build a life for themselves abroad, only to find everything ruined because of unruly misguided youths high on violence.

As for blaming the violence on the bad decisions concerning social services, I beg to differ. Look at the protests/riots in Greece, Spain, etc. All of them had major peacefull counterparts, with actual demands being made. It's not like the so-called "disenfranchised youths" (and they were not all poor, nor young btw) of London and elsewhere did not have recent examples of protests that did not involve using social networking to best loot the fashion shop, and burning people's homes (Arab Spring anyone?).

I agree about the ridiculous consummer identity we have going on in society... "you are what you buy" really sickens me to the bone. As does the corporate criminels going on with their billionaire, society-crushing lifestyles. But is it possible to send a more counterproductive message than the one we've seen in England?

p.s.: what's and ASPO?

>> ^radx:

Unjustifiable as their actions are, calling it mindless destruction by spoilt children does no good in my book. There is a reason, there always is a reason, and I highly doubt it is as simple as it is presented to be in most articles I've read so far. They are criminals, yes, but what's their motivation, what's their reasoning? Without knowing the deeper cause, any actions -- crackdowns as many suggest -- will only suppress the problem for the time being, making a later outbreak all the worse.
Particularly if law enforcement plays dirty, pushes the boundaries of the rule of law -- and the use of billboards and social media by the police as a modern pillory, that's on the fucking edge, if you ask me. If one of those bonehead militias acts upon it, the shit could turn ugly real quick.
Anyway, there's no wisdom, no insight I can claim to have from within the isolation of what is commonly known as the middle class; only impressions and thoughts.
However, the violence cannot come as a surprise, given the unrest last winter caused by a raise in tuition fees; it cannot come as a surprise, given the sheer volume of social cuts, particularly small programs. How can anyone be caught off guard by their blatant disregard of the law given how disenfranchised many of them are, and given how the crooks working in the City of London walked away scot-free after the damage they caused, which was magnitude higher. Who speaks out on their behalf? Politicians? Unions? Seems to me, they're on their own, destined to remain invisible -- until they lash out. They appear to be farther removed from the democratic process than anyone would like to admit. Politics, society, community, whatever you want to call it: they have no stakes in the game.
And how surprising is it, really, to find them looting expensive comsumer products -- you are what you wear, right? It's in your face, everywhere, all the time, particularly in a city like London. So now the folks who were cut off from this just snapped and went for it, no matter the rules? I'm shocked!
As for their treatment by the coppers: are ASPOs still handed out left, right and center in certain districts?
But hey, like I said, I'm too far removed from their reality of life to make any meaningful statements, much less suggestions. Just poking in the dark, that's what this is.

Unjustifiable as their actions are, calling it mindless destruction by spoilt children does no good in my book. There is a reason, there always is a reason, and I highly doubt it is as simple as it is presented to be in most articles I've read so far. They are criminals, yes, but what's their motivation, what's their reasoning? Without knowing the deeper cause, any actions -- crackdowns as many suggest -- will only suppress the problem for the time being, making a later outbreak all the worse.

Particularly if law enforcement plays dirty, pushes the boundaries of the rule of law -- and the use of billboards and social media by the police as a modern pillory, that's on the fucking edge, if you ask me. If one of those bonehead militias acts upon it, the shit could turn ugly real quick.

Anyway, there's no wisdom, no insight I can claim to have from within the isolation of what is commonly known as the middle class; only impressions and thoughts.

However, the violence cannot come as a surprise, given the unrest last winter caused by a raise in tuition fees; it cannot come as a surprise, given the sheer volume of social cuts, particularly small programs. How can anyone be caught off guard by their blatant disregard of the law given how disenfranchised many of them are, and given how the crooks working in the City of London walked away scot-free after the damage they caused, which was magnitude higher. Who speaks out on their behalf? Politicians? Unions? Seems to me, they're on their own, destined to remain invisible -- until they lash out. They appear to be farther removed from the democratic process than anyone would like to admit. Politics, society, community, whatever you want to call it: they have no stakes in the game.

And how surprising is it, really, to find them looting expensive comsumer products -- you are what you wear, right? It's in your face, everywhere, all the time, particularly in a city like London. So now the folks who were cut off from this just snapped and went for it, no matter the rules? I'm shocked!

As for their treatment by the coppers: are ASPOs still handed out left, right and center in certain districts?

But hey, like I said, I'm too far removed from their reality of life to make any meaningful statements, much less suggestions. Just poking in the dark, that's what this is.

I love that when I am watching any video about religion on YouTube, which are pretty much always videos from an atheist view, the top sponsored video is invariably a Mormon ad. Insidious. But one atheist billboard angers the nation.

Actually i have seen debates-where there has been a vote after-and Hitch has swayed a large amount of people. The more people who listen to him, and ignore their bias, the better off we will be.
Also, the people who dislike him do so because, in every debate, he has applied logic, intelligence and common sense. I do not recognise your comment that people want "revenge on Christianity." People simply want the theists to get on with their lives, keep their dogma to themselves, stay out of politics and schools, and leave the rest of us to get on with ours lives. You ask "how do you convince people that god has no place in government?" That's simple, get them to study the constitution, read jefferson and payne, and listen to Hitch. I stand by my initial comment because Hitch would have destroyed their false sense of theological superiority. Forget protocol, some people need to be embarrassed to wake up, and, if you deserve it, Hitch is just the man for the job.
In reply to this comment by VoodooV:
>> ^A10anis:

This is why we need Christopher Hitchens. He would have destroyed their childish premise with one or two cruise missile sentences.


I hate to say it, but I disagree. As much as I love Hitchens. You can't convince mouthbreathers to use reason instead of faith when it's coming from someone like Hitchens. From their point of view, he is everything they hate, the "condescending college boy who uses big words and thinks you're dumb" stereotype is misused a lot but it's still an effective method of generating hate and distrust.

Hitchens is the perfect example, IMO, of someone who only convinces people who are already convinced. Just like all the people on the other side who will reaffirm the beliefs of people who already believe in god, but will never convince a single atheist that there is a god.

This is the question that needs to be answered: How do you take someone who has believed in god all their lives and slowly convince them that god has no place in gov't. People have a right to believe whatever they want so I don't really care about what religious people do on their own time, the central argument is to remove their influence from gov't and public education. That's all.

I don't think we need...or want..people who can be easily pigeonholed into that stereotype of someone who just wants revenge on Christianity. I think Silverman did a great job of not being confrontational, respectfully disagreeing and keeping his cool throughout the whole ordeal.

Atheism has a serious PR problem that needs to be corrected and billboards won't fix it. Making lawsuits claiming kids are traumatized by the Pledge of Allegiance won't do it. They need to pick their battles better and represent themselves far better than they are currently doing

>> ^A10anis:

This is why we need Christopher Hitchens. He would have destroyed their childish premise with one or two cruise missile sentences.


I hate to say it, but I disagree. As much as I love Hitchens. You can't convince mouthbreathers to use reason instead of faith when it's coming from someone like Hitchens. From their point of view, he is everything they hate, the "condescending college boy who uses big words and thinks you're dumb" stereotype is misused a lot but it's still an effective method of generating hate and distrust.

Hitchens is the perfect example, IMO, of someone who only convinces people who are already convinced. Just like all the people on the other side who will reaffirm the beliefs of people who already believe in god, but will never convince a single atheist that there is a god.

This is the question that needs to be answered: How do you take someone who has believed in god all their lives and slowly convince them that god has no place in gov't. People have a right to believe whatever they want so I don't really care about what religious people do on their own time, the central argument is to remove their influence from gov't and public education. That's all.

I don't think we need...or want..people who can be easily pigeonholed into that stereotype of someone who just wants revenge on Christianity. I think Silverman did a great job of not being confrontational, respectfully disagreeing and keeping his cool throughout the whole ordeal.

Atheism has a serious PR problem that needs to be corrected and billboards won't fix it. Making lawsuits claiming kids are traumatized by the Pledge of Allegiance won't do it. They need to pick their battles better and represent themselves far better than they are currently doing