Annoying Ads - Sprint

Tis the Season of conspicuous consumption. When I look around at the commercial nature of
the Christmas Season, I find myself understanding why the Puritans refused to celebrate the holiday. While largely moderate in my views and beliefs, the "Gimmie, gimmie, gimmie" nature of the average American's "Christmas Celebration" can still be downright painful.

Knowing full well that the average rants on this subject are boring, I thought I'd be more specific in my criticisms. Specifically, I'm going to post a series of advertisements and explain why these particular ads annoy me. Who knows, if I get a good response this might become a year round shtick.

First, I present an ad from Sprint.


Boston T commuters will recognize the artwork as it's been infesting Boston Train stations since late November. The photo was taken with my cell phone, so the resolution is rather fuzzy. Fortunately, the readable text is also the only part that really annoys me.

This version of the ad, and there are several, has the text "For the Person who wants everything, but still wants more."

It'd be hard to create a better example of WHY the current state of the Christmas season is so annoying. The ad starts off appealing not just to greed, but to excess. "Having everything isn't good enough for you, ya greedy bastard" it seems to say. In the wealthiest nation on the planet, having more than 90% of the rest of the world's population isn't good enough. You've just GOT to have this gadget.

And what does this gadget do? Why it's a portable chunk of hardware that can make cell phone calls, check e-mail and even brows the Internet, all without wires. Oh, and it's an MP3 player. The really sad thing is this device, and hardware similar to it, is seen as essential to many people. We're so out of touch with reality, with the rest of the world, that a gadget that was a sci-fi fantasy just ten years ago is a vital device. Kids need it to one-up other kids and executives insist upon similar gadgets so they have yet another expensive anatomical compensator to show off.