A part of me assumes media will descend into a Kafkaesque, Minority Report style advertising blur..... but is that really likely?
Assuming limits of person freedom remain fairly constant (and I accept that could be a big if) - peoples right to manage access to their own data might well be a hedge against the worst excesses of our advertising age.
Much more likely - we'll look back on late 20th century brand culture with a quaint distain. The idea of wealthy elites being able to pay to attached meaning to simple, commodistised products as bizarre an idea as Aparteid or a war on terror....
A bygone era.
A product of historical circumstance and cultural ignorance in a disrupted transitionary age - a mismatch between what everyone – and the individual knew - an asymetry of cultural information.
Who - my frail self will ask - would accept the tenuous associations made between a hair dye and sexual prowess, when - by speaking a single sentence to whatever type of computer exists in 60 years time - the origin, utility, environmental impact, social credentials, executive pay structure and ultimate manufacturer of any product can be ascertained as quickly as we now find a brands’ facebook page.
