Episode 117: Can You Hear Me Now?

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It’s not coincidental that the most irritating advertising arose only after machines increased audiences. Broadcasting and amplification beyond the range of a single voice likewise allowed today’s aural effluent. Hence, Episode 117: Can You Hear Me Now?

In this episode, I read from Benjamin Franklin's autobiography, specifically a section I found quoted in Brooke Allen's book, Immoral Minority: Our Skeptical Founding Fathers.


What's Missing in This Picture?

Sound-bite-wise, I play: William Jennings Bryan's close to his famous 1896 nomination speech; and Alexander Graham Bell saying his name. I revisited both the 1947 movie The Hucksters and the 1950 television production featuring Spike Jones and his City Slickers Orchestra, pulling out of them some classic ads for both now-defunct and wholly-fictional soapy stuff.

To break things up just a bit, I played Lee Rosevere's "Ingenuity" (well, at least snippets of it). I opened with Clark Gable's character Vic Norman bitching about ads while backed by KMFDM; I'm closing the show with Mistle Thrush.

I'm releasing this and all my episodes under a Creative Commons 4.0 attribution, share-alike and non-commercial license.