Tuesday, September 14, 2004
The Affection Economy
Two recent stories, one in MIT's Technology Review and the other in BBC News, focused on ways to to market your idea by exploiting people's feelings for each other. There's a clear logic to marketing easy Internet access for the elderly to their younger relatives, or nicotine patches to friends of chain smokers, or wireless mood rings that say "I'm thinking of you." But I also find capitalizing on affection to make a buck rather repulsive.
