How much is this not selling your soul? “Our sponsors, Voxel, who are all about embracing a bit of a chaos when it comes to a family road trip, have asked us a very apt question, Marina….”
In podcasts we’ve all, in recent years, got used to the host-read advert. Something that had previously never existed in this country (right at the start of ITV in the 1950s it was banned*), where the trusted presenter of the show is suddenly reading out an advert for the sponsor.
Then in yesterday’s episode of The Rest Is Entertainment (a favourite of mine) Richard Osman reads out a question from the sponsor, with the tagline ”Our sponsors, Voxel**, who are all about embracing a bit of a chaos when it comes to a family road trip” right in the middle of the show. No break , no warning, no caveats, just straight out selling his soul, doing what Bill Hicks called sucking the devil’s dick, right there on the show.
Does anyone else find this akin to the recent Black Mirror story where she starts blurting out adverts cos her brain surgery’s been sponsored?
I find this all morally questionable. Just me and the ITA circa 1955?
* A bit of googling later I discover host-read ads were banned in 1962 following The Pilkington Report, which was critical of sponsored content in so-called Ad Mag shows on ITV.
** You'll notice neither the Youtube caption nor the transcript of the show is able to spell the sponsors' name, which is the home to a famous Tavern, to MI5, and is the Russian word for an underground railway terminus.
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Richard The Third | Findlay Macbeth | Prince of Denmark Street | Midsummer Night's Dream Team |
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Shakespeare Omnibus | Comic Tales From The Bible | Joseph, Ruth & Other Stories | Space Elain |
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