> > The most notorious of these are ads for prescription medicines. Now, a lot of the ads out for prescription medication actually do try to sell the product. But how many times do you see an ad saying "Ask your doctor about ", and they don't even tell you what the pill is FOR? Idiocy.
>
> Actually, there is a reason they do this (though I still find it completely inane): If they actually mention what the pill is *for* in addition to its name, by law, they have to run through that long, Happy-Fun-Ball-esque list of side effects. Supposedly, though, from what I recall, if they mention the purpose of the pill but *not* its name, they can get away with skipping the side effects. Of course, that means that the doctor may pick the pill that's not being advertised...but it *still* makes more sense to me than mentioning the name and not the purpose...
>
> -- codeman"chock full of useless knowledge"38

I know. Those commercials are pointless. "Ask your doctor about Rubitol, because WE sure aren't going to tell you anything about it." And even if they do tell you what it's for, the visuals in the commecials have nothing to do with it. Whether it's for hair regrowth, allergies, heart disease, athlete's foot, equophilia, whatever, the commercials are one of two types:

1) Vague commercials with lots of nature scenes and no specific information
2) Vague commercials that cut between people's faces and have no specific information

These things irritate me. They could at least have all the people have runny noses or no hair or something so I would konw which product is being pitched at me. Or perhaps just an image of one of their pills slamming into their picturesque little lake, causing a vague tidal wave, which destroys an advertising agency. There would be, of course, no specific information as to which advertising agency it was, but I think we'd all be happy just the same.

-eric "...ask your doctor..." sleator
Mon 8 May A.D. 2000