Right? I’ve seen the walls of Funko Pops… nerds definitely are not immune to marketing.
Comment on Marketing Doesn't Work on Nerds
rafoix@lemmy.zip 2 weeks ago
Has anyone been to any kind of convention for nerdy things. Nerds are so captured by the marketing and products being sold that they let it take over their personality and they can’t stop buying junk.
very_well_lost@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Peffse@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
do people actually buy those? I honestly thought they were some kind of money laundering thing. I’ve never once saw one sell.
Chronographs@lemmy.zip 2 weeks ago
Maybe it’s a whale thing, most people don’t give a shit but the people who do have to buy all of them to sate their neurosis
binarytobis@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
I’ve seen maybe 3 passable figures by them. Mind boggling that they actually sell.
very_well_lost@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Working in tech, I’ve seen a lot of them in people’s cubicles.
peoplebeproblems@midwest.social 2 weeks ago
They aren’t fucking nerds then. Nerds don’t buy Funko Pops.
I can name 3 or 4 people who own walls of Funko pops and I can tell you they wouldn’t know an IDE from MS Word. None of them went to college either.
They’re posers.
very_well_lost@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
If you say so… but some of the Funko collectors I know are definitely die-hard nerds. Having bad taste doesn’t exclude you from nerddom.
gdog05@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Is that marketing or is it just finding stuff they want to own?
JohnnyCanuck@lemmy.ca 2 weeks ago
It’s marketing making them think they want to own that stuff.
cygnus@lemmy.ca 2 weeks ago
How do you think you “found” it? A whole supply chain of people, from branding to packaging to advertising, made it so that you can “find” things on websites that are themselves outright advertisements or at least funded by them.
AnAmericanPotato@programming.dev 2 weeks ago
It’s a mistake to attribute purchases to marketing just because a marketer breathed the same air at some point. First-degree advertising influence and umpteenth-degree influence are very very different.
I mean, I probably wouldn’t buy a car from a company I’d never heard of, but that’s mainly because there are none. If I happened to buy a car from <insert company here> after researching what was available, I wouldn’t attribute that to <insert company here>'s marketing department. At least, not unless they bribed the independent reviewers, ratings boards, etc.
Same deal with most of my tech purchases, except that in that space there often are brands I’ve never heard of. And I’m (usually) savvy enough to tell when they’re legit and when they’re not. (I know more than I ever wanted to know about SSD controllers and I’m kind of angry about it.)
You’re right that nobody is truly “immune” to marketing, but as a matter of degrees, there’s a big difference across groups. There are people out there who look at ads and register them as useful information. There are people who intentionally click on ad banners on Instagram, rather than treating them like digital leprosy. There are people who click on the first Amazon referral listicle they find on Google and then treat it like independent journalism. There are people who use GoDaddy, when the only possible reason anyone would is because that racecar driver is hot. These are not behaviors you should expect among the kind of nerds this article is talking about.
cygnus@lemmy.ca 2 weeks ago
You’re right that nobody is truly “immune” to marketing, but as a matter of degrees, there’s a big difference across groups. There are people out there who look at ads and register them as useful information. There are people who intentionally click on ad banners on Instagram, rather than treating them like digital leprosy. There are people who click on the first Amazon referral listicle they find on Google and then treat it like independent journalism. There are people who use GoDaddy, when the only possible reason anyone would is because that racecar driver is hot. These are not behaviors you should expect among the kind of nerds this article is talking about.
Perhaps, but I’d argue people who click on ads knowing full well it’s an ad are more enlightened than the
nerd- sorry, “geek” - who thinks they operate on a higher plane of existence, not knowing that online review was bought and paid for or that Reddit post was made by an LLM.Same deal with most of my tech purchases, except that in that space there often are brands I’ve never heard of. And I’m (usually) savvy enough to tell when they’re legit and when they’re not. (I know more than I ever wanted to know about SSD controllers and I’m kind of angry about it.)
This is a bit different because it isn’t really an emotional decision - they are are fungible, functionality being equal. But would you choose, say, a computer acse without caring about the way it looks or makes you feel?
grte@lemmy.ca 2 weeks ago
It’s marketing.
rafoix@lemmy.zip 2 weeks ago
Marketing. It is very effective.
Arcka@midwest.social 2 weeks ago
Someone makes a good product and then sells it in a store. Even if they do nothing else and buy no ads, a marketing wank somewhere would apparently want to take credit for the maker’s work.
peoplebeproblems@midwest.social 2 weeks ago
Posers. All of them.
Nerds enjoy a hobby, like tabletop games.
Posers buy Funkos and toys that they never open.
Nerds have fun. Posers try to look like they do.
turkalino@lemmy.yachts 2 weeks ago
Yeah but I don’t think that’s marketing, if you’re going to a con for something, you’re likely very passionate about it and passionate people love to scoop up everything they can that relates to their beloved hobby or franchise.
Also, nerds tend to have a good amount of disposable income on that stuff
jawa21@piefed.blahaj.zone 2 weeks ago
The cons themselves are marketing. Heavy marketing. If you can't see that, I don't know what to say. Vendors (and even artists for crying out loud) are willing to pay top dollar for booths to sell stuff. On the surface, they are their namesake - conventions. Dig any deeper, and they are giant pop-up malls.
Comrade_Squid@lemmy.ml 2 weeks ago
I would call my brother a geek, a collector of shit, expensive cards, moulded plastics, I love him for it but I see it as vapid. Whereas I am a nerd, I research and act with caution when it comes to spending, I own a mechanical watch which I can repair myself, I buy leather shoes with soles that can be replaced at a cobblers, run Linux on my desktop, custom ROM on my phone.
Geeks are nerds who enjoy gimmicky things, nerds are geeks seeking purpose.
SoftestSapphic@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Nerds in arrested development over a franchize is not the same as seeing any ad and then that makes them want to buy a product.
cygnus@lemmy.ca 2 weeks ago
Yeah, this is self-aggrandizement from a group of people who consistently believe they’re smarter and more self-aware than everybody else, when in reality they just lack self-awareness. Nerds will smugly post in this thread as a wall of funk pops and Star Wars slop looms behind them.
frezik@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 weeks ago
Pretty much, yeah.
The article points out how a bunch of specific techniques don’t work on programmers. That’s because they’re aimed at project managers, not programmers. And yeah, they work. No programmer willingly chose Jira for their ticketing system, but project managers love that shit.
All it really means is that it takes a different set of marketing techniques to reach programmers. They generally don’t bother, because programmers don’t typically control the budget directly.
lennivelkant@discuss.tchncs.de 2 weeks ago
I believe that thinking you’re immune to something makes you even more vulnerable, because it creates a cognitive blind spot. If you think you can’t make mistakes, you don’t stop to wonder if you are making one.
FearfulSalad@ttrpg.network 2 weeks ago
You just described Geeks. Geek and Nerd group labels can sometimes apply to the same people, but they are not synonymous, and a person can be one without the other.
melfie@lemy.lol 2 weeks ago
laist.com/…/whats-the-difference-between-a-geek-a…
ThePantser@sh.itjust.works 2 weeks ago
I disagree, I don’t fall into the category you stated. My walls are lined with 80s memorabilia and 3d printed things I have created. I reject anything advertised to me and will only purchase tech that I have sought out that meets my needs.
cygnus@lemmy.ca 2 weeks ago
If this irony, good job because I think most people will fall for it.
semperverus@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
I don’t think it is. I know a few people like this, and im heading in that direction myself. The only kinds of “ads” that work on me are when a number of equally nerdy people I know find a new thing, and they’ve demonstrated that it has helped them with something or they are genuinely enjoying using it. Like 3D printing. Its semi-pointless most of the time but it is a genuinely fun hobby, which when combined with 3D modeling and post-processing skills becomes an actual craft. I didn’t get into it until a good number of people around me did.
JoMiran@lemmy.ml 2 weeks ago
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CriticalMiss@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
I don’t have a single funko pop or Star Wars toy or whatever. I have a Keychron keyboard that cost me $70, while it is more costly than the average membrane I like mechanical ones. I never buy new if I can (usually this is a time constraint, I.e I broke my phone and I need to replace it quick one because my job relies it). I Adblock everywhere I possibly can to not see the ads but I genuinely believe I’m immune to advertising.
cygnus@lemmy.ca 2 weeks ago
You are not - you just don’t see it as such. Even if you didn’t use the internet at all (which we can see is not the case) you would still fall victim to its network effects.
chocrates@piefed.world 2 weeks ago
I got a curved, split, tented ortholinear monstrosity with a built in trackball and I'm finally done. I get that it's stupid and a waste of money but my hands feel so good typing all day on it
peoplebeproblems@midwest.social 2 weeks ago
I did too. I didn’t get it to look cool, I got it because I have carpal tunnel and I don’t want to have surgery.
I like the clicky, it allows me to type longer, and I can fidgit with the firmware and do what I want with it.
If I got it because it looks techy then I’d just be a poser
biotin7@sopuli.xyz 2 weeks ago
Then they ain’t nerds, sorry.
TheFogan@programming.dev 2 weeks ago
Yeah, I think scottsman are the ones that are actually immune to marketing.
meco03211@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
What say you to this example of a Scotsman that is infected with marketing?
peoplebeproblems@midwest.social 2 weeks ago
They’re not nerds. They’re posers.
mybuttnolie@sopuli.xyz 2 weeks ago
I saw people recommending keychrons, went and bought one thinking I made a smart choice. didn’t even google what kind of issues they have… I’ll remember next time I’m about to throw money at some random crap that a few people recommend.