The Age of Look @ Me!
We all have attention deficit disorder.
I’ve only imbibed Red Bull a couple of times. Once was when it was one of two ingredients of an alcoholic drink foisted upon me at a party (remember those? parties, not the alcoholic concoctions) and the other time was on a river trip where it was a group of restaurant employees’ beverage of choice–provided free–and that was my first unadulterated Red Bull imbibing and I think because it followed a morning’s worth of coffee consumption it actually gave me a pounding headache.
I never get pounding headaches. I rarely ever even get headaches. This Red Bull induced headache was, therefore, notable.
I read yesterday that Red Bull is notable for being a product and a company that is mainly known–almost exclusively known–for its marketing. It’s an Austrian entity. The energy drink itself is a derivative of an elixir the company’s founder stumbled across in Thailand called Krating Daeng which is Thai for–you guessed it–Red Bull.
The Austrian version of Krating Daeng, Red Bull, pulled off a marketing stunt that definitely caught the attention of the world’s extreme sport enthusiasts and those of us who like to vicariously experience extreme sports. It was someone skydiving from very high up in the atmosphere. I read that 43 million viewers have watched the YouTube video. Ever since that, Red Bull has done nothing but promote, market and associate itself with extreme sports of all kinds.
The Red Bull Wikipedia entry, which is undoubtably curated by someone associated with Red Bull, says this:
Rather than following a traditional approach to mass marketing, Red Bull has generated awareness and created a "brand myth" through proprietary extreme sport event series such as Red Bull Cliff Diving World Series, Red Bull Air Race, Red Bull Crashed Ice and stand-out stunts such as the Stratos space diving project.
Red Bull's marketing also includes multiple sports team ownerships (Formula One teams Red Bull Racing and Scuderia AlphaTauri, football clubs RB Leipzig, FC Red Bull Salzburg, FC Liefering, Red Bull Bragantino and New York Red Bulls), celebrity endorsements, and music, through its record label Red Bull Records.
I think it would be safe to say Red Bull spends more promoting its affiliation with extreme sports than on the product they sell. But it’s synergistic, so it’s really one in the same.
They capture your attention, they capture your business.
When I was first introduced to the idea of the coming Information Age, I never imagined this world where “attention” would be the hottest commodity. I think most people–with the exception of dystopian science fiction writers like William Gibson–were imagining the free-flow of information as a means of democratizing education and making things that we already thought were convenient even more convenient.
Attention, in this new era, is the coin of the realm.
I think it must be the reason some people post tweets that are personal and traumatic and, in many cases, too much information to share with the world in general. It’s a way to garner attention, possibly followers and bump up your ‘stock’. Another tactic is to get in a “Twitter feud” with someone more famous, or infamous, than you.
Likes, views, claps, responses–no matter how they are characterized–they all come down to “attention”. They all add up to branding.
Red Bull is just an energy drink. An energy drink among thousands of energy drinks. But their ability to direct attention to themselves through incredibly high-profile extreme sports is unparalleled. (For the record, I’d rather have an event sponsored by Red Bull than Camel cigarettes.)
The point of the article I read about Red Bull, and the point I am attempting to make, is that the “attention” economy is bleeding over into politics. The expression, “No press is bad press” is beginning to look like “no attention is bad attention”. In the attention economy, if no one is talking about you, do you even exist? Are you even relevant?
‘The former guy’ has proved along with a host of other bombastic, truth-challenged nitwits–all of whom have been spouting nonsense for ages–that the worst thing that could happen to you in the Age of Attention is to be forgotten. Or no longer being “relevant”, using their definition of relevant?
My hope is that politicians are going to carry it too far and it’s going to come back to bite them in the ass. ‘The previous dude’ had the cover of the presidency and the White House, but Matt Gaetz? All of the Congressional representatives who encouraged the insurrection? I found it interesting that the day following yet another mass shooting Sarah Palin lite–Lauren Boebert (Q-CO)–was shown in a picture captured from a Zoom call with a normal book shelf in the background, with books and household knick-knacks, instead of her usual arsenal of automatic weapons. I guess even attention-whores have lines they are not 100 percent sure should be crossed.
Or maybe her communications person realized it would garner attention because it was completely out-of-character! After all, I noticed it.
There’s nothing inherently bad about attention-seeking but it should be content-worthy, not just attention for attention’s sake. It should be part of an effort for good, positivity, getting things accomplished, society-building, education. New York representative AOC and New Zealand prime minister Jacinda Ardern are masters of that sort of positive attention-seeking.
We are now consumers and our attention is a commodity - which means, it not only matters where we spend our money, it matters where we spend our attention. And, unfortunately, opting out will not help bend the arc of history toward justice.
Fun, interactive website where you can get a scientist’s eye view of the tiniest of creatures. Called Life Under the Ice. Very cool.
Also, in my own effort to help Red Bull’s promotion, this is an interesting video of one of their skydiving stunts in West Texas. Marfa, Texas, actually, where I Love Dick, starring Kevin Bacon, was set, and where some inexplicable lights hover over the horizon just outside of town. I stopped at the rest area outside Marfa once and I witnessed those lights. This video will not show you THOSE lights, but it’s interesting nonetheless.
Thanks for the attention! Maybe I need to be more outrageous. I’ll be AWOL for the next week. Until then, enjoy infrastructure week! - JLM
Indivisible.org is a good place to go to stay in the fight. Lots of resources.
