Strawman, of course, but I think it's excusable in this case. Advertising is definitely out of control in the US. Entertainment, I would argue, is not, and studies repeatedly undermine the accusations against entertainment. Advertising is an entirely different beast.

So, advertising and entertainment are separate categories, and it's important to respond to them separately.

Entertainment does not present with ulterior motives in the way advertising does. There are a lot of blurry lines in this discussion, but I think they should be the focus. I think it's the manipulation in blurring the lines that we are really contending with. Entertainment does not generally present with blurry lines, but that's gradually changing, whereas advertising has been blurring the lines for far longer, and tech does so more through utility than anything else.

So, if entertainment is generally what it claims to be, advertising is more shape-shifting. As popular culture has subsumed it, logos have become decoration on clothing, brand names find themselves in pure art forms like musical lyrics, etc. and all the while serving to promote. It's easy to consider these conflations as notable chaos, but as long as it all remains conceivably easy to ignore (something I think Aristotle would readily debate), we consider it excusable.

Tech does not conflate the business intentions of it's product with entertainment like advertising does, but instead with something that is conceivably more difficult to ignore: utility. Social networking tools that the tech industry provide have become critical to a citizen's well-being. Getting a job that pays the bills generally means needing to promote one's self on social media. Even if it doesn't, one can never know if their insecurity is a result of avoiding thus, so they are by all accounts forced to participate. This goes quite a bit deeper than the repercussions of, say, modifications to T-Shirts and music. The utility of technology has a deeper correlation with civic duties and every-day utility. If it didn't, social media would unlikely seem so critical to adults, and teens alike.

It's important to remember how useful electronic communication is when discussing social media. There should be no debate over this. It's amazing.

And, I think it's worth asking if psychological damage of social media (assuming it exists) is exacerbated by advertising. The most obvious exacerbation is in funding through ad sales, and that can hardly be overstated. And such funding strategies probably undermine product design. But I think there's even more to it...

As we know, advertising abstracts our conceptions of who we are through archetypal narratives, and plays to the weaknesses of the self-identity problem. It does so in a purely intentional way. I worked in advertising for years, and this is what it's all about. But, I don't think that's how the tech industry works. It is providing unquestionable utility. But, an increase in communication can exacerbate the issues that undermined self-identity creates. So my point here is that I'm not sure this should all fall on tech, and I can't help but wonder if we need to shift all of the blame to advertising. This would at least give us an idea of where we stand.

> It's ironic that an entity dependent on ad money would create such a title.

No, it's not. As you say, they are dependent on ad money, which should not suggest they choose to be. I would assume quite the opposite. I would assume they would prefer integrity, and are aiming for such the best they know how. Again, it's the advertising.