Influence

Part 9 of 12  ·  Evidence

The Marketplace of Attention

Where influence became an industry: public relations, manufactured doubt, engagement design, and the business models built on attention.

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1 Torches of Freedom: How a PR Man Sold Cigarettes as EmancipationEdward L. Bernays‘ staged ’Torches of Freedom' march in the New York City Easter Sunday Parade, 30 March 1929, commissioned by…
2 The Engineering of Consent: Bernays Writes the ManualEdward Bernays‘ book ’Propaganda‘ (1928), with its claim of an ’invisible government' shaping public opinion, and his 1947 essay…
3 Bacon, Eggs and Borrowed Authority: Inventing the American BreakfastBernays' 1920s campaign for the Beech-Nut Packing Company, in which he had a physician survey some 5,000 doctors on the merits of…
4 Bananas and Regime Change: The United Fruit Campaign of 1954Bernays' multi-year misinformation campaign for the United Fruit Company against Guatemalan president Jacobo Arbenz, culminating…
5 Halitosis for Sale: How Listerine Invented a DiseaseThe Lambert Pharmacal Company’s 1920s Listerine campaign under Gerard Lambert, which lifted the obscure medical term ‘halitosis’…
6 A Diamond Is Forever: Four Words That Built a CartelCopywriter Frances Gerety’s line ‘A Diamond Is Forever’, written in 1947 at N.W. Ayer & Son for De Beers Consolidated Mines and…
7 A Frank Statement: The Ad That Launched Fifty Years of Doubt‘A Frank Statement to Cigarette Smokers’, the full-page advertisement placed on 4 January 1954 in 448 newspapers in 258 cities,…
8 Doubt Is Our Product: The Memo That Named the MethodThe 1969 Brown & Williamson internal document ‘Smoking and Health Proposal’, which states: 'Doubt is our product since it is the…
9 The Marlboro Man: Rebranding a Woman’s Cigarette as Frontier ManhoodPhilip Morris' 1954-55 relaunch of Marlboro through the Leo Burnett agency in Chicago, converting a filter cigarette marketed to…
10 Joe Camel: Cartoon Recognition and the Under-18 MarketR.J. Reynolds' Joe Camel campaign from 1987 onward, the 1991 JAMA studies showing recognition of Joe Camel among young children…
11 Light, Mild, Deadly: Judge Kessler’s 1,683-Page VerdictUnited States v. Philip Morris USA: Judge Gladys Kessler’s ruling of 17 August 2006 finding the major cigarette makers liable…
12 The Popcorn That Never Sold: Subliminal Myth Versus EvidenceJames Vicary’s September 1957 press conference claiming that flashing ‘Eat popcorn’ and ‘Drink Coca-Cola’ in a Fort Lee, New…
13 Wal-Marting Across America: The Fake Grassroots BlogThe 2006 ‘Wal-Marting Across America’ blog, funded through Working Families for Wal-Mart and produced by Edelman, whose CEO…
14 Energy Balance: Coca-Cola Buys a Scientific FrameThe Global Energy Balance Network, revealed in August 2015 by New York Times reporting and later by FOI-obtained emails to have…
15 Less Than One Percent: Selling OxyContin to PrescribersPurdue Pharma’s OxyContin marketing campaign from its 1996 launch, in which sales representatives told physicians that fewer than…
16 Mark to Myth: Enron’s Accounting ImaginationEnron’s use of mark-to-market accounting under Jeffrey Skilling, which booked projected future profits on deals such as the…
17 Ask Why: Brand Mystique and the Punishment of DoubtEnron’s ‘Ask Why’ advertising campaign launched in 1999-2000, paired with Jeffrey Skilling’s 17 April 2001 analyst call in which…
18 The Blood Unicorn’s First Draft: Theranos and the Fortune CoverRoger Parloff’s June 2014 Fortune cover story on Elizabeth Holmes and Theranos, which he retracted in a December 2015 piece…
19 Hot Startup, Cold Data: How the Wall Street Journal Broke TheranosJohn Carreyrou’s Wall Street Journal investigation published 15 October 2015, 'Hot Startup Theranos Has Struggled With Its…
20 Psychographics for Sale: Cambridge Analytica and the OCEAN ModelThe Facebook-Cambridge Analytica affair exposed in March 2018 by The Guardian, Observer and New York Times: Aleksandr Kogan’s app…
21 689,003 Subjects: The Emotional Contagion ExperimentAdam Kramer, Jamie Guillory and Jeffrey Hancock’s study 'Experimental evidence of massive-scale emotional contagion through…
22 The Facebook Files: Knowing the Harm and Shipping AnywayFrances Haugen’s disclosure of internal Meta research to the Wall Street Journal and US Congress in September-October 2021,…
23 Dark Patterns: Harry Brignull Names the Interface TrapHarry Brignull’s 2010 coinage of ‘dark patterns’ at darkpatterns.org, and the FTC’s complaint of 21 June 2023 against Amazon over…
24 Counterintuitive by Design: Epic Games and the $245 Million OrderThe FTC’s December 2022 settlements with Epic Games totalling $520 million, including a $245 million order over Fortnite’s dark…
25 The Bottomless Feed: Infinite Scroll and Persuasive DesignAza Raskin’s invention of infinite scroll in 2006 and his public regret — including testimony in the 2026 New Mexico case against…
26 Watch Time: The YouTube Recommendation EngineFormer Google engineer Guillaume Chaslot’s account of YouTube’s recommendation system optimizing for watch time, and his…
27 Forty Minutes to Your Desires: The TikTok Bot InvestigationThe Wall Street Journal’s July 2021 investigation that ran dozens of automated accounts, including bots registered as 13-15 year…
28 In re Amway: The Ruling That Legalized the ModelIn re Amway Corp., 93 F.T.C. 618 (1979), which held Amway was not a pyramid scheme given its buy-back, 70% and ten-customer…
29 Herbalife’s $200 Million RestructuringThe FTC’s settlement with Herbalife announced 15 July 2016, requiring full restructuring of US operations and $200 million in…
30 LuLaRoe: Sisterhood, Leggings and a $4.75 Million SettlementWashington Attorney General Bob Ferguson’s consumer-protection suit filed 23 January 2019 against LuLaRoe, settled for $4.75…