It's here!
This idea is probably already in circulation, but I bet these advertisers are thinking that the iPad's early adopters are the type of people who "believe the hype", precisely the type of people who fall for advertising.
This phenomenon also explains why guys like 50 Cent get paid so much for their endorsements. As a rapper, he's never been as good as his hype, not because he's all that terrible, but because, circa 2002, his hype bordered on the messianic. The fact that his art falls short of his billing might actually make him more appealing to advertisers, because it means he attracts a target demographic of "undiscerning dullards who buy into marketing".
50 was given part ownership in Glaceau when he agreed to create and endorse the "Formula 50" flavor of Vitamin Water. When the company sold to Coca Cola in 2007, he pocketed over $100 million. As 50 himself said on the song "I Get Money":
"I took quarter water, sold it in bottles for 2 bucks
And Coca-Cola came and bought it for billions, what the fuck?"
Not exactly Shakespearean, but the song made the top 20 on the Billboard Hot 100, and he probably moved a few units of Vitamin Water by telling people its a sham - the perks of having a stupid audience. As they say, its not the product, its the packaging; where 50 cent failed as a rapper, he excelled as a wrapper.
Maybe if I drink this I'll become black.
The iPad and 50 Cent have been able to sell their hype as a product in and of itself; to advertisers - those great purveyors of bullshit, something insubstantial (and in the case of 50, unsubstantiated) can be a great commodity. Artists who's talents outstrip their hype can't pull off stunts like this, in part because their discerning audiences will identify it as derivative of Warhol, and shun it as unoriginal.
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