ABSTRACT
The highly visible sign of a modern consumer culture promoting the sale of goods and services through a range of media, including newspapers, radio, television and the Internet. It has its modern origins in the development of the Industrial Revolution. Using advertisements to sell goods can, however, be traced back to Roman times: in Pompeii there are surviving images and text on the walls advertising products and services to a Roman audience. In the late 18th century pioneering British industrialists such as Josiah Wedgwood understood that simply producing goods was not enough; you had to market and advertise your products successfully. From the 1760s Wedgwood set in place most of the key elements of modern advertising we would recognize today. He used press ads and commissioned leading designers to design his catalogues so that customers could look at and order his ceramics in the comfort of their own homes. In the 19th century manufacturers understood the power of the single arresting image, and signs painted on to buildings became commonplace. These were followed by temporary paper posters and then purpose-built billboards, structures that have become more and more elaborate, so that in the Bund district of 21st-century Shanghai the sides of huge skyscraper buildings host advertisements for international companies.
