Discussion questions week 4: #3

The subject I decided to review this week was section C in chapter 5 of the Epstein text: Advertising and the Internet. I spend much of my day viewing the internet and advertisements are continually present, whether we realize it consciously or not. As the book states "Many advertisements are arguments," and thus we should evaluate them with the same criteria that we evaluate any other arguments, but because of the way they are presented this is often not the case. This problem is further complicated when the internet is taken into account, for example: imagine you're browsing a message board and you come across a post from someone detailing a new electronic gadget they like. This comes off as simply a discussion on the internet about a gadget; however this type of interaction is an argument as well, and if you do not evaluate it with the same criteria that we use for any other argument you may end up buying that product. Another aspect of advertising and internet interaction is the possibility that the person discussing this gadget may be working for the company that distributes the gadget, because of the anonymous nature of the internet we must always be skeptical of any "free advice" found on the internet.